Hope and Healing Stories of Survival

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Hope and Healing Stories of Survival

The memory of a daughter is the hope that carries Belinda MacIsaac. A hope that one day they will see each other again. And that light became the guide to find peace and carry on. The loss of a child is something no parent should have to face. But that was just the beginning of Belinda's journey. Hers is a story of love, loss, a life-changing diagnosis.

and the shadows of three dark strangers. We have always held to the hope, the belief, the conviction that there's a better life, a better world beyond the horizon. Everyone has a story. This is Belinda's. I don't feel that my story is any more important than anybody else's. There's so many people out there that have lived through and survived through

much, much worse than what I have. So I'm kind of feeling like it's, you know, why would I do this? I don't want sympathy. That is not a reason. Money, writing a book to be published, to sell, it's just not where I think I should be. I decided to tell the story this way because it'll help me organize my thoughts. I decided that I would tell my story just to see if it could encourage other people in their

journey if they're going through something similar, if they're going through worse, if they've already been through it and they don't know how to get through it, I guess maybe I can encourage them to make different choices or have a different perspective on their life or the outcome of it. And hopefully by doing that, you can also change your inner emotions. You can hopefully be more at peace.

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dedicated to Cassie and Mikayla and in loving memory of their sister Jaymie Lynn.

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Mom and dad provided us with pretty much everything that they could and I was spoiled I think. Because I was youngest for 14 years before my little sister came along. So we always, I don't know, we had horses and motorcycles. My dad started me out when I was like nine on a dirt bike. And bit of snowmobiling, skiing, cross country and sometimes out to Jasper to downhill. But I started work when I was I think 12 out at the Tijon Lodge washing dishes. And then I cleaned rooms for a bit.

just was always in the industry until I left after graduation. And then I ended up in Chilliwack here actually in 1986 for a year. And then I moved back home to Valmont and started driving truck. Up the mountain, yep. And then I found out I was pregnant with my first daughter. So I cut that out. I met my husband that I was married to for almost 20 years in Valmont right after I moved back home.

Very quickly we moved in together and then I found out I was pregnant six months later and I didn't really want to get married but he did and so six months into the pregnancy I was kind of kind of unattractive and fat and I said, okay, I'm not going anywhere, we'll get married and so that continued on our path of marriage.

And we ended up in Prince George after that. And I went to the RCMP there and did casual for a bit. And then I got on as a civilian member doing 911 dispatch. I did some auxiliary work as well with them until we moved to Williams Lake in 1992. And they didn't have a federal position for me there. So they gave me a leave of absence for five years. And I had two other kids.

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And my time to go back would have been 1996, right? As soon as my daughter was born. I ended my service with them. And then we moved here in 2000, in September 1st actually. So I've been here for 24 years.

I went through a divorce first, in 07. We had had a few years on and off where we felt like we were struggling. I don't think we were truly happy. It was very stressful. And then trying to raise kids and trying to be there for them. And we like we did counseling together. We reconciled. I did life coaching through his company. It did change what the way I thought about life and

my perspective about things, but at the end of the day, I don't really believe that you can change who somebody is at their core, what their values are or their personality. And by doing, trying to change each other, it's just, it just doesn't work. Having accepted that, I decided that to end it. And as stressful as that was, I think it was better for the kids at the end of the day, because we were in such kind of a lot of volatile.

moments in our household where I was angry a lot. I don't really think that I accepted him as his own person inside our marriage. I wanted him to be doing something different for me. And maybe he wanted that. He wanted me to do something different. I don't know if that's his story, not mine. Emotional stress is, it's just, I mean, you carry so much anxiety because you just, it's the unknown.

You just don't know what's gonna happen or how the other person is really gonna be. You know, it's heartbreaking because you don't want to do that to your kids.

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So it's, you know, it's a lot to carry and a lot of emotion. And we decided early on that we wanted to be amicable and we wanted to raise our children together and just do the best job that we could. We did Christmases together for a bit. We did holidays, birthdays. We did lots of things still as a family, but we didn't have the daily stresses of living together. I guess so it was different.

Yeah, I don't know if we ever had a whole lot of conversation about that. We just both agreed to that's what we were going to do. you know, if I grounded one of them and, well, they were grounded at his house too. We didn't have a schedule where it was like, you have to go here, you have to go there. They had friends, things that they wanted to do with their friends. They did it pretty much. He worked away from home a lot. So when he got home, they would go spend some time with him or and, you know, now that my kids, my kids are grown now.

We've been apart for since 07, so that's quite a few years. I'm quite proud of the way they've turned out. They're living life, they're successful. life is good. It was just very easy and we had joint custody, so it wasn't a set thing. We never went to court. We didn't do any of that. We did all our agreements between the two of us. We had lawyers, but to write it up and stuff, we never ended up in court. And I'm quite proud of that fact that

We've been able to do that and raise our kids and we are friends. He's the father of my children and I never wanted to ever make the kids feel like I thought he was a bad person or I hope I didn't anyway. And I think we both gave them a lot of guilt trips. That is one thing I think we did. But I said to my daughter not too long ago, like, you just wait. I said, you're going to become the queen of guilt trips when your child is born.

That's all you're ever going to feel is guilty about everything. So, you know, I don't know. The thing is when you stand up and say, do, in front of God and your family in the world or whatever, to each other, like why 20 years later, five years later, how many ever years later, can you actually look at somebody and say, I hate you? That just doesn't sit with me. You know, it's like you were together and you had...

