I’m holding a fund raiser in honor of my mom with all proceeds going to the American Cancer Society. It’s located at http://tale.heartwhispers.com/momfund/index.htm.

My mom was a wonderful, but a stubborn, woman. Around October 2007, she got this awful cough. We badgered until she went to the doctor. Now, I like this doctor, but he let’s his patients diagnose themselves too often. Mom came home with antibiotics both times. She told him that she felt she had bronchitis. After the second round of meds didn’t work, we made her ask for a chest x-ray. Well, several x-rays and MRIs later, she was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer after Thanksgiving.

She was very positive and so was I. I didn’t know at the time she was already at stage 4.

She began chemo on December 15. By January, she was really sick. Her left lung was filling with fluid over and over again, she developed blood clots in her legs and right lung and she spent all but 3 days of January in the cancer ward at Monongalia General Hospital. She couldn’t have been in a more caring and loving place.

In late February/early March, we were told the chemo wasn’t working. The oncologist told us there was a pill we could try, but the side effects were horrible. Dad and I had questions, but he couldn’t ask the most important one, so I did. I asked at this stage will it really help or should we let nature take it’s course? He was very honest. He said she may get a few more months, but they’d be hell. He said he’d let nature take it’s course if it was his mother.

We made the hardest decision ever and mom passed away, at home, in her sleep on April 24, 2008.

It took me a long time to write this because it hurts so much. My birthday is October 17, my first without my best friend, my hero, my Mama. If writing this can convince even one person to quit smoking, that’d be the best gift ever.

When? Everyone keeps telling me it’ll get easier, and I know they mean well, but I want to know when? Tuesday will be two months and it just seems to get harder. Dad thinks I’m keeping too much inside, and maybe I am, but there’s only a few people I can talk to and they are hurting as bad as I am.

I know this blog is here for this very reason. I wanted to talk about Mama and her life and I guess that includes her sickness and death. Instead of letting it sit here, maybe I should use it. It will be good to have a place to remember good and bad times. And to grieve without worrying about making someone else sad.

Today was a hard day. We finally got Mom’s ashes and laid her to rest. I didn’t think I could get through it. All that was left of my Mom was her ashes in a marble box. Dad asked me to tell her goodbye. I couldn’t. I said them in my head, but my voice wouldn’t work. I don’t know how to say it. She was my mom, best friend and everything else that was good.

This site is dedicated to the most amazing woman I know, my mom. I was making it as a journal celebrating her life as well as the daily trails and joys of caring for someone with terminal lung cancer. Mom lost her battle last Thursday, April 24, 2008 before I finished this blog. I decided to finish it because I still want to celebrate her, tell our tale and try to deal with this huge emptiness I feel.

Never forget to tell those you love how you feel. It could be your last chance.

Loreen (Lori) Lee Uphold Hurley
April 13, 1949 – April 24, 2008