Through all of this, there were two little girls watching their parents live a life that was becoming increasingly complicated.
Marley and McKinley were not side characters.
They were the center of my world.
When Marley became sick, our entire family had to learn how to live with something we hadn't expected.
McKinley had her own childhood happening at the same time.
She was growing.
Learning.
Laughing.
Playing.
Watching.
She was experiencing her sister being sick.
She was experiencing her parents' relationship.
She was experiencing our family life.
And she was experiencing all the ordinary things that make up childhood alongside all the things that weren't ordinary at all.
I don't want to write this story as though McKinley existed only in the background while Marley was sick.
She didn't.
She was there.
They were sisters.
They shared a childhood.
They shared parents.
They shared a home.
They shared the good days and the difficult ones.
There were birthdays.
Christmases.
Family gatherings.
School events.
Vacations.
Sick days.
Holidays.
There were hugs.
There were arguments.
There were laughs.
There were ordinary days that probably didn't seem important at the time but that I would give anything to go back and experience again.
I want both of my daughters to have their own place in these pages.
Not because I want to expose every painful detail of their childhood.
Quite the opposite.
I want to preserve the parts that belong to them while protecting the things that should remain theirs.
This book is about my story.
But my story happened around them.
They were the reason I kept moving.
They were the reason I got up when I didn't want to.
They were the reason I worked.
They were the reason I tried to keep our household functioning.
They were the reason I believed I could handle one more problem.
And one more.
And one more.
For a long time, I believed that if I could just keep everyone else okay, eventually I would be okay too.
I didn't understand that a person can keep carrying everyone else until there is nothing left to carry with.
I was becoming exhausted.
And I didn't know how to say it.