It was 2009 and I had been in sixth grade for a couple of months. I was on the phone with one of my friends from school when my mom called through my door for me to come out into the living room. I ignored her and kept talking for a few minutes when she called me out again. I rolled my eyes and told my friend I would call her right back. I walked into the living room and it seemed odd to me that both my sisters and dad were all out there too. I watched my mom take a deep breath with my dad by her side.
As she began to speak her voice shook and gloss covered her eyes. “The doctors found a lump in my last mammogram. ” she said. “It came back as cancer. I’m going to have to get treatment but I’m going to be okay. ” No one else said a word, we all sat there in silence with tears rolling down our cheeks. My mom seeing her three daughters scared and upset of course made her cry more. We all left to go be alone in our rooms. I remember my body and face feeling so hot because of how overwhelmed I was. My tears fogged up my wire glasses and I felt a hand on my back.
My mom went to comfort each of us because even during her nightmare, she cared more about our family than anything else. She held me tight and it never crossed my mind to call my friend back. My mom started her treatments the following week. I still did not completely understand what cancer was or what to expect the chemo to do to her. I was only twelve, I needed my mom. Her hair started to fall out in chunks in the shower. She decided it was already noticeable enough and she would take control and shave the rest off.
I remember walking down the hallway and hearing the sound of the razor though the open crack of the bathroom door. My mom cried in my dad’s shoulders as he shaved her head for her. My dad was the biggest support to my mom and inspiration to our family during this time; taking off of work to bring her to her appointments, buying her new comfortable clothes, helping her with whatever she needed. Many people around our community reached out to help my mom as well. After she shaved her head, my neighbor Carol, took her to pick out her wig.
Getting this wig made my mom feel very self-conscious, she wondered if anyone could tell she was bald underneath. I always saw her as the most beautiful person in the world. I wished that she could see that herself. Some of her doctors told her about a program the American Cancer Society has called “Look Good.. Feel Better”. My sister and I convinced my mom this would be a great class to go to and we would go along for support. We sat around a table with about five or six other women.
I could sense they all felt out of their comfort zone coming to this class exposing all the changes cancer had given their body, reaching out for help to make them feel beautiful again. They were all given a bag full of free makeup and the instructor taught them how to fill in eyebrows, use eyeliner to fill in where their eyelashes used to be, and fix their wigs. My mom never really wore a lot of makeup, so this was all especially new to her. I remember my mom, sister, and I all laughing after the class was done about how my mom felt like all that makeup made her look like a clown.
That made me realize that even though the makeup did not make her feel beautiful, it gave her an opportunity to meet other women going through the same fight as her, and a chance to loosen up and laugh. Laughter really is the best medicine, because in that moment the image of our sick, tired mom was gone and our positive, happy mom was back. The summer of 2010, my family took a vacation to celebrate my mom finishing her chemo. I remember before we left for vacation, my mom’s eyelashes started to grow back and she was so excited to go out and be able to buy mascara again.
My mom fought her way through cancer and now she was able to start living her life normally again and that made me more happy than I had been that past year. My mom deserved that vacation more than anything, she was finally able to relax, be spoiled, and know that everything from there on out was going to be okay. Fast forward to the summer of 2014, my mom received her five years clear of cancer and strolled out of her doctor’s office to a round of applause by all the nurses who helped her win her fight.
I remember that day smelled like the sunflowers my sisters and I had set on our dining room table for our mom to come home to. It was then that I realized I was given the best role model possible. I could not be more thankful to have a mother who is strong enough to beat cancer and a family who is there for each other no matter what. My family’s happiness and health will always come before anything else for me. My family values have been instilled in me ever since sixth grade, the year my life changed, and as long as I have the support of my family I will be able to take on anything that comes my way.
