- The people you surround yourself with are a direct reflection of you.
- Your intuition is usually right, stop doubting yourself.
- It’s possible to make a life worth living after grief destroys yours.
- #3 is an excruciatingly painful realization.
- People will talk all day but their actions define their true character.
- Sometimes you have to meet people where they are, and sometimes you have to walk away. The wisdom is in knowing the difference.
- Addiction is insidious.
- Asking for help is a sign of strength, not weakness.
- You would probably benefit from therapy. We all would.
- Not a whole lot of good happens on social media.
- There’s always hope; you can always change.
Category: Uncategorized
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2025’s lessons
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to everything there is a season
it all passes eventually. five years from now, the very moment you’re existing in will most likely have faded into oblivion, wherever memories go to be archived when they aren’t needed.
you know, the mundane things of life: what you did at your job today, what you’re having for dinner, the fight you had with your partner. in the grand scheme of things, none of this matters.
but right now, right here, it matters at this moment. i’m committing to making my moments more meaningful, even if they’re inaccessible to me years from now. because i will remember the joy, if not the specific circumstances.
and i want to remember the joy. all of it.
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Walt Whitman Said It Better Than I Ever Could
These are the strange in-between days,
a fever dream I can’t escape,
the unsettling quiet after the war.
But is it after or is it before?
Stuck in purgatory in this place.
All I ever wanted was more.
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“I am loved, I am not a disappointment.”
This text was from 2022 just before I checked myself into detox for alcohol. She made me cry. She took all the best parts of me with her when she died, but I’m determined to get them back. That’s what she would want for me.
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Man. Ya hit your mid-30s and the aging process really revs up its ass kicking, huh?
8 years between these two photos – 27 vs 35
Brb, off to inquire about Botox and just how many units one face can stand, slather myself in sunscreen despite it being 10pm at night, then guzzle a gallon of water before my 12-hour beauty rest.
February 12th, 2017 
May 10th, 2025
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Brain Cancer? More Like Lame Cancer
the month of May starts a week from today and with it, a plethora of emotions: ranging from hope to despair, joy to mourning, and a gamut of unidentifiable stuff smushed all in the middle.
it’s the month my daughter, the silly sweet sassy light of my life, turns two.
it’s brain tumor awareness month,
it’s the month my Mema died of glioblastoma.
for some reason, it’s NOT the month with glioblastoma awareness day; that’s in July. as if people weren’t already oblivious to its dangers, they chose a whole-ass different month from brain cancer awareness.
i promised my Mema i’d never use the “f-word” again on Facebook, so i’m physically unable to type it anywhere, especially under my government name. if I had her permission though – boy would i be swearing up a storm. i truly understand now, more than most, why people say ‘f*** cancer.’
we all know it’s bad. we all know it’s painful for both the patients and their loved ones, even if we’ve never experienced either side personally.
glioblastoma is a snowball of terminal cancer and dementia all mixed up, gaining speed, rolling down a hill. then it knocks you on your ass for daring to believe it might spare your loved one.
it won’t, and it didn’t.
my sweet Mema. my precious grandmother.
she left this earth May 15th, 2024, just 14 months post-diagnosis. in that time period, she underwent one craniotomy (on her 81st birthday!) and countless rounds of radiation and chemo. eventually, they told us what we’d been holding our breath for several months prior: the treatment had stopped working.
the only option as far as fighting it was another craniotomy. but the first one almost killed her and she was tired. oh, the exhaustion. she wanted to go home and see her mama, she said. and her husband. her siblings that had passed before her, too. she was ready, what part of her still remained untouched by GBM’s foul tentacles.
may 15th, after three months on hospice: the day she left the body she’d occupied for 82 years, surrounded by loved ones that have felt her absence every second since.
those fourteen months after diagnosis were shiny and bright and tear-filled and horrific. they were heart wrenching and beautiful and tragic. they were full of sweet fleeting moments of happiness and long, drawn out days of misery.
glioblastoma is aggressive. it is cruel. and i can say with my entire being, it’s one heartless son of a bitch.
it’s a death sentence, and nobody understands because so many cancers are treatable, with decent quality of life and extended years of happiness.
so you try your best not to rip their heads off when you get suggestions like healthier eating or, god forbid, snake oil cures. you grit your teeth when you hear things like “god has a plan,” or “i’ll pray for her to go into remission.”
what stings the most are the innocent, well-meaning but all too hurtful questions like “how’s she doing,” “what can we do for you” or the dreaded “but how are YOU?”
the kinds of questions you get, and answer, over and over and over again, the same way each time.
because they don’t understand. they can’t, not really.
brain cancer is not a normal cancer. treatments that send other cancers into remission don’t work on brain tumors because the blood-brain barrier is designed very intelligently and is very good at what it does.
it’s also much rarer than, say, breast cancer. because of its rarity it doesn’t receive as much attention, and don’t even get me started on funding.
