What Henry did.....

The world is watching the Olympic heroes this week; in awe of their motivation, their stamina and their sheer gutsiness to succeed in life and in their chosen field.

I’m with them, watching from a distance and being inspired by their determination. I know they are heroes and inspiration to the masses – but to me I have two other people who I chose to watch in awe and call my own heroes of the week/month/year.

Mani and Henry are two people who are categorically leading different lives, yet are connected by one single horrific word - Cancer. But this is not a tale of morbid sympathy. Not at all, this is a blog about how amazing these two people are in light of the dreaded C word.

The first is a young woman called Mani. I know her because her little boy is good friends with my son. Our boys go to school together, play rugby on Sundays mornings together, they get up to mischief, giggle and exchange stories of computer games and other “boy” things. They are normal energetic, lovely ten year old Australian boys. But enough about them.

Mani is an amazingly interesting woman. I’ve known her for a number of years through our sons connection and have always admired her energy to bring up her son alone after his father passed away. I have never heard a complaint or negative comment from Mani. Ever! I know that she just gets by but is always smiling and finding a new positive angle to view life. She has put so many things on hold in order to provide for her son and she does an amazing job. She’s intelligent, caring, funny and extremely dedicated. I have watched her hold conversations with people from every walk of life – her demeanour never changes from person to person. She treats everyone with dignity and respect.

Mani was diagnosed earlier this year with an aggressive form of ovarian cancer, one of the major killers of Australian women today. I still remember the phone call when she told me, I was absolutely speechless - what do you say to that? Here was a woman who had never asked for help, had done it on her own for a long time (and she has done a bloody good job), had remained upbeat in the face of atrocious circumstances and was now looking down the barrel of the unknown. Her greatest fear at that time was losing the battle and her son becoming an orphan at ten. I’m tensing just writing this. She was calm and stoic when telling me about her situation, but I could tell as a mother she was outright petrified. Its hard not to project in these situations, all I could think of was how I would handle this. I don’t think I could have held it together, and I really don't know how Mani did it.

The past 5 months have been incredible for Mani and her son. She has undergone emergency surgery to remove the cancer and then weekly/fortnightly chemo sessions which left her bed ridden and often with her head inside a bucket. She lost her gorgeous hair. She lost her independence. And all through this, I never heard her complain once. Her son has been there with her all along, keeping her buoyant and positive and giving her a reason to fight the C word. Every Sunday morning in the freezing cold Winter mornings, Mani was one of the first mothers at Rugby cheering on the team. And still not complaining.

The harsh reality of her situation, Mani was forced to give up her job and rely on a small amount from the government. Of course she has a wonderful family who are helping her out with emotional support, but financially she is way behind the eight ball.

This brings me to the other amazing person who is my new hero - Henry.

Henry is another one of my sons friends, a beautiful ten year old boy who shares the same love of Minecraft as my little guy does. He is just a lovely gentle soul who is always smiling and my son absolutely adores him, for good reason.

Henry decided to make a website for Mani to raise money for her and her son because they need it. Let me repeat the amazing part here – Henry is 10 years old!

You can view Henrys wonderful work here: http://helpingmani.webs.com/

Henrys mum sent an email this morning to her network of friends (she too is another lovely beautiful person) – and this motivated me to send the word to the wider community.

If you can spare a few dollars to help out a little family in need, please visit Henrys website that he made for Mani and click on the donate button. The funds raised will go directly to Mani (and yes I trust this unquestionably).

This email about what Henry did for Mani has restored my faith in humanity, and especially the next generation of people.

Both Mani and Henry are so worthy of hero status, just like the Olympians.

Dear Zoe, A Letter to the Universe....

Dear Zoe,

Happy Birthday to a beautiful little seven year old.

This morning I’m heading off to buy you a birthday present, I have something very special in mind that I know you will absolutely love, and I’ll take so much pleasure in getting this for you. But this is just a “thing”. I feel compelled to give you something more of “me” as your gift - perhaps a letter to the universe telling you how I feel about you and how proud I am that you are here celebrating life and that I am partly responsible for this.

I am not your mother, I did not give birth to you. I am not even an Aunt to you, yet because of me you are here and my heart sings with pride and love for you. Right now you have no idea about my involvement in your “being”, because at seven years old it would confuse the hell out of you, and probably even scare you a little bit. One day you will be told about the  extraordinary lengths your parents went to just so that they could have you in their lives, but not just yet.

When the time comes, you will be told that I helped your mum and dad become parents. There is no age appropriate way to put this without being incredibly sterile and harsh - so I’ll just put it out there. I gave your Mum and Dad my eggs. There I said it, but I’ll let them explain ‘eggs’ to you.

