Welcome to my WORLD!!!
A world that consists of family. At 48 I’ve been a mother, a wife, a grandmother and… a widow.
My life really began in 2000 when I met Bill Becker who would turn out to be the love of my life and my soulmate. I was asked by my friend to go with her to listen to hear her brother’s blue grass band play at some bar. She wanted to set me up. YIKES!!! I almost backed out last minute. You see, I was married before and had five remarkable children as a result of that relationship. All I will say about that relationship, is that an addictive substance took hold of my husband and never let go. He, very sadly, died years later. But my gift from that marriage was my children. I’m not one to embrace change, so I was hesitant to go listen to the band. But it was a kind invitation so… I went. And guess what?! I had a great time!!!
I met the brother in-between sets and while he was very nice – the person that sparked my attention right away wasn’t my friend’s brother… but her cousin, Bill. He was so engaging, great conversation, funny. We hit it off immediately. So much so that I felt badly that I didn’t really engage my friend’s brother in conversation. (I think he got over it. LOL) But I did not want to mislead Bill in any way so I excused myself to the ladies room in the hopes that my friend would fill him in on the fact that I was in the process of getting divorced but most importantly that I have 5 kids!!!!! Who the hell wants to begin dating someone with that many children?! When I returned, I decided to screw up my courage and tell him how much I enjoyed talking with him. He said that he enjoyed my company as well. And then I lowered the boom – “I have 5 children.” He literally DID NOT FLINCH. He said that he liked kids and continued with the conversation. I was blown away. A couple of weeks after we first met, we had two dates. We started seeing each other exclusively. We became engaged a year later and married in July of 2002.
The minute Bill walked into our lives, he became everything to all of us – in every way possible - physically, emotionally, financially, and spiritually. The children, though not biologically his, were in every sense of the word… his. They called him dad and loved him beyond measure. We had no plans to have any more children but in 2007, we were blessed with our 6th child. He was born the day after our eldest son graduated high school!!! Talk about an age gap. But we embraced it all. Every crazy, busy part. Life had its typical ups and downs: Moves, job losses, job gains, financial ups and downs… all of it. Through it all Bill and I never lost the passion for each other. We held on to feeling like newlyweds. Our kids used to tell us to “‘get a room”. We were busy with kids football and soccer games, family dinners, back to school nights. And we loved every minute of it. Bill’s and my favorite thing to do was to go out and hear live music. We had a fairly active social life with very dear friends.
Our life was not perfect but it was pretty damn good! Bill and I knew we loved each other and we could weather any storm that came our way. And then… only a few short years later, after our youngest was born… a lump was found. Not in me… him.
The lump grew and changed our lives, forever.
