This is the story of two women God brought together more than two decades ago, forging a faith-filled friendship which has seen them through incredibly scary diagnoses. Chris’s ordeal began in July 1999 when at the age of 36 she suffered a grand mal seizure while sleeping. “My husband thought I fell out of bed,” she …
Category: hope
Jul 26
My “Filthy Wealthy” Cousin
My husband’s Cousin Marge, born a premie in 1919, came with a doctor’s warning to her parents: “Don’t get too attached because she’s not going to survive.” For years Marge loved to tell that story, including the detail of spending her first few months sleeping in a shoebox. That precarious beginning seemed to set the …
Jun 15
The One Cancer Patient I Didn’t Like
In my nearly two decades as a cancer patient advocate for Dr. Marc Hirsh, I met (and liked) 3,000+ newly diagnosed patients. This is a story about the only one I didn’t like and the miracle God did in both our hearts. That patient was told he always would be under cancer’s shadow. He was …
May 04
Is Jesus Really Enough?
My cancer diagnosis in 1990 was especially crushing to my husband because he had lost his first wife nearly 20 years before to ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease) while they were still newlyweds. To watch me face a life-threatening illness and such an uncertain future was like a recurring nightmare. One day as he was riding …
Apr 20
Mountaintops & Valleys: My Oncologist Has Cancer (Part 8)
Dr. Marc Hirsh has walked some deep valleys since he was diagnosed in 2020 with such a serious and rare cancer that he and every specialist he consulted thought his death was imminent. Within days he was forced to close his busy, solo practice of more than three decades and then undergo a painful thoracotomy …
Apr 06
“Give Peace a Chance”
You may or may not be familiar with the 1969 Beatles’ song, “Give Peace a Chance” but years later John Lennon explained its message: “It wasn’t like ‘You have to have peace!’ Just give it a chance. We ain’t giving any gospel here – just saying how about this version for a change? We think we have the right to …
Mar 23
When You Can’t See Daddy
When our grandson Benjamin was four, he was a total Daddy’s boy—as in, the best time of day was when Daddy came home and the worst time was when he had to leave. So it wasn’t surprising when we were together at a local pizza buffet a few years ago and Benny stopped eating pasta …
Mar 08
The Last Touch
My younger brother Jim and I invented a game as little kids and for some inexplicable reason we continue to play it now in our late 60s. We call it “Touched You Last.” The rules are simple: When it’s time to part, be the last person to touch the other. Finesse is important as we …
Feb 09
“Just let ’em fall like healing rain”
May I be honest and share two things?…First, this short post is mainly for me. And second, the song at the end is the best part of it. I’m writing for myself because unwelcome events have left a trail of sadness in my heart. Perhaps you can relate. I’m mourning two years of a brutal …
Jan 26
Swallowing Sunshine
So, this month is my 50th birthday! I know that surprises some of you who thought perhaps I was pushing 70. Well, actually both are true… It was January 1972, my sophomore year of college at THE Ohio State University (some of you are cheering and others are booing—I love you all). My best friend …