six.one

Some times in our lives
we have all have pain
we all have sorrow…….

Leaning is something I do well somedays and others I can’t do at all. There are a select few I can talk to. Others I can barely answer the phone for. But even the ones I find myself confiding in, occasionally get pushed away. Sometimes those are the ones that are the hardest because when I know I can confide, it scares me. Some days opening it up is just too much.

I’m sure being my friend right now isn’t easy. Texts go unanswered phone calls end abruptly and visits tend to get cancelled. But all in all they still let me lean. And to those I lean on most I thank you.

When I look back on this journey, I remember days. I recall the cancer day, the stage four day, the hospital day, the last day…. But there are twenty four hours that have a different type of remembrance linked to them.

First Chad came home and the next day Dustin came home.

The timing was due to nothing more than airline schedules but the sequence in which they came set the pace for the entire ordeal.

I have no certainty that this next pact exists except that I know my cousins and I know it exists. I’m am certain. The pact that Dustin and Derek would be there for Dana and Chad. And they were.

Dust became the Robin to Chad’s Batman. They drove my mom to every appointment and as Chad took care of her at every chance Dustin took care of Chad.

He was with him every night. Whether it be WII bowling, movies or just talking the two were inseparable. He understood what it was to be a friend. His cousin lost his mom. He never needed it explained or even spoke about, he just was there.

When we began sleeping at the hospital both Dustin and Derek slept with us. They lay on the floor cold and sleepy, but they were there.

The night she died, the night my world stopped turning and my heart was shattered my strength was found in a young man. The same kid that was always teamed up with me in backyard football and the same teenager that couldn’t pick out a shirt without me.

Derek took his hands placed them on my shoulders and said to me “ I need you to know that you will never ever, not for a second have to go through this alone”

In that moment I had no idea what to do. Should I hug him? Should I cry? I was overwhelmed with his empathy and his strength. I was so proud of him and yet had no strength of my own to tell him so.

He was the first person I told. He sleeps with me three nights a week. It goes without saying that he is my rock. He is what keeps me going, LITERALLY. It may be a simple Pixar movie or a text in the middle of the day, but it is Derek Frank that has shown me his heart through the thickest of thick and the thinnest of thin.

He's seen me cry too many times. He understands what she was to me. He understands that I can't move on. He gets that I can't sleep and he excepts my anger. His compassion and capacity for empathy astounds me. I once text him from the other side of the table to tell him I was sad and when I saw him read it, I saw his entire body hunch down. Not only has this amazing being lost his aunt, he is in such pain because his mom and his cousins are in such pain. And yet he will rise about and let us lean. We he looked up at me from that table his eyes said to me

LEAN ON ME
WHEN YOU’RE NOT STRONG
AND I’LL BE YOUR FRIEND
I’LL HELP YOU CARRY ON