04/08/2020
At 11:48pm PST last night / 4:48pm AEST yesterday, my father passed away peacefully at home 🕊
Just over 2.5 weeks ago I received the news that would change everything: my Dad had a rare and aggressive cancer; so advanced that it had already spread to his liver. He was given just weeks or months to live 😢
Hearing this news, just shy of six months after my sister and I said our final goodbyes to our mother, was unfathomable 💔
As I scrambled to book tickets to fly home, I discovered that 3 days earlier the Australian government had placed restrictions on the number of people arriving in Sydney, capped at 350 people per day.
Seems the panic had caught on: it was three weeks until I could get a flight home, and another two weeks of a mandatory hotel quarantine before I could even see my Dad 🤯
“I don’t know that I’ll make it to August” Dad said when I’d told him the news.
The past few weeks have been a blur. My incredible sister took on taking full-time care of my Dad and has shown amazing strength, handling all of this on her own while I waited anxiously for updates, feeling totally helpless that I couldn’t be there 😭
After everything that has happened this year, in the midst of a global pandemic, I’m now getting the message loud and clear: it’s now time for me to be at home in Australia 🤍
In a couple of days, I’ll be leaving the US with the two suitcases I arrived with five years ago. It’s crazy to think about how much has happened over the past few years, and while everything is really uncertain right now, one thing I know for sure: I’ll be returning as a much wiser, stronger and far more resilient version of myself 🦋
It’s time to start the next chapter, and It’s time to trust the magic of new beginnings ✨
