Like last year, our family will be spending the week together to honor and celebrate both Brad and his twin, Dave. For one beautiful chaotic week, we get to live in each other’s noise and space and emotions. For one week, we gather from all across the country and get to be in each other’s presence.
Read MoreWhen Brad died, I had several people ask me (and many more ask around me) if I was going to stay in Detroit. At the time I was incredibly offended. How could they question my loyalty to Detroit?
Read MoreI’ve spent the last year and a half openly talking about and writing about courage - courage in the face of illness, courage in the face of death, and courage in the face of life after loss.
But the reality is, I’ve spent the last year and a half utterly terrified.
Yesterday I was informed by my accountant that I have to pay taxes on Brad's forgiven student loans in the wee tiny amount of, wait for it, TWENTY-TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS.
Read MoreIt was the first morning I woke up and wanted it to be over - a thought that is hard to admit, but one that, unlike so many other thoughts over the last year, comes without guilt.
Read MoreIt was two and a half months after Brad’s death. I was running away and was in Florida at the time. I stubbornly refused to celebrate, not wanting to acknowledge the day. Not wanting to acknowledge another minute had passed without Brad.
Read MoreI found connection as I paddled through the water, being followed by the Great Blue Heron. I found joy as I pounced up the rocks, remembering the childlike joy I used to feel stomping through the woods and climbing up trees. I found peace as I stared up at a sky so big and so full of shooting stars, it was impossible not to feel incredibly powerful and oh so small, all at once.
Read MoreToday I received my 5 year CT scan. It was 5 years ago - to the very day - I received my first, post relapse, clean scan.
Read MoreI've always been an anxious person. I think this stems from an early and deep-rooted need to always be perceived as perfect (ridiculous, right?). I blame being the middle child - aka the "peacemaker" - during a tumultuous childhood. When things felt out of control, I took it on as my job to attempt to keep the peace. Or at least not add to the turmoil.
Read MoreI would be lying if I said I never think about my future and the idea of possibly someday sharing my life with another person again. Because Brad taught me to love.
Read MoreMy sister recently made the comment that nobody really discusses loss and grief on an everyday level.
Even those of us that write about it (and talk about it), still do so in mostly sweeping statements about waves and universal truths and fragmented stages in time.
Read MoreI’m on my final leg of this journey. I’m dirty. I’m exhausted. I’m sore. I feel beat up and raw. I also feel powerful and proud. I found a strength and openness I didn’t acknowledge before that I will carry with gratitude as I head towards home. Tomorrow.
Read More6 months ago, my life - my happy, perfect life - changed forever. 6 months ago today, Brad and I walked into the Saint Joseph Mercy emergency room, hoping and expecting for an infection and instead getting a stage 4 cancer diagnosis.
Read MoreI’m trying to slow down. To embrace this journey. To embrace the fact that this isn’t a trip for me to see the country and tour the sites. It’s a trip for me to be alone with my thoughts and emotions. To be alone with my grief.
Read MoreWhat if you only had 100 days to live? What would you do? Quit your job? Travel the world? Start living? Start loving? Start making your moments count?
Read MoreI now have to make new plans. The reality is, this road trip was just one of many plans we counted on that will never come to life. One of thousands of dreams and ideas and ambitions we discussed. It is part of a future that no longer exists. My future now looks wildly different. My future is unrecognizable.
Read MoreThis morning Dune and I sat in your chair. The leather chair I promised you on our third anniversary in 2011, when we lived among cheap Ikea furniture and hand-me-downs and were too broke to invest in something so luxurious. The chair we finally splurged on 5 years later, after you got sick and needed a better place to read and write.
Read MoreToday my worst nightmare happened. We lost my love, my best friend, my heart, Bradford. He passed away in our bed, holding my hand, just like he wanted.
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