by Betsy Shaw posted in Mom Stories
Imagine: A family– two sisters, a mother, two breast cancer diagnoses, two bilateral mastectomies, a fiancé-turned husband, four frozen fertilized eggs, a relapse, mother-daughter chemotherapy infusions, a wedding, a funeral, an offer of gestational surrogacy, a C-section birth, and twin babies born just in time for mother’s day.
This opus of an article, written by Bonnie Rochman, for Time Healthland, was so heart-wrenchingly poignant, I don’t know where to start. First… I need to stop crying.
What got me going was a journal entry, written by the story’s main focus, Melissa Brown, who, after being diagnosed with breast cancer at age 26, opted for a bilateral mastectomy, just as her mother had when she was 30.
Five months after Melissa was engaged to be married, she discovered a lump in her breast. Not long after, her mother’s cancer returned for a third time and she was not given long to live. They rescheduled the wedding to make sure her mother would be there.
Her mother was there. Both Melissa and her mother wore wigs. Days after the wedding, Melissa wrote this short entry in her journal.
March 13, 2008
“I am sitting here on my chemo drip. Mom is sitting across from me having her treatment. At least we can share this time together.”
Her mother dies. I’ll leave you to click over to the original article to read that journal entry. It’s a doozy.
Then came this entry that hits home the dizzying amount of hard balls life is pelting at Melissa Brown, the most stinging being the fear she will never have children:
“Cancer has stripped me of so much; my mother, my breasts, my hair, my twenties, my immune system and now my fertility. How do I cope with this loss too?”
Then Melissa’s loyal little sister, Jessica, swoops in to the rescue and offers, actually demands, to be her gestational surrogate. (Melissa had been advised to freeze her eggs before her first chemo treatment.)
“But Jessica was adamant. “I don’t care what you have to say,” she told Melissa and Steve, not unkindly. “You are saying no because you feel bad. But what is nine months of my life when I could give you a lifetime of happiness?”
The pregnancy took. Twins. The pregnancy was healthy. Jessica referred to her baby bump as “Melissa’s belly.” Then, at 38 weeks, and a diagnosis of pre-eclampsia, it was time for delivery. Thankfully, a bit of humor is offered up in the form of Jessica’s concern that her brother in law didn’t see her naked.
Finally, the comedic relief is replaced by the deep and moving connection between the two sisters:
“Jessica is doing well. I haven’t left her side and will be sleeping with her at the hospital until she comes home. I have the most incredible sister. She has given me the gift of my children, and I can never repay her for this gift. I cannot believe how lucky I am.”
The babies were born, healthy, three weeks before Mother’s Day.
I don’t really have a question to end with, but please feel free to comment.
Read more from source:“babycenter-com-baby”
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