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very good times and memories and stuff. Why do you just all of a sudden forget that? It takes a lot more energy to hate people or to have those negative feelings towards somebody than it is to be positive. You know, if you change your perspective on how you look at things, it can change the way you feel inside. That's just what I know for myself anyway. You know, if I'm having a really tough time with something or a tough day, I can turn it around and look at it differently and all of a sudden it's not so bad.

And I've been through a lot. some of these little things that annoyances and inconveniences is exactly what they are. They're just really small things and they mean nothing in the whole scheme of things. I don't know. I don't want to sound like a self-help tape here.

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After we separated and got divorced, I lost a lot of weight very quickly, obviously because of the stress, but I was reacting to every food, like almost everything I ate was, I would just get this horrible reaction. And my ears were plugged, I felt like I was in a tunnel, my eyes were always bloodshot red, my heart would pound, I would shake like, it was horrible. And I didn't know what was going on and somebody said to me one day, maybe you should check out.

a gluten allergy and I'm like, what the hell is gluten? What's celiac? Like, I don't even, never even heard of these things, right? When I did check it out, I just started watching breads and things like that at first and went to a naturopath and he did say, yeah, you have celiac disease. Later on, my doctor kind of said, well, that's kind of rare. I think that maybe you're gluten intolerant. But she said, if you would come to me, they do some kind of medical tests in the hospital. And she said, but now you're feeling better.

You're on the diet, you've been on the diet too long, so I'd have to put you back on all those things. You're feeling better, don't worry about it. I worked with the naturopath, everything that he wanted me to do for quite a while. And I just was very careful with my diet for about three to four years. And then I found that as the levels, I guess, in your body, when they come down, I could start tolerating it again. So that was good. And now I don't really have to watch anything at all.

One thing I read was that when you react like that to gluten and you have this intolerance or whatever, can be caused by stress and major surgeries or car accidents or things like that. And I'd been through a major surgery in 2005. So it kind of made sense.

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And then we got that settled down and I was now dating my husband, now is Jim, and we started dating. I didn't ever really want to get married again or have anybody live in my house. I was done with that. We lost our oldest daughter in October of 2011.

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It's coming up 13 years, but it doesn't get any easier.

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So when that happened, he was with me all the time.

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you

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and he became my rock. And I was quite dependent on that. I just didn't want to be alone anymore. I really needed to have that support and company. And I thought, know, wow, he can really be there for me. Why wouldn't I live with him? We're together all the time anyway, right? But I really, at that time, I felt deeply in love with who he is.

and because he's so strong.

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He's talented in every way. He's very handy. He can do absolutely anything. He loves cars. Dodge, Plymouth Chrysler, Mopar, right? So he had this car that he's had since he was 17 and he used to race it at Mission and, well, Street Race when he was 17. He was a bit of a bad boy, I guess. And I just loved that car. He took me out in it for a date one night. I just loved that car. And I had bought this Dodge Charger.

and it sounded pretty good but and it went pretty good. I took it out to Mission a few times and raced but I said to him one night when we were going out there I said well I just want something that sounds like yours and he said well you can't do that unless you go old school so I said well I'd like a car so he said well okay I'll have a look so he looked around and got this deal

with this 68 GTX that was in pieces, in a trailer, all the boxes, everything that somebody had started on and then just gave up on and sold. And then the guy hauled it out here to BC and left it sit in the trailer. So we went and had a look and I bought the whole thing, trailer included, from him.

and Jim and I got started on this project together. Yeah, we finally got it on the road and we started that in 2014, I think, and got it on the road by 2015. But that's what he likes to do. That's his thing is tinkering around with cars and building stuff like that. He's a concrete guy. He's very talented at landscaping design and doing driveway stamp concrete, that kind of thing. He's a hard worker.

But there's nothing he can't do. He's the happy man around the house, I tell you. And if he can't, if he's never done it before, he'll figure it out. Andy's my best friend. We get along so well together. We're so similar in so many ways. He's just very laid back and relaxed. And he's home. In 2009, Jaymie Lynn started having, well, she had a seizure. September long weekend. So her dad texted me and said she'd had the seizure and...

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She was in the hospital. I had kids at our pool in the backyard swimming and I couldn't leave till that was done and it was really, I guess nothing I could do anyway. A friend was there with her but when I was getting ready to go, she was already gone from there. They'd already released her. And I questioned the fact that maybe she had been partying too much, playing around with drugs. That kind of entered my mind.

She said, no, mama, whatever. But she didn't stay at home very long. She decided she wanted to go to Alberta to be with a guy that she had met on holidays. She didn't have a seizure again until after she got there, I think. Not that I recall anyway. So she left and went to live with him. And she started having more seizures when she was in Alberta. So her first neurologist was in medicine at.

And so she stayed there until 2010 with these seizures that she was having. They just couldn't get the right mixture of drugs to get them to stop. So she'd go two, three, four months without having one and be all excited that she could maybe drive again after six months, but it didn't work out that way for her. And sometimes she would have two, like three in a day and end up back in the hospital. I don't know, because of the epilepsy, she had some...

Growing up, she had some learning difficulties and she was tested for ADHD in grade 10, which they said she had. Learning assistance helped in school, that kind of thing. We had tutors for her and she had some impulse control issues and then the teenage years came along and then that's a whole different ball game with hormones and everything else. When she was on all this medication too, it was causing side effects.

and she had she described to me on the phone one day being really really happy or really really low or she'd just get really angry all of a sudden so I had said well you know you need to discuss that with the doctor but anyway she moved home and ended up moving in with her dad in I don't know maybe April of that year and then in August he helped her get out to an apartment

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within walking distance to everything in downtown Chilliwack. She was in an apartment by herself, which kind of scared me. Never in a million years did I think she would pass away during a seizure. I guess I thought it was possible if she cheated and had a bath and maybe drowned, but that wasn't the case. She just had a seizure she didn't come out of.

