Kelly’s Fight and Faith

 

In this fight against cancer, a battle ground where light and darkness collide, I have been astounded how God has opened doors for T. Teal to be in the right place at the right time. One of those instances was when I met Kelly. We were inexplicably sat next to each other at the nail salon where we exchanged fight stories. Kelly’s story and her nine year fight with Breast Cancer immediately impacted me, and we decided to meet a few weeks later where I explained the ministry of T. Teal and gave her a Cancer Care Pack. We talked about our shared battles with cancer and a host of other things, but one thing that stuck out was how Kelly beamed talking about her daughters. Kelly wanted to arrange pictures of her and her girls, something she knew they would need, and I knew T. Teal could help.

Bethany Bond Photography donated an Empowerment Shoot, and the five of us spent an evening behind Metroplex Nazarene Church, documenting the love and bond between Kelly and her daughters; Emmy (17), and Victoria(12). It would’ve been apparent to anyone there to feel the huge amount of love and frienship shared between them. And there was something so special about witnessing what we knew was the documentation of an eternal love shared between a mother and her children.

There was a lot of laughter, and Kelly surprised her youngest Victoria with the fulfillment of a request she’d frequently asked her mom during her fight, “Mom may I draw on your head?”, Victoria would ask.  The day was finally here, and Kelly was so excited to surprise her youngest with markers and permission to “have at it”.

Kelly maybe didn’t fully realize it but with each smile and picture she displayed her strength and bravery for the most important audience, her girls!  Kelly said before the shoot, “I want to inspire other women to be brave, despite cancer, and despite being bald, because bald is still beautiful, and women don’t think they can do it, but they can, we can.”

I was able to call Kelly Monday morning to tell her how beautiful the final shots were, and told her to pick out her favorites for framing. She was elated, but the conversation quickly turned to the reality of her fight. Pallative care was being called in, and she realized her time was short. Despite the unfairness of the situation we had a powerful discussion about our shared hope in Heaven. Kelly’s faith was refreshing, an eternal perspective, because of simple faith in Christ and his death on the cross.

Kelly embraced her hope in eternity, but her greatest fear was the hurt her daughters and family would experience. My reply, “The faith you’ve had during your fight will never be undone in the mind of your family despite their grief. They will be sad and may have anger at God, but He can take it. Most importantly the faith, strength and courage you’ve maintained throughout your fight will be at the forefront of their minds despite their grief. Faith in a God who understands our suffering first hand through his death on the cross, and who will greet us when we all get to Heaven.” Kelly talked about how much she loved her daughters and family for the rest of our time on the phone, and I promised to remind her beautiful girls, along with a host of family/friends, how much their mother loves them.

24hrs after Kelly and I’s phone conversation she was taken by ambulance to the hospital after falling. I was able to pray over her and her family at Hospice House this morning as she drew close to seeing her savior face to face. Please, #Share4Prayer