People keep saying I should be writing all “this” down. “This” being the vague euphemistic reference to the fact that my eldest child was diagnosed with leukemia last September.

While I’ve been diligent in semi regular communications about Reid’s health status via a blog created on his behalf, it’s the more personal and in depth that are being called for: the experience of being a family with cancer, how it feels to be a mother dealing with a child’s cancer, and how I’m a woman who’s world has been turned on tilt (by a number of things).

“Why don’t you do it?” Asked one old friend, and I told her that I felt as though I was sparing others by not sharing all the dirty details. It’s my version of “what you don’t know – can’t hurt you, ” and after seeing the people I love hurt so deeply by cancer – why would I want to add to their pain?

Writing the reality feels raw, uncomfortable, too revealing. So why am I here today?

Because I’ve realized that to be revealing may be the most honest way to embrace life.