My longtime friend, Katie, just happened to be speaking this week at Ohio State in Columbus. She lives in North Dakota, so the fact that she was 77 miles away when I got the diagnosis was a true gift from God.
She met me at my house right after the MRI. I had just finished showing her around my home and we was about to take her uptown for lunch when my phone rang. While Katie quietly played outside with my dog– she said she was out there praying– I was inside talking to my doctor.
The preliminary results of the MRI showed that there is for sure cancer in the smaller spot in my left breast but maybe not in the larger spot. The written results we got later indicate that the cancer is wider spread in that breast than we initially thought, but I’m glad I didn’t know that at the time.
Katie gave me a big hug and we headed downtown. We started talking about other things, because as much as she wanted to be here to console me, I just wanted to find out what was happening in her life.
When we got to the restaurant, I realized that my stomach was not going to cooperate with food, so I had a smoothie and we sat outside and talked.
I asked Katie all about her consulting business and her speaking gigs and her kids. She wasn’t her normal upbeat self, and I ended up calling her out on it.
“Are you okay? Is everything going okay in your life? You just don’t seem happy.”
And then she reminded me that her friend had just been diagnosed with cancer.
Oh yeah, I kind of forgot about that.
Gosh was it good to have her around.