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The night she passed, Jim's father had been taken to the hospital. He had got a lung infection and he collapsed on the sidewalk and the ambulance picked him up and took him. And he was admitted to the hospital. And so we were checking on him that night. And when we got home, he dropped me off and I guess it was, I don't know, 9, 30, 10 o'clock or so at night. And I just had this overwhelming feeling that I needed to talk to my daughter.

And we had an agreement between the two of us that if I called her, texted her, and she didn't get back to me within two hours, then I was going to either send somebody to check on her or I would come myself. I just knew something was wrong. I don't know how I knew, I just knew. I think I called her dad or texted him and said, in not very nice way, go and check on your daughter. And he said, no, I'll go in the morning. She's fine.

And I said, you either go now or I'm going with the police and they're going to kick the door in. His common law partner at the time had the keys to the apartment because she's a real estate agent and it was for sale. So I said, you have the keys, so go and check on her. And so that's what happened. They did. So yeah, I got a phone call. And the first thing he said was, it's really not good.

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and I don't remember much after that.

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The police came to my door and a lady from victim services, guess my daughter Cassie was home at the time too. And I ended up pretty much assaulting the police officer. So later on that night we had to go out to my ex-husband's place and wake my youngest daughter up and tell her. So it wasn't good. I don't remember calling my parents.

And I looked at them the day they arrived and said, what are you doing here? Like, how did you get here? Everything kind of is a blur.

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So that was very tragic, obviously. And it's beyond stress that's hard to deal with. It's not just a stressful situation anymore. It became something else. It's almost like a part of you is gone because she's gone. Especially as a mother, I feel like part of me is gone. And I looked in the mirror a few times and

thought to myself, you're never going to be the same again. You're always going to be different because of this. And how is how that's going to look, you better decide. You know, I really wanted to just lay in bed and cover my head and not just not live anymore. And I had medication from the doctor that I was on for two or three weeks, but it just

It of felt a bit like a zombie walking through my days and I decided that it wasn't good. So I just stopped taking it and I just had to feel what I needed to feel, I guess. There was a lot of mornings I just cried in the shower because I didn't want anybody to hear me.

or to upset anybody. And I didn't want all this empathy or attention obviously, which just makes me uncomfortable I guess.

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So then we had the memorial service to plan. So that took a couple of weeks. It was Thanksgiving weekend. So everything was kind of not being done quickly, especially with funeral homes and coroners and things like that. So we waited.

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until the 14th of October.

My brother-in-law stepped in and did a lot of the planning and organizing for that. I don't even know if I was capable of really making a decision and I'm forever grateful for him for taking over. He did an awful lot. think my ex and I kind of got closer maybe because of this event too. Because not only was I a mother who lost my daughter, but he lost a daughter. So it's...

You know, if you have any empathy at all, you feel bad about for somebody else, right?

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Don't Grieve For Me, a poem by Belinda MacIsaac.

Don't grieve for me, Mom. I'm not that far away. I know you feel my presence each and every day. You held me for just a little while, but don't grieve for me, Mom. I was God's borrowed child. I'm here in heaven now, alive and free in God's embrace. Please don't grieve for me, Mom. I'm in just the right place. I'm hap-

free. There's no pain. Please don't grieve for me mom. Remember, I'll see you again.

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I grew up having beliefs and faith in God. Christianity was part of my upbringing, especially with my mom, I didn't always go to church, but every now and again I would. But I've always believed in God, in something bigger than myself, and I choose to call it God.

other people say whatever they want to say. So it's always been there. I haven't always been, you know, very, what would you call it, active. But, you know, I was just, I just had to ask the question why. You know, why did you take my daughter? Hasn't she had enough go on in her life? Like, why couldn't she live out her life to, you know, why did she get epilepsy? It just seemed like everywhere she turned.

Sometimes it was something else, whether it was, you know, ADD or having learning difficulties in school or life didn't seem to give her a break and then the epilepsy. And I was just angry, but I had to believe.

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If I didn't believe that she had gone to heaven and was maybe watching over us or with us still or they say, she's in a better place. Well, whatever. I guess heaven probably is a better place. I don't know. Right? But I had to believe that because the alternative was to believe nothing. And to me, that felt like a deep, dark, empty black hole that you would never climb out of.

and there'd be so much darkness and unhappiness and grief and negativity and I didn't want to live like that. I wanted to have hope and believing and having faith gave me that hope that I would not only would I see her again someday but it gave me the feeling that I could go on.

certainly didn't do it on my own strength. You know, everybody says, you're so strong, you're so strong. It's not me. It's truly not of my own doing because I'm really not that strong. You know, I've had help. God's got me through. I know it. And I felt sometimes like I look back at things that I've done and it's like, well.

okay I did that but why? And then it's like well because I was being led by something other than myself to do those things because God knew what was coming down the line.

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And I thought about that when I was thinking about the life coaching. It's like, why did I do all that, right? But maybe I was being prepared to have lived these parts of my life and be able to come out of them. I was able to make different choices and I also decided when Jaymie Lynn passed that I didn't want to be that person. I knew I was going to be different, but I wanted to live in a way that was going to love and honor her.

