"The Unwinding of the Miracle" is a powerful memoir by Julie Yip-Williams, chronicling her extraordinary life journey from a blind infant in war-torn Vietnam to a successful lawyer and mother in America, culminating in her battle with terminal cancer. This deeply moving book offers a raw and honest account of Julie's experiences, her struggles with hope and despair, and her ultimate acceptance of mortality.
Born blind in Vietnam in 1976, Julie's life began with an attempted infanticide by her own grandmother. Against all odds, she survived and went on to lead a remarkable life filled with triumphs and challenges. Her story is one of resilience, determination, and the human spirit's capacity to overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles.
Overcoming Early Adversity
A Difficult Beginning
Julie's life started under the most challenging circumstances imaginable. Born in post-war Vietnam to an ethnically Chinese family, she entered a world of poverty, violence, and political upheaval. Her birth name was Diep Ly Thanh, later changed to Julie when she moved to America.
At just four weeks old, Julie's grandmother made a shocking discovery – the baby was blind due to congenital cataracts. Believing that a blind child would lead a miserable life and bring shame to the family, her grandmother insisted that Julie be given a potion to "make her sleep forever."
For three weeks, Julie's grandmother pressured her parents to end the baby's life. Eventually, they reluctantly agreed and took Julie to an herbalist to obtain the lethal potion. In a twist of fate, the herbalist refused to participate in infanticide, inadvertently saving Julie's life. Upon returning home, Julie's great-grandmother learned of the attempted infanticide and put a stop to it, declaring that Julie would live as she was born.
This harrowing start to life set the stage for Julie's extraordinary journey, demonstrating from the very beginning her ability to defy the odds and survive against all expectations.
Escape to America
In 1979, when Julie was three years old, her family made the perilous decision to flee Vietnam. The country's dire economic situation, widespread violence, and government confiscation of assets had made life unbearable. Moreover, they hoped to find better medical treatment for Julie's eyesight in a new country.
The family's escape was fraught with danger. They boarded a leaking fishing boat bound for Hong Kong, joining countless other Vietnamese refugees risking their lives for a chance at a better future. Julie's mother was terrified, having heard stories of families drowning or resorting to cannibalism during similar escape attempts. Miraculously, they made it safely to Hong Kong and eventually arranged emigration to the United States.
Landing in Los Angeles, Julie's family began their new life in America. Her parents found work – her mother as a manicurist and her father as a wholesale vegetable buyer. This new start allowed them to finally seek medical treatment for Julie's eyes.
A New World of Sight
At the Jules Stein Eye Institute at UCLA, Julie underwent eye surgery that would change her life forever. She vividly recalled fighting against the anesthesia mask before waking up to a world of color and light. While the surgery was successful in giving her some vision, it wasn't perfect. Julie remained legally blind, seeing the world through what she described as a hazy bubble.
Her visual acuity was limited – she could only see objects from 20 feet away that a person with normal vision could see from 200 feet. This partial vision would have a profound impact on her life, presenting both challenges and opportunities for growth.
Growing up, Julie faced numerous difficulties due to her impaired vision. She endured taunts from classmates who mocked her thick glasses and the magnifying glass she used for reading. She was often excluded from activities like sports, driving, and even going to the movies. These experiences of exclusion and marginalization deeply affected Julie, but they also ignited a fierce determination within her to prove her worth and capabilities.
Determination and Achievement
Academic Success
Despite the challenges posed by her visual impairment, Julie refused to let it hold her back. She channeled her feelings of exclusion and marginalization into an unwavering drive to succeed academically. Throughout high school, Julie set incredibly high standards for herself, accepting nothing less than straight A's.
Her determination paid off. Julie was accepted to college in Massachusetts, far from her home in Los Angeles. This decision to study across the country was a testament to her desire for independence and her courage to face new challenges. At college, she excelled in her studies, earning a bachelor's degree in English and Asian Studies with outstanding grades.
Julie's academic achievements didn't stop there. Her exceptional performance in college paved the way for her acceptance into Harvard Law School, one of the most prestigious institutions in the world. This accomplishment was a powerful statement about her abilities and a direct challenge to anyone who had ever doubted her because of her disability.
World Traveler
Julie's ambition and thirst for life extended far beyond the classroom. As soon as she was old enough to travel alone, she discovered a passion for solo adventures. By the age of 30, Julie had set foot on all seven continents, a remarkable feat for anyone, let alone someone with visual impairment.
