Twenty- two years ago, on Tuesday May 7^th, I suffered a massive brain bleed.  My two daughters, Audrey and Amy, who were born on May 2^nd and May 20^th, were just 1 and 3 years old at the time. Mothers’ Day was on May 12^th that year and my brain surgery took place the following day.  I came home on Audrey’s birthday with 76 stitches in my head. I had bargained that I would live long enough to see them stand on their own two feet and have a college degree.

Last Thursday, on the 23^rd birthday of my youngest, I traveled to Virginia to attend her graduation from James Madison University. Her sister was there and after moving Amy out of her apartment, we drove to Duke University where Audrey will graduate on Mothers’ Day with a second degree as a labor and delivery nurse. To honor my anniversary and reflect on my surviving, I read them the paragraph from my book that described my homecoming:

“Standing there in the driveway with my three-year-old wrapped around my legs and my one-year-old safely in my arms, I felt as good as I ever could. It didn’t matter that I was in pain. I didn’t matter that the world was spinning around me. I just wanted to comfort them, reassure them, that I was OK. I wanted to let them know that Mom was here, ready to protect them and to teach them how to protect themselves”

 This would prove to be both my strength and weakness. To prove to my girls that I was capable of surviving anything, I would forgo a chance to be vulnerable, to ask for help when I needed it…”

They are adults now and I don’t know how many life lessons I can still teach, but this one seems worth sharing:

“Asking for help and opening yourself up to accepting it is crucial to surviving a lifetime”