Erin’s Story

Erin’s Story

by | Oct 26, 2019 | Stories

Erin’s story is one of inspiration and true gratitude.  Erin is a board certified and licensed physician assistant, but Job #1 for her is being a mama to a cancer warrior. She hopes to raise awareness and improve treatment options for pediatric cancer. In the meantime, Erin and her son Jack celebrate and enjoy every day.

“The scan is showing ascites not stool like we initially thought” the pediatric ICU doc said as he sat at his desk looking at the CT scan on his computer screen. Suddenly a diagnosis of constipation became instantaneously more serious. “Ascites?!” I repeated, as my physician assistant brain searched back to medical knowledge I learned years ago in graduate school. “He doesn’t have liver issues, so are you telling me my son has a malignancy? Does my son have cancer?” I demanded. The doctor spun around in his chair and met my eyes, an obvious mix of pure sadness and sympathy, but also wonder at the diagnosis I had formulated in just a few minutes time. At this moment my life was over, I was beyond devastated. At nineteen-years-old I lost my mother to cancer and figured that my turn was over and I had suffered enough in this lifetime. Never in my wildest dreams, or worst nightmares, did I ever consider it even possible that my only child would be diagnosed with cancer. I wish I could say this was the worst moment of my life, but six months later, eight weeks after finishing his treatment “successfully”, I was told my son’s cancer had returned. This time I knew it, but I prayed for any other diagnosis except for this. Even a new and different cancer would be more acceptable versus a relapse. This time the prognosis was far more dismal and something I still can’t seem to wrap my head around.

My son is my only baby. I am divorced and aside from some alternate weekends, I largely raised him by myself. He is my true love and my absolute best friend. When I heard his little heart beating, and when I held him for the first time, the hole in my heart that my mother’s death left me with was instantly filled, patched, and painted over. Being a “mama” is the best privilege I’ve ever been given and helped me become the absolute best version of myself. To look in the mirror and be proud of who is looking back at you is a gift in its self.

Watching your child battle cancer, twice, is a really hard journey. I signed consents to procedures and treatments no mother should ever have to consider, and no child should ever have to endure. Today we both still suffer from anxiety that the cancer will return again, which is more than likely a death sentence. At the same time, everything that happened almost feels like a bad dream that isn’t really real, and maybe didn’t happen at all.

My son is now eight-years-old and ten months post salvage chemo, high dose chemo with stem cell transplant, and radiation therapy. I wake up every day grateful. I get to make him breakfast, get him ready for school, and scramble to get to work at a decent time. After a six-month leave of absence I love going to work now. I love fighting with him over what to wear to school while I try to make myself look acceptable at the same time.

Every moment with my son is a gift. Our day–to-day life is beautiful and I feel grateful to have any interaction with him, regardless of how mundane. Taking care of him and loving him is a privilege and frankly an honor. I was tasked to care for a sick child, and with my education and love of medicine prior to this, I know it was always my destiny.

Every night, once he falls asleep at night, after fighting with me over bedtime first of course, I check on him and pause for minute in complete awe. Every night I wonder how I was lucky enough to be chosen to have him. How despite his poor prognosis, I was allowed to keep him. There is no greater moment than this, no need to look to the future, or wish for anything more. This is a moment, every night that I could live in forever.

 

Butterflies and Gratitude – What’s up with that?

Butterflies and Gratitude – What’s up with that?

by | Jun 30, 2019 | Gratitude

Butterflies have been on my mind lately.  Yup – butterflies.  Yesterday, a friend of mine sent me a short video clip of a really cool looking caterpillar chomping on a leaf in their backyard.  I started thinking about the amazing transformation that little guy will go through over the course of the next several weeks – caterpillar to cocoon to a butterfly.  What the??!?!?  How does a change like that even begin to occur.  I also thought about the migration of monarch butterflies, where each fall, millions of butterflies leave their summer homes in the northeastern U.S. and Canada and travel upwards of 3,000 miles to reach their winter havens in southwestern Mexico.  Again…what the?!?!?!  How do they know where to go every fall?  Heck, I have hard time figuring out how to get someplace in downtown Minneapolis.
 

Anyway, this led me to the concept of the “butterfly effect”.  Maybe you’ve heard of it – they even made a movie about it staring Ashton Kutcher.  Pretty good flick – you should check it out.  The Butterfly Effect is based on a scientific theory that suggests that a single occurrence, no matter how small, can change the course of the universe. The term goes back to the theoretical example of a hurricane’s formation being dependent on whether or not a butterfly had flapped its wings weeks earlier. 

