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I’ll Miss You Always, Serena.
Where do I begin?
I’ve written forum posts before about how difficult it is to lose a close friend to chronic illness. This feels especially cruel when you’re also facing early mortality as a young adult. My heart is broken, and this is my 4th attempt to write a forum post about my amazing friend Serena Lawrence.
This has become exceptionally difficult because I can’t yet associate her name or picture with an obituary or a memorial post. However, that truth is going to hit me like a ton of bricks today as we say goodbye at her funeral. This last week has not only been painful for me in the wake of her death, but the entire BioNews team is grieving the loss of one of our own. She was a talented columnist as well, and you can read more of her work here. None of this makes any sense to me yet.
Serena was a passionate advocate for chronic illness, and a fierce and courageous patient in her fight against what-doctors-thought was Pulmonary Hypertension (PH). Unfortunately it turns out she had PVOD and by the time she was willing to consider transplantation, it was too late. Beyond a patient with a chronic illness, Serena was a compassionate, supportive and kind colleague and an even better friend. Despite knowing she was dying, she was texting me recently about unfair it was that I am living with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). She was apologizing to me, saying I didn’t deserve this. I am now furious that this is how her story ended, because she deserved better.
Serena was our Senior Columns Manager at BioNews and she recruited most of our patient columnists (including me) to manage both the forums platform and write our website columns. The BioNews company wouldn’t be who we are today without her efforts and talent. Beyond BioNews, Serena and I met and worked together at DavidsTea while we were in University and we shared many days together before I left to move to another city. Boy did we have some fun memories during those days!
In 2013 Serena was diagnosed with PH and my own IPF diagnosis came in early 2016. I remember sitting with her at her favourite tea shop and contemplating how both of us ended up with “rare” diseases. We questioned whether it could have been something at DavidsTea (right or wrong) and we made a commitment to then support one another going forward. It now feels pretty surreal that she’s gone from this earth forever. I will cherish those memories, hold on tight to cards and Christmas gifts she made me, and continue to be inspired by her passion for giving those with invisible illnesses a voice.
Losing friends to a chronic illness is never easy, but after the many years of it happening, you kind of become de-sensitized to it. Until a loss like this happens, then it rips your heart out all over again. Rest easy Serena, I will miss you always!
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