I watched with excitement as your mums tummy grew bigger and bigger and finally after all those months - you were born. Along with the births of my babies, the day you came into the world ranks as one of the proudest days of my life.

I love that your parents have let my family be a part of your family. I love our weekly ‘family’ dinners and celebrating special events with you. Mainly I just love watching you grow into such a beautiful, kind and funny little person.

So today on your seventh birthday, I write a letter to the universe wishing you a very Happy Birthday. I know the universe will respond by sending you extra special wishes.

Loads of Love,

Lisa xx

RIP Hevilift Victims.

As I read today about the Hevilift crash in Papua New Guinea, it brings back the raw and painful memories of my own experience in 2010. 

I am trying to remain my normal positive upbeat self, but the flashbacks of the images weigh my heart, as does the sadness of the families who I know are now suffering a significant loss. I know from trauma counselling that these thoughts are not helpful, so today I have tried to distract myself with exercise, cooking, cleaning the house, watching a movie and chatting on my beloved twitter. The thoughts and images are there today because of the recent crash and there is no escape. I have written about this before and its very likely will write about it again because it has been the single most life-changer for me; raw, emotional, painful but also something that has allowed me a second chance to appreciate my life and do something wonderful with it. So I am throwing my words out to the universe.

The thoughts. 

I can still see the body bags, contorted shapes in thick black plastic of my colleagues. Laying deathly still on orange plastic basket stretchers as they are lifted out of the rescue plane. Gone. Dead. No longer here but in spirit. My breath is gone as they emerge covered in tropical flowers. Women around me are singing mourning songs of the Highlanders and holding me. I remember catching my breath again as I sobbed, using my pink silk scarf from Cambodia as a tissue. Tasting the salt of my tears. Feeling the heaviness in my chest and ribs. Reviewing the hangar space around me, I see some of the ugly people who have been unhelpful in my efforts of orchestrating the retrieval of the bodies. The local government departments who wanted to photograph the charred remains. The high commissioner with a huge ego who disrespected the deaths by putting her ego ahead anything else. The media who somehow bribed their way into the hangar despite my efforts of keeping them at bay. The security men I had contracted to ensure some privacy. And finally the four ground ambulances I had arranged to be backed into the hangar to receive each body to take to the morgue for identification. 

I had spent some time at the morgue the days prior with the Australian consulate. It had to be done, and I was the only person to do it. They were unlikely to be able to deal with the identification but would be able to prepare the bodies for international repatriation of mortal remains sufficiently. The morgue was cold, it smelt like formaldehyde and bleach. There were garish plastic flowers, crosses and tiny baby clothes on display. It hurt to look. My local colleague waited outside because he feared coming in with me. Most of my visits inside the morgue I spent alone. I hated every minute. I hated having to arrange this. I hated that I had to arrange this by myself. I hated speaking to the mortician who had seen too much death in her young years to show any kind of empathy. I hated it - the whole lot. 

At night I would go back to my hotel room alone. I tried to stay as long as possible at the office to avoid being by myself but there came a time in my day when I had to go back and maintain a routine before a global conference call with the crisis management team. I drank a lot of coffee. I made a lot of phone calls. I watched a lot of TV. I wrote a lot of emails. Anything to keep me from thinking about it. 

A few days later I found myself at the airport flying back to Australia. A memory of myself in the business class lounge with a glass of wine talking to someone. Then boarding my plane, taking my seat and looking at the view. Thats when I realised I was about to fly. I cried, I felt so alone. 

The "incident" was with me 24/7 for months. I wore the same pair of diamond earrings every day incase I was on a bus that crashed and they needed to identify me. My colleague was wearing a gold Orthoodx cross which I had cleaned up in case his wife wanted it. She wanted him buried with it and I arranged it. I stopped thinking about it every day after a while, and then I only thought about it on a Tuesday. (It happened on a Tuesday). And now, eighteen months later I hardly ever think about it unless I see a news report of another plane or helicopter crash in Papua New Guinea. 

So that was then and now I have to focus on the positives. I have learnt a lot from the experience. 

I didn't die in a plane crash in Papua New Guinea. I did a brilliantly professional job of managing the repatriation of the remains, of project managing the disaster victim identification and getting them home to their families for an honourable burial. I did an amazing job of keeping it all together.  

I came home to my beautiful family. I am grateful every day for this luxury and I don't stress about the little things anymore because they just don't matter. 

The memory of that time is still very painful and when I hear of another crash in PNG it breaks my heart. Putting it in words is healing. 

To the Hevilift victims, may you all rest in peace.