And I still wanted to, had to be a mother to my other two kids and I wanted to be there for them. Cause had I not been then they would have lost their mother too, right? And I also needed to feel like a parent to Jaymie. So I started doing fundraising with the center for epilepsy.

and the first thing we did was a hockey game in 2012. The next year we did a gala event and we did, I ended up being involved with four of them. Two of them I did with a group of my friends came on board and became part of my committee. And there was, I think, up to 10 of us, I think the first time. And we got donations and we got advertising and we had auctions and drinks and dinner and you know,

wonderful and we raised quite a bit of money. Then with my ex's job, he was in insurance. He got big insurance companies to donate and they came forward like so willingly with quite substantial amounts each year. So we ended up having about $75,000 in a memorial fund that I helped them to manage over the years. It kind of just fizzled out a little bit, but it was also a lot of work each year.

I people get kind of tired of seeing your face come around asking for money and donations all the time. So I felt it was kind of time to step away a little bit. So the last one they held was in 2017, I think, the last big one. And so that was kind of what got me through a few years too, like doing stuff like that. guess it took my mind off of things and I felt like I was still being her parent by doing things like that for her. Now, like every year I just...

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I do something on her birthday and the date she passed is not a great day. But I try to do quiet things or spiritual things or be out in nature walking to something to kind of take away that hard memory.

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After she passed away, was just a short month and a half later, we had a show horse, like a little, we did local shows and lessons with her and my daughter, Cassie and I, and we had her boarded over at my friend's barn and she had been lame and having problems on and off with her one hoof. And we were trying to help her with that and so we weren't riding all that much or doing that much, but Cassie would go over and spend time with her. And when Jay passed,

I think she was over there quite a bit and probably very good therapy for her to go and look after her. I got a call November 25th from my friend who owns the barn saying that they couldn't get her up. The horse just didn't want to get up. So I said, okay, well, I'll get ready and come over. so they did get her up and did get her walking. anyway, long story short.

decided to get the vet there and the vet stopped in and we thought maybe we could get her to Langley to a specialist and I said at all costs just do whatever you can do to please you know please get her healthy or keep her alive or whatever it just didn't look very good at all. She was trying to get her loaded into the trailer to go to Langley and she just looked at me and said it's not gonna

It's not gonna work. She's not gonna make it. So I think we have to put her down.

so that we waited for Cassie to get there to say goodbye and stuff. And that's what happened that day. So it was devastating. And I think it was more devastating because of what we had just been through. And so everything was just heightened and it just felt like it hurt a lot more, I guess. So then there was a few deaths happening and close to me, like with friends lost their parents.

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That's the circle of life, know, things are gonna go do that and happen and but it's sad and especially with I don't know what I was going through it. Just everything just felt so More it just felt so much more than what it normally would

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Then my sister-in-law, she had decided they got engaged October and then they decided they were going to have a wedding at the end of February, like right around my daughter's birthday, in fact the day before. Which was great, it was something else to look forward to and concentrate on. I got to go to Vegas with her and her bridal party and friends for her stag-up party and we had quite a weekend there.

So we went to the wedding and the next morning another brother-in-law and his wife knocked on the hotel room door and said, you know, I'm really sorry but grandpa by this past and it was my daughter's 19th birthday that day. I was like, really? Why? now? Right? And he was, I think he was in his early 80s, like pretty sure, but and he had had

battled cancer and bone cancer and things, had prostate cancer, but it just seemed like, something else? And now like then the funeral to go to in March. And so then we get through that at the end of March and another friend of mine wanted me to do a concert with her in...

Port Coquitlam. And so her and I went and spent the night and had girls time and had a fun time at the concert. And I got home the next day, was April 15th, and did some stuff around the house, cooked dinner, sat and watched the hockey game or whatever we were doing. Went to sleep around 11 o'clock and...

It was warm that night, so I had left the bedroom window cracked a couple of inches. The house we lived in before was on property at seven and a half acres. Our bedroom was on the main floor. And so I woke up at around 2 a.m. and there's a guy with a mask standing beside me with his hand on my hip and another coming through the window and with a mask on. I instantly thought, where are these bugs coming from? What the hell is this? I yelled.

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and my husband only just moved in. Which was another kind of like good moment, right? The good goes with the bad always. And when you have those good moments, or you really hold on to them, right? Especially when you know you can feel just so bad. So that had happened and that was a good thing. anyway, so I wake up and he comes to the gym.

jumps out of bed and came around the bed and didn't even notice the guy standing beside me. He just kind of had tunnel vision for the guy coming in the window. And he started fighting with him in the corner of the bedroom. And the guy had a steel bar that Jim was trying to get away from him. And the other guy punched him a few times. so he took a few good hits. And in the meantime, they were screaming at me to get him to stop fighting. They were screaming at him to stop fighting or they were going to kill me. And I was just

yelling at them saying get the hell out of my house take whatever you want it's not worth it I don't care just get out take whatever they did do that but I didn't know that they knew I had a safe in my bedroom in my closet and so one of them said yeah well you come come with me and show me where the safe is and you're gonna open the safe or something like that so I went through the bathroom to my walk-in closet and the safe was in the corner they were standing over me and

yelling at me to open the safe and he said, you better get it right the first time or I'm going to fucking kill you. don't know, something inside me just kind of cracked and I went, you know what? It's really not that easy. But I did it. First try. I was like absolutely shocked and amazed that I got that right. And they let me go back to the bedroom. There was another guy that had come in through the bedroom door, broke into the kitchen and dining room, came to the bedroom. so he was watching over Jim. So he was in there when I

went back to the bed when the other two were still in the closet taking whatever they wanted out of the safe. And I had a bit of money in there and some jewelry that I was saving for my kids that their dad had bought me over the years. And they took all that and they came out with a video case that was Jim's and it was all his family videos. And he said, you know, that's nothing there. It's just videos. They took it anyway, rifled through my nightstand drawers. And they didn't they didn't rifle through anything else. The dressers.

