All Notes in the Middle
Browse the full collection of reflections, prayers, cancer and survivorship stories, practical care, and everyday hope.
We can be responsible without carrying every outcome. Sometimes surrender means doing what is ours to do and trusting God with everything we cannot control.
I've been a good girl most of my life. I follow the rules, like getting things right, and thought I could approach chronic illness the same way. Fifteen years of living with lymphedema has taught me otherwise—and somewhere along the way, my boring compression sleeves even turned into tattoos.
When someone we love is diagnosed with cancer, we want to help, but knowing what to say or do isn't always easy. As Breast Cancer Awareness Month comes to an end, I'm sharing what my own experience taught me about supporting someone through cancer, remembering the caregivers, and why the need for compassion continues long after treatment ends.
For nearly 18 years, I found reasons not to write the book that had been on my heart. Then one young mother’s cancer diagnosis changed something in me. I opened my hands, said yes to God, and began taking one uncertain step at a time.
It is easy to spend today carrying problems that have not happened yet. This reflection is a reminder that God gives us grace for the day we are actually living—and we can trust Him with what comes next.
I thought treatment would cost me a year of my life, and then I would get my old life back. I did not know survivorship would become its own season.
Rest has never come naturally to me. I am much better at pushing through. But I’m learning that slowing down is not failure, and sometimes receiving the rest God gives is one of the most faithful things we can do.
Sometimes faith does not look brave. Sometimes it sounds like, “God, I’m scared. Please stay close.” You do not have to perform courage for God.
Nobody warned me that cancer might make me angry. Not just scared or sad, but angry at what changed, what was lost, and how unfair it all felt.
Waiting can make one day feel like a hundred. When answers are slow and our minds race ahead, God reminds us that we do not have to carry the entire journey today.
When someone you love hears the words “you have cancer,” it can be hard to know what to do. These practical, thoughtful ideas can help you show up without adding pressure.
Cancer can make vulnerability feel very physical — hospital gowns, scars, needing help, losing privacy, and learning to live in a body that may suddenly feel unfamiliar. You are not weak for struggling with that.
Cancer can be deeply lonely, even when you are loved and supported. Sometimes the hardest part is realizing that no one else can completely know what it feels like to live inside your body, your fear, and your uncertainty.
Cancer can make you angry—at your body, the timing, the losses, the people who do not understand, and sometimes even at God. Anger is not proof that you are handling cancer badly. It is a human response to something hard and unfair.
Cancer can bring grief long before anyone talks about loss. You may grieve your body, your plans, your routines, your confidence, or the version of life you thought you were living. That grief is real.
Cancer can make life feel impossibly full—appointments, paperwork, decisions, medications, questions, and emotions all arriving at once. If you feel overwhelmed, it does not mean you are handling cancer badly. It means you are carrying a lot.
Cancer can make fear loud—especially in the waiting, the uncertainty, and the quiet hours when your mind runs ahead. Fear does not mean you are failing at faith or handling cancer badly. It means you are human.
It is easy to believe God is good when life feels settled. The harder work is trusting His goodness when plans change, answers are unclear, or the future feels uncertain. A reflection and prayer for noticing God’s presence in the middle.
Cancer can bring emotions no treatment plan prepares you for. Fear, grief, overwhelm, anger, loneliness, and vulnerability are not signs that you are handling cancer badly. They are part of being human.
Sometimes hope looks profound. And sometimes it looks like a five-year-old labeling a feeding tube “French fries and Pepsi.” A story about illness, cancer, laughter, and the small ordinary things that help soften hard days.
What happens when life hands you one more hard thing and you find yourself wondering, What am I doing wrong? A Monday spent unexpectedly in the ER reminded me that another difficult season doesn't necessarily mean we've failed. Sometimes we're simply being refined—and God is still meeting us right in the middle.
Fear has a way of getting loud enough that we temporarily forget what we know about God. Sometimes faith means remembering His faithfulness ourselves—and sometimes it means letting someone we trust remind us.
Sometimes faith doesn’t look bold or certain. Sometimes it’s simply asking God for enough grace to make it through the night. A reflection on small faith, long nights, and trusting that morning is still coming.
When life feels uncertain, the instinct to fix, control, and protect can get loud. A reflection and prayer for asking God for wisdom about what is ours to do—and grace to release what is not.
Cancer emotions do not arrive in a neat, predictable order. Here’s why Faces of Cancer is organized around the emotions we carry rather than a series of stages we are expected to complete.
Hope Lives Now grew from my own experience with cancer—and the realization that while there was a plan for treating my body, the emotional, practical, and spiritual parts of the journey were often overlooked. This is a place for those facing cancer, living beyond treatment, and walking beside someone they love.
A few weekends ago, both of my grandchildren landed in the penalty box. Watching them serve their time and skate right back into the game made me wonder where I've been playing it too safe—and what it costs us when we're so afraid of getting something wrong that we stop sounding like ourselves.
There are phone calls you remember for what was said — and phone calls you remember because your life split into before and after the moment you hung up.
By my fifth hospital admission, the nurses knew how much I missed my flower gardens. Since fresh flowers were not allowed, they made me a bouquet out of hospital gloves. That ridiculous, thoughtful bouquet reminded me that whimsy does not erase what is hard—it simply refuses to let the hard be the only thing in the room.
After years of cancer, surgeries and unexpected returns to the couch, I am finally learning that rest is not failure—and my worth was never measured by how much I could do.