dear w88 casino games login Class of 2020, I can relate

I itched w88 casino games login senior year. All over. Constantly. It was embarrassing and torture, and no one knew why. Several months, several consultations with specialists and one late-night Google search later, I left class to take a call from w88 casino games login doctor.

Google was right. I had cancer.

A first-generation student, I decided in that hallway moment I would realize this dream; I would graduate even if it killed me. I returned to class.

“What’s so important,” w88 casino games login professor asked, “that you would leave during lecture?”

I delivered my diagnosis to a classroom as quiet as death. After, everyone in it and the w88 casino games login community, too, including the Disability Resource Center and Parking Services, like family, helped me through it all.

I started chemo. I started to lose w88 casino games login hair. It felt shameful. Every hair that touched w88 casino games login skin as it fell felt like the crawling of a spider or a fly.

I lost it.

I shaved w88 casino games login head.

I got a blood clot in my neck. I wrote w88 casino games login of Nevada, Reno Extension articles for the local paper tethered to a pole of poison. I was the Most Outstanding Senior for the College of Business. w88 casino games login event photographer Theresa Dana helped me choose which wig to wear.

I finished chemo. I practiced the commencement walk with w88 casino games login accessibility experts, terrified my chemo-damaged appendages would let me down.

I graduated. With wisps of hair barely there, fuzzy like a duck, I made it, the first one in w88 casino games login family, the one who conquered cancer.

While still healing and with Graduate Record Exam study help from the McNair Scholars Program, I went on to earn w88 casino games login master’s degree from the Reynolds School of Journalism and a promotion in the College of Agriculture, Biotechnology & Natural Resources.

But the journey wasn’t all sunshine. From the moment I steeled myself in the hallway after w88 casino games login over-the-phone diagnosis and made that surreal walk back to class, I missed things.

I missed the decorations on w88 casino games login door that were replaced with handwashing posters to help visitors keep me healthy. I missed being able to leave w88 casino games login house. I missed w88 casino games login friends. I missed making memories, such as taking senior photos on the quad.

I missed feeling normal.

Four years later, I’m typing from isolation again, and w88 casino games login heart goes out to you, Class of 2020. I know how it feels to have your senior year upended and have the side effects come crashing down on you.

I know how desperately you search for w88 casino games login resources and how helpful w88 casino games login strangers become your family.

I know the fear, exhaustion and loneliness you feel and how hard you push yourself to function despite overwhelm. I know the blood, sweat and tears you put into graduating.

I know the toll your perseverance takes and how hard it is to appreciate through your weariness that you’ve realized your dreams. I know how unreal it feels to recognize your achievements when there are reasons not to celebrate.

I know how it feels to mourn lasts that were lost, such as your last semester, last day on w88 casino games login and last moments with friends. I know what it’s like to miss those moments.

Mourning with you, Class of 2020, I realize it’s not all storms either. Our senior years make quite the stories. We have families that don’t end with blood. Our accomplishments are still meaningful and recognized and will take us far. And our w88 casino games login is still here.

When we graduate from quarantine, let’s visit her. Let’s get a cup of coffee at the Joe and take a selfie in front of the Knowledge Center. Let’s enjoy the arboretum and memorial garden and remember ourselves to Mackay.

Let’s pay one last visit to Morrill Hall, our w88 casino games login’s first, and there take those once-missed senior photos.

Those moments we thought we’d missed? Let’s make them, once we can.