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They didn't really go anywhere else in the house. My youngest daughter was upstairs and I was having her bedroom painted so she was in the spare bedroom and her phone was not working properly. So her dad had ordered her a new one but it hadn't come in yet. So she was up there and she was listening to what was going on downstairs, hiding in the bedroom closet by herself. I can't imagine what was, what she was feeling like all alone up there. She was only 16.

Her phone didn't turn on so she couldn't phone the police. I guess they felt like there must be an alarm set in the house, which I had failed to set that night. And they said, you know, time's almost up, we got to go. So they found Jim's jacket and took his wallet. They took my purse, had my phone in there as well. And they ripped a gold chain off his neck that I bought him as a last little thing before they took off. And my daughter came downstairs after she knew they were gone.

and helped me close the back door and try to send an alarm. We did press the alarm and I didn't think it was working, but the monitoring company did say later that they had received it. It was a silent alarm, so I just, thought I was going to be hearing it, but I didn't. So we phoned the police and they came out and then they took Jim in the ambulance and I followed a policeman and a,

in about five o'clock in the morning to the hospital so I could go get him. And I had nothing. I had no driver's license, no credit cards. I had some money stashed in my dresser drawer that wasn't in the safe. I think it was, I don't know, maybe six, $700. It was still there. Couldn't believe it. And then the kid's dad came to the hospital and he gave me his credit card and said, you need to do whatever you need to do. If you need a room to stay at, you can go stay at the house. I'm going to be gone. He just like...

passed me his credit card and said, just use it. So that was really supportive and very nice. And we couldn't go home until the police had gone through there, all the evidence people and IDENT. So we hung around and waited until 9 a.m. and went in for our first interviews and statements and things like that and in our pajamas. My daughter went over to my Walmart and got me leggings instead of pajama bottoms to wear to the police station.

EP Production Team (39:18.71)
And that was, again, different than losing your daughter, losing a child or going through divorce. Again, it's just a different stress. Like, that's fear. Your adrenaline and everything is involved. it's just, I think the next day I was doing laundry or something after we were allowed home. And I think I called my mom and I was talking to her and I just said, you know what? I've just had enough. I can't take anymore. I just can't. If anything else happens, I'm just about, I'm at my breaking point.

I prayed about it too and said, you know what? I screamed at God and I just said, I don't get this. I can't do this. Why are you doing this? What did I do in life to make stuff like this happen? Why me? And I just didn't have any answers to that question. the next while, over the next years, answers did eventually start to come or explanations that would just all of a sudden pop into my head as a thought.

and I've been able to get some peace over the wise and not keep asking them. And I really felt like the night that that home invasion happened that either my daughter was watching over us or certainly God was there because it could have been so much worse. They could have beaten or killed or found my daughter raped. Who knows? They could have ruined the rest of the house. They could have broken everything. You just don't know how those things are going to.

they're gonna go. There's no way to know and so I thought you know what I felt somebody was watching over us and we we had that protection.

And my mom used to often say, God can't give you any more than you can handle. And I said that day to her, was like, I'm done. This is more than I can handle.

EP Production Team (41:16.962)
But yet I had the strength to walk through it and get through it. And again, I was on at event for a little bit, but I think I only took it one night. I was just like, no, I'm not doing that. Decided early on to it. Somebody said, are you going to sell the house? And I'm like, no, why would I sell the house? It's where the kids, it's our home. Well, know, home invasion. I'm like, not a chance.

I'm not letting them win. I'm not selling this house until I'm down, and ready. So I put about extra money into the extra security measures and locked myself in, set the alarm during the day because I wasn't comfortable being alone. Couldn't sit outside at night for a long time, things like that. But we got through it. And we did go to one, a counseling session with a psychologist.

And he said he felt like we were going to be okay.

EP Production Team (42:25.698)
A lot of anger that Jim was holding, he felt that would be dealt with if we went to court and if they were caught and charged. And so over the course of that next six months or year, they were caught.

three of them were and they were all charged and they're sentenced at their time all that so I think we dealt with court until seems to me like it was September of 213.

And then we got married. We got married November 12th of 2013. 11, 12, 13. We're engaged December 12th of 2012. So that whole year also planning a wedding, also going through court. It was fun times and hard times. Court was very stressful. We were driving to New West there every day for almost two weeks to go to court in the summer.

But yeah, then we got to get married. It was fun. We had a great wedding. It was a good time. It was a good time.

EP Production Team (43:37.366)
And we just, traveled a little bit over the years and did car stuff, lot of car stuff, car shows. And we decided to downsize that house and buy something with less acreage. And we shopped around and bought this house, which has a huge garage in it. It's like 2,400 square feet or something on two sides built underneath the house. So it was like having a separate shop.

that we didn't have to have property for. And the house was, is, you know, 3,700 square feet. So we're not lacking any, we weren't lacking any room. So I decided it was time to downsize and do that in 2016. Yeah, it's been wonderful. During that time I helped Jim, I bought him a, he's adopted. So we always wanted to find his birth parents. So in 2018, a friend on Facebook said to me,

get him a DNA kit and get him to do it. And then I'll can maybe help you with some stuff. And I said, okay. And so I did. And it took him a month or so to do it. He sent that in, in, 218. We got to some connections from the DNA and it appeared to be like a, a cousin ended up being a second cousin. But through that, my friend had found an obituary for his maternal grandmother, I guess had passed.

She found this obituary with his mom's name in it. So Jim and I decided to email this woman on the DNA list. And she got right back to him and saying, yeah, your mother's been looking for you for 30 years, over 30, well, over 30 years. And through her, we found his birth father and stepmother and three other sisters.

