Today is my mothers 60th birthday. My mother was born on her father Raymonds birthday. Every July 19th we had two candles on the cake, one for Grandpa Ray and one for mum. We will blow out two candles on a cake today even though both of them have returned to heaven. I posted a lot about mum during her final days on earth this year between May 27 and June 1, 2014 Those who know us really well remember that a year ago today, we celebrated moms 59th birthday on the 11th floor of the Bigelow building of The Massachusetts General Hospital. Nine days prior, an ER team of doctors admitted mum after having shoved a huge tube through the side of her body into her lung (without pain meds) to drain 3.5 liters of fluid. As mum fought for her life on 10 liters of oxygen, #Team Wanda sat vigil around her hospital bed round the clock waiting to hear what caused the fluid to build up in her lung. During those long and stressful days we realized the importance of time. We all prayed God would grant us more minutes, more hours, more days with mum. Day 9 of her hospital stay (mums 59th birthday) is the day she learned that the breast cancer she had beat in 2009 had returned and metastasized to her lung and liver. Days later we realized the cancer had also spread to her bones. Ten months of non-stop bucket listing began the moment mum was discharged from the hospital. The optimist in me never believed my mother would spend her last earthly birthday in the hospital. Today, I cannot help but of how mum spent her second to last birthday on earth. A year prior to the Mass Gen birthday, our family randomly decided to celebrate mums 58th birthday at the Brazilian Grille in Hyannis. The day fell on a Thursday. Everyone had busy schedules. We had to work the next day. Despite all of this, we all ended up around a table to celebrate mum. After dinner, we walked up and down Main Street poking into the shops. The grand kids loved their time in the joke shop with mum. The perfect night ended with the kids riding on the old fashioned carousel and us posing for a family photo near a ridiculously oversized Adirondack chair. On the way home mum said it was one of the best birthdays of her life. We didnt have a crystal ball to reveal that mums next birthday would entail a hospital room, tubes, oxygen, IV lines and the diagnosis of a terminal illness. None of us knew mums Hyannis birthday in the summer of 2012 would be her last birthday filled with good health and hope for more birthdays. I am so damn grateful that we dropped everything to celebrate mums 58th birthday on the cape. It wasnt a Big Birthday. She wasnt turning 21, or 30 or 40 or 50 or 60 but we celebrated BIG and created a BIG memory. If I learned anything during the last 10 months of mums life, I learned that we must always live in the moment. We have to honor and celebrate the people we love every day. We have to treat every birthday as if it is a Big birthday. Every moment as if it is a big moment. Life is a gift. A privilege. Who are we to downplay or downsize the beauty of every day here on earth? The photos I have selected for this post tell the story. In an instant everything can change. July 19, 2012 -one ofthe best times in mums life July 19, 2013 - one of the scariest times in mums life. July 19, 2014- one of the saddest times in our lives as we celebrate mums birthday without her. As my family blows out the candles for mum and Grandpa Ray today, I am going to make a wish. My wish is for everyone to treat the little moments in their lives as if they are GIANT life moments. If we had waited to celebrate mums BIG 60th birthday today, we wouldnt have had the chance to be with her. During the final ten months of mums life shed begin most mornings by stating a mantra of gratitude. When I close my eyes, I can hear clapping and saying, Today is going to be awesome! (insert rapid clapping) I cant wait. Every day I have something fun to look forward to. Today we are going to make more memories. We have another day. How lucky are we?! How lucky we were to have that extra time. Time is the one thing we should never take for granted. On mums Big 60th birthday I encourage you to make the pockets in your busy schedules for happiness, and enjoy every second with those you love. Rinse and Repeat. Dont save the celebrations for the big moments because in the big picture, all of the moments are big. (insert rapid clapping) Love, Lorna
Posted on: Sat, 19 Jul 2014 11:33:26 +0000
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