“You guys have been dealt a really bad hand . . . .” These words delivered by a neurosurgeon forever changed the lives of Mary and her spouse, Duane Leach. At 59, Duane was diagnosed a having the most deadly of all brain tumors--gliobastoma multiforme.

In WINNING with a Bad Hand, A Story of Love, Loss and Healing, Mary shares the inspiring account of how their relationship flourished in spite of the terminal diagnosis. Each “bad hand” they were dealt during the last months of Duane’s life was played with faith, courage, and unshakable love for one another. This book is not about loss but celebrates healing coming in unexpected ways. It reaffirms faith--in ourselves, in our fellow man, and in God--seeing and accepting what can’t be seen. As Mary learned to redefine her life after Duane’s death, she discovered the power of hope and the assurance of life after death--on both sides of the grave.

Life is learning how to play a bad hand well.
~Rudyard Kipling

She stood before us in the surgical family waiting room looking more like a fresh-faced medical student than a highly skilled neurosurgeon. This tiny woman, still dressed in her blue scrubs, had just operated on my beloved Duane, removing as much as she dared of the tumor in his brain. As she spoke, I felt my heart shatter. “You guys have been dealt a really bad hand,” she began. Was she speaking to us? Or was I overhearing life-changing words meant for another family? Her words echoed in my mind, “You guys have been dealt a really bad hand, but within that hand everything has gone right. We bought him some time.”

I was numb with shock. In a daze I walked away from the others seeking solitude in a quiet corner. I thought I was alone, unaware of my friend Carol’s hands bracing my trembling shoulders. Looking up towards the heavens, I shook my clenched fist and I angrily called out, “God, why do you keep thinking I am so strong? I’m just this weak little nothing.”

A psychic once told me, “Your life has not been an easy one. You have experienced many opportunities for growth.” She was right. With all those opportunities, I should have been ten feet tall, not five foot two. My first husband betrayed me, leaving me and our two young children for my best friend. My second marriage was a fraud. It wasn’t until I was in my early forties that I met the first man who truly loved me; he turned out to be a paranoid schizophrenic. I had learned and grown from each heart-breaking relationship, starting over time and time again. Now, in my mid-fifties, having at last found the love of my life, I faced losing him to a brain tumor! Didn’t I deserve to be happy? Didn’t I deserve to be loved?

For seven years Duane and I had enjoyed a loving, secure relationship. He was my soulmate, my knight in shining armor. Now we had “bought him some time.” In frustration and anger, I had cried out to God. In my soul I heard his answer, “Who are you to question God? If I say you can do this, you will do this.” “Okay,”’ I meekly replied, “but you’ve got to help me.” Somehow I knew he would.