This weekend found us celebrating Peyton’s 5th birthday.
Each milestone is still amazing to me.
I know there is still fear in my heart that each birthday that passes could be her last.
I celebrate a little harder.
I want to make her big day a little shinier.
I feel this need to make sure that if it should ever be that this WAS her last birthday we made the most of it.
I’ve been praying that I’ll stop facing each holiday and birthday with that frame of mind. I don’t think it’s right and I feel the deepest bit desperate.
I just can’t help but think of my dear friends whose son should have been celebrating his birthday this weekend as well. His cake should have had six sparkling candles to commemorate the day.
But so fast, too fast, he was gone.
I know the very real possibility exists that although Peyton is doing so well, feeling healthy and energetic, cancer could creep back into our lives. Steal her away from us. I’ve watched it happen time after time.
Perhaps it’s not a bad thing that I hold so tightly to my kids…I want them to experience everything fully and feel completely loved. I suppose that more than most, we’re incredibly aware of the frailty of life and we are blessed to have NOW. We aren’t promised tomorrow and I don’t ever want to regret that we haven’t done the most with what we have.
That whole “live like you were dying” thing? Poetic in song, a little crazy in real life.
You can also find me at Hope4Peyton, The Mayhew Review and Twitter, you should come by, it’s nice…we have cookies! Feel free to email me at Anissa.Mayhew (at) gmail (dot )com.