It's really coming down to the end of my time a the Cancer Clinic in College Station. I can't just "leave it to Fleener" anymore. I have to find another's hands in which to place my care. Sure, my oncology family here will always be here for me, but it's just not feasible for me to make the 3+ hour trek every 3 weeks for the rest of time.
This process of moving and thinking about leaving these amazing people behind, while trying to help my children transition into their new school/sports homes has been stressful. Our house hasn't sold. Stephen's working here while we are there until October. I have to coordinate plans for moving and storing our belongings until our house sells and we can actually think about buying another home. I haven't been sleeping well, and I'm sure its related to all of these and many more stresses involved with changes and moving and getting organized and settled in a completely new place.
I've been feeling great, other than in not sleeping, so there is much for which to be grateful, in that area. Tomorrow, I will have a CT and and MRI, so my information will be up-to-date, as I find new doctors up in the Dallas area.
I continue to look for blessings and at all the things for which I can give gratitude. One simple one...Stephen dropped his wallet in the parking lot of Lowe's last week. He didn't realize until he was checking out, and it wasn't in his pocket. He thought he left it at home, but found that someone had turned it in, without even taking the $20 bill inside. This seems like such a small thing, but for anyone who has ever had their identity stolen or truly lost all of that information, it is such a pain to cancel old credit cards and a order new driver's license and all the other tedious to-dos which result from that annoyance.
I'm thankful my boys have a good school to attend up in Frisco. It was a hard choice to miss out on Camp Kesem because of their earlier school start, but I'm glad I got them registered and started at the beginning instead.
I'm grateful for family--especially right now to Stephen's brother and his family for allowing us to live with them while we figure out our whole moving situation.
I'm grateful for all the friends, neighbors, and other warriors that have continued to love and support me and my family through our journey over the last five years. We have survived up to this point because of the service you have given our family. We have felt your prayers buoy us up.
I'm sad that our moving plans have messed up other plans that have been set long before Stephen got a new job, which necessitated all of this moving business in the first place. I was heart broken to not fly to visit my new niece in Utah last week because I needed to help the boys with their first week of school at a new school, but I am grateful that I will get to meet her soon.
I feel a connection with this new niece on many levels. First, she's the firstborn of my baby sister, the one to which our mother calls my twin. I cried tears of joy when this sister first told me she was pregnant. She and her husband, like me and mine, had experienced many years of the pains and sadness of infertility. And, finally, there was a pregnancy that could FINALLY become a person. It was a time worthy of a river of happy, thankful tears.
For anyone in similar circumstances, having been poked and prodded and tested and medicated and FINALLY having a viable pregnancy, you know the conundrum. There's extreme excitement and gratitude, but there's also potential worry and concern if it will REALLY happen this time. The inner monologue,
"Should I allow myself to get excited?"
"Should we share our news, just in case?"
"How do I know this one is different?"
Plus, with this type of pregnancy, you usually know VERY early in the process, making that 9-10 months a VERY LONG 9-10 months.
I felt so special to be on the VERY short list of people who had even been told about this pregnancy so early-on, partly because of my similar experiences/partly because it was my baby/twin sister, and mostly.....let's be honest......because I needed to get started on planning the baby shower which would live up to my sisters' incredibleness!
We both felt pretty strongly that this baby was going to be a boy, but we were surprised to discover there was pink for their future. A baby GIRL!!!
Then came the name search.
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A little background.....
My name is spelled in an unusual way (MELODEE.) It's the EE that has special meaning in our family. My mom's nickname growing up was DEE; she also had a friend named Melodee, whose name was an inspiration for mine. My baby sister's name also ends with an EE, so naturally, she was looking to name her baby girl with a name that also ended in EE. When her favorite name was taken by a relative, only months before the birth, the name search was on again. She was disappointed at first, and many of the names I suggested never quite matched up to the original idea.
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Then, one day my sister called me. She began telling me a story about a dream she had where she already had a baby girl who was already named in the dream. When she and her husband had dinner the next evening, talked all about a dream HE had had about their daughter and her name. Incredibly, their dreams contained THE SAME BABY NAME!
So, my sister continued,
"I need to ask you a question:
Would you mind if we named our baby after you?
We are thinking of naming our daughter Melodee Ann.
It fits the EE thing. It's got family name status."
For the second time in only a few months, my baby sister had me crying like a baby on the phone. She described how much she loved and admired me and felt like I was one of the strongest women she's ever known and how she wanted her daughter to know the same strength in life. She couldn't think of a more special name for her baby girl.
Of course, I didn't mind. I couldn't stop crying, but I definitely didn't mind. It was an incredibly humbling honor, one of the times in life where I have felt most special and important.
I also felt a little anxious. It is a big responsibility, to be a namesake. Would I really live up to such an honor? Had I truly lived a life to deserve that? Would it just be a name?
(What follows are thoughts I haven't truly shared until now....)
I pondered on this honor for the months which followed. I was so excited, but I was also scared. Would my name be a curse on this baby? Would she fall into so many life trials and hardships, like I have? And, even worse thoughts, would having a namesake, a new child named after me, signal an end to my time on this earth? Was this the time cancer was going to take me, perhaps as I might need to be this new Melodee's guardian angel? I was feeling ALL.THE.THINGS. surrounding this news.
It's not like I wasn't happy about this amazing honor. But, the mind can be a tricky thing. I kept being led to dangerous thoughts: Was the world big enough for me to keep being Melodee, and Baby Melodee to also be Melodee? Was this God's way of letting me know that it was time to turn in my crown?
I didn't want to talk about these feelings because I didn't want my sister to think these thoughts, either, while she was still growing this baby and already had concerns about a healthy delivery. I didn't want to tarnish this beautiful story about a baby name miracle. I didn't want to introduce any doubt on this decision because I really did love the name.
I just couldn't stop thinking about the spots on my brain that had been discovered around the same time and how my doctors weren't sure if they were cancer, but they all believed it was highly likely that cancer was coming back in my brain. Was I even going to be alive to meet my namesake niece? Was this name going to be end up being in memorandum because it was "my time" to be called home?
And then the answer came:
My scans came back clear. These spots weren't growing. The were fading and getting more difficult to identify on a scan. They were nothing that we need to worry about now.
I'm Melodee, and this baby can also be Melodee. A name is a name. There are often beautiful reasons and meanings behind them. But, maybe---just maybe---this name is just a bit more special. My heart is with this baby, the one I still haven't met, who shares my name, the one who was born by emergency c-section, with the umbilical cord around her neck, saved on a Saturday by an on-call doctor who made the decision to get her here quickly. As another Saturday child, born quickly, ready to be here, even amidst challenges, I know that I will be here for her and her mother as long as I have breath in me.
This gift I've been given to be a part of this baby's world, an example, a support----I have no daughters of my own, but I hope she will let me love her with that same intensity. 'Cause this Melodee doesn't do anything mildly.
Baby Melodee, you've come into this world with a little craziness already. You're welcome.
Keepin' on keepin' on kicking cancer (and whatever life brings at you!) to the curb, one day at a time!
