Dear friends. .

Dear friends,
Yesterday we heard back from our oncology team.
We are sitting here now, waiting in the school carpark.
Waiting to pick up our sons and tell them.
Tell them that dad won't be going to Sydney for an operation. Not this time.
Tell them that there doesn't seem to be any other option in chemotherapy world that might fight back the cancer.
Tell them that we are going on a family holiday starting next weekend.
Tell them.. because they need to know.
They need to know that when our kind-hearted oncologist called yesterday, he said words we didn't want to hear.
He said that options have been exhausted and his advice is to "enjoy the time you have left. "
Those words.

And so we are here.. I'm watching my sons dance and jump across the pedestrian crossing (they can't seem to just simply walk around ).
They are all talking and clamouring for their dad's attention as they juggle school bags and hats..
And my heart is about to burst wide open.
I don't want to do this.
But it is our privilege to parent these outstanding sons. And today parenting looks like this.
It looks like a heart broken.

Enjoy your time.
The hours and the weeks.
The months and the years.
Enjoy them with a ferocious thankfulness.

We have been given a number.
Months.
Just a few.

With wide eyed faith we run into these next days.
Wide eyed faith means we hear the report and we call out for our miracle.

Let me tell you about miracles.
We have three.
We weren't supposed to have children. Medically improbable.

And here we are.
About to tell our improbable miracles what we face and what we need.

A miracle.

And then suddenly... Again.

I had this plan.
The plan was really quite simple..
Cancer was supposed to just back the hell away from us after the epic journey of last year. I mean.. We fought hard in September.
And it was a battle well won.
And this plan was for life to roll along in absolute normality..

Well.
Cancer is a rude, inconsiderate s.o.b.

But we battle.
Battle wearied and battle ready.

Reviewed Plan:
love generously.
Battle.
Know that my plan is insignificant compared to the master plan.

Please pray.
We don't know anything really just yet.
Just that we need a miracle.
Like really.
Now.

Natalie Grant "When I Leave The Room" // SiriusXM // The Message

Leaving Dark Lands.

Loneliness is a dismal dark lands.

I have wandered their plains in recent times.

You might have been there..

Because there are many of us.. Walking through the same desert of loneliness.

My "I've been horribly lonely" badge has been planted firmly on. 

Seeds of discontent are the produce that loneliness sprouts..

And I've been discontent. 

A lonely discontent heart.

That just spells trouble. With a capital T.

Loneliness rarely has to do with who is around us.

I could be justified in being a lonely ol' soul right now...

My go-to person left the room on April 20th last year.. And her leaving has left a ginormous mother shaped hole in my world.

My weeks lately have been quiet.. My husband is working away 5 nights a week. When the boys go to bed, I have hours stretched out each night where I sit alone.

And alone has come to mean lonely.

And lonely has lied her way into the fabric of my life and now I'm discontent.

Discontent has a catch cry- she yells "well... It's just not fair!" 

Lies.

So here I sit. 

Lonely.

Not fair. 

Blah blah blah...

I am actually not meant to be lonely. Or discontent. Because I'm not alone.

Actually.

I heard a song this week. 

It smashed me to pieces.

It grabbed "lonely discontent" by the throat and told her to back off.

It had me sitting on my kitchen floor, sobbing. 

It is called "When I leave the room." Sung by the beautiful Natalie Grant.

 Listen to it if you never have.

It's a lullaby love song. To a child from a mummas heart.

And the words chipped away at the lie that I'm meant to be lonely because I have no mum here to run to anymore, and I'm meant to feel lonely because my husband is away.. And I'm supposed to be lonely because I'm too busy to nourish friendships. 

The words tell a story about how a mum knows that her child is always held close in stronger, safer arms than her own. 

That when a mum leaves the room after turning off the lights, she leaves Jesus there. 

Jesus.

Hello shoppers.

Here's the lie that lonely discontent has been revealed as- 

I'm not lonely because He will never leave me lonely.

When mum left to go her eternal home, she turned and saw that I was in the arms of Jesus. Nothing new there. She had always seen me safest in her Saviors arms. 

When Jesus said "I will never leave you. I won't forsake you.", he actually truly meant it. 

The dark lands of loneliness is a place that doesn't  need to be entered, let alone lived in. It's not my dwelling place. 

There's a better dwelling place.

The shadow of his wings. 

Not dark lands. 

But the shadow of his presence.

If you are a lonely discontent heart... Find the shadowed place.

And be surrounded.

And rest easy there. 

two thousand and fourteen

I keep getting a message on my Facebook page. Telling me to look at how awesome my year was..
And random pictures have been somehow collated to give the overview of the year that has been..

for Suzanne Gakowski.

They are lacking though, these pictures.

They lack the reality of extremes that I endured in the last 365 days. 

The year can, in a way, be summed up in a conversation I had with a great friend in the early days of September.
Sheldon was in a hospital bed..horrendously ill.
Cancer was wreaking havoc with us.
And I went on a coffee run. Sitting in the passanger seat, I said with something of a sigh.. "I'm not sure if I can become a motherless child and a widow in the same year..."

This year has been all about extremes.

Feeling intense grief.
Unbearable loss.
Fear.
Faith.
Absolute desperation for a miracle.
Commitment to believing.
Mountains of doubt.

Extremes. 

Those extremes don't last.
The intensities fade.
Intense grief is numbed to an ongoing reminder that she has gone home first. That she glimpsed that wonder and majesty of a heaven clad Jesus and no earthly, daughters love could keep her here. 

The unbearable nature of my loss becomes bearable... Because there is not much option otherwise. You bear it or it beats you.

Fear and faith walk close to each other.
It's what you feed that grows.
Feed your fear, fear will multiply.."what if this... What if that...." There it goes. Fear growing fat.
Feed you faith, faith will strengthen. "Even if this..Even if that..." It is well.

