In the nearly three years since she came to North Texas, Bekki Nill has seen two of her kids graduate from college, one get engaged and her husband's career flourish.

And she became a grandmother!

"Amazing things," she said.

Blessings, truly, and somewhat newsworthy because Bekki's husband is Dallas Stars general manager Jim Nill, architect of one of this NHL season's most improved teams.

But more so because Bekki, 55, is nearing the fifth anniversary of being diagnosed with incurable cancer and told she had two months to live.

Would anyone blame her if she quietly focused on prolonging her life while privately cherishing these milestones? Instead, she openly discusses her cancer fight while becoming a guiding light within the Stars' organization -- and an inspiration to many outside of it.

"The way she lives her life probably allows me to do this," Jim said last Monday, mere hours after acquiring Calgary's Kris Russell before the NHL trade deadline. "She doesn't put herself first in anything, though she probably should at times."

That night, Bekki was driven to American Airlines Center for the Stars-Detroit game by Kathy White, wife of Stars Director of Hockey Operations Scott White.

Bekki requested the ride because she was just two days removed and a bit shaky from her most recent chemotherapy infusion.

Bekki wore gloves to lessen the risk of picking up germs that might compromise her weakened immune system, but she beamed while greeting several well-wishers from the Red Wings organization, where Jim spent his final three seasons as a player and 19 in the front office, the last 15 as assistant GM.

She said she'd barely seen Jim in two days, because of the deadline. She joked that she thought about making and wearing a jersey that listed vital particulars such as her age, draft year, contract status and injury report.

"That's the only way he would recognize that I exist," she laughed. "That's OK. You just know there are times of the year when they're gone. I'm self-sufficient."

Life-changing events

Bekki's last in-depth interview with The Dallas Morning News occurred days after Jim was hired as the Stars' general manager, on April 29, 2013. It was the realization of a career-long dream for Jim, 18 days after his 55th birthday.

He'd never been a general manager, despite overtures from several teams because of his well-known eye for talent and role in building the minor league system as the Red Wings rolled to four Stanley Cup titles in a 12-season span.

Detroit was more than home for the Nills. The organization and community became part of Bekki's support system after she learned in May 2011 that the breast cancer she thought she had beaten in the early 2000s had metastasized into her bones, ribs and liver.

Thirteen months after her diagnosis, Jim was in talks to become Montreal's general manager, but withdrew, at least in part due to Bekki's health considerations.

When the Stars called a year later, Bekki told Jim, "I'm all there. And I'm all in." By then the cancer was eradicated from her bones and ribs, though what remained in her liver was incurable.

"This is an opportunity to meet new people, and for people to meet us," Jim told The News in a profile of him and Bekki that appeared on May 12, 2013. "It's going to be life-changing for us -- and we hope it's going to be life-changing for other people, also."

Many longtime Stars fans no doubt recalled the franchise's 1993 move from Minnesota to Dallas and coach-general manager Bob Gainey, whose 39-year-old wife Cathy died of brain cancer in June 1995.

When Bekki shared the story of her cancer battle to The News nearly three years ago, it was mere days after she underwent a procedure to freeze lesions on her liver.

Turns out, Bekki now says, the cancer was "flaring up." Her Detroit-area oncologist, Patricia LoRusso, determined that the seven to 10 daily chemotherapy pills Bekki had been taking for 16 months no longer were suppressing the cancer.

Bekki estimates that was the eighth or ninth cancer drug she had tried and by far the most effective.

Months earlier, it had been determined that Bekki fit the criteria for a trial study of a therapy called Kadcyla. But as Bekki drove to a Michigan hospital to sign forms to begin the trial, a patient in France got the study's last spot.

So in September 2013, Bekki not only had to transition to a new life and doctors in Dallas, but a different cancer treatment.

Fortunately, during a medical conference in Budapest, Dr. LoRusso met and discussed Bekki's case with Dr. Joyce O'Shaughnessy, Chair of Breast Cancer Prevention Research at Baylor Dallas' Charles A. Sammons Cancer Center.

And on Feb. 22, 2013, the FDA approved the use of Kadcyla therapy.

"It's all in God's timing," Bekki said.

Bekki's first appointment in Dallas occurred the day after movers delivered the Nills' belongings to their new Frisco home. She began Kadcyla therapy immediately. Other than fatigue, there are no side effects. No nausea. No hair loss.

Bekki's most recent Kadcyla infusion was her 47th.

