Walk of Hope

A few weeks ago we traveled to Union City to surprise Markana's parents and join them in the annual Walk of Hope, an extremely successful cancer research fundraiser in her home town. We've participated in the past, and though we initially thought we couldn't make the trip this year, we realized how important it was to us and our family so we made the time.

I originally wanted to post about our trip immediately after we got back, but never quite pulled it together. This morning, however, I came across the image below and it stunned me.

We've been living "cancer free" for some time now, but I (we) continue to learn how to live in post-cancer-land. I've said this before to friends, but for all the hell Markana went through during those two years, it's been a different kind of hell trying to reacquaint ourselves with life. Don't get me wrong, we are extremely grateful for our health, our doctors, our daughter, our extremely supportive family and friends — but the truth is you never get to really live in the pre-cancer world again.

So back to the image...

I saw this on the side of the walking track and just stared. I still just stare. And then I get emotional. We were so close to not having each other, so close to Stella not having her mom, and now Markana gets to walk as a survivor while Stella watches on having no idea what happened during the first two years of her life. She just knows that Mommy and Papa (also a survivor) walk around the track with balloons.

We love you Markana.