Plan B Christmas

It's a good thing there's photographic evidence that Christmas was actually celebrated at the Hsieh household this year.  All I can remember is halfheartedly filling our advent envelopes with such winners as "Christmas movie night" and "Christmas bath." Ava was so onto me and my meager attempts at holiday merriment.  Thankfully Ben had the genius idea of a taking the whole family up to Great Wolf Lodge.  It was the perfect distraction and chance for the munchkins to be silly with their cousins.  

Candlelight service at Hope

Lizard lovers

Elia's perfectly dimpled smile

Monogramed purses were a huge hit

remote controlled monster truck 

of course they had to go to build a bear for new outfits

love me some Addy Grace

the boys

life is good at Great Wolf Lodge

little howlers

Just tall enough for the water slides

mastering the ropes course

shutting down the lodge with ice cream each night

fireside photo shoot

sillies

cousin jackpot

Of all the people in the world I got lucky enough to get these humans.  Such a blessed mama.

Come to me all who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest.

Yesterday morning I awoke to the sound of fresh cries from Ian's room.  I dragged myself from the covers and climbed in beside his perfectly warm body.  I stroked his hair as he whispered a fear that I couldn't answer with any sure promise.  "I was looking for you and your were gone.  I couldn't find you and I needed you."  How desperately I wanted to tell him that I would never leave him.  Soon my tears matched his and I prayed for the first time of a hundred that day to make me better.  I know that none of us have a promise of tomorrow but all the evidence points to the quick unraveling of my human body.
The news at the oncologist was dim.  My hopes for a healing surgery hinge on a miracle.   I suppose all our futures hinge on the miracle of His freely offered grace, my limited future just has photographic evidence.  I wish I could promise my children that I'll always be here for them but I know it's a promise I can't keep.  In some ways I can see how God uses that fear to force my face up against the glass and appreciate the precious pieces of my life.  I breathe deeper each bedtime with a little and a book cuddled up in my lap.  The I love yous come quicker and the hugs are a little bit longer.  I know the reasons to show up for battle.  Bottles of pills, constipation, vomiting, diarrhea, weight loss, food sensitivity, exhaustion, all threaten to rob me of my joy.   But I am going to fight for every name I've been given; wife, mother, daughter, sister, and friend.

These are the faces that propel me forward and allow me to lean in to the good and terrible of this journey.  I'm trading in flimsy new years resolutions for the unwavering promises of my savior.   For promises that He is right here alongside me with the gift of life in exchange for surrender.

This guy

It's the same story just a different tune.  In two days he'll dare to turn six.  He'll step into roomier clothes and continue to surprise me with all that he is becoming.  I wish I could adequately express what a phenomenal person Ian is.  Since his wee bitty days he has a light that doesn't seem to have a dimmer switch.  Even though he and I both know that those baby days are long gone he still humors me with a perfectly timed hug and a hint of baby talk.  He's so eager to please that I'm left praying that we won't take advantage of his easy demeaner.  His sensitivity is a gift and I pray that God will mold all those soft pieces into great strength.   I couldn't help but tear up as his teacher expressed what a joy he is to have in class.  Not that I'm surprised.  I've known for awhile that he would be a quiet but strong leader wherever he goes.  I am so head over heels in love with this guy and on the edge of my seat to see all that God will do through him.

hair release and surrender

It isn't too often that a girl gets the option of a complete head shave and the opportunity to rock a new vibe.  I'm not going to say I'm lucky that I get to sport a "I wonder if that girl has cancer?" hairstyle, but it is kind of empowering and makes me feel a tiny bit like a bad a#*.  It also seems to beat the alternative of of standing in the shower bawling over clumps of hair cascading down the drain.  There was so much friendship radiating around that room. The best part was just the simple reminder that I am clinging to a whole lot of ordinary love right now.

 my sweet sis in law sent chocolate covered fruit

 Ava got her fancy on with some bubbly

 sister selfie

 Popping the champagne

 Angela was so sweet to get all my fancy on before cutting my hair.

