Being Grateful

I think you are always reminded of what you are thankful for during Thanksgiving, but this year I felt extra reflective. My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer this fall and has been fighting her battle since. We are blessed to have the financial resources and hospital facilities nearby to help her fight and I'm forever thankful for God's blessing in that!

Mom is doing daily radiation treatments until the week before Christmas and has already undergone a successful lumpectomy. Her prognosis is fantastic and she is totally kicking cancer's ass! I'm so proud of her for being brave and tackling her diagnosis head on without any hesitations! 

For thanksgiving everyone always shares what they are grateful for and reflect on the blessings they have been given. This thanksgiving, I was the purest definition of grateful I have ever been. 

Grateful to have a healthy, able body. 

Grateful to have a kind, loving, caring, husband. 

Grateful to have a strong, happy, FUN, faith driven marriage. 

Grateful to have two dogs that completely fill my heart with love. 

Grateful to have a nice, warm home with plenty of meals and cozy blankets for lazy nights.  

Grateful for supportive, positive friends that encourage me to better myself, but love me for who I am.  

Grateful to have a family that loves me and all the craziness that comes with loving me, and does it unconditionally. 

But this thanksgiving, I was most aware of being grateful to have my mom. There are so many cheesy things I could say about how my mom is the best  ever and she is my best friend, all of those would be true, but they don't define why I'm grateful to have her. 

I'm grateful to have a mother that LOVES me. She loves me to the moon an back. Everytime she calls she greats me as "hello Sunshine!!" She will listen to me talk endlessly on the other line of the phone while I talk through my problems, helping me solve it myself so I can learn from it. She is all those awesome things a mom is and more. 

I have a mom that is driven in all that she does by the love of her family. When she got her diagnosis, she didn't question treatment. Letting cancer win wasn't an option for her because she knows that my sister and I NEED her. 

She didn't let fear paralyze her when she had to go in for that extra mammogram when one came back "weird". She didn't think twice when the doctors wanted to do an invasive biopsy. When she got the "Big C" diagnosis on my birthday, she waited to tell me so I could enjoy my fancy date night with my husband. When she told me the next day, she already had an action plan ready. 

Two weeks after her lumpectomy, she was busy tying up lose ends at work and packing so she could meet me in Orlando for a conference and a girls weekend. 

During her first week of radiation, it seemed like everyone around her needed her. She did her treatment quietly and helped everyone else. Now she goes every morning before work for radiation, just like someone stops by Starbucks. 

During my visit she just casually mentioned some side effects she's been having from the radiation but always reminded me she can't complain because what's she's going through is noting compared to what so many women go through. 

I could give more anecdotes about how she is the coolest, the best, or the most fun, but if you re-read what I wrote above, her battle is more than enough to show how much she loves as a mother. She's fighting because I'm worth it to her. She's fighting because she has a husband that would be lost without her. She's fighting because she has a daughter just figuring out motherhood and still needs her guidance.  She's fighting for a lot of people because she loves you and can't let you down. 

This thanksgiving we all got together and ate too much, because we could. God gave us another Thanksgiving as a family so we celebrated. This time though we celebrated a little deeper and a little more lightheartedly. 

Thank you for reading and thank you for the prayers that I hope will follow.  This Thanksgiving, I'm grateful for my mom. Simple as that ;-)