Start with what’s in front of you
My job: to help Phoenix make it through chemo.
My worst days were the days I googled things.
A Letter to my ten-year-old daughter on the equinox
Dear Kyrie,
I have been dying to tell you.
I never wanted to be a mother.
I was so afraid of having a kid and then messing them up, the way I felt messed up.
Ashes on my forehead
I belong to a society of sufferers, a subculture called cancer moms.
I wear ashes on my face because I know the truth in my brittle burnable bones: we are dust and to dust we will return, and most of what we do in between is also dust.
These ashes are the visible marker.
These ashes are the “live like you could die tomorrow” bumper sticker stuck to my forehead.
Smoke em while you got em
I want to secure my hope. Tether it to facts and action-whatever works for the day to stave off the panic. Research the shit out of it and do every single thing I can to help him live.
But the truth is, me pushing every last supplement down Phoenix's throat does not guarantee any bit of saving from pain.
It keeps him aware he is sick, and the hovering high-pitched spirit I do it in communicates that I am NOT OK and because I am NOT OK, I cannot let him be OK.