Dear mom,
I wonder if I disappointed you. I wanted to show you I could do better. Part of me is glad you're not here to see me continue failing. Another part of me is upset because you lost what could have been the best years of your life. I wanted you to be free. I feel you were cheated.

I'm losing my life because I don't have the guts to take any risk. I don't feel motivated by anything anymore. 

Mom, I am anxious to tell you, though others would say you already know...your neighbor Cristina died on November 20th of this year, at age 70, from metastatic breast cancer. The same date, almost the same age. I am frustrated and sad. Like you, she left her husband and daughter, and far too early. I like to think of the two of you socializing (in the ether!) over tea and biscuits, speaking french, discussing world news. 

Her death makes me even more determined to keep reading and learning about nutrition and cancer, with the hope that one day I will find a way to help someone, perhaps lots of people, survive their cancers and be well again.

Some tidbits from my reading:
(1) Research shows that refined carbohydrates and animal-derived protein both accelerate the growth of cancer. 
(2) Daily low dose aspirin is shown to be preventive and also to reduce metastasis in many cancers, including breast (I didn't know this when I visited Cristina in 2018). 
(3) Cancer is generated by cancerous stem cells which rely on a number of biochemical pathways. It can easily switch to alternative pathways if one is blocked. The best approach seems like it would require agents to block multiple pathways simultaneously. 
(4) Many harsh cancer drugs could have increased efficacy at lower (less toxic) doses if correctly combined with integrative therapies (specific supplements, off-label drugs). 
(5) The toxic effects of chemotherapy can be dramatically reduced if patients do a complete or even a partial fast 1-3 days before and 1-2 days after chemo is administered. 

If you were alive, you would be quite interested in the subject. I miss you. I still dream about you but feel that you are getting farther and farther away. I will try to make something of my life, so as not to waste the entire thing. I want to be someone you would have been proud of, even if you aren't here see it. 

love, Tamara

P.S. Zoe is now my friend, and together we remember you. 

Barbara and I met in Eighth grade Sunday school. We quickly became fast friends.
We were still friends 50-some years later. Whenever we talked , we just picked up where we left off. The last time I talked to Barbara was shortly before she died. She called to remind me that we had stayed friends over so many years.
 We loved so many of the same things. Bike riding, classical music, going places together. There is a picture of us at the state fair, in Detroit behind bars. Very funny. She was a part of my family and I was a part of hers.
 When Barbara was at home in Detroit, she would call and I would visit, or vice versa. One time my husband Marvin and I visited her at her mother’s house in Southfield. Yanni, you were quite interested in Marvin and wanted to sit next to him, etc. It was very cute, and I know Marvin was as interested in talking with you as you were in talking to him.
 Tamara, everything your Mom taught you, everything you shared together is inside you. She is always right there with you.
 Barbara’s birthday is 3 days after mine, but she was a grade ahead of me. She was such a smart person.
 Rest In Peace my dear friend.
Love, Joyce

Dear mom, I sent you a text through Facebook today. It said "Hi mom. I love you." You didn't answer. A part of me still thinks maybe there's some way to be with you again. Some way to get you back. 

Why didn't I try harder? There were answers out there. I know more about nutrition and alternative cancer therapies than ever before, including several that would have been within our reach. 

It's not fair. It's not right. You should be alive now. I was glad you didn't see the 3 year aftermath of my knee surgery and stem cell treatments. I was my smallest, weakest, most pitiful self. I'm glad you aren't seeing me squander my life, year after year, in a career that deadens me. But that is no reason for you not to exist. 

I can't be realistic. I have to tell myself you might still exist in some form.  Please come visit me. Please be with me again. I pine for you to be in the world again. 

Mom,

There are a lot of things that I wish I could ask you. About your past, and about my future. I wish I could have your counsel. I have found some important questions, some hard questions about life, but I can't talk to you about them anymore. I wish I had found them before.

I put some stories in the story section. Since there are no new stories about you, I thought I'd write something about what is happening with me.

This is supposed to be a tribute, so here is what I want to say, in a roundabout way the simplest of things: As time goes by, it gets harder and harder not to talk to you. I love you, Mom. I miss you.

My dear Petooli,
I love you. I miss you. I dream that you are with me. I have variations of the same dream over and over again. In one version, I have an urgent need to warn you of impending doom. You are unwary of the danger. 
.
In another version, you have recovered. We have second chance. We need to implement preventive measures before the cancer returns. We need to act fast. You are oblivious. I need to prod you into action.
.
In another version, I am trying desperately to connect with you. We need to be together while we still can, before time runs out. I plead with you to be with me. I plead with you to hear me. I implore you to express your love to me. I can't get through to you. 
.
In yet another version, I am overcome with gladness and relief to see you. I express the appreciation and love that I failed to express in the past. I run up to where you are sitting at the computer (reading world news), and hug your shoulders. You receive me with joy. I hear your voice. Consciousness begins to dawn, and I remember the truth. The sadness feels heavy and deep. 
.
I sometimes speak of you in the present tense, as if you are still here. I mourn that I cannot share what I recently learned about diet, which might have prolonged your survival. I think you could have lived another 20 years. Maybe longer. 
.
I mourn that you will not be here to see me do better (if I do). I mourn that you will not see your grandchildren (if they are born). I mourn that I cannot cook for you. I mourn that I cannot walk with you. I mourn that I cannot tell you what I read. I mourn that you cannot have adventures of your own. 
.
I remember your flaws, your weaknesses, your imperfections. And I love you as you were. Still learning, still growing. At almost 70, still young. Still full of wonder, still full of hope.