EP Production Team (45:28.622)
And then his mother has another two other children. So he's got all this family all of a sudden. And we got to travel and go see them and get to meet them and get to know them a little bit. And we've had some great times with them. We just got to go to Europe with his birth father and wife last year for three weeks. So and see Austria and Italy, it's where his dad was born. So yeah, it's kind of cool.

2020 got here and yeah, we were in lockdown in March, right? But we started hearing about it in 2019 at COVID. I was like, yeah, okay, whatever. I don't know, I was always out walking or running or getting my steps in for the day or taking my little dog out in February. I was started to wake up with a sore throat after a few hours and go away, no big deal. Towards the end of February, was...

still coming and going, coming a little longer than going. And we took my daughter out for her birthday with some friends and I just kind of joked around that, maybe I've got dual cancer. And my friend said, my God, don't say that, you do not. And I went, yeah, you're right. And I just kind of laughed it off. It was stupid, but yet I don't know. Did I subconsciously know? It was totally weird. I just threw it out there with no filter. We got locked down in March.

On my stepson's birthday, we had taken him out to the casino and I was thinking, this is very strange. All the machines are, some of them are shut and there's like a notice on the door saying all other casinos are closing at midnight. And I'm like, what? So it was definitely the lockdown. So during that first week of that, I was a little nerve wracking because we just didn't know, it was really the unknown what we were dealing with.

With everything being shut down, couldn't really leave the house and go to town or do anything because I always needed a bathroom and there was never any open. So my husband, Jim, it was fell on his shoulders to go to town and do the groceries and get the essentials or things. And he said it was so weird because things were flying off the shelves. Things were empty. It was eerie. There was hardly any cars. It was crazy. I thought, well, whatever, I'm just going to amuse myself at home instead of sitting around in my pajamas all day.

EP Production Team (47:48.718)
and getting fat and eating and drinking, I'm going to exercise or walk or run outside every single day. And I think in a two, three, four weeks, I tell you it was the longest 537 days in my life. I did it in a stretch. Every day my rings were closed and I was doing between two and a half and 15 kilometers a day. I don't know what kind of motivated me or moved me to do that because I don't particularly like cardio.

But I was doing it and it seemed to be easy and I seemed to enjoy it. And again, I'm wondering now if I was led to do that because maybe God knew what was coming and what I had to fight.

EP Production Team (48:35.798)
In April, I decided that I needed to phone the doctor because my throat was just persistent and I was getting quite annoyed with it all. And it wasn't clearing up and now it was becoming more of a problem. So I phoned and they said, well, we'll give you the obvious things first, some nose spray and acid reflux medication in case it's that. And we'll follow up with you in a couple of weeks.

Yeah, she followed up in a couple of weeks. That was the beginning of May. And I said, yeah, I'm sorry. Nothing's changed. Not working. And she said, okay, well, there's another one we'll try and just keep on with the nose spray and, you know, see how that works and whatever. And if you're in pain, you know, you could take Tylenol and add bills. So I said, yeah, okay, no big deal. I was joking with her too. And I said, well, what happens if it's throat cancer? And she's like, nah, it's not throat cancer. It's really rare.

And I said, okay, good. And I just carried on. I carried on through till July and I couldn't take any more. I was just done. I was like, somebody has got to look down my throat and see what's going on because this was getting far too painful. My voice would get really raspy or I just have a really hard time swallowing and eating. And so I called the doctor's office and basically in tears and I said, no, you got to do something. I need to see a doctor.

like somebody's got to look. So they made me an appointment and my own doctor wasn't, she was full that day, but I seen another doctor from her office. And he said to me, is your voice always this hoarse? And I said, nah, comes and goes. And he said, and do you always clear your throat like that? Like you're always, know, and I'm like, I don't know. I guess so. I haven't really noticed it, but he had a look and he couldn't see anything.

felt my neck and couldn't feel anything. And he said, no, I don't feel or see anything, but I'll send you for a CT scan. So the hospital called and a couple of days later and made the CT scan appointment for August the 13th. And I just carried on, didn't try to think too much about it. I don't really think I thought anything about it. And as you can see, I'm still dealing with the side effects, which in my mind should have cleared up by now it's been two and a half years. So I went and I had the...

EP Production Team (51:00.642)
CT scan done on the 13th. And August 16th is my daughter Jaymie's birthday. So we went to one of her favorite restaurants and we were having appies and drinks and my phone rang and it was a doctor and he said, well, there's a concerning mass on your throat, in the back of your throat. It was too far down for me to see. So you're gonna have to see the ENT sooner rather than later. And I've been referred in May to the ENT specialist, which is ear, nose and throat.

The office called me or I called them and she said, I'm, dear, she said, it's going to be like a year. We have to deal with our cancer patients first. And so she said, it's going to be a while. So I thought, okay, whatever. So then the doctor said, no, he'll be seeing you sooner rather than later. And I think I have cancer. No sooner off the phone with him than my phone was ringing and it was the specialist and they had a cancellation for the next day. So I got in the next day on the 17th. There's one thing to deal with.

my daughter's birthday that day and then also think, God, I think I have cancer now what? Anyways, when I seen the specialist the next day, he, he just, said, I'm going to put the scope and look at your throat and I have to go up through your nose. And I'm like, excuse me, you know, two foot long wire and he's going to shove this thing up my nose. And I'm like, awake. Yeah, awake. So I put on a brave face and led him to his thing.

I guess it turned out to not be quite as bad as what I thought it would be. When I looked at that piece of equipment, I was horrified. And Jim's sitting there watching and I'm like, my God, I don't know if I could do this. But there are experts at it and I'm used to it all now. So we did that and then he said, well, we're to have to schedule you for a biopsy to see if this mass is cancer or maybe we can operate or not and refer you for a PET scan at the same time. That happened and...

