Hello!
Somehow I mistakenly re posted Dana’s post from last September regarding FF miles and surgery. Please disregard. I am not getting another surgery and am not requesting miles. Sorry for the confusion

xoxo Hilary

Hi Friends and Family,

I want to create a Memory Book of my dad for our family and especially for my Mom and I need your help! Please send me via email or snail mail the following:

photos in JPEG format or original and I can scan them and send back to you (please try to make the files big enough that they will print nicely)

Stories of my dad

Quotes

Memories

It’s easiest for written things to be sent to me via email however if it’s something that can’t be emailed then send it snail mail.

Please send to my by January 31.

There will be a Memorial Service and gathering for my dad here in Austin the weekend of March 27th  with the actual memorial being on Saturday, March 28. Hilary will post all the details once they are solidified.

Please hit reply to this email for my information (email, address etc) so it is not posted publicly.

Thank you for your help!

Becca

It is a new year. I can’t say I am full of renewal and resolutions. The calendar has flipped, the year has changed but I feel like I’m right in the middle of something that has nothing to do with those markers. Call me cynical, and I probably am to some degree. I’m stuck in the middle of a hail storm of worry. A visceral attack on the human spirit. A place where every negative sound bite I’ve ever read or heard since November 15, 2013 is sticking like black sludge to my heart and drowning out my soul so it can’t rise above the senseless chatter. The loudest sound bite is the one from Dr. Javle saying he thinks I still have cancer, we just can’t see it right now. That one dovetails nicely into all the stories I’ve read of people, good people who have wanted to live just as badly as I do and who did all in their power to be cured but succumbed anyway. That’s where my worry is lodged.

Anxiety is a powerful beast. It’s a robber of energy, time, resources and most of all joy. It is the stealer of life and certainly the enemy of hope. Oh! AND these worries are just thoughts, they are not actually facts. The stories an anxious brain hatches and then retells are completely fictitious. Yet amazingly these reminders are not enough sometimes to quiet the greedy, beastly, grizzly fears that my brain churns out at will.

I know these old patterns of mine are part of this cancer journey. These fears, these anxious tendencies are as familiar to me as the street I grew up on or my own two hands. Their magnetic pull is as strong as the abused going back to the abuser. Familiarity doesn’t make it right.

Today I woke up with anxiety. Plain and simple, dressed down, no frills, anxiety. The strange thing about plain, simple, dressed down, no frills anxiety is that it has no fancy reason attached to it. I couldn’t label my anxiety this morning, I couldn’t tell you what it was about. It was just a feeling that greeted me as soon as I was conscious. It’s primal, it’s fight or flight. It’s the very worst kind because it’s so sneaky and insidious. It’s way bigger than worry.

Here’s the thing. God gave me Phin. Thank you God. He gave me this boy, a charming, sweet, beautiful boy. This child of mine had to go back to school today after a long, lovely break. I went into Phin’s room this morning to wake him for school and as he lay there waking up he fought demons. He fought greedy, beastly, grizzly fears that his brain churned out at will. My sweet boy could even name his fears, he didn’t want to leave his family, he was feeling unsure about an upcoming social studies project, he was feeling like he couldn’t get up and do this day.

I sat on his bed and stroked his back and handed him Kleenex and listened. I watched him in the grips of all that anxiety. Then I spoke. I chose my words carefully because too many words choke out the air in which connection happens. I needed him to connect his true feelings of transitions being difficult to the anxious made-up stories his brain was telling him that it was all too much to manage. I told him his is family would be there waiting for him at home tonight, the social studies project was going to be done bit by bit and not all at once. He could remind himself that he just did a daunting social studies project a few weeks ago and aced it. At this time last year his cousins were here for a week staying directly across the street and they left the day he had to go back to school, he cried and cried and even went in late to school because he thought he couldn’t do it, but he did do it, and the feeling that gripped him so went away just like the feeling he holds right now will go away too. Then I told him to rely on his tools, his breath (deep ones) and his ability to think different thoughts. I asked him to think of something that would make him feel better when the grizzly thoughts occurred. He said he would look forward to coming home and being there. He said he would not count the day in hours. Great, I said. He panicked and wanted to know what he would do if he was overcome at school with sadness and worry. I reminded him that he had handled that previously too. (He started the school year with a month of worry and fear). His teacher, myself and Phin came up with some ideas that would help him when he was overwhelmed, he could excuse himself to go out of the classroom to get a drink or go into the bathroom to deeply breathe or he could pull out a book and read with his head down until the wave of emotion passed. I reminded him these were tools he could still use at any time. My sweet, brave boy got out of bed and righted himself and tackled the fears, the day, the moment.

Ironic isn’t it? I thought to myself. That I am gripped by the same thing as this child of mine and I can look at his suffering and see so plainly a way out of it for him yet struggle to apply the same sage advice to my own situation. This is of course why I have sat down to write. Writing is one of my tools. Like deep breathing for Phin, it is a coping mechanism for me.

I am not through this journey friends. There are layers yet to shed, the cancer of my body is the cancer of my life and as long as I let anxiety prevail, I will struggle with thoughts running a muck and stealing my joy. I have something now that I didn’t have when I was little or even have a year ago. I have tools. I have breath, writing, meditation, and visualization to name a few. These tools are the bridge to freedom. I can see the path before me and I know it’s waiting for me. No, this is not the path to death or some such horse shit. This is the path to joy. It’s mine and I want it. And my kid is gonna get it too.

Happy New Year – go get your joy 🙂

Before signing off I wanted to share an email I got Christmas Eve from a college friend, Heather DiPaolo and her husband Jon. What an amazing love note, thank you Jon!! I adore you both:

Hils,
Each year, Jon is in charge of the outdoor Christmas lights at our house and it was no exception this month-except he changed up the usual decor a bit. This year he surprised me and made this light display in your honor. He has been listening to the Lyle Lovett song “If I had a Boat” that you put on my Australia ‘mix tape’ so many years ago. As the holiday season approached he decided (without telling me) that he wanted to acknowledge your success in some small way here at our home. When he took me out to see the lights he choked up when he told me “they are for Hilary because I know you guys like that Lyle Lovett song.”
He has been reading all the blog updates as I receive them and is always asking how you are doing. We feel so honored to be able to share your journey.
Every time we get a compliment I tell my neighbors that Jon put them up for our friend who has been battling cancer to support her through this fierce fight.
I see smooth sailing ahead my friend because you have your boat this Christmas.
With so much love and admiration,
HAM

xoxo

Hilary