Not a Bucket List

You can find Amy’s story in our June issue, “What Gets Us Through.”

Register to hear Amy read her story aloud at our upcoming Perkatory on June 4th, 2026.

They tell me to live like I’m dying.
But I have four small children who still need their lunches packed and bedtime stories read.

In my life situation,
as the mama to four little people,
there is no option to throw in the towel,
to go skydiving,
to take a month-long trip to Fiji,
to disappear on a shopping spree.

And while I cling to the fullness of life…
it races past me,
leaving me behind like an ambitious toddler trying to jump on the back of a really dodgy stray cat.

The cat slips through my fumbling hands and darts away,
leaving me sprawled on my back—
holding onto nothing.

I blink and my newborn baby is now a toddler.
My kids seem to grow faster on the hard days I wish away.

Time can be savored to some extent—
but it cannot be coddled.
It cannot be stopped.
It is plowing past us,
raging onward toward the future.

And as I consider living like I am dying,
my latest PET scan looming,
facing the possibility of metastasis and a terminal diagnosis—
what gets me through?

Knowing my children need a mother who keeps showing up.
The beautiful, heart-wrenching simplicity of routine.

What gets me through?

Seeing a future together with them—
birthdays, graduations, weddings, grandchildren.

I want to stop and weep and mourn all that is being taken from me in this season:
the loss of certainty that I will be there the next time they need me,
my forfeited “good health” and control.

But instead,
I sweep the floor—my kids hate cockroaches.
I read them stories—a distraction from the hard.
I make them dinner—so they grow up healthy and strong.
I help them with homework—hoping to see them graduate one day.
I rock the baby to sleep, tempted to hold her forever, terrified I will miss it, but knowing that when I put her down, she and I will both sleep better.

What gets me through?

I will refuse to let fear set the agenda.
To steal these moments.

What gets me through isn’t squeezing every ounce out of today.
It’s preparing for my ordinary tomorrow.

My routines are a quiet defiance.

My changing of diapers, wiping of noses, putting out petty conflicts
are a declaration that I am laying the path for future days—
planning, hoping, praying
that I will be here to see them.