A lot of life.
A lot of death.
A lot of coming & going.
A lot of stripping & reidentifying.
Before & After.
The then and the now.
Then I got the call.
January 27, 2014, at 3:14 p.m. I got a call from an unknown number, which I do not normally answer, but I did this one. It was my doctor’s office.
A growth.
A mass.
A tumor.
Large, not small… not medium. A very large growth on what he felt looked like was on my nasopharynx.
A single moment like this for anyone has monumental effects of the human heart and mind. Some things in this life just permeate.
You cannot fully comprehend the impact a few short words will have until you are in that exact moment. Even then and even now, it still echoes.
This tumor has been identified within me now for ten years. Ten years of growth, honing in on relearning identity, grieving, persevering, and overcoming.
Never once did I want to be defined by an illness or a disease. I never wanted a label placed on my shoulder for what I have or the cards I have been dealt. From the early days of finding out, I knew God had given me a choice to press on and through or to sit and draw back. And I believe, to the best of my ability, I have pressed on and through.
We are not defined by our circumstances.
We are not defined by what others say.
We are not defined by praise.
We simply are the identity that deconstructs us down to our bones of who Christ has molded us to be.
This journey has been wild. So many ups and downs, but the one consistent has been the surroundings of people who have prayed, encouraged, supported, and have been a rhythmic pattern of community that has just so deeply impacted me.
I have witnessed so much loss over the past ten years, but I have equally received an immense amount of gain. Establishing roots, formulating boundaries, and then at the root, knowing who I am (and continuing to understand this) in Christ in such a way that goes beyond anything I have learned.
April 2026 Update:
I have been on this journey. Twelve years of navigating hard, raw moments. At times, silent with feelings of not being seen. This is not said for pity, but to simply acknowledge the real emotions of navigating a brain tumor. Not cancerous, but a silent disease that at times has tried to steal me. Yearly appointments, scans, bloodwork, quiet symptoms, navigating appeals, being my biggest advocate, believing for what is the truth, and asking the hard questions… it is as if my body has been trapped and unable to be set free. I have been told no matter what I do, my body will not be able to look a certain way or feel a certain way. I have been told never more times than one can count. And for someone who sees the positive and the good, those words can feel like a weighted vest. So many moments crying out with full-on tears that are so vulnerable it hurts.
The grip that grief has had a hold on is no longer.
Yes, grief is very real and still is present.
But the weight of what it holds is dismantled.
As a Gray Nation Endurance® athlete, I ran 13.1 miles in the 2026 Walt Disney World Half Marathon. And what became of that is the most valuable thing I could receive from this experience. It became a gift of the full release of no longer being held by what was.
It is not lost to me what being a part of a community means. It surrounds us. Sometimes, it even feels like family. You create these connections with unknown faces that soon become concrete memories.
I had just turned the corner on the last half mile, and there was one of my Gray Nation Endurance teammates. They, too, were running and surviving. It was the moment where she said I’ll run with you to the end that gave me a little extra confidence to finish strong and to keep on keeping on.
And then another teammate found me in the corral. It was her first half marathon. She was younger. I was older. We both had stories. And we ran together… the first four miles. We weaved through individuals, stopped for photos together, and took in every moment. She ran for her brother. I ran for me and them.
This wasn’t just about a race. It was never for accolades or the dollar amount raised. It was for me. And it was for them. It was for her brother. It was for my friend’s fiancé. It was for another friend’s cousin. It was for my patients that I care for in the ICU, who were fighting for their lives. It was for my teammate who recently lost her mom. It was for those whose brain tumor diagnosis was and is a silent disease. It was for my dad, who fought a victorious cancer battle for a little over six months before his time on planet earth was done. It was for the survivors, the caregivers, the thrivers, the downers, and for those who felt as if his or her voice was lost to the diagnosis.
It truly became so much more than going an extra mile. It was perseverance. It was passion. It was advocacy. It was more of saying yes, I can. It was release. And it was healing.
I crossed that half-marathon finish line, celebrating twelve years of survivorship from a brain tumor that started out the size of a lemon and tried every way to defeat me. But loss, lost. I became victorious. And the Gray Nation Endurance Team helped be a part of that by allowing me to share my story… because our stories are not meant for us. They are meant for others. They are meant to be shared. And every single one of them has a message. And mine speaks from a volume of hope, freedom, grief, loss, determination, and resiliency.