Bekki said Dr. O'Shaughnessy, whom she describes as a ball of energy, asked, "Is there anything else I can do for you?"

"I said, 'Just find a cure,'" Bekki recalled. "And then she hugged me. She lives and breathes to find a cure. Not just for me; for anyone that's dealing with this."

A message of hope

According to the American Cancer Society, Bekki is one of 14.5 million people in the United States and 950,000 in Texas who are living with, or have overcome, invasive forms of cancer.

Each October, as part of an NHL-wide initiative, the Stars host a Hockey Fights Cancer Night. Bekki hosts about 40 cancer survivors in a suite, while Stars employees and players' wives wear pink and auction autographed jerseys to benefit local cancer organizations.

At this year's Hockey Fights Cancer Night, on Oct. 24, Bekki dropped the ceremonial puck before the game against Florida, although she much preferred the personal interactions with fellow cancer survivors in the suite.

The Nill's suite at Fight Cancer Night on Oct. 24, 2015. Jim and Bekki Nill are at far right (Jim in back row far right, and Bekki in middle row far right) (2013)

"For me to walk out on that ice to do that puck drop was way out of my comfort zone," she said. "But I understand that when God is telling you to do something, you just move.

"And I want people to have hope. I don't have a cure, beyond these treatments, until they either stop working or there is nothing else for me. But I know a lot of these girls have a hope."

Bekki brings Stars tickets to her infusion appointments and leaves them, with her phone number, for patients who might like to come to a game, or just talk. She also gets calls and texts from people in her church congregation, asking if she'll pray for or speak to friends who have cancer.

Last summer, Bekki helped organize a weekly Bible study for women who work in the Stars offices and wives of male employees. One of them is Kathy White, who says the younger women in particular look up to Bekki.

"Jim and Bekki have done a great job of creating a sense of community, making everybody in the organization realize that we're a part of this and important, that we're all going for the same thing," White said.

Bekki refers to the women in the Bible study as "my little fireflies," who often light the way for her.

"Most people look at cancer as a terrible thing, the worst thing that's ever happened to them," said Trevor Nill, Jim and Bekki's 26-year-old son. "And obviously cancer is a terrible thing.

"But her mind-set is, 'OK, I have this. I have it for a reason. What is the reason I have it? How can I help others?'"

When his father was hired by the Stars, Trevor's hockey eligibility at Michigan State had ended and he was a semester shy of earning his engineering degree, but also had pro hockey aspirations.

Trevor was invited to the St. Louis Blues' training camp, but a slow-to-heal leg injury raised red flags during his physical. After his parents' move to North Texas, it was a Dallas doctor who diagnosed Trevor as having a heart arrhythmia similar to, though less severe, than the condition that ended Stars center Rich Peverley's career in 2014.

Trevor reports that he's now "doing fantastic." He finished his degree, has an engineering job in Michigan and has an August wedding date with fiancée Amber, in Dallas.

Kristin, the youngest of Jim and Bekki's three children, graduated from Grand Valley State in Michigan, moved in with Jim and Bekki in Frisco and recently began a public relations job in Dallas.

Seven months ago, the oldest Nill sibling, Jenna, gave birth to Jim and Bekki's first grandchild, Cael. Add the Stars' surge to Western Conference contender status, and there's been a lot for the Nills to celebrate.

Jim and Bekki Nill's grandson, Cael

"We're in a good spot in our life," Jim said, though he deflects credit for the Stars' success. "My title is 'manager' for a reason. You hire good people and then just manage them, let them do their thing.

"I've got that in my life, with my wife and children. It's about the people you surround yourself with, supporting each other."

Of Bekki, Jim adds, "She's an example of how you should live your life. She gives me a different perspective. She's the balance that I need."

Each day's a blessing

Bekki said that each morning, she asks God what his will is for her that day. Then she vows to embrace that will, whatever it might be.

"I'd like for him to write it on the chalkboard in my kitchen," she mused. "But he doesn't."

Each day brings challenges -- and no guarantees.

Each time she goes for an infusion, she briefly braces herself when handed her blood work results.

"Ultimately, I can't let that piece of paper dictate my day or the way my life is going to be," she said. "Because I don't really have control. Living with a different perspective since I was diagnosed is absolutely the perspective God needed me to have."

In reality, she doesn't need anything to be written on her kitchen chalkboard to know that her purpose is to help others.

"That's what I want my life to be," she said. "I need to leave things better than how I found them."