Embracing Her Final Wishes: A Mother’s Lasting Legacy

It was a cold December night—the 29th, to be exact—when my mother called with the news. She had cancer. The “big C,” as some call it. In that moment, nothing else mattered. Not the fact that we were in the middle of moving. Not the reality that my husband would soon deploy. Everything else could wait. My mother had just been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

I gathered my family without hesitation, and we headed to her house. There was no time to dwell; we had things to do. My mother, always embracing life, created a bucket list—her “last dying wishes.” Some requests were simple: Graeter’s ice cream, dinner at Applebee’s, and one last visit to see her mother. They weren’t grand or extravagant, but they meant the world to her.

Each time we set out to fulfill one of her wishes, she would chuckle with a lightness that defied the weight of her diagnosis. She wasn’t focused on the inevitable. Instead, she was present, savoring every moment, every laugh, every bite of ice cream. Running from place to place, checking off her list, wasn’t about the destinations but the journey. It was about love, family, and making memories in the time she had left.