We Have to Stand Up for Each Other

"We have to stand up for each other"

Not the typical opening for my blog updates but I thought it was so poignant, I had to use it. My friend Kaval wrote that to me after I sent my last update about Bob's fight against non-Hodgkins Lymphoma. It couldn't be more true.

I was talking with my friend Sven about life, the universe and relationships. Sven was talking about how the movie Up in the Air really hit the nail on the head with its theme that life is richer with friendships. It may seem obvious, but all of us get caught up in the chaos of everyday life and we may lose sight of the temporal nature of friendships. What Sven and Kaval so simply illustrated is that you have to treat friendships like treasures and part of that obligation is, as Kaval put it, "you have to stand up for each other."

Which leads me to fighting cancer. We all know someone that has fought cancer. Not necessarily a blood cancer, but we have friends and loved ones that have fought and sometimes, succumbed, to these diseases. The thing about it is, it won't just go away. It takes research. Research takes funding. Research funding comes from people that care, people that have the means to help, and people that are willing to stand up for another.

I choose to raise money to fight cancer because it's my way of standing up for my friends, loved ones, and for people whom I haven't ever met. If you see someone harming your friends or family, you will step in to stop it; fighting cancer is like stepping forward to stop the mugger from harming your friends. So, please join me and stand up and fight against blood cancers by visiting my donation page at http://pages.teamintraining.org/sf/TourAlps10/sasche

Bob
Last time I wrote about Bob and his impending stem cell transplant. I realize I can not even come close to communicating the ordeal as his wife Leah does. I've never met her, but my heart goes out to her. Here is her latest update on her blog http://www.califmom.com/califmom/2010/03/twenty-one-years-coming-to-an-end.html Go there. Read it.

Twenty-One Years Coming To An End

April 8, 1989. I had just returned to campus in Chico from spring break in Ensenada, Mexico.

Tan, rested, ready to party, my roommate and I headed out for a night on the town.

Bob and I met that night. Fell in love that night. Haven't been apart since that night.

After college, we got married. We had two beautiful children. We bought a house. We took vacations.

We lived.

We loved.

And now, I have to figure out how to do this without him --without the other part of me.

Without my We.

As I lie on this godforsaken chofa bed in a hospital room Bob won't get to leave, I can imagine millions of scenarios, but none of them are my life without my husband. None are my children without their father.

And this precarious position between keeping him comfortable and having him coherent is a level of hell Dante neglected to mention.

I used to worry about children not coming with instruction manuals. Now, I wish there was one for life and death.

This is Easter and Passover week. For many of you it's a time of faith, a time of miracles. Please remember Bob, his wife, and their family in your thoughts and prayers.

What am I doing?

I forgot to mention in my first post that I was doing the Death Ride this year...again. The Death Ride, for those of you new to this blog, is a one-day, 129 mile, bicycle ride over 5 mountain passes in the Sierra Nevadas south of Lake Tahoe. The Death Ride is an 11,000 calorie burning epic ride that takes every ounce of energy to complete. Cyclists do this ride because they're really fit or they don't know any better - I fall into the latter category. As if it it weren't hard enough, I started a new job in mid-February and I have the additional challenge of sacrificing training time for commuting and new-job-get-up-to-speed time. Unwisely, my only real training is on the weekends and I am getting further behind as it gets increasingly difficult. But you know, I just have to do it. It's nothing compared to what the victims of blood borne cancers are enduring.


We have to stand up for each other


Steve

visit my fundraising site at: http://pages.teamintraining.org/sf/TourAlps10/sasche
visit my blog at: http://notabouttheback.blogspot.com/

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