We began our adoption process when the wait was estimated at 9 months. Nearly 2 years later, we were still waiting. On a grey November morning I checked the CCAA site and based on our log-in date we had another 6 months to wait. Another Christmas without ...we tried to shrug it off and get on with the day.
A couple hours later the phone rang -- our file was ready! Our daughter would be here!!! We had 7 weeks to get ready to bring our daughter home. Well, 7 weeks minus holiday celebrations and a ski / snowboard trip that we book and prepaid when we were feeling sad about the waiting. In the time we had, I shopped like a maniac. Crib, car seat, clothes, bottles, formula, all of it done in what felt like record speed.
Our trip to the big mountain was amazing. A new snowboard, record snowfalls and no one but us and the locals on the runs. A dream vacation.
At the end of the first day, I took a fall. As I spun through the air, a brain tumour that I was unaware of, shifted, and made itself known.
That night I felt so vertiginous I could barely walk. As the days passed, vertigo and disorientation haunted me. I told only my husband and then, only a watered-down version. With less than 2 weeks before we were scheduled to go to China, the migraines and vertigo got so bad I had to go to the hospital. Enough time to get fixed up before we have to leave, I told myself.
Not quite. A CT found a “mass” at the base of my brain. The mass: meduloblastoma, was brain cancer. My snowboarding fall moved it so that it was preventing fluid from draining from my brain. My only hope was surgery as soon as possible. My insanely talented and dedicated neuro-surgeon explained that there would be no air travel for at least 7 weeks. And the ‘insult’ of surgery would zero my balance and co-ordination centre. Recovery would take 2 years. No travel.
I don’t think I’ve ever been so angry in my life. Unfair. Raw deal. @#$&%!!!
Then I calmed down, and made my husband a deal: I would meet him at the airport if he went to China and brought our little girl home. He said he would and I knew he would. Two and a half weeks later, Tom brought our baby girl home and we shared a teary family hug in the middle of the International Arrivals Terminal.
That snowboarding fall saved my life and my family. Sooner or later the tumour was going to creep its way into my brain matter and then no amount of surgery or radiation would’ve saved me. Luck. Red thread. Destiny. I don’t know, but I’m eternally grateful to whoever or whatever is responsible.
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