SO, FUNDING, now brain cancer (GBM specifically) will receive less funding than the minuscule amounts usually raised (compared to other cancers). the Department of Defense quietly slashed GBM from its annual research funding for FY25 after introducing it just a year prior: a $10 million blip really, hardly even a line item in 2024. gone again in 2025.
that blip could’ve saved lives.
but hey, let’s all raise brain cancer awareness next month and maybe someday it’ll get breast cancer level recognition. by the way, breast cancer is one of the most treatable and well-known cancers.
perhaps, in a far off future, maybe it’ll receive even 10% of the $130 million breast cancer will receive in research program funding this year.
maybe.
sources
2025 CDMRP Funded Research Programs
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the kind of person I’d like to be
I don’t know what my values are. I don’t know what I want out of life anymore. I don’t have any goals at the moment per se. I don’t even have a to-do list for tomorrow. But I I know that I would like to be the kind of person that um has um a filing system at a home.
Yeah. I would like all of my important documents and paperwork and stuff to be in a central location at my house that is static and I would like for the organization to make sense. I would like to be the kind of person that goes to a room to declutter or clean and doesn’t just make a mess out of cleaning before getting frustrated and shutting the door behind her as she exits.
Yeah.
I’m the kind of person that goes to clean or organize and declutter, and just makes a bigger mess. Yeah, that’s my brain. I try to sort things out and I just make it messy. So I’d like to be the kind of person that has a filing system at home, and I’d like to be the kind of person that keeps up with it – not only keeps up with that, but thinks about it on their own, like, wake up in morning like, “uh oh – “
“well, darnivvy, I forgot to water the the hoses outside and it’s gonna be freezing overnight and they’re gonna be out in the cold.”
I wanna just think of that stuff on my own, you know? The boring adult stuff that you’re supposed to do, nobody really wants to, but you do it because you’re an adult. I want to be the kind of adult that instinctively just is an adult.
I want to be the kind of person that people can come to for reassurance. I want to be the kind of person that knows what to say when someone they love is hurting. I want to be the kind of person that cares and that’s empathetic and not just you know, pretend empathetic, and fake.
I don’t wanna be fake, but I am fake.
Because my every thing that I do, every action, every interaction, every response, I have mapped out in my head what I think it’s gonna go like. When it comes to other people, I am so concerned with whether they like me – well, I don’t even actually really need them to like me, although I’ll tell you all day long I just need to be liked. I don’t actually care.
What I really need is to be perceived as a person who is likable. Why is that? My couple remaining brain cells can deduce that I need people to perceive me that way because I don’t, in fact, see myself as someone that people find joyful to be around.
And I’m gonna be honest, I am not a joyful spirit anymore. There’s a glimpse every now and then, usually when I have been off of all substances, at least 72 hours plus minimum. Um, I want to be a joyous spirit. I want to be like my grandma, man. Be a joyful song. Right now, it’s like a generic beat uploaded to SoundCloud, with some dude you went to high school with mumbling over it. And then he posts it to his Facebook, like, “hey y’all, don’t forget to go check out my music.” That’s the kind of song I am. I’m a SoundCloud song I’m not even a song — I’m a SoundCloud rap. Yup. Maybe I’m the SoundCloud rapper.
This is why nobody likes me. At least if I were funny, that would cancel out a lot of my inherently bad aspects and at least make them a little there would be one thing that would make people want to be around me occasionally.
So that’s the kind of person I want to be. I want to be the kind of person that doesn’t allow myself to remain in the situations that I put myself in. I want to be the kind of person who claws her way out of the poor decisions and bad judgment and terrible utter abysmal failures of coping mechanisms. I want to be the girl that dragged herself to detox three years ago. I couldn’t even walk, man, but I got in the building, couldn’t sign my own name on the admissions paperwork because I couldn’t stop puking and sweating and crying and, I don’t know, making these weird moaning noises for some reason, cause I thought I was about to die.