 

C’mon…really?  Something so simple as a butterfly flapping its wings, creating enough change and power in our environment to result in something as powerful as a hurricane?  Really?  But, when you think about it,   the same can be said for our actions. The moments that we show true and genuine gratitude, even the smallest act, can have true power…power to change the world in ways that extend far beyond our imagination and in ways that we may never even see or realize.  Consider the impact of a simple thank you to someone who holds the door for you, a note of thanks to a fellow employee, a phone call to a friend with whom you’ve not spoken with for years simply to tell them that you appreciate them, or even a something as simple as a smile (check out this amazing research by Shawn Achor on the ripple effect of a simple smile – it’s pretty incredible).   These examples remind me of a quote I saw some time ago – “be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about”.  These simple acts of gratitude can be game changers…these are things that can start that ripple…something that costs nothing, but may be priceless for someone else.
 
So many acts of gratitude are incredibly simple, yet, they carry incredible power…the power to (even though it’s cliche) quite literally, change the world.  And even if it’s not some massive world-altering result, those acts can at least be the start of that change just like that butterfly flapping its wings and creating change in our weather patterns.  If you want to see positive change in the world, bring it yourself.  Practice gratitude.  Make it a habit.  Let it become an unconscious behavior and let your acts of gratitude be the spark that ignite a series of change that will continue to evolve and ripple into bigger and bigger change…that can eventually…well…change the world.  
 
Ok…now, back to figuring out how that little caterpillar can actually change into a freakin’ butterfly!!!

How Ferris Bueller Can Help Us With Gratitude

How Ferris Bueller Can Help Us With Gratitude

by | May 4, 2019 | Gratitude

We know science says that expressing gratitude brings with it a ton of benefits.  It increases happiness, improves relationships, increases one’s self-esteem, improves your career – it’s next to impossible to find someone who doesn’t feel that there is a tremendous upside to expressing gratitude.  It takes only minutes a day – perhaps even seconds to practice.  It costs nothing.  Its benefits are endless.  So why do we sometimes struggle with developing a consistent practice of gratitude?  

For me, it stems back to a couple of factors – mindset and speed.  

Mindset: All too often we focus our mind’s energy on all of the negative things that “might” happen, while at the same time, missing out on the positive things that “are” happening.  In my case (and probably others), that mindset seems to be a self-fulfilling prophecy – the negative thoughts tend to feed off of each other quickly and I find myself in a bit of a downward spiral which has, at times, proven difficult to break.  I liken this type of negative-focused mindset to a snowball sitting at the top of a snow-covered hill.  As the snowball starts to roll, eh, no big deal, the snowball isn’t getting too big – I can handle it.  Soon though, that small snowball has grown in size..grown in speed – perhaps to a point where it’s harder to stop and we tend to let our negative mindset feed off itself which has a whole bunch of, well, negative side effects.  

Speed: In the classic words of Ferris Bueller – “Life moves pretty fast.  If you don’t stop and look around once in awhile, you could miss it”.   I love that movie and the quote could not be more true.  Life does move fast and we often find ourselves just trying to keep up at times.  Running out the door in the morning to get to work for that 8:00am meeting.  Scrambling to get home to get your kid to baseball practice.  Quickly walking from meeting to meeting with your head in your phone trying to catch up on emails.  All too soon we realize that another year has come and gone and with that, countless opportunities to notice and appreciate the beauty in our world around us.  

So what can we do?  As David Steindl-Rast says, it might be as simple as the actions we are taught as a child when crossing the street – Stop.  Look.  Go.

STOP:  Ferris Bueller was right – life does move fast.  We do need to try to slow down to recognize the things in our life for which we are grateful – to just suspend and attend to the now, the moment.  Before running out of the house to get to that 8:00am meeting – pause to give yourself an opportunity to notice things that you might take for granted – ,Notice the pictures…knick knacks.  Take a minute to focus on the memories.  Instead of walking to meeting to meeting with your head in your phone checking emails – stop and look up.  Greet your colleagues.  Smile.  Take the opportunity to make a difference in their day.  Be in the moment.

LOOK: Be aware of your surroundings.  Look at the people in your life.  Look at the things in your life.  Notice the good actions of others.  Look at the kids playing at the park.  Keep your eyes open to things that are easy to look past.  Appreciate the little things.  

GO: This is the key piece – act on this appreciation. Thank people in your life that make a difference.  Thank people that make a difference in other people’s lives.  Gratitude can be so much more impactful on those around us if we act on our appreciation.  

So, when I am struggling to be consistent in my practice of gratitude, it’s this simple set of actions that I will return to – Stop…Look…Go. Well, this, and the immortal words of the great philosopher from the 1980’s…Ferris Bueller.

Taking Chance

Taking Chance

by | Apr 14, 2019 | Gratitude, Inspiration

An interesting thing happened to me on a recent business trip. I was working with a client and after a long day I was just hanging out in my room flipping through the channels. I came across an older movie called “Taking Chance” caught my attention.

