My friend Sharon and I were like bobbsey twins … we were about the same age … we each had dark hair … we each loved Mexican food … we each had one son … both boys played baseball … we had both been married twice … we both worked for lawyers (that, in and of itself, is another story). Yes, Sharon and I were each other’s confidants.
Sharon’s routine visit to the doctor detected a suspicious lump. Further tests revealed breast cancer. So began the rounds of chemo and radiation. Everything was fine for awhile, then “IT” came back … with a vengeance. Another course of chemo, but this time there was no remission. She called me one Sunday to tell me she had decided to have a double mastectomy. I encouraged her to have the surgery as soon as possible. The surgery took care of “IT” for about five years.
Then a mass appeared in her liver. By now, chemotherapy had advanced enough to keep “IT” under control for several years. Sharon, always the strong one, always marched on, always cheerful, always the encourager.
I got a call one day to tell me she wasn’t going to fight “IT” any more. The doctors had given her less than three months to live. We talked a long time, my listening to her, she listening to me. I couldn’t pretend to know what she was going through so I told her that. I told her how much she meant to me and that I loved her.
The last time I saw my friend Sharon was two days before her passing from this life to the next. She wasn’t conscious, but I read to her, I sang to her, I told her how much her life meant to so many. Her passing hit me like a ton of bricks.
Get Go Tell It! – Debby’s Book