There are moments..
They live deep in my soul.
They moved in to my world this year.
This 2014.

The moment Helen got engaged.
The moment we took mum and dad to Romeo and Juliets for their anniversary dinner.
The moment my twins turned 7.

The moment I sat on a plane, clutching my bible and my sisters hand as we flew with hammering hearts to be by her side.

The moment I knew it was not a matter of if but a matter of when.

The moment that when became now and she left.

The moment I sat my sons on my lap and whispered that Granny wasn't coming home.

The moment I walked into a coffin room, confronted with the choice.

The moment we stood in that church with an ocean of love behind us and cried our grief out.

The moment my eldest son whispered that he would be my strength, and that I needed to remember that a Granny was actually more alive in heaven than she had ever been on earth. 

The moment that Helen walked down the aisle 10 weeks later, resplendent in white and married her love.

The moment that Sheldon rang me, voice hoarse and told me the cancer was killing him... Growing faster than I could believe. 

The moment I saw him in a hospital bed, fading.

The moment he was wheeled away into surgery.

The moment the tumor was removed and I hugged that surgeon tight.

The moments..

This was a year of big moments.

But through it all

Through it all

My eyes are on You.

Through it all

Through it all

It is well.

IT IS WELL.

 2014-   it is well.

Maybe not great at times.

Maybe not happy at times.

Maybe not easy at times.

But it is well.

It is well with my soul.

There is a deep peace that still reigns over each of the moments. 

Where would I be without that peace, that is an anchor in the face of the squalling waves? 

So... I will smile at the stroke of midnight and watch as 2014 is placed in the past. 

I will look at the moments.

I will remember the goodness. 

I will welcome 2015 with wide open arms. 

I will declare that 2015 is a year of peace, hope for some calm sailing, believe that our miracle will continue it's outworking. 

And through it 

IT IS WELL. 

No weapon formed...

Ok.
It's time to say this:
No assignment against
No weapon formed
No flood of woe
Against me and my house will prosper.

These are the words on my lips
Morning
Noon and
Night..

No weapon
Will prosper.

No gain made
By worry and by stress.

Worry is simply deciding that thinking continuously about the current and possible state of affairs is going to do some possible good.
When was the last time worry brought about an answer?
When was the last time worry came hand in hand with peace?
Has worry ever fought the battle of fear and won?

No.
Never.

Worry eats away at faith.
Worry erodes peace.
It steals rest and sleep
It burdens the already weary.

So.. I make a conscious decision each time the hungry dog called worry comes sniffing, with its bloodthirsty fleas called fear clinging to it's back. I decide that worry and fear are best left outside.
I don't feed them my time and my energy.
Instead..
I find these words on my lips:

No weapon
Formed against us
Will prosper..

Memories are made of this..

My house is quiet tonight.
I'm not actually normally awake at this hour, but my heroic husband is in Sydney for a quick high five session with his oncology team (more on that another time)..and I can't seem to find sleep- it has slipped out unannounced. How inconsiderately rude that selfish slumber seems to be.


My sons are sun kissed from being in the pool today and sleep has kindly stayed with them.
I remember that feeling.. being 10 years old and spending the hot scorching summer days in the pool. I would be so water logged, so pruned and wrinkled skinned.


I've been thinking alot about memories today.
Today is one of those line in the sand type days.
Each day since we said goodbye to mum has been tough, but today was 6 months.
And I don't know why, but the marker of time is important.


It tells us to pause..
To recognise that time is actually passing.
That we didn't stop the clock that night.


I noticed that the challenge with memories and moments like today is this: we have to partake in the moments we have lived- while we actively live in the moment we have now, making new memories. (That's ok. read that again...)


I face this challenge each day.
When I water my plants by my front door- plants that mum planted for me- I remember that she despaired of my absolute ability to kill all things green. I remember the joy that her garden gave her. And as I'm standing there, probably drowning my plants, possibly killing them with kindness, I look up and watch my sons speed up and down the sidewalk on their bikes.

I live in the beauty of all those past moments I spent with my mother while I actively file away a moment I am in right now...
Because one day, when my sons have grown up and are living their grown up lives, I will see a kid zooming around on an orange bike. I'll hear the no-holds-barred laughter of a happy 7 year old. And my mind will call to attention the moment that I watched my sons ride around our street, while I watered my plants and thought of my mum.

Here's what I have learnt in the tragedy of loss:
Don't live in the past with no regard for the moments you have right now.


What is in front of me each day that is worthy of being a moment I will remember for the days to come?
I didn't know it then, but the time I sat with mum in a cafe at a beach in Redcliffe would be a morning that I relive and hold onto for it's preciousness... the last time it was just me and her. Just two BFF's chatting about life and kids and.. well.. we actually just talked normal stuff. But that normal stuff is the stuff that precious is now made of.


Don't shrug off the opportunity to do the normal stuff with someone you love.
Don't rush through the mundane, waiting for the excitement. Memories are made up of those mundane minutes.
Don't wish that a baby would grow up, or a toddler would learn how to look after themselves.
They do.
And then you reach back into the recess of your memories to see that brand new, 6 pound bundle. You close your eyes to recall the giggle of a toddler who was being tickled.


If you know anything of our journey, you'll know that 7 weeks ago we were staring down the prognosis of mere months for my husband.
He was in a bad place.
We had lost mum only months before and I couldn't reconcile the titles that were swirling around my brain- how could I handle being a motherless child and a widow in the space of months if Sheldon was to succumb to the cancer?
Well, he didn't and I don't and this is where I am-
Where we are-
We are living.
One hand is firmly wrapped around the moments that we have known and experienced and lived through, the other is high fiving the moments we have right now.

Memories are made of this...