Mom, I miss you more than ever. As time passes, I have come to mourn not only what I lost from your death, but what you lost. You were deprived of everything in your life that was unrealized; your potential to learn and to grow; the adventures that were just starting to unfold for you when you went back to school after retirement; the initiative that you were learning to exercise in your life; the happiness and fulfillment that were yours for the taking. 

Unlike many people who slow down when they come to the end of their working life, you simply changed direction to seek new challenges of your own choosing. No longer encumbered by many of the stresses of your youth, I think you were freer than you had ever been before. And all that was cut short. 

It is this loss that saddens me even more than the loss of your company, your friendship, your support, and your love, though all of that leaves a void that will never close. 

I wanted to become a stronger, better person, to set my life in a new direction, and then to show you how much i had improved. That hasn't happened yet. But if it does, it will hurt not to have you here to see it.

Dearest YIANNI AND TAMARA;
Both of you must be very, very proud because you had the best lady in the world as your mother! Your mom Barbara, whom I met at Wayne State University fifty four years ago, while both of us were students, was the most intelligent, caring ,encouraging and the most compassionate person in the world! She would do anything to see others succeed, especially in the educational world. Words cannot be found enough to express her sincere loving interest in helping others climb the ladder in education.
Being a foreign student myself that time while in college, I owe all my high achievements to her loving heart, who showed me unselfishly how to locate a job as an educator. She was my sister-friend as she used to call me, and though the life's roads would take us apart, we always kept our friendship alive with correspondence, or phone calls. Barbara, your beautiful mother, was my only best friend, whose heartwarming and sweet personality would bring joy to my life!
Her sudden and quick passing to eternity has left a big void in my life like it has in yours. I miss her a lot and I feel joyless without her admirable personality! Barbara Anne Kouskoulas, my sister-friend, was the best person ever existed in this World, who made the difference in the lives of those who were fortunate like me to know her ! May her memory be eternal as she rests in the best place of paradise in heaven!

Barbara Anne Burstein Kouskoulas was a noble lady that captured my mind and my heart from her age of 17 till she left me crying at her age of 72 and asking for more of her peacefulness and wisdom...
   Barbara was one who knew how to admire, how to love, how to please and keep you next to her: She was an artist and a scientist; one successfull to enchant and please; to play her quitar and enslave her listeners. I am the one who knows more than others...

A heartfelt letter written in grief last December by a close family friend in Greece, about Barbara to Vasily: ... δεν πρέπει οι καλοί να φεύγουν τόσο γρήγορα. Το Προσκλητήριο Βασίλη φαίνεται το διαβάζει ανάποδα (από το τέλος) και τώρα έχουμε ένα δεύτερο αλησμόνητο όνομα, μια γυναίκα ανεπανάληπτη που έφυγε και αυτή αθόρυβα σαν πουλί. Μετάφερε στα παιδιά την οδύνη μου και τα συλλυπητήρία μου -- Νίκος


Translation:
... it should not be that the noble among us leave so quickly. It looks like the invitation card, Vasily, is read backwards (from the end) and now we have a second unforgettable name, a woman whose like the world will never see again, who left without sound, like a bird. Translate for the children my grief and my condolences. -- Nikos Tserpes

Happy belated birthday! I love you mom. I wish you were here with me. I don't understand your death. How can you be gone? 

Yanni is my lifeline; I know you would be pleased about that. Sometimes we still argue, but only because he gets frustrated when I am unable to respond to his encouragement. 

I want to stay positive. I will go out in the sunlight for a few minutes. I know you would want me to find happiness and peace in my heart. 

Love, Tamara

Dear Yanni and Tamara,
While the substance of one persons life cannot be summarized in a single page, your words are so true to your dear mother's personality and spirit that I almost believe she wrote them with you. I loved your mom not only as an aunt, but also as a friend. She was completely open to any topic of conversation and she especially enjoyed hearing about my children's activities. As sad as I was to see her bedridden in Maryland, I feel lucky that my mom and I had a chance to visit with her. She still had that sparkle in her eye when she told us about your accomplishments and I got the sense that she was beyond proud of both of you. Barbara was kind, compassionate, intelligent and indeed an incredibly patient woman! I am blessed to have known her. May her memory be eternal.
Love, Anna

Dear Yanni and Tamara,

Thank you so much for making such a beautiful website to honor your mother. I worked with Barbara for many years at Lawrence Tech and like everyone that met her I felt welcomed and soon we became friends. I was impressed with her kindness, forgiveness, strength of spirit and her open mind. She will always be a great role model for me,

I would like very much to attend the memorial in Michigan. At Lawrence Tech we will all miss her.

Maria

Dear Tamara and Yanni,
  Barbara and I became best friends in eighth grade when we met at sunday school at Adat Shalom. We have maintained contact ever since that time. Although a few years might pass, we always picked up where we left off.
 We spent a lot of time together throughout high school and college, riding bikes, talking, and whatever teen girls do for fun. We were in
French classes together and loved speaking French with each other.
 Barb's mother Ida was a mother substitute to me, offering an accepting and safe place to feel appreciated.
 I will miss our conversations so much. Barbara was a very dear friend.
  I have some old pictures from choir at Adat Shalom, and high school that I will try to add to your album.
 I do want to attend the memorial service.
 
with love to both of you and for your mom.
 joyce (Lazar) alpiner