Taking_Chance

It was about a Marine who was responsible for bringing the remains of a fellow soldier named Chance Phelps to his family in Montana. The journey of these two soldiers was nothing short of inspirational. The obvious inspiration was that Chance gave everything as he protected the country that he loved. But it was the many other things that occurred during their journey back to Montana that really hit me – the reactions, and actions, of complete strangers toward Chance and his escort. The expressions of gratitude displayed by complete strangers was incredibly inspiring.  It was the gate agent that recognized the situation and upgraded the escort to first class. It was baggage handlers that grew solemn and held their caps over their hearts as the coffin was loaded and unloaded from the planes. It was the flight attendant that handed the escort a cross (which he in turn gave to Chance’s family). It was the sight of the escort sleeping in the hangar during a layover so as not to leave Chance’s side. It was the words of encouragement from the pilot – an ex-Marine himself. The happenstance convoy that was created when Chance was being driven to his hometown – a line of cars falling in behind the hearse….not passing, lights on. Each act – overflowing with gratitude – was truly inspirational.It was these simple acts of gratitude by strangers that profoundly impacted the military escort. On his way home after bringing the soldier home to his family, he wrote about his experience over the past few days. When he got home, he sent his story to a few friends, who in turn sent it to more friends. Within days it had taken root on the internet.It’s amazing to think that those people, strangers to the escort, strangers to the fallen soldier, strangers to the situation, took a small moment of their lives to show their gratitude and do something they felt necessary.

Chance's Final Ride
Chance’s Final Ride

Strangers impacting strangers – that’s what it’s all about.  Not only did Chance inspire those along his journey home, but those individuals have inspired a multitude of others – all strangers to one another. Anyway, I’m not sure I had any intent to share this until I got on the plane for my return flight home. I opened up the flight magazine (which I rarely do), flipped through the pages and came across a short article on – guess who – Chance. I guess I saw that as a sign – so, I grabbed my laptop and started writing.

The Spark

The Spark

by | Mar 29, 2019 | Gratitude

So this is it – our first blog post.  I’ve always wanted to start a blog and over the last few months I decided that, well, it’s time.  If for nothing else, I’m hoping this can be therapeutic for me because I have started to wonder if I’m in a bit of a mid-life crisis.  No, I haven’t gone out to buy a fire-red Ferrari (though, how fun would that be), but, I have realized that my life has changed quite a lot over the last few months and with it, lots of deep thinking with probably more questions than answers.   

First, our youngest child decided she was going to do this whole “adulting” thing and headed off to college.  With that, my wife and I quickly entered the next “phase” of life – we became empty nesters (kind of – we still have two dogs that seem to demand our attention every waking moment of the day – we love them anyway).   While the quietness of the house was sometimes deafening, we knew that both of our kids were doing exactly what they should be doing – experiencing life.  As we acclimated to the newness of this phase of our lives, we entered the month of November which proved to be the month that changed my life forever.  On November 15th, my dad – my role model, my mentor, my rock – passed away.  It was crushing and I think myself and the rest of my family has really been trying to find our way without him in our lives.  As I went through the months following his passing, I realized that things were starting to spiral a bit out of control – dealing with my personal grief, worrying about other family members, stressors at work, our kids moving onto their next step in life, uncertainty about the future, and on and on.  It was then that I realized that I needed to take a step back and start looking at life through a different lens – and that lens just happened to be the lens of gratitude.  

Gratitude – it has always been a bit of a nebulous word for me.  One that I really only associated with saying “thank you” when someone did something nice for me.  I always knew that gratitude was important, but, sometimes life seems to happen so fast that it’s easy to take things for granted and to overlook the beauty in our lives.  It wasn’t until I really started to be intentional in the way that I expressed gratitude that I started to gain some clarity.  I have started to see the power of being intentionally grateful for the things around me.  I have noticed and appreciated more things over the last few months than I think I ever have – the beauty of a sunset, the way my dogs love each other and play together, the kindness and generosity of family and friends, the words of encouragement from my wife.  Recognizing and appreciating all of these types of things has been a bit of a life changer for me.  I have found myself to be more at peace, more relaxed, more content, probably easier to live with (you’ll have to ask my wife about that), happier.  It hit me one morning on a trip with my family – I realized that this appreciation and expression of gratitude really has been the “spark” that has ignited change in my life…good change…really good change.   

In fact, it has been the “spark” that has led me to this blog, the Facebook group page and the concept of “The Gratitude Spark” – the spark that can ignite change, awesome change, simply by being intentional in your expression of gratitude (heck, science even says it’s a real thing!  Go figure!).  So I really have no idea where this will all go, but, I’m excited to see where it goes.  And with that,  I’d love to have you join me on the journey – I’d even bet that expressing gratitude in your own way may just be the spark that will ignite some pretty awesome changes in your life too.  Buckle up