But you know what? I wanna be that pukey sweating crisis of a person because that crisis did what needed to be done to come out of crisis mode and this crisis – this is just chosen chaos at this point. It’s not even comfort.
Talk about a tangent, wow. I think the kind of person I’d like to be is resilient. I’d like to be resilient and honest and sure of myself.
I wanna be the kind of person that doesn’t have to talk to herself because she feels like nobody else is listening. I wanna be the kind of person that doesn’t talk to herself constantly just as some sort of reassurance that she’s still there. I want to be that kind of person. I want to be the kind of person that is sure of myself even if I go three weeks without saying a word, and I want to be the kind of person that can go three weeks without saying a word because in my head isn’t such a bad place to be for that amount of time.
I want to be the kind of person that can be alone with her thoughts. Who can go to bed at a reasonable hour, instead of staying up for no reason other than the fear of self-reflection in the dark. Because that time is the loneliest time for me.
I wanna be the kind of person that doesn’t use the voice memo app on her phone to pretend that she’s doing any sort of self-reflection in an attempt at growth in the way of actually doing any work. I can record a voice memo every day of the week with my faults and moral failings and toxic traits and all that, but what good is that gonna do me? It’s not gonna fundamentally change who I am. It’s not going to push me to actually take the actions and do the tiny little things I need to do to make changes.
I’m not the kind of person I want to be and I wanna start trying to get there. I wanna try. I want to give it everything I have and I know it’s not much, but I I hope that it’ll be enough. I may not have all that I used to have, but what I do have I will throw at this with all of my mind.
All of it
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shut up, GPS, i’m talking
Well, Mema, it’s almost Christmas. It’s, uh, oh gosh, it’s less than a week away, actually.
Today is Thursday and Monday is Christmas Eve, Tuesday is Christmas.
Stella, stop shaking your juice box upside down, honey.
Well there have been some changes since you’ve been gone. um Stella and I are currently in the car on the way to her 18 month and doctor via church check up appointment and also just a follow up on her ears a lot of ear infections more she started daycare back in February the-
“two lanes to take exit 153B on the left to merge onto I 30 west toward Little Rock.”
-and the first dycare we enrolled her in was like right by the house. It was so convenient. But that was pretty much the only good thing about it. Um, it was $200 a week. They didn’t have any
“left“
cameras or anything for us to check in on. Um, after the tour which
“in about 5 miles, keep right toward Hot Springs,”
you know, wasn’t much of a tour really, and wasn’t that impressive, we weren’t even allowed in the building or we had to drop her off at the front door. And we had to ring a buzzer for them to bring her out, but it was close and it was the only place that we could get her in.
I wish I could have talked to you about all of this then, but, um, you know, you weren’t you so much by that point.
You sure did love to see her though still. You always loved to see her, no matter how you felt or what was going on. I know that because the last thing you said, the only thing you said in the days before you died, was- you had been asleep for about two days, I think, um, but uh, you woke up the day before you died or.. or maybe two days before.
I’m sorry, I can’t think now. Um, you woke up- there were a bunch of us in the room. A lot of people that love you and that you loved but you only had eyes for one person.
Um my mom or your other daughter, uh, one of them was standing beside me and you looked at them and um, I don’t know if you didn’t recognize them or what, but you didn’t say anything.
And there I was holding Stella, um, at the foot of your bed and-
Stella, stop shaking your juice box all over your jeans, baby!
But you didn’t, you didn’t look at me. You just looked straight to her,
“Stay in the left two lanes and”
you looked at her and you were clear. You were so clear, you were recognizing, you said to Stella, ‘hey baby.’
And that was it, you looked up at me from her and you.. you didn’t see me.
“In two miles, keep right toward Hot Springs”
Your eyes had that that, I guess, near death look, uh, you, you looked through me. You weren’t seeing anything. Um, but you saw Stella. And then you went right back to sleep.
And, uh, you never woke up again.
