I made it. Thank God — I made it.
This year, I will be sitting at the table with a heart that’s fuller than any plate in front of me. 2025 has been a year of highs and lows, hope and fear, pain and healing. And somehow, through everything, I’m still here. That alone is something to be thankful for.
People see me today and don’t always realize what 2024 did to my body. Radiation, chemotherapy, and a radical neck dissection changed me in ways I never expected. The surgery scarred my neck. The radiation hardened that scar. And the cruel truth is that when the radiation machine shuts off, the damage doesn’t stop — it keeps cooking you from the inside. It tightens your skin. It pulls on your muscles. It fires at nerves that were already hanging by threads. It leaves marks you can’t see but feel every single day.
2025 became the year I really felt the aftershocks. My shoulder collapsed. My nerves burned. My throat tightened. My body struggled to do things that used to be automatic. But somehow — even in the middle of that storm — grace showed up. Faith showed up. People showed up.
And that’s what I’m thankful for this Thanksgiving.
I’m thankful for my family and friends, who lifted me up when I could barely lift my own voice. I’m thankful for the prayers, the messages, the quiet moments of encouragement that kept me going on days when I didn’t think I had much left.
I’m thankful for every single person who has stood with me, followed my updates, donated to help me cover living expenses, treatments, infusions, and bills while I wait for disability to finally come through. More than 200 of you have carried me through a chapter I couldn’t handle alone.
Your support didn’t just help me survive — it helped me fight.
So today, on Thanksgiving 2025, I’m grateful for breath, for love, for faith, for healing, and for the people who remind me every day that I’m not walking this journey by myself.
I made it to another Thanksgiving.
And for me… that is everything.
“I will not die but live, and will proclaim what the Lord has done.” — Psalm 118:17