 It was fun to have so many of my girlfriends in one place and getting to know each other,

 Me and My Anne

 It was so amazing to have Amy come just at the right time to hold my hand. :)

All the Lincoln ladies 

 Beautiful Terwilligers although we missed Jaime!

 love that girls smile

 Ava and Bob the corkscrew.  It looks like she's having a blast but she spent most of the time hiding in Melanie's arms crying about my hair loss.  It's taken awhile to convince both my loves that I am still mama no matter what I look like.

 On display

 The first cut

 Mohawk mama
Was tempting to keep it this way and see what would happen but I totally chickened out

All done!

 Wig #1

 wig #2

wig #3

I'm not even sure if I'm going to lose any hair or not.  So far we are on week 4 and I haven't lost any.  Most days I end up without a wig just because it's more comfortable.  It's been an easier decision than all this surrender I have to face.  So much love and generosity and all the people showing up for everything and making me believe that I am LIVING with cancer not dying with it.  I have the best people that love me richly and remind me of the every day Jesus.  The one giving extra hugs and chicken noodle soup.  The one driving me to all my appointments and letting me cry into his cashmere sweaters.  The ones watching the kids and filling advent calendars or flying in from around the country to hold my puke bag.  The party was just one more reminder of how precious this team of mine is.

port side

Things got a little matrix-y this week with the insertion of my port.
 It definitely ranks high up on the list of bizarre things that have happened over the past month.  Maybe I wish I would have known, maybe not.  It seems normal enough at first.  Take off you clothes, let's play 50 questions, lots of needles and enough cords to make you feel like a home office.  The barely 5 foot asian doctor gives you the run down, most of which I plugged my ears and hummed through.  Oh you know, it's just like your run of the mill night at home chopping vegetables and whoops, your hand slips and you stab yourself in the chest.  To which Ben replies, or your average gang fight injury.  You know stuff that happens to everyone.  You'll want to take it easy for a couple days.  
Then they wheel you into a room with four hipster guys listening to music and casually joking around about real estate and not staring too long into their beards.  I'm introduced to "my bartender."  And then my top is taken off and I'm rubbed down with alcohol while under a giant blue hospital napkin.  I'm thinking in the future that maybe they want to do all of this after I've had a few Versed cocktails but I guess they know what their doing.
On the flip side I now have a built in Halloween costume if I choose to go as Frankenstein or the victim of a vampire attack gone horribly wrong.

I can only imagine the ragers that go on in the post surgery wing of the hospital that required this kind of signage.

It probably would have been perfectly manageable if this kind of day wasn't stacked up against a dozen others like it.  I barely have time to try and deal with the physical pain and emotional fears coming at me when inserting a port and starting chemo want to come to the party.  Thankfully those who rally in love are stronger than that which whispers deceit and fear.  
I've got so many human angels in my corner reminding me to focus on the solid truth of my being loved by the most perfect love and not dwell on the what-if's, I'm-not-strong-enoughs, and it's-not-fair temptations.  There is an answer for those days that tempt me towards darkness.
Because If I say, Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me, even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.  Psalm 139 11-12
And because I cried tears of laughter I'm including this post surgery video of me that B took.  It was a toss up between this one and the one of me trying to eat a banana and missing my mouth, which I'm pretty sure I was set up for because I didn't see anyone else eating a banana there.

The part where you stay

This morning as the steam rises off my chai, the kids have been whisked off to school, and the two B's ignore the breakfast dishes in leui of extended time in bed catching up on reading, I want to remember.  I want to knit together the snapshots of these past few weeks and study them.  How did so much happen in such a short amount of time?  How did we go from stomach pain to pancreatic cancer?  When did God think I could face this reality?  I'm not the girl with Philippians 4:13 tattooed on my left ankle.  I'm the girl who, when faced with her first real crises, decided John 6:68 was the only verse that made sense.
"You do not want to leave too, do you?" Jesus asked the Twelve.