But um, I just say all that, but to illustrate, not that I need to, just how special she was to you and how special you were and still are and continue to become to her. You’re, uh, you’re still her GiGi. She, uh, we’ve been showing her some pictures and stuff of you lately and um, um.. sh-, she started pointing at you and pictures and saying, GiGi. I wish that you could see it, she’s doing so much. Um, it’s oh,
“the right two lanes to keep right toward hot springs.”
but uh anyways. Let’s see. Um, she’s talking, she was delayed, but she meets with the developmental therapist and also a speech therapist once a week for free at her new daycare. It’s in Sherwood and
“2 miles take exit 128 toward Mapelvale West Rd., and Outer Creek Road”
They do activities, all kinds of fun stuff. The teachers are great. And it’s cheaper. Anyway, uh so—
Don’t, don’t you get over, you truck!
But yeah so anyways a lot going on this year and I’m gonna be honest with you, Mema, cause I know that you would have something to say that I just needed to hear, but ever since you died..
I have no idea.
I have not moved on.
I mean, I don’t think I’ll ever move on. I’m gonna miss you every single second of my life for the rest of my life. Uh, I haven’t progressed in life. My life came to a standstill when yours ended. I’m not really proud of that, but I just haven’t been able to help it. Um. I’ve been so depressed and I wish you were here to just tell me to do whatever to make me happy and you would support me through the sadness that I was feeling and just let me sit in your lap, in the recliner, just you and me. I remember telling you not too long before you died, I wish I could just climb up there with you in that awful hospital bed that you hated, and hold you in my lap when you didn’t feel good, um and you- sorry, yeah, I have..
just haven’t found work yet. I’ve had a lot of health stuff going on. I’m still sober, haven’t touched a drop of alcohol, but I’ve been making poor choices regardless: you would be disappointed, but more so you would be concerned about me and just want me to get better because you always believed in me and my ability to get better. You always believed in the good part of me. And when you died, I feel like my ability to believe in that part did too.
Anyways, what a long convoluted Christmas update. So anyway, happier time.
Yeah, so we just got the tree up. Today is the 19 December and we just got the tree up last week I think it had said undecorated until like a couple nights ago when we finally started and I just can’t I can’t put myself in in the Christmas spirit this year and it’s because you’re not here, you know, I I feel like you, like ‘no we don’t need to put the tree up yet. It’s too early. It’s too early.’
‘OK, you can put it up but you have to take it down’ and then I’d say ‘okay Mema I’ll be here on this day’ and I’d be there and not a tree in sight, only your voice saying ‘well I got tired of looking at it so I just went ahead.’
You always just did when needed to be done no matter what. And I am trying now to do what I need to for me. I started-
“In 2 miles take exit 128 toward Maplevale West Rd. and Otter Creek Road”
..therapist specializes in grief trauma and addiction seasoning and I think she’s really gonna help me, um, just start living again because I know that’s what you would want me to do. You would just, like, have some things to say about mom and I..how we’ve been and we were both very sad, still. We both have a lot of anger, not at you at all, but we have a lot of resentment and a lot of things but never you. Anyways, um, it’s not gonna be quite the same this year. We uh we’re doing some things different, we think that you would like that. We think that’s actually what you would want us to do, just for this year and then we’ll kind of get back on track next year, I hope, but some things are still staying the same. Um. Anyways, um.. I, uh, took some pictures. Stella’s walking now. She’s always
“use the right lane to take exit 128 toward Mabelville West Road and Outer Creek Road“
She’s walking. She is a mess. She’s a wild little girl, and you would just love her so much. And um anyways, I’m uh, these pictures, there’s a
“take the exit”
uh, Stella, and she’s awed by the tree. She says “pretty!” every time we turn its lights on in the morning
“in about one mile, turn right”
and um, you know, um we don’t have our Christmas selfie just yet. I imagine we will take one, but I just keep thinking of the ones we took with you and Granddad and me and mom, all four of us, the gang,
And well, I I keep looking at the picture of you and Stella from last Christmas too, and I just wish you could be at this one. Your stocking will be there, and, and- but your chair will be empty. And uh it doesn’t mean you’ll be forgotten. You will never be forgotten. Um, we love you so much and that will never change. Um, just, uh, just wish you could be here for this one. I love you so much and I hope there is something after and I hope that the place you are is everything you wanted and I hope that Granddad is there with you.
I too am not a bit tamed—I too am untranslatable 