Twenty-One Days

They say that if you do something 21 days in a row, it becomes a habit.  Set your alarm for 5:30 a.m. 21 days in a row (yuck), and chances are you're going to turn into an early bird out of sheer repetition.  Exercising for 21 days will leave your body craving those endorphins and it'll become a part of your routine.  Can the same be said for the less enjoyable things?  Stressing out, fitful sleep, refusing to keep up with chores and responsibilities... Do those things become habits too?

Three weeks ago, I was finishing up the last of the loose ends at work, checking the clock and rushing out the door to get to Wawasee.  Friday.  I was ready to crack open a bottle of wine, spend the weekend with my favorite Chicago friends and feel that humid Indiana sun on my skin.  But now it's three weeks later and I'm sitting here wondering how the hell we managed to get so far from there to where we are now in just 21 days.

In 21 days, I learned that the most important lady in my life, and one of the healthiest people I know, had cancer.  We learned that she was going to have to undergo surgery to remove some stupid tumor no larger than the size of a pencil eraser.  But it was fine because it's my mom we're talking about here...  Something that small seemed to be so insignificant.  Just get in, cut it out and we can all go back to the way things were before the C-word came into the picture.  And then there we were again, trying to figure out what the hell distal and lateral and metastatic invasions meant from a pathology report.  I swear it might as well have been Arabic we were trying to read.

A hell of a lot can happen in such a small number of days.  In the last three weeks, I have come to realize just how many incredible people our family has in our lives.  I have experienced first-hand that it is in fact possible to worry yourself sick.  The first weekend we brought mom home, I was relieved to see that incisions or not, when Norm completely misses jumping onto my parents' bed and crashes to the floor, my mom can't help but laugh until she cries.   In 21 days I have surprised myself with just how effective a bottle of wine and going to the bars with friends has been in boosting my mood.  I have heard from friends and friends of friends who have offered up genuine words of kindness and prayers, some I haven't really spoken to in years.  I'm so grateful for each and every one of them.  There are others I haven't heard a word from-- I've learned a lot about what and who matters in those instances.  But I'm grateful for that just the same.  I've got friends in all sorts of places who are there for me in the different ways that I need them most.  I am relieved to know that in spite of the last 21 days, humor still has a place in our home and optimism is rarely difficult to come by.  Somehow I still believe that everything happens for a reason, and you never really know what you're capable of withstanding until life hauls off and smacks you in the face.


Twenty-one days ago, if you had asked me to describe my mother, I would have told you about how much she loves yoga and waking up at Wawasee.  That she's one of the most positive people I have ever met, she's beautiful, she's fun and she never fails to try to set me up with the cute bartender once she's had a glass of wine or two.  She's creative and she's happy, and at times I swear she's a dog whisperer.  There have definitely been times in the last 21 days when I have forgotten these things.  At times it seemed like cancer was really the only thing worth mentioning and avoiding all at the same time.  I have become completely caught up in fear and anger and asking too many questions and not receiving enough answers.  I have laid in bed way longer than necessary and stared at the laundry piling up around my room.  But I have since come to the fantastic realization that my mom is still every single thing I have always known her to be.  Sure, all this stuff changes things a little bit.  But who she is, and who we are as individuals and a family does not change.  I think the biggest difference is two-fold:  we are even more humbled by the fantastic people we have in our lives, and we are much stronger than we ever thought we would be.

I know that they say it takes 21 days to form a habit, but I think that our family has made a habit out of focusing on the best in situations and having fun a heck of a lot longer than these last three weeks.  A few weeks of all of this is not going to break us.  I think the most important thing I have come to realize is simple:  life is what you make it.  No, sometimes it doesn't make sense, but my mom has always told me that "Life is all about how you handle Plan B."  The way I see it, you can spend your time focusing on the unfair's and the unknowns all you want... or you can find comfort in the fact that in spite of what life throws at you, some things will always stay the same.