The past year has been one of my best. And one of my favorites. Probably my most successful year professionally, lots of new venues, opportunities to write, a five part webinar series with Weaving Today. Lots of great possibilities for the future. My daughter finished college and moved home. Though she is working full time we still have wonderful weaving adventures. My son spent a long year on a military deployment, but has returned, and has grown for the experience. And I turned 60. Lots of looking at the future and what I want to do with the next phase of my life. Suddenly there is permission to say no to things I don’t really want to do. I am starting to unload and destash things that don’t hold any meaning for me anymore. And my husband and I are talking of the next steps after he retires next year. Of course, just reading my posts you dear readers know how special each of the venues I’ve had this year have been. One of my best experiences at Sievers, my all time best experience at Peters Valley, an amazing month on the west coast, and everywhere I’ve traveled, eager and enthusiastic students work hard and are really grateful for what I seem to be able to teach them.
Until Wednesday…
I started this blog to celebrate a life interwoven with fiber, adventures, creativity, conundrums, and observations. When I was diagnosed with cancer 13 years ago, there was no blog. There was no Facebook. Only emails, and I gave progress reports to those who wanted to be kept informed by email. Wednesday morning I drove my husband at 5:30 in the morning for an endoscopy, following up on some random trouble swallowing, nothing more specific than that. By 10am we knew, he has a mass on his esophagus and the news was of course devastating. It is cancer but the extent wasn’t known until a follow up endoscopy on Thursday, this time with a sonogram. And the news is not good.
This isn’t my story to tell, and I promise dear readers that I won’t turn this blog into a step by step progress report of my husband’s journey through the hellish nightmare of treatment for esophageal cancer. I am a fiber artist, and a weaver, and a mother, and a wife, and I am a living breathing cancer surviving human being that takes the curve balls with grace and humility, because we all get hit with curve balls in the baseball game of life, and I am certainly not exempt. I am incredibly grateful for the past year and will cherish it as a large chocolate cake with a red wine chaser that gave me terrific memories to hold onto as I move into a darker scarier phase of life, our lives together.
I wanted to let all my supporters and students and potential students know that I do have a heavy schedule still lined up for the fall. I am going to do everything in my power to still make those venues happen and to be as professional and focused as I possibly can. Not because I’m a hero, or slighting my husband and family, because after going through cancer myself, the absolutely best thing I can do for myself is to keep as busy as possible. I have grown children now. I didn’t have that 13 years ago. I still had to be a mother to them. Now they can be a support to the two of us.
Wednesday night my daughter and I went to the first meeting of the new season of the Jockey Hollow Weavers Guild. It was wonderful to just get out of the dark place life is taking us right now. And on Thursday we sat around the table at the Boonton Library, knitting. For a brief couple of hours my mind was at ease.
I went back and read the editorial piece I wrote for Handwoven magazine the morning after 9/11. So much of it still rang true for today and what my family, my husband is facing. You can read it here if you want.
The warps are wound, the handouts printed, and Thursday morning I’m still planning to get in the car, plug in the next installment of the Outlander series on Audible, and drive the 8 hours to northern coastal Maine, for Fiber College. (FYI, I’ve already read the Outlander series, but it is amazing how much I’ve forgotten.) I’m hoping for a bit of distracting serenity and to be surrounded by lots of colorful fiber. And some pretty cool people.
Lots of hugs.
Wow. Talk about being blindsided! So sorry to hear all this and will be thinking of you, your husband, and family. You’re all in our prayers. Hugs, e
Know that you are never alone.Prayers are with you both as you face this rotten turn of events together. Best wishes always.
Sending prayers for you and your family.
DH will be added to my daily prayer list.
What a curve ball! No matter, I am sure that you and your dear husband will hit a home run. Warm wishes and thoughts for you and yours. Daryl you are one in million and if anyone can handle this news with grace and forethought it is you. Best wishes.
So sorry to hear the news. You have a great, strong family and I am sure you will get through this together. You are in my prayers. If you need anything just call. Hugs
Sending love and prayers. For some reason this summer I got into origami cranes to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Then I heard that if you fold 1000 cranes, you get a wish. A good friend of mine was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer, so I decided to fold 1000 cranes to wish for her recovery. I sent the 1000 cranes to her home and they were hanging on her porch when she returned from a stay at the hospital. It was the best! I have a group (a small group) of women… Read more »
Cancer is no respecter of anyone. So sorry you are going through this just when things were going so well. 🙁
Laura
You and your husband wiil be in my thoughts and prayers. Love, april
So very sorry to hear this, Daryl. Through your blog, I feel like I know your family. And I know that you are a source of strength for one-anither. My thoughts are with you.
Sending Love Love Love from Boulder
Dear Daryl, I sure liked the part best before Wednesday. I echo well wishes and positive thoughts as expressed above. My guild here lost one of our members on Thursday morning to a long battle with breast cancer. Stay strong. I admire you so much.
Double-double dangnabit……prayers and if there is anything I can do…….
Sorry to hear this. You are in my thoughts and prayers, I know you are strong, and faith and modern medicine can move mountains. Much love
A friend of mine is forming a support group for those dealing with cancers of the head and neck. Please look them up.
http://www.teampuddinpop.org/
I love you both. Beautiful daryl. Thanks for sharing this so poignantly and with courage
I will light a candle for both of you. No matter what other people think is “the way you should respond” to this. You know what you have to do. Travel safely thru all of this. Fiber people are a fiber family.