These travels were more than just sightseeing trips for Julie. They were opportunities to test her limits, to prove her independence, and to grow as a person. She deliberately put herself in challenging situations, often arriving in new cities without pre-booked accommodation, armed only with a paper guidebook and binoculars to read train timetables.
From exploring back alleys in China to strolling along boulevards in Budapest, Julie embraced the unpredictability and excitement of solo travel. She marveled at the Sistine Chapel, gazed upon New Zealand's pristine landscapes, and trekked across Arctic tundras. These experiences brought a sense of peace and wholeness to Julie's soul, strengthening her spirit and deepening her love for humanity.
Career Success
After her extensive travels, Julie settled into a successful career in law. In 2002, she moved to New York City and joined the prestigious law firm Cleary Gottlieb. This firm represented some of America's biggest businesses, dealing with billion-dollar transactions that often made headlines in The Wall Street Journal.
The work was demanding, often requiring all-nighters and causing intense stress. However, Julie thrived in this environment. She found satisfaction in the intellectual challenges of her work and took pride in the improbability of her success – a disabled Vietnamese immigrant excelling in a top American law firm.
Eventually, Julie specialized in corporate mergers and acquisitions. This role allowed her to balance her professional ambitions with a personal life, setting the stage for the next chapter in her extraordinary journey.
Love and Family
An Unlikely Romance
In 2007, Julie's life took another unexpected turn when Josh Williams walked into her Manhattan office. Their love story was as improbable as the rest of Julie's life. Josh came from a wealthy family in the Deep South, a stark contrast to Julie's background as a Vietnamese immigrant who had escaped poverty and struggled with legal blindness.
Despite their differences, Julie and Josh formed a deep and lasting bond. In Josh, Julie found a partner who was exceptionally kind and understanding. He didn't hesitate to read menus to her in restaurants or support her in countless other ways. Their relationship defied societal expectations and demonstrated the power of love to transcend cultural and socioeconomic boundaries.
Motherhood
Julie and Josh soon married and started a family. Their first daughter, Mia, was born in 2010, followed by Belle in 2012. Motherhood brought Julie immense joy and fulfillment. She marveled at Mia's beauty and Belle's intuitive understanding of people, finding new depths of love and purpose in raising her daughters.
This period of Julie's life seemed like the happy ending to her incredible story. She had overcome tremendous odds, built a successful career, found love, and started a family. However, fate had one more cruel twist in store for Julie, one that would rob her of the chance to see her daughters grow up and experience many of the joys of motherhood.
The Cancer Diagnosis
Initial Symptoms
In the summer of 2013, Julie's life took a devastating turn. What should have been a joyous family gathering for her cousin's wedding in Los Angeles became the backdrop for a life-altering diagnosis.
In the weeks leading up to the wedding, Julie had been experiencing stomach discomfort – cramping, nausea, and constipation. She had visited a doctor but was reassured that it wasn't anything serious. With this assurance, Julie flew to Los Angeles a few days before the wedding, her stomach still uneasy but her spirits high.
However, upon arrival in Los Angeles, Julie's condition rapidly deteriorated. The discomfort turned into a constant, throbbing pain. She hadn't had a bowel movement in over a week and began vomiting even water. Despite her determination to make it through the wedding, the pain became unbearable. In the early hours of the wedding day, Julie's father rushed her to the emergency room.
The Devastating News
The next day, Julie woke up from a colonoscopy to see her husband Josh's face. The news was what she had feared – they had found a mass in her colon, suspected to be cancerous. In a whirlwind of activity, Josh arranged for surgery to remove the mass in the coming days.
The surgery was successful in removing the tumor, but it revealed something far worse. The doctors had found and removed a metastatic spread – cancerous cells that had broken away from the original tumor and formed new tumors elsewhere in her body. This discovery meant that Julie had stage IV cancer, a diagnosis that is almost never curable. She was only 37 years old.
The Beginning of Treatment
Julie began chemotherapy immediately after her diagnosis. The side effects were brutal – nausea, diarrhea, fatigue, mouth sores, and hair loss. This marked the beginning of a long and painful relationship with chemotherapy, as well as the start of a challenging psychological journey.
The diagnosis of stage IV cancer at such a young age was a devastating blow. Julie, who had overcome so many obstacles in her life, now faced the greatest challenge of all – a battle against an relentless disease that threatened to cut her life short just as she had achieved so much and had so much to live for.
