Doreen McGettigan

Articles

What do you do when your friend or loved one has cancer?

So many of you have been praying, sending healing thoughts for and asking me what you can possibly do to help my friend Joelle and her family.

I often wondered why our God gives some of us heavier crosses to bare than he gives others’. Joelle is one such person. She has lost loved ones to violence and illnesses. Refusing to allow herself to be stuck in sorrow, she continued to be supportive and to stand by her friends, family, church, community and even complete strangers.

In the twenty-seven+ year’s I have known Joelle I cannot remember one day when she was not full of life, driven, focused, loving and filled with hope and faith. I have never seen her unable to provide a smile.

Seventeen-months –ago Joelle went in for a routine procedure and woke to the news that she had cancer. She had a mean, ugly and very aggressive form of cancer. She smiled through months of chemo and radiation. She endured a radical life altering surgery. She is now going through another round of chemo. Through all of this, my sweet friend is still smiling. Joelle has not once stopped not only walking through this fire, but walking through this fire with the grace of an angel.

She calls to see how I am doing because I had a little dental surgery. She worries about leaving her boss with work undone. She manages to put her own pain aside to provide emotional support for her husband who himself is working in a battle zone in order to provide for his family as well as Joelle’s treatments.

Our friend Tina has graciously given of her time and put her life in Philadelphia on hold to be in North Carolina to care for Joelle, the children, the fur babies and the house. She worked tirelessly in the garage and even got chiggers (one of my greatest fears.)

I have not done much. I have driven Tina back and forth, tried to do some fun things with the kids and prayed constantly. I could not figure out what else to do. Then I got this idea:

Joelle’s husband Nat who is in Afghanistan wrote his first book not too long ago. I hope he is working on another one if he has any down time over there because his first book is very good. My idea is to get everyone I can to buy Nat’s e-book, and to ask all who buy the book to pass on the request to everyone they know, to buy the book as well. If enough of us buy this book, I have no doubt we can move mountains of debt, and provide a blanket of security for this deserving family.

I believe in miracles…

About the book: Gavin Richardson is a family man in his late thirties with a wife, Samantha, and two young boys. He wakes up one day and wonders, “what the hell happened”. Gavin is a finance executive at Whole World Telecom in Atlanta, Georgia, and is growing cynical about corporate America. Gavin is pushed to the limit when he is forced to eliminate fifty jobs for executive benefit only. The false security of a winning lottery ticket combined with the arrogance of his boss, Roger Bernadino, leads him to behavior far beyond his moral boundaries. When Samantha confronts Gavin with the reality of what he is becoming, it threatens the foundation of their marriage. Gavin’s older brother Joey, a successful restaurateur, shares Samantha’s fears for tragically different reasons. Joey’s drug addiction led to the death of his six-year-old daughter, Natalie. Gavin’s Christian upbringing is his only tether to reality. Samantha and Joey can feel Gavin slipping through their fingers and heading down a destructive path. The material and spiritual world battle for Gavin’s soul. Throughout this struggle Gavin has recurring dreams about Natalie, his mother, a man he does not recognize, a desk and two chairs, and fireflies that lead him to a surprise revelation that will forever change the footprints he leaves on our world.

To order the book:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007PS8U9I/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_K4dEsb1REKX05