I can so picture the looks on their faces here.  Like, um well, let's see.  We've given up everything to follow you around.  You've given us the only answers that ever made sense and the only life that actually means something so where are we supposed to go.  Or as it's actually written:
Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom shall we go?  You have the words of eternal life."

I mean it's not like I'm getting t-shirts made that say, Hi Jesus, I'm just here for the free food but I don't really see myself as a poster child for faithfulness through a devastating cancer battle either.  I suppose everyone is called to something different.  I was sort of hoping my calling would be of the quieter kind.  The classic Middlemarch ending of the beauty in living a simple faithful life.  I don't think it's a bad thing.  It was Jesus after all who mastered the equation that a little + a little bit less=more than necessary.  As usual though I'm prone to wanting something other and quick to forget all the ways he wants me to be less so that He can take all the glory in the end.

If there was one moment I wish I had a photo of these past two weeks it has to be a week ago today at the hospital.  The smell of flowers filled the room and the other sights and sounds had become comfortably familiar.  My bed and nurses and family were my constant security blanket.

Come to think of it, it's a wonder that they managed to get me out of there at all, what with all the morphine IV's pumping me with relief for the first time in a year while being swaddled under a heavy heated blanket with my sister finger combing my hair.  Ahhh...why did I leave?   I think there were promises made but now I can't remember any of them.

It was in this scene that my mom came into the hospital from church and sat down next to my bed.  She took her finger and gently rubbed her own forehead and then mine.  We prayed for you in church today sweetie.  We anointed you with oil even though you couldn't be there.  I can't remember if I cried then or later but just the physical feeling of the oil on my head reminded me of the extension of my experiences.  The oil had traveled from the elders through the hands and prayers of the members and from my mother's forehead to my own.  It was such a beautiful image of how I am not alone in this.  In those fleeting moments I remember that this calling is a gift and my track record for thinking I know what I need would have robbed me of experiencing the beauty that has made this life mine.  I'm still in the hard days of getting overwhelmed by physical pain and emotional fear, struck by questions and worries that I'm too scared to even put down on the page yet.
The only thing I'm sure about is that this story is going to have some twists and turns.  But I haven't painted any walls black yet and I'm still looking for manna each day to keep me from starving.  I have a sneaky suspicion that my days are going to look less like a bouquet of peonies and more like that little yellow flower that pushes its way up the ugly crack in the sidewalk.  But maybe, on most days, the sun's light will catch it just right and make it gleam.

Perfect 10

When the white caps rise up and the west starts to feel a little wild I burrow in to all the cozy I can scrounge up, usually in the forms of soft blankets, tall stacks of books, creamy chai and swing naps.  The last few weeks of lazy family time have come and gone and I'm trying to keep my ear tuned in to the need for a slower pace even as the calendar fills up.  Whether I will follow through on that remains to be seen.  But it seems like a worthy enough cause today.  As I came nose to nose with summer I marveled at how much I love my people.  With all the travel and long days at the hospital the troops rallied.  It was some concentrated time but we all fit together in the best ways.  I kinda miss them the rest of the year.  Their sunshine cannot be contained.

Pickin peaches at the farm

 Even the dahlias can't compete with that smile

 Tree stump shortcut

 Skin and bones and spunk

 Frog whisperer?

 Playroom campout = late night giggles

 These two are in straight up bff territory and I am so geeked out by it.  They woke each other up all summer to play.  I won't lie, there were a few incidents of hurtful words and most days I had to turn a blind eye to their tornado alley creative adventures. But they can turn two rooms and a handful of toys into another world like its their job.  Of course she was too cool to sit by him on the bus but her secrets safe with me.

 she's always showing off her pachabels cannon

 No one can make her laugh like Tia

 What am I going to do with this kid?!  Could he be any cuter?  He schools me in love and ninjago villians.  Every time he says, "that was like ten yesterdays ago" my heart melts.  

I know its shocking to hear that summer went way too fast.  I'm not ready for it to end.  Tomorrow we'll all get up and head into four classrooms ready to do this.  But tonight I'm throwing my own personal pity party.  281 days till summer vacation.  Boom.