My Sister, Yvonne

August, 2006
Some of you know my family well and others not at all. Some of you will receive duplicate emails from several members of our family if you are on all our email lists, so please bear with me if I try to explain things in detail here that you already know. Three weeks ago, my wonderful sister Yvonne told the family that she has metastasized breast cancer, which is life threatening. About 5 years ago, she first found out that she had breast cancer and over the next three years fought it with a mastectomy and chemo. At the end of that time, the PET scan showed no sign of cancer and she had breast reconstructive surgery 2 years ago. This summer Yvonne had reason to be concerned so she had several MRIs, CT scans and a PET scan which show that the cancer is extensive through her upper body skeletal frame: her sternum, rib cage, breasts, neck, spine and an 11 mm spot on her liver. The doctors want to start chemo immediately. He is not willing to give us a prognosis yet. They are waiting for a biopsy to see if they can start chemo next week with a new drug that is more cancer specific if she has the "right" kind of cancer. As you may know if you read any of the statistics, this is deadly serious. Without a miracle, she will die from this. There are exceptions, of course, but it’s rare.

Our family is extremely close but Yvonne is special. She is the angel of our family, always kind, always thinks of others first, lights up a room when she walks in. She’s 1 ½ years older and my best friend. She’s like my twin (the good twin) and my soul mate. I can’t imagine my life without her, nor can anyone in our family, especially her husband and children. We are all devastated.

Yvonne is in a lot of pain that comes and goes in its intensity. She’s sore all the time, but if she coughs, sneezes, hiccups or burps, the pain in her chest is excruciating. She’s terrified of getting a cold or the inevitable vomiting that usually comes with chemo. She’s having a hard time sleeping at night because she can’t sleep on either side for the pain in her shoulder on one side and the pain in her arm & breast on the other side. Lying on her back is uncomfortable because of the pressure in her chest from the cancer. She’s taken to sleeping on her back in bed half the night and in a recliner chair the other half. She can’t easily raise her arms past her shoulders so it’s difficult for her to wash her hair, lift anything, etc. She finds it difficult to drive long distances, put a seat belt on and off, etc. There’s more, but you get the idea. It seems to get worse by the day although at this moment, the pain has subsided some.

I have just come back to Saudi Arabia to finish the last year of my two year teaching contract. Leaving Yvonne at this time was extremely hard. My first reaction to the news was to write the principal and quit immediately, but I didn’t feel that I could leave the school three weeks before school started with no 11th grade English teacher. It’s not like the US where there are hundreds of qualified replacements. I’ve told the administration about my situation and that I’m coming back to teach, but my stay is uncertain and they should be looking for a replacement should I decide I need to leave. Since Yvonne has no prognosis yet (months or years), I have no idea how long I should stay. I will need a great deal of wisdom to know what to do. I do NOT want to come home to her death bed. I want to spend as much time with her as possible.

Yvonne is married (Walt) and has three kids: Miriam (24 and married), Hannah (18) and Megan (16). Megan left about 3 weeks ago to spend the year in the dorms at Faith Academy, the school in the Philippines that we all attended. She seems to be adjusting well and really happy. We didn’t want to drop this bomb on her until my brother Steve & his wife Mayen returned to Manila to be there when Yvonne & Walt called (which just took place). This will also be a tough decision to know when she should come home and pull her out of school and a situation that Yvonne felt was where God wanted her. She has bonded with the dorm girls, with Joel & Betsy Eyestone (for those of you who know them, they have been amazing in welcoming her into their lives), and her dorm parents are the best (Brian actually drove the get-away car when the dorm girls decided to raid the boys dorm). Several years ago, I asked Von & Walt to let me be the guardian of their girls should anything happen to them. I love them dearly, have a great relationship with them, and I am the closest female adult to them, besides their mom. Although they are older now, I know that losing your mother at any age is hard, and teenage years are no exception. I feel like I need to take on that mother role for them if Von dies. Yvonne said this means more to her than anything I could ever do.

I know that there’s a balance between facing reality and hoping for healing and a miracle from God. People die. That’s life, but I am still hoping. The whole family has felt such deep heartache the last three weeks and I have never cried so much. Mom has said that she doesn’t know if she can go on if she loses Von. Please pray for Yvonne and her family, wisdom for me to know what to do, and peace and comfort for all of us.
LuAnne