Summer's Exodus

For those of you who know me, know that I am fighting a battle everyday and sometimes my life feels like a war zone. For those of you who don't know me, now you will know. I have Cystic Fibrosis. Cystic Fibrosis (CF) is a genetic lung disease that affects the lungs and the digestive system. I was one of the rare people that only had the disease affect my lungs. Every day my life is filled with breathing treatments, physical therapy and literally what sometimes feels like an uphill fight. I am hospitalized several times a year to fight off infections in my lungs. There is no cure. One day I will have to have a lung transplant. I like to consider myself very normal and I try to do as much as I can on my own. I do not like asking others for help.
I am extremely active and I have a beautiful healthy eight year old daughter that is a complete blessing from God. However in an instant, just from catching something as simple as the flu my life could turn upside down. I am leading a TEAM in a walk to cure Cystic Fibrosis in Huntsville, May 2nd, at 9am. The walk is GREAT STRIDES.
My team is called Summer's Exodus. The choosing for my team name was so difficult for me. As a writer I pride myself in making my words dance however this was a true struggle for me. I wanted a name with some Biblical strength behind it. After considering many names, none of which I am going to mention here to save myself from the embarrassment, Summer's Exodus took me. The definition of the word Exodus is as follows:
1. a journey by a large group to escape from a hostile environment
2. the second book of the Old Testament: tells of the departure of the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt led by Moses; God gave them the Ten Commandments and the rest of Mosaic law on Mount Sinai during the Exodus
It is so perfect because that is exactly what we are going to do!!! We are going to walk out of the depths of this disease into a brighter tomorrow!!!!
I live an almost normal life and I consider myself to be one of the lucky ones. God has blessed me already in ways that are unmeasurable. In ways I am sure that I am not worthy of.
Today I come to you. I am reaching out through this virtual world of static, past a survey, or myspace graphic into something much deeper. Life. This is my life....and I need your help.
You can click on the link below to go to my website and learn more about what the GREAT STRIDES walk. You can also make donations and join my team. You too can walk along side of me on May 2nd. The walk to me is a protest. A protest that I will demand nothing but the best. That I will not let an evil rob me of what is mine. That I will stand and be a miracle in God's work and I will be here as His tool, to only glorify His Great Divine.
I take these myspace surveys all the time. A question that comes up quite often on them is "What is your greatest fear?" My greatest fear is so horrible that I can never bring myself to type the words. It stays lodge in my throat, and runs down into the pit of my stomach. It aches at every part of my being. I have never shared that fear until now.


That fear is leaving my daughter. That fear is her standing on stage to receiver her diploma and her mother not be there. That fear is those college years so sweet yet confusing and her mother not being a phone call away. That fear is the happiest day of her life arriving and her mother is not there to help pick out the cake, the dress, the flowers. That fear is those sweet grandchildren of mine that need nothing more than to be spoiled rotten yet their grandmother will have no chocolate for breakfast to feed them, for their grandmother will not be there. That fear is not dying. That I can do. It is leaving Peyton in this big world to fend for herself that absolutely puts me into almost a throw of insanity. One day I hope to go when I am old, and wrinkled, and used. The way we are supposed to go. When I have lived so much that there is no more life for me to take. When God calls me home in the natural order of things. But going now. Going when my daughter is 8, 15, or 21, when she will need me the most is absolutely agonizing to even think.
Today I need your help. I like to believe that we are all interlinked. We are all good. We are all love.
Visit my website today and please join me as I become a beacon for God's light. No breath is ever easy, yet no breath is ever a struggle. Walk with me, not just on May 2nd, but walk beside me in this beautiful gift and help me fight.



Summer Welch is taking strides to make "CF" stand for "Cure Found!" Visit Summer's GREAT STRIDES Home Page at http://www.cff.org/great_strides/SummerWelch! NOTE: If link looks broken, cut and paste ENTIRE link into address bar. If you are presented with a "Find A Walker" page, enter Summer's first and last name and click on "Find Walker." Then click "View Walker" in the results list to go to "Summer Welch's GREAT STRIDES Home Page."