Wrestling with Hope
The Double-Edged Sword of Hope
Throughout her cancer journey, Julie had a complex relationship with the concept of hope. She found herself wrestling with its meaning and its role in her life as a cancer patient.
Julie was never one for clichés or empty platitudes. She often felt frustrated by how frequently people invoked the word "hope" when talking about cancer. Phrases like "there's always hope" and "you mustn't give up hope" felt hollow to her, like words used to fill an uncomfortable silence rather than offer genuine comfort.
She recognized that hope could be deceptive. When embraced too strongly, hope could take on an almost religious quality, leading people to believe that hope alone was enough to cure cancer. This kind of blind optimism, Julie felt, could be dangerous.
The Herbal Medicine Adventure
Despite her skepticism about false hope, Julie's desire to tackle her cancer on all fronts led her to explore alternative treatments, including Chinese herbal medicine. This pursuit resulted in one of the more entertaining episodes of her cancer journey.
On the recommendation of a friend, Julie consulted a Harvard-educated doctor specializing in alternative medicine. The doctor's request to meet on a street corner initially alarmed Julie, but when he showed up in a floral shirt, she couldn't help but laugh at the absurdity of the situation.
The doctor explained that meeting outside his hospital allowed him to give advice more freely, without the constraints of official medical records. After their consultation, Julie received a shopping list of herbs including tangerine peel and cinnamon twig. While she was unsure if the $300-per-month herbal regimen would have any effect on her cancer, Julie appreciated the experience for the great story it provided.
The Dark Side of Hope
As her cancer progressed, Julie came to see hope as potentially dangerous. She observed how some dying patients clung to hope as a form of denial, preventing them from making the most of their remaining time.
Julie struggled with the idea of "living fully" in the face of terminal cancer. She found it challenging to embrace joy when the weight of her diagnosis constantly loomed over her. At times, the contrast between her reality and the normal lives of those around her was almost unbearable.
She recalled a moment at her daughter's birthday party where she stood among other mothers, smiling and making small talk while internally seething with rage and despair. She wanted to scream at them, asking why her children deserved to have a mother with cancer.
These moments of internal conflict and barely contained emotion were warning signs of the dark journey ahead, as Julie's cancer progressed and she was forced to confront her own mortality.
The Spread of Cancer
A Devastating Turn
In late 2014, over 18 months after her initial diagnosis, Julie's cancer had not yet become terminal. Despite having stage IV metastatic colon cancer and facing low odds of survival, Julie had always been one to defy the odds. Her entire life had been a testament to overcoming seemingly insurmountable obstacles.
However, in December 2014, Julie received the most devastating news of her entire cancer battle. During a routine visit to her doctor to receive the results of recent scans, Julie, alone in the doctor's office, was told that her lungs had 20 nodules – small spots measuring just a few millimeters. These nodules were most likely cancerous, and if confirmed, it meant that Julie's cancer was no longer curable. Her life expectancy had suddenly shrunk to just a few more years.
Emotional Turmoil
The news hit Julie like a tidal wave. She left the doctor's office in a daze, her mind reeling with the implications of this new development. The thought of leaving her children behind tormented her. Who would take them to their piano and swimming lessons? How could she leave them enough memories of herself? How would she express to everyone in her life how much she loved them?
In the weeks that followed the confirmation that the lung nodules were indeed cancerous, Julie's carefully maintained emotional balance crumbled. She slipped into a level of depression she didn't know humans could experience. More than once, she found herself broken and sobbing on the floor, screaming in front of her bewildered husband and children.
Julie experienced emotional suffering few of us will ever know, feeling extreme forms of jealousy, fury, anguish, and terror. She felt herself teetering on the edge of insanity, grappling with the unfairness of her situation and the impending loss of everything she held dear.
The Harsh Reality of Treatment
As her cancer progressed, Julie began further rounds of chemotherapy. However, the goal of treatment had shifted – it was no longer about curing her cancer, but about prolonging her life on Earth for as long as possible.
The side effects of chemotherapy were brutal. Julie experienced severe diarrhea, nausea, and searing mouth ulcers. These physical symptoms, combined with her emotional turmoil, made it nearly impossible for her to maintain a calm or philosophical outlook on her situation.
In her darkest moments, Julie found it difficult to place her life in the grander scheme of human history or to view her situation as luckier than those of child cancer victims. In those moments of despair, there was nothing to do but sob, embrace the pain, and curse the cruel lottery of life that had dealt her this hand.
