“Are you kidding me?” Isabella said. “You are so much stronger.”

The Summit

When the team reached Camp 3, towering above the clouds at 19,600 feet and dotted with orange and yellow tents, Bella zipped her mother’s jacket. Isabella’s fingers, chapped from chemotherapy and the elements, were bleeding. Bella offered her arm to steady her as they looked at the layers of mountains that unraveled in the distance.

The trip had brought out another side of Bella — it had forced her to become the mother.

There were few words as the team left early the next morning. Hard-to-reach places often demanded silence. As the sun rose and blanketed the snow-capped mountains in warm, orange light, it cast a silhouette of Aconcagua across the vast landscape.

Isabella had a determined look in her eyes and kept a steady pace. When Bella broke down with fatigue 500 meters from the top, it was Isabella who convinced her daughter that she could make the summit, just as she always had.

Six hours later, Isabella and Bella reached the roof of the Americas. Exhausted, they embraced as Isabella wiped tears from her eyes. The mountains always have a way of making me cry, she said.