my *sister*

scott and i were having a great saturday afternoon (august 14, 2010) just running errands together. at one of our last stops, i stayed in the car to call my cousin june to tell her about the cute swimsuit i found at target for our trip to hawaii at the end of the month...i could tell she was a bit distracted and then that's when the news pierced my heart: she told me she had colon cancer. i felt my breath getting sucked out of me and instead of being strong...i cried. sadly, she was having to console me, telling me everything was going to be okay...i couldn't control my tears. you have to know, i consider her and cindy my two sisters. we are cousins but we love each other as sisters would...

june went in for a colonoscopy a few weeks ago and the results came back as cancer. she just underwent surgery this past wednesday (august 18, 2010) and thankfully, it went very well. they removed the tumor, removed 8 inches of her right colon, corrected her hernia and removed her second dermoid cyst and had to remove her right ovary. thankfully, they didn't have to do a hysterectomy. she called me the next day to let me know she was done with the surgery...i loved hearing her voice. she's recovering right now and is expected to be released on monday...please pray for her as she continues on this journey.

this is also my *sister* who just had twins back in january. she is not even 40 and dealing with all these things. she is a strong person and admire her strength and determination to beat all of this...

{cindy, june & i}

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the night before her surgery, i didn't realize at the time how stressed out and anxious i was for her. scott had left earlier that morning on a business trip to north carolina. usually when he is away i am excited for some alone time and to get things done around the house but i really didn't want him to go this time. that night, i couldn't fall asleep...i wrote in my journal, read scripture and when i finally fell asleep i awoke abruptly feeling as if i couldn't breathe and felt like i had a huge weight on my chest. i had to consciously take in deep breaths. poor scott, i called him in the middle of the night (east coast his time) because i started to get scared. he stayed on the phone with me and gently reassured me that everything was okay...i fell asleep for another few hours before i called dr. stewart's office. the on-call doctor told me to go to the emergency room right away. she said the difficulty in breathing is something they didn't see patients for...of course this freaked me out. sad to say, the first thought was "oh my goodness. the ER is so expensive!" when i called scott to tell him, he was ready to hop on the first flight back home...but i told him that i would wait to talk to dr. stewart. dr. stewart asked if i had anything going on in my life at the moment...so i explained about my worries about june...he said that it sounded like i had an anxiety/panic attack...he said if this occurred regularly that he would want to put me on a very low dose of anti-depressants (yikes!). however, if the difficulty in breathing continued i would have to go to the ER to make sure it wasn't anything else...

when i heard all of this...i felt like i had already failed as a mom. i wasn't taking care of myself to make sure our baby was safe...i was lucky enough to be able to hear our baby's heartbeat that day to relieve me of the stress of wondering if our baby was okay or not. hearing that precious heartbeat again gave me strength and i promised God that i would do everything i could to be strong for our baby...and june. that night...i slept so peacefully. thank you Jesus...

scott gets home tomorrow...YAYY!! i feel that God purposefully speaks to me when i am alone and uses this time to strengthen me. i've had to depend solely on Him and it has been a sweet reminder of His love for me...