Hero can be defined a million and oneways, but I see it as only three letters: M-O-M. My mom is myhero; she is kind, strong and optimistic.

Kind is whatmost people call my mom. She tries her best to live life, butsometimes ends up with the short end of the stick. She alwaysputs others before herself.

When you hear the wordstrong, you might picture a body-builder but I see my mom.Recently she was diagnosed with breast cancer and had surgery.You have to be strong to deal with that; strong to beoptimistic when things look down. My mom is. She takes it aspart of life and moves on. When the rest of the family isn'tdealing well, she makes us feel better.

My mom is veryoptimistic. She tries her best to smile when in pain. My momhas to keep a clear head because she just started five longmonths of chemotherapy. She is okay about losing her hair; sheeven jokes about it. Once she said, "I never thought Iwould be catalog shopping for wigs instead of clothes."Without optimism she would just break down. She thinks of thepositive things in the future instead of the negative. I havethree older sisters and we help my mom get all the love andsupport she needs. You could say we are alloptimistic.

My mom is my hero. I admire her for allher ways. She is coping, and so is my family. A hero can be alife-saver, or a kind person; a hero can be old, young, fat,skinny, short or tall, but mine is my mom!