The Hardest Year of My Life

It’s January 2026, and — I’m Coming Up for Air

I am putting the finishing touches on my book, The Dawn of Me, so I can send it off to my publisher in just a few days. This baby has been 5 years in the making, including the year I lovingly refer to as “The hardest year of my life” AKA 2025. I’m especially proud of myself for taking this big step because it’s been very challenging to get back to it.

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I’ve been working on resurfacing in my life for a few months now. It feels like I’ve been in a swirling vortex of shitty circumstances for so long that it’s taken me a while to get my feet back under me. I can honestly say I spent most of 2025 in survival mode, barely making it week to week, sometimes day to day. But somehow, I managed to shuffle from one crisis to the next without completely losing my mind.

Here’s the past year in a nutshell.

In December of 2025 my husband Bill, at the age of 46, was diagnosed with stage 3C colorectal cancer. It was a complete shock as he’s very healthy otherwise. That same week my best friend Heather, at the age of 43, received news that she may have breast cancer. Two weeks later my dad, who lived with us, began having complications with his heart, my husband started his chemotherapy treatments, and my dear BFF was formally diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer. In March, Heather tragically lost her husband Brian who was got caught in an avalanche while skiing — our daughters were both 11 at the time. Three weeks later my daughter Hayden and I watched a dramatic scene unfold as my dad, who was starting to feel much better, coded (lost his heartbeat) at a dermatology appointment. I somehow mustered the courage in the moment to advocate for his wishes and told the medics not to resuscitate him. Hayden bravely stood right by my side, comforting me through the event. Incredibly, his heartbeat returned a minute later, and that was the beginning of his hospice journey. Heather had her double mastectomy in the beginning of May. At the end of July, I had the honor of being by my dad’s side for three weeks until he passed on July 25th. He passed at 1AM and at 3PM that same day my daughter and I joined Heather and a few friends for a round of golf to celebrate Brian’s first birthday (and my dad’s first hours) in heaven. Yep, my dad passed on Brian’s birthday. One week later, on August 4th, my husband had surgery for his cancer.

Then we started putting the pieces of our lives back together.

Looking back on all we lived in less than a year is almost shocking to me. It still took Bill a couple of months to get back on his feet due to complications from his surgery and he continues to feel the effects of all he’s been through, though he truly has handled it so very well, honestly, we all have!

I’m not sharing all this in hopes of receiving pity. I’m sharing because I want to give it all a place to live that is outside of my psyche and outside of my body. I’m writing to extricate this traumatic year from my present and gently place it in a shadow box on some shelf in the past. I’ll keep the lessons learned, the strengths gained, the relationships deepened, and of course a few scars, but to be frank — last year can eat a dick.

OH wait, somewhere in all that madness we got a grief puppy who 9 months later still refuses to be potty trained! We figured with all the storms we were weathering, our family, and particularly our daughter, could use a little ray of sunshine. Albeit a ray of sunshine that poops more than any dog I’ve ever known, and mostly in the house. Nonetheless, Nugget truly has been a bright spot in our lives. Nugget is the Chiweenie pictured in this post, AKA Captain Underbite.

I have another motivation for sharing my awful year with you.

I want to share what kept me going.

I was on a call with one of my dearest friends right in the middle of all of this, and she said she honestly didn’t know how I hadn’t offed myself yet (sorry if that’s tender language for you). But truly, it was a lot. And perhaps you’ve gone through or are going through just as much, or more even. Here’s what got me through.

1. I just kept putting one foot in front of the other.
   I couldn’t think too far in advance, or it all seemed impossible. Sometimes I could only think about the next day or two, sometimes I could just get through the next hour or two.

2. Sometimes it WAS impossible.
   I did what I could, I asked for help, and I had/have grace for myself.

   There was one particularly difficult Friday I really could not do it all.

   Thursday was the day we lost Brian, I spent the night with Heather to be there with her as she awoke hourly to her nightmare, Bill had chemo that morning, and my dad was struggling to walk and was unable to get up and make himself breakfast. I was literally needed in 3 places at one exact time. Not to mention my daughter had to have her lunch made and get to school, thankfully Bill was able to do that before his treatment. Bill’s mom was on her way to pick up Bill and take him to chemo — she got in a car accident. Thankfully she was OK, but you’ve gotta love the proverbial icing on the cake.

   Do you see what I mean? That moment in time was impossible. I COULD NOT DO IT ALL. Even with help it felt like more than I could handle both emotionally and physically. I just did what I could, and tried not to let the weight of everything take me out.

   A friend came to be with Heather that morning and as I walked into my house my mother-in-law Vivian greeted me at the top of the stairs. I hugged her and collapsed in her arms sobbing just repeating “it’s too much, it’s too much” so many times I thought I’d never stop. As I took each next step, making Papa eggs and toast, getting in the shower, driving to the treatment center, sitting with Bill, getting him home and settled, going back to Heather’s for the night, I accepted that I was doing all that I could and that had to be enough.

3. I raised my frequency.
   I would lay in bed and send rainbow light to Bill’s tumor, which by the way was almost completely gone when he had surgery. Was it the rainbow light or the chemo? It doesn’t really matter. I would send loving energy to all my people, including myself. I’d go for walks. I expressed love and gratitude for what I still had, either in prayer, in my mind or out loud. And I tried to always be kind even when I was wholly depleted because the truth is, we all were. And when I could, I took care of myself with simple things like drinking water and eating a good meal.

4. I rested.
   Sometimes I would sit on the couch staring at nothing for an hour or more. I took up a hobby of knitting winter hats, so I could sit and do basically something while I was doing nothing. I’d take a bath, sometimes for 3 hours. I allowed myself time for nothing in whatever gaps I could find it.

5. I shared.
   I talked to friends when I was struggling. It helped so much.

6. I received.
   Several friends showed up with meals, always at the perfect time. Some sent cards and gifts, toys for Hayden and beautiful lotions for me and generous gift cards to Door Dash. It feels weird to let people give you so much, but it was so incredibly supportive. It changed the way I feel about receiving. It was so helpful and I’ll never forget the abundance of kindness and support we received.

   One friend even got the Pope to pray for Bill’s butthole, talk about above and beyond!

7. I’m still recovering, and I accept that.
   Yep, I still have days where I can hardly muster the energy to do the dishes. I try not to be too hard on myself on those days. I want to emerge stronger and braver, but some days I just want to crawl back into a hole and ignore life. And that’s ok!

8. I honor my journey.
   By continuing to find our “new normal”. By continuing to explore the things I love. By being a little more present and a little less task oriented. By writing. By loving. By being honest about where I’m at. By realizing life is a gift and living as such.

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If you’re in the midst of or recovering from your hardest year, I hope this helps remind you that you can do it. Just keep moving, just keep putting one foot in front of the other. I hope you find people to support you, it makes all the difference! If you ever need someone to listen, reach out.

With Love,
Gina