I said, you know, we have these plans to go to Ontario for Jim's niece's wedding. We're leaving the end of August. And he said, no, you're going to have to cancel. It's not going to be doable. so this biopsy was booked for around the 27th, which is or 26, which was the day we were leaving or something. So I thought, okay, well, whatever. I let it sit for a couple of days. And then the day I was trying to get a hold of WestJet all day long and couldn't get through to anybody to cancel our flight that I didn't have any insurance on.

EP Production Team (53:23.468)
I just, I didn't get through. The specialist office called me and said, hey, can you come in on the 21st instead of the 27th? We've had another cancellation. We can get you in sooner. And I said, great. Yeah, sure. I can do that. Can I go to Ontario? And he said, yeah, I don't see why not. We'll be done with that. you're go ahead. So that was great news for us. So like again, had something else to look forward to besides now the stress of thinking, do I or don't I have cancer? The big cancer scare.

which is, I was hoping I thought was all it was was just a scare, but it turned out to be positive.

EP Production Team (54:07.854)
So on the 23rd, I was in town having nails done and getting ready for our trip and the specialist phoned and he said, you know, I've got some bad news. It's the biopsy is positive for cancer and it's squamous cell carcinoma. But he said, that's actually, that's good. It's very curable. And you know, it's easier, it's more common and we've dealt with it more.

whatever else he said. And then the PET scan that was to come up would tell them if it had spread anywhere else in the body. But he said it was not operable because it was too far down my throat on the hypopharynx. And if they operated, I would end up possibly not speaking or talking again or eating. So he said, that's, it's just not going to happen. So he said, you know, I hate to tell you this, but you've got a long road ahead of you, but you can get there.

And I thought, okay, well, if I die, then I die. I just dawned on me that I wasn't afraid of that. I was like, okay, kind of nonchalant feeling that I had was, at least I'll see my daughter again. That's what I truly believe. And if I don't die, well, then I guess I'll get to stay here and hang out with my other kids and my husband and...

have some more fun. So I thought, well, whatever it takes, and that's what we're going to do is whatever they suggest I'll do and I'll get through it. And I made up my mind that that was the way it was going to be. And he had given me some extra painkillers the day of my appointment too, to help me deal with the pain that I was having. We went, we had a good time at the wedding. We came home with his parents, came with us for a two week visit.

And during that time, I got to go up to my, see my parents in bailout with my two girls for a weekend before I started any treatment. my PET scan was on September 11th. And, so we went in and had that done. I can't remember when the results of that came out. It was two or three days later, probably a week. The good news was it was contained just to the one area and it was involving a few lymph nodes. But.

EP Production Team (56:31.468)
He said, you know, it's totally curable. Again, he said it's totally curable, 100%. So I said, okay. And I had my first consultation with BC Cancer and we were set to do mapping appointment, which means you go in and get fitted for a mask for the radiation therapy. was to have 35 radiations and seven chemo appointments, chemo every week. The radiation goes Monday to Friday.

except for weekends and holidays for seven weeks. So that was to start. My first one was October the 8th. And when I went in that day to have my first radiation, was a Friday and it was Thanksgiving long weekend. Coincidentally enough, something on Thanksgiving long weekend again. And when they put this mask on and locked me down to the table, I felt like my neck was, it was too big.

The mask was too tight. And so I said that to them and they said, well, okay, we'll do a little adjustment. And they heated it up a little bit and made it a bit looser. And I got through that appointment and came home and Saturday night I wanted to have a meal with the kids. And they came out and I just, couldn't eat, I couldn't swallow, I was sick. And by Sunday night, my neck had swollen. It was almost doubled in size on the left side.

And one of the doctors had given me steroids just in case something was swelling in there and I couldn't breathe. And I was so on so many painkillers, I hardly remember. My doctor tells me later that I was also in shock, like my body was going into shock because of the infection that was happening in my throat, which we didn't know about. So I guess I had this infection brewing in the back of my throat for however long. And it came to a head like it was abscessed. And that's why I...

swollen up so quickly overnight. So I went into Chilliwack Hospital to the emerge and the doctor there said, we don't have an ENT surgeon on call. We're going to have to send you to Surrey. So we waited around for a while to go to Surrey and my husband couldn't come in with me because it was COVID. So I went to Surrey and later on that night in an ambulance, he couldn't come in there with me either. So he was sitting in the car for how long? I don't even know. And the surgeon there,

EP Production Team (58:57.792)
that night that see me in Surrey. Anyway, he introduced himself and said, well, he said, we've got to do something with that like right now. So we'll see you in surgery and we're going to have to get that drained. I said, okay. My throat had swollen to the point where they couldn't put up, they couldn't give me sedation to put me under before intubating me because my throat was too swollen and the airway was too narrow. So they had to do it while I was awake and on the table. So they were wheeling me down to

surgery and the anesthetist stopped quickly and said no we we have to do this now and they intubated me there on the table and I tell you I've never felt anything like that in my life. All I remember is coming my back coming up off the table a bit just in rigid and shock and having this thing go down my throat and then and it was lights out. I remember absolutely nothing after that.

And I woke up in the ICU and I kind of looked around a little bit. seen my husband sitting there and I thought, I wonder what he's doing here. I hope he's okay. And I went back to sleep. So I guess that was when I was finally coming out of the coma that I was in. I had been in a coma for, I guess, nine days.

And that was a drug-induced coma that the doctor did to get this infection to heal and to make sure this abscess drained and that my body could fight the infection. So I don't know, that nine days was, is missing. I remember most of the dreams that I had or whatever you call them when you're out. I don't know what it was like for my husband or my kids, but I can only imagine how scary.

