A Love Letter To The Life I’m Building

For years, I equated “living well” with having it all figured out. I chased plans, perfection, and self-reliance. If I stayed ahead, worked hard, and didn’t ask for help, I believed I could outmaneuver life’s chaos. I thought living well meant carrying the weight of everything—career, family, identity—on my own shoulders. Then life stepped in to teach me otherwise.

Every time I thought I had it all together, life gently—or sometimes brutally—reminded me that I didn’t. That’s when I began to understand: living well isn’t about control. It’s about surrender.

I didn’t come to this realization through quiet reflection on a mountaintop. I came to it in the messy middle—motherhood, chronic uncertainty, and a diagnosis that changed everything.

THE AWAKENING

On May 1st, 2024, I found out that my cancer had returned— in the exact same spot it had been before. Nine days later, I learned it had metastasized to my bones. I was grounded from flying, the career I’d built over thirteen years, and thrust into a reality I didn’t choose. At first, I spiraled. I had done everything “right.” A double mastectomy. No evidence of disease. No chemotherapy or radiation because doctors believed surgery had removed it all. We never did a PET scan—insurance didn’t deem it necessary. Then I thought about my last flight—April 26th. I didn’t know it would be my final one. I had no idea that within weeks, I’d be saying goodbye to a dream I had worked toward my entire adult life. But here’s the thing: this diagnosis wasn’t the end. It was the beginning of something else. A quiet but urgent call to rise. To stop shrinking. To stop apologizing. To stop pretending I had to be someone I wasn’t. It was the start of my awakening.

REDEFINING SUCCESS

For so long, success looked like titles, hours in the cockpit, and ticking off boxes. I was a pilot, an assistant chief pilot. I had climbed. I had achieved. I had arrived. And then, everything changed. Now, success looks different. It’s slower. Softer. It’s found in how I show up—not just for others, but for myself. Success today is raising kind, curious children. It’s laughing with my wife after a hard day. It’s writing words that help someone else feel less alone. It’s creating something meaningful with the time I have, however long that may be. It’s not about pretending everything’s okay. It’s about choosing to live fully while I’m here.

WHAT LIVING WELL REALLY MEANS

Living well now means letting people in. I’ve spent most of my life believing I had to carry everything alone. That strength meant silence. That asking for help was weakness. But that’s not living—that’s barely surviving. Living well means choosing grace. On the days I’m fatigued or afraid or just plain done, I let myself feel it. I sit with those feelings. I process them. And then I let them go. It means turning down the volume of everyone else’s advice and tuning in to my own voice. I don’t need everyone to understand my choices. I just need to trust myself enough to make them. Living well means having purpose. Without it, life becomes a loop: wake up, work, care for kids, cook, clean, repeat. We lose ourselves in the grind. But in places where people live the longest—the Blue Zones— purpose is at the heart of their longevity. They wake up each day knowing why they’re here. So do I.

A LOVE LETTER TO MY LIFE

If I could write a letter to this life I’m living now, it would go like this: My one sweet life—you’ve been messy, magnificent, and more than I ever expected.

You’ve held pain I didn’t think I could survive.
You’ve carried stories I wasn’t always ready to tell.
And somehow, we’re still here—resilient and real, weaving it all into something beautiful and true.

This new chapter? It’s not about disappearing into grief. It’s about becoming more visible. No longer hiding the parts of me that once felt too heavy or too much.

I embrace it all:
• The survivor.
• The mother.
• The wife.
• The writer.
• The woman with stage IV breast cancer who still chooses joy
• The woman who carries childhood trauma and turns it into connection.
• The woman who pays attention to how the wind moves the trees and how squirrels dart across the yard like they’re late for something important.

Some days, I choose stillness. Some days, I speak loudly—because someone out there needs to know that survival is possible. That softness is strength. That being here, right now, is enough. Living well isn’t about being understood by everyone. It’s about being understood by yourself. And maybe—just maybe—reaching one soul who says, “Me too.”

THE LIFE I’M BUILDING

I don’t know how many years I have left. None of us do. But I do know this: I will not spend them chasing perfection or waiting for certainty. Living well is about being present, being honest, and being here—mess and all. It’s about choosing joy, even when joy is complicated. It’s about showing my children what resilience looks like—not through invincibility, but through vulnerability. Through choosing to keep going. To keep loving. To keep showing up.

Tomorrow’s version of success might look like a hot cup of coffee, a finished page in my manuscript, or a moment of laughter in the chaos. And if that’s not living well, I don’t know what is.