Accepting Mortality
The Mental Journey
As Julie's cancer continued to progress, she embarked on one of the most challenging mental journeys a human can face – coming to terms with her own mortality. It's a path that terminal cancer patients must navigate, moving from the highs of hope to the lows of despair, and ultimately reaching a place of acceptance.
For Julie, this journey was accelerated by the aggressive nature of her illness. In 2017, her cancer spread to her liver, marking another vital organ that had fallen to the disease's relentless advance. The end was drawing near, and Julie was in constant pain from radiation treatments.
Finding Peace
Despite the physical and emotional toll of her illness, Julie was able to find a measure of peace in accepting her mortality. This acceptance was rooted in her faith in God. Although she didn't belong to any organized religion, Julie had always believed in a divine creator and an afterlife.
She struggled with the idea of a God who would take her away from her children so soon, but eventually, she was able to make peace with this concept. Instead of approaching death with furious denial and resentment, Julie chose to face it with dignity and grace.
Planning for the End
Having accepted her impending death, Julie turned her attention to planning for it. Unlike sudden tragedies, cancer allows for a strange kind of preparation. Julie set about organizing the practical aspects of her passing and saying her goodbyes.
In the summer of 2017, Julie began the difficult process of summoning family and friends for final farewells. She vividly remembered a poignant moment in late July when she sat in her dining room with her parents, sister, and brother. Everyone knew it would be their last moment together, and the air was heavy with unspoken emotions.
Julie also made decisions about her final resting place. Initially, she had wanted to be cremated, but she changed her mind when she realized how important it was for her husband to have a place to visit her – a place where he could eventually lie and rest beside her.
One of Julie's most important decisions was to die at home. This choice, while seemingly simple, required careful planning. Many cancer patients in their final stages end up trapped in hospitals, unable to be released as their health deteriorates. To ensure she could die in comfort, surrounded by her family, Julie arranged for a team of medically-trained professionals from a hospice to be brought into her home early in her end-of-life journey.
The Final Chapter
Julie's Last Days
As Julie's health continued to decline, she focused on spending quality time with her loved ones and putting her affairs in order. She wrote letters to her daughters, to be opened at significant milestones in their lives. She recorded videos, sharing her thoughts, advice, and love for her family.
Despite the pain and fatigue, Julie continued to write, pouring her heart and experiences into the memoir that would become "The Unwinding of the Miracle." She saw this book as her final gift to the world, a way to share her extraordinary journey and the lessons she had learned along the way.
A Life Well-Lived
Julie Yip-Williams passed away in her apartment on March 19, 2018, surrounded by her loving family. She was 42 years old.
Looking back on Julie's life, it's clear that it was nothing short of miraculous. From a blind infant narrowly escaping infanticide in war-torn Vietnam to a Harvard-educated lawyer, world traveler, wife, and mother in America, Julie's journey was extraordinary by any measure.
She overcame poverty, disability, and cultural barriers to build a life filled with love, success, and adventure. Even in the face of terminal cancer, Julie approached her final challenge with the same determination and grace that had characterized her entire life.
Conclusion
"The Unwinding of the Miracle" is a powerful testament to the human spirit's resilience and the preciousness of life. Julie Yip-Williams' story reminds us that every life, no matter how challenging its beginnings or how tragic its end, can be filled with meaning, love, and extraordinary achievements.
Through her raw and honest account, Julie invites readers to confront their own mortality and appreciate the miracle of their existence. She challenges us to live fully, to embrace both the joys and sorrows of life, and to face our inevitable end with courage and acceptance.
Julie's journey from a blind infant in Vietnam to a successful lawyer and mother in America, and finally to a woman grappling with terminal cancer, is a reminder of life's unpredictability and the strength we all possess to face whatever challenges come our way.
In the end, Julie understood that her cancer diagnosis was simply the unwinding of a miracle that had begun 42 years earlier. Her life, with all its triumphs and tragedies, was a gift – one that she cherished until the very end.
As readers, we are left with a profound appreciation for Julie's courage, her honesty, and her ability to find beauty and meaning even in life's darkest moments. Her story challenges us to examine our own lives, to appreciate the miracles large and small that surround us, and to face our own mortality with the same grace and dignity that Julie demonstrated.
"The Unwinding of the Miracle" is more than just a memoir of illness and death. It's a celebration of life in all its complexity, a reminder of the power of the human spirit, and an invitation to embrace every moment of our own miraculous existence.