Happy Birthday, Grandma.

Today would have been my grandmother's 76th birthday, she passed away last February. She was a champion of a woman, the strongest woman I ever met and my hero.

Charlene Diana Becker was born on January 25th, 1935. While in-utero, she had wrapped the umbilical cord around herself, causing her to be born with deformed feet. Successive surgeries attempted to fix her condition. During her recovery after one surgery, she developed gangrene. My great-grandmother had come to visit and could smell the flesh rotting. The surgeons wanted to remove my grandmother's feet. Her mother refused, her daughter would walk. The doctors saved what they could, leaving her with severely deformed feet. Every step she would take for the next 70+ years was excruciatingly painful. This, however, did NOT stop her from climbing the mountain in Medjugorje.

From L to R: Marlene, Charlene (my grandmother), Betty and Judy

She had her quirks. She was a little high-pitched in the vocal department and her hairbrushing skills could have been utilized during the Inquisition with great success. Each one of her grandchildren promised to be a doctor when she/he grew up so they could fix her index finger on her left hand, which was missing the portion above the first knuckle. (Also from her umbilical cord.) She would smile and say, "yes, you will". We never doubted it.

She always told us we were beautiful and smart. She showed us that she was strong.

Her first husband, my grandfather was an extremely abusive man. He abused her daily; emotionally, verbally and physically. She was barely 5'3", but she survived. She was able to leave him when my mother was 4 and my aunt was a 6 months old. It wasn't easy. It was 1962 and she was a divorcee with two little girls, not to mention her feet. Which was NEVER called a handicap. She never had a handicap sticker on a single one of her vehicles.

She worked every day, taking the bus in the cold and rain. She went back to college and she raised her girls, her second husband's son and her two children she had with him. She showed us nothing was insurmountable if you tried hard enough.

She battled cancer numerous times and we never heard her say, "why me". She took it in stride and set an example of strength and dignity each time. She passed of lymphoma which the doctors attributed to second hand smoke. My grandmother never smoked a cigarette in her life.

She taught us to give and not expect in return.

To share and to be joyful, to love and respect others. To be strong and to stand up for what we believed in.

No excuses, no complaints. There was no reason not to succeed. She was our greatest champion. No, she wasn't perfect, no one is. Her cards were dealt with more difficulties than your average Joe and we are all better for having known her.

To my Grandma. I love you.