It must have been. People have told me what they felt during that time and how scared people were. But for me, was, it's just, there's no memory of it, right? When I did come out of the coma, they brought me out and took the tube out. I couldn't walk. And it was kind of weird because I thought, well, why can't I walk? But I guess it's laying there for nine days on a ventilator.

EP Production Team (01:01:24.352)
And you just, everything that stops working, I don't know why. Maybe it's the drugs they give you, I have no idea. But I couldn't even lift my hands to touch my own hair for at least a day. And I was in there for two days after they woke me up. So I was in Surrey Memorial for like three weeks total. Halloween came and went and I had a feeding tube up my nose going straight into my stomach so they could feed me. And lots of drugs, a hole in my throat.

that was, they just, when they pull the drain tube out, they don't even put a stitch in it. They just let it heal. I had said to the specialists during one of my appointments that I didn't want a tracheotomy. I was adamant about that because I didn't know that they could be temporary. I thought they were always permanent. You'd end up with a voice box. But I guess if it would come to the point where I was going to die, they just would have done it. The surgeon ended up phoning my husband and saying, you know what? I've done what I can do and now it's up to her. And yep, she could die.

EP Production Team (01:02:27.66)
Midway on our life's journey, I found myself in dark woods, the right road lost. To tell about those woods is hard, so tangled and rough and savage the thinking of it now. I feel the old fear stirring. Death is hardly more bitter.

EP Production Team (01:02:58.894)
battered by chemo treatments, scared, ready to give up, unable to speak for months, exhausted from the unrelenting anxiety and devastation of the disease. The woods are lovely, dark and deep, but I have promises to keep and miles to go before I sleep.

EP Production Team (01:03:26.168)
Blessed by friends while the floodwaters rise, prayers answered as the healing begins. For I will restore health to you and heal you of your wounds.

EP Production Team (01:03:42.902)
One of my last days in the hospital, I had another abscess in my throat and a new ENT was there looking at me and he said, I think we have to do a tracheotomy, airway just isn't there. And I thought, I just don't want this, right? I said, you know what, threw up my hands and I said.

I don't care. I'm sick of dealing with all these side effects. I'm sick of dealing with all the backwards infections and everything else. I just need to move forward. Go ahead and do the damn thing. I was praying about it and said, God, take it over. Like if that's what's going to happen, that's what's going to happen. I surrender. If this is the way you want things, that's it's going to be. And I'll get through this too.

EP Production Team (01:04:27.982)
So we were all set up for surgery and that night was going to happen. And the nurse and I were talking in hallway a few hours later and she said, you have fluid dripping out of your neck. And I'm like, what do mean? She said, it's dripping down your neck to suck. So she gets some gauze and the scar in my neck, which is now eight, nine months old, started draining fluid out from my neck. And I said, well, that's weird. It's been healed for nine months.

And she said, yeah, it's really strange, but it might be a good thing because I can already see the swelling going down in your neck. And again, my neck was swollen up like twice the size. So anyway, I just thought it was a miracle. It was just amazing. Like I even think the doctors were amazed and it was like, just let it drain for as long as it can, right? And it did for three and a half days.

And then I did have to go back to the hospital and have more taken out, but I didn't have the tracheotomy. So that was my miracle while I was there. And I said to one of the doctors, you know, I said, this is a miracle from God. And he just rolled his eyes and I'm like, yeah, I know. I said, you know what? I said, my mom's a pastor. And I said, I think she's a very powerful prayer.

EP Production Team (01:05:56.462)
Like said, I'm cancer free still. I was announced cancer free in June of 2022. My ENT surgeon is the only one that has said that to me. Nobody else will for five years. I've just got not quite two and a half years left of appointments. And I've been able to go back to the gym. I've got a trainer two or three days a week and I'm gaining some weight back. I lost like 43 pounds and I'm back up by about...

15 pounds maybe and I'm gaining some muscle back. Really enjoying life. We got, like I said before, we got to go to Europe with his dad and them. My daughter got married and now I'm looking forward to being a grandma in November.

Cassie's, she's gonna have their first baby and Jim and I are starting a house that we're gonna build. We bought an acre and a half of property. So we're just starting on that project and that's been a dream of mine for a long time. It's an acre and a half, so it's not seven and a half, but we pretty much grew out of this garage here again.

And we decided that it's too early yet to sell the cars we don't want to, so we're just, we're not going to do that. You know, it's, we've always got life. Like we've lost a lot of friends over the years between 219 and now. And I think it's just that time of your life where it's going to become a little more common, unfortunately. And a few years ago, I lost a couple of high school friends to cancer. You know what? Cancer just sucks. There's no other way to describe it. And now my...

One of my very close friends is just starting her journey with throat cancer. I hope I can be there for her and help her through that. Now I just look at things a lot different than I used to and I can't control anything that happens to me except for my reaction to it. So I don't want to waste any time on anything like negative energy. I want to find peace, which I have, which is amazing.

EP Production Team (01:07:58.422)
And I think that my faith gives me that. And having all these answered prayers and people say, prayer doesn't work, but for me it does. Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops at all. Like so many, Belinda's story is one of hope, strength and resiliency in the face of so much adversity.

Staying positive and grateful on even the hardest days. Keeping perspective and holding on to faith keeps you moving forward. Draw strength from loved ones. You are not alone. Faith consists in believing when it is beyond the power of reason to believe.

EP Production Team (01:08:55.842)
dedicated to Cassie and Mikayla and in loving memory of their sister Jaymie Lynn.