My friend Meredith

I met Meredith about two months ago when she sat beside me during a chemo infusion and we started chatting. We were about the same age, the youngest in the infusion room most days, and we became fast friends and exchanged phone numbers. She had metastatic breast cancer, stage IV, and had come in to start Taxol treatments after oral chemo had no longer proven effective. 

Since I had already had four or five treatments, she asked me about my experience with it and what she might expect. We both were working with Dr. Curley, who only worked at this clinic on Fridays so we almost always looked for each other on Fridays during appointments. She and I would talk about our families and treatments and laugh about our side effects so that we wouldn’t cry. The nurses used to joke that we needed to be separated because we were always causing trouble with low blood counts or adverse reactions. 

Meredith went in for a blood transfusion last week but never went home. Her oxygen levels were so low that she was taken from the infusion center to the hospital and she was receiving treatments from there for two blood clots in her lungs. I had been texting with her over the weekend to check on her progress but on Thursday, when I went in for some blood tests to prepare for my chemo on Friday, I found out that Meredith died Wednesday night. I was so caught off guard that I just began to cry and cry until my mask needed to be wrung out.  How could that happen so suddenly? How was her husband Mike, and their children? Questions have been running through my mind and I have had a hard time sleeping. 

Meredith and I never talked about death in any of our conversations but I wish I could have shared with her what I know about our eternal existence and what will happen to us when we die. Even with my tears and sadness, I have felt the mercy of a plan for our happiness, set in place by our loving Heavenly Father, that will allow Meredith to learn these truths after death, and live forever with her family if she chooses. Meredith was my example of courage. How I will miss our talks, dear friend. I can’t wait to see you again, with your full head of hair.

"Thanks to Him, each body will be restored to its proper and perfect frame. Thanks to Him, no condition is hopeless. Thanks to Him, brighter days are ahead, both here and hereafter. Real joy awaits each of us--on the other side of sorrow." (Jesus Christ — The Master Healer, President Russell M. Nelson)