So sorry to hear this. My thoughts and prayers are with you and your family.
Dear Daryl, I send hopeful, caring thoughts to you and your family.
I’m so sorry to hear of your news. My dad had esophageal cancer, but that was 45 years ago and treatments are much better now. In two weeks my husband has to have a biopsy if his prostate so I’m crossing my fingers for luck. A few prayers don’t hurt. I’ll be thinking of you and your husband.
All my good wishes to you and your husband as you both work toward making him a survivor also.
Thinkng of you and your family and sending positive thoughts and healing eneris Daryly. Do NOT let those negative thoughst take hold. One day at a time…
I have been there with my husband with the same cancer and he is 5 year clear.
They can fix your’s! It is a tough road but there is sun on the other end. You and he will have lots of support!
HUGS
You will all handle this together. There are many miracles out there now, and you will have even more appreciation of your precious time together when all was well. All the best hopes, wishes and prayers.
Sorry to hear about your hubby, Will be sending prayers and healing thoughts to him and you to help get you through this tough time.
My thoughts and heart are with you and your family at this challenging time. Please let me know if there is anything I can do to help — anything!
All my love to all of you.
Caren
Yes he can survive this cancer. My best friend’s hubby beat the odds from 1992
-2002. Read Bernie Siegel, MD. Get into support group.
Positive thoughts to you and your wonderful family. From a member of your worldwide fiber family, xxxooo Rosemary in MI & TX
Thinking of you and your family. Best wishes to your family for staying strong and a complete recovery.
Daryl, there is something that seems to happen when faced with this kind of challenge – at least it did for me with my husband’s head/neck cancer… some of the fear and emotion that could have been present was sort of ‘set aside’ while I dealt with all kinds of more immediate things… from the mundane to seriously important. May the treatment be successful and may you find the right balance of nurturing and taking care of both yourself and your family. I wish you strength and the best of luck through the treatments… I am acquainted with a couple… Read more »
Daryl,
Yikes! you guys really didn’t need that! Daryl our thoughts and prayers are with you and Kevin and the kids. Love and prayers for healing and strength for you all. We are here for you all!
love,
Carol
Daryl and Kevin, what a blockbuster you have to go through. You have fabulous kids to help you remain strong as you go through this nightmare. Please know we are thinking of you and hoping that each step taken is the road to recovery. Love, Nancy and Jerry
Daryl, you and your family’s strength in overcoming your cancer will show you the way in dealing with his. I wish him the best. Hugs!
Patricia
As with last time, anything, anything, that I can do to help…I will be there for you as everyone else who has left a comment above. Know that you and yours are loved and in our thoughts.
Bettes
I love you. You know that. Let me know what you need.
What devastating news 🙁 My father had esophageal cancer 40+ years ago when there really wasn’t any treatment beyond surgery. Thank goodness there are better treatments now, and your husband will have the best possible chance to beat this!
So, so sorry you have this in front of you Daryl.
Hang in there. Staying busy and having as much “normal” as possible is a great plan, and revisiting old favorite books is both therapeutic and good company. I am also rereading/listening to the Outlander series! 8 more hours of Voyager! All the best live & fortune to you and your family.
Hugs back to you and lots of prayers
I am so sorry to hear the news. I hope all goes well for your husband.
May the power of love, confidence, joy in partnership with your husband, and miracle of modern medicine be there for you during this upcoming difficult time. “Angel” candle is now being lit for all of you.
Holding a space of light for you, for your husband, for your whole family. My family has been on that road, too (husband diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer 4 years ago.) It’s amazing how that journey clarifies priorities, and focuses gratitude. Wishing peace and healing for you both.
Echoing previous comments–many prayers for you and your family. You are an amazing writer and communicator. But please keep us somewhat informed. Be safe in your travels and I wish you and your husband the best. It was found through a catscan of the carotid of my husband that he had spots on both lungs. All were cancerous but very small–lost a lobe in his left lung. But we were so lucky. Geez, maybe everyone should be checked head to toe once they turn 60 or sometime. We wouldn’t have known. Carotid was fine. God Bless. Helen Hart in Cheyenne,… Read more »
good luck with dealing with lifes curve balls, hope all goes well. Maybe as Helen said we should all get regular check ups, but what to look for is always the problem, we dont need to live in fear, that only encourages cancers so I have been told. We understand that you have to write about it, and we will all journey with you, this is part of your therapy, to be able to express the anguish and the joys of the battle ahead.
LIFE….ups and downs. Sending positive thoughts.
My prayers go out for you, Kevin, and your kids. Stay strong, and God bless you all.
Just when everything seems to be going well – darn. Plan for the worst, pray for the best and live each day to the fullest.
Hope this turns out to be just a little bump on life’s highway.
We are all praying for you and will be thinking about you and your wonderful family.
Susan
Thoughts and prayers go with you and your family from all of us in the fiber community!
Susanne
Sorry to hear about Kevin and am sending all good wishes your way.
His health is going to be a major concern of yours and your friends on the blog will appreciate the occasional update on how he’s doing. Your concerns are ours too.
Best possible treatment and luck to you both.
Your visit to Skagit Weavers Guild was a chocolate cake & red wine highlight of my year, too. You were a real inspiration and I’m happy to say that I’m back to weaving & sewing following your class. So very sorry to hear this diagnosis for your husband. I will keep you all in my thoughts & prayers.