Why I Hope

Where does hope come from? When facing something as scary as life with a disease like cystic fibrosis, how do we keep the hope alive? And when reading all the statistics describing the scary realities of the disease, doesn’t it sometimes seem easiest to give up on hope altogether? But most of us don’t give up. We hold onto hope. Why?

Recently, my husband and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary. We were definitely ready to celebrate making it through our first year of marriage. It was our hardest year so far. It was also our best year so far. During that year we had some periods where we went through some pretty rough patches. There were moments when we lost hope.

Experiencing those times without hope made me more certain that hope is essential. I spend a lot of time reading up on new treatments for CF. When reading those studies, I frequently come across reminders of just how serious the disease is. But I have to hold onto hope, focusing on the progress that comes through, instead of letting fear hold me back.

I clearly remember the day that fear first caught hold of me. It was a sunny summer day and I was visiting the guy I’d been dating at college before we both graduated and moved to opposite ends of the country. We tried breaking it off because of the distance, but it didn’t last. Instead we ended up talking all the time and eventually visiting each other. We were sitting by a lake on a Sunday afternoon after one of those visits. I was basking in the sunshine and the warm glow of this excited feeling that there was something real there between us, that maybe we didn’t have to break things off, and that maybe I had finally found my special someone. He was sitting quietly next to me, and then suddenly said he had to tell me something. I was taken aback by how serious he sounded. “Sounds serious,” I said hesitantly. He told me that it was serious. A thought flickered through my head - what if he was sick? Like seriously sick? But I dismissed it with the naive thought that those things don’t happen to people I know. Then he told me he had a disease called cystic fibrosis.

That moment changed everything in my life. I had breezed through it pretty easily without any major problems: I had a happy childhood, got through my teenage years without too much angst, had a great time in college while maintaining good grades. My friends and family were healthy and happy as well. I hadn’t found love in the romantic sense yet, but I was hoping I would soon, and this guy seemed like he had potential. But suddenly he also had CF. He told me what it meant: lung problems, digestive problems, reproductive problems, shortened life span. It was a lot to process. I tried not to cry but a few tears escaped. He told me not to worry, that he was fine, for now anyway.

That night, before I left, I asked him about our relationship, and if he wanted to try making it an official long distance thing. I had never wanted to do a long distance relationship. And I had never anticipated a complication like the one I had just learned. I was pretty terrified by the whole situation. But somehow I was more scared of losing him. So I chose hope. I decided to risk the pain of long distance dating, and risk dealing with the health issues that were ahead of us, because deep down I knew I had found someone special.

I have never regretted that decision I made on that night. Looking back over the time we had dating each other, and especially the past year of marriage, I’m just more certain I made the right choice by choosing hope. The choice has let me experience so much joy. The past year as I said was our hardest year. But it was also our best year so far. We find happiness in each other every day.

I don’t know what’s in our future. I don’t know where we’ll be in 5, 10, 15, 20 years. Maybe we’ll have a brood of kids and our lives will be jam-packed every minute of every day filled with rambunctious laughter and yelling and energy. Maybe it will be just the two of us, alternating between travels to exotic places and quiet evenings in reading a book and enjoying each other’s presence. I do know what I want out of life: laughter and love and friendship and fond memories and knowing I made a difference, somehow, to someone. I already know that by having my husband in my life, I can achieve those things, because I’ve already experienced them during this first year with him. I can’t wait to experience more of the same in the years ahead of us.

Please never forget all the possibilities that we have in life. That is why I hope, so that I never forget those possibilities. We should remember those possibilities every day. I hope, so that I can most enjoy the laughter and love and friendship we experience every day.

I cannot live
I can’t breathe
unless you do this with me
and here we go, life’s waiting to begin.
~”the adventure”, angels & airwaves