wow, katie. i can hardly find the words to comment on this article and your whole story. i too have a sister who i have that best friend/sister bond with. for those of us lucky enough to have it, we know it's just about the closest relationship a woman can share with another. i'd be lost without her. i talk to her and hear her in my head throughout the day----i know what she'd think about things, or what she'd tell me to do. not to mention the hours we burn up on the phone and all the fun we have when we're together.
when she got cancer last year, i convinced her to come here and get her treatment at M.D. Anderson. only the best for her, i said. she was here, away from her husband, her home, her sons and her grandchildren for 7 months. nobody else could ever understand what that was like. it was our journey and ours alone. the thing is, she said she wouldn't have it any other way. if anyone was going to be in charge of her care, she wouldn't want it to be anyone but me. so i get the sister thing, which gives me SOME understanding how horrible it had to be to lose your sister, especially the way you did. my heart aches for you.
as a rape survivor, i really wanted to help others. i felt it would be good for me, and good for them. i helped 2 women---one was a patient of my husband's who had been raped in her home, with her children present. her rapist was never caught. she was so traumatized, she couldn't even remember what he looked like, and her children remembered some things, but not enough to narrow it down. the other woman was sent to me via a friend, and i listened to her story and went to court with her when her rapist was tried and convicted. she broke my heart---a nurse like me, who was attacked in the parking garage when she arrived at work.
but i found going through this with them brought it all back for me---the 6 hours i spent in a locked taxi with my rapist, the threat of death, at one point i decided death was preferable to spending another minute with him, and then i saw my salvation-----a car with 2 men who stopped to ask if he needed assistance (he was parked in the grass at a park where there were no people in sight, and these guys were going to the archery range behind it), and i escaped with their help to safety. but i was never the same. you never are, no matter how many years go by.
i decided i either wasn't ready to be an advocate or that it was just something i wasn't cut out for. it just drained me so much that i felt physically sick. maybe it's a weakness but whatever it is, i've had to accept that it's the way i am, and i can't force myself to be something else.
so i admire you beyond what words can convey for what you do. i'm sure you mean so much to the people you've touched and you probably don't even know it. but you sure have a fan here. i just want to send love and good things your way---from me to you. i would love to BE you but i'll settle for knowing you, a little, on this boards. ((((((big strong hugs to you)))))
Wakey wakey! lol
