My own mom I didn't realize it at the time was dying of cancer. I remember she said to me at the time, " I should had walked off a redlight." That is what she said. My beautiful young mom, only 53 said that. Next came a phone call when she said, " You know Cookie, I may die from this." I gave her a false hope, telling her not to talk like that, saying, " you will be fine." I couldn't deal with it. She lived 19 months with it, the last couple months was bad. It destroyed me. I sat with her when she died. Unable to answer the nurse's questions, if I wanted her to have more morphine. She slipped into a coma and sometimes, would whince or try to call out. I would eventually, say to give her more morphine because I didn't want her hurting.
I sat there in the dead of winter, 8 months pregnant after she died. I just sat there and sat there while everyone else was making phone calls and telling them, "mom was gone."
She was now 55, and I was 30. My whole life changed. I didn't know if I should be happy because I was bringing a new life into this world, my life, or sad because, I lost a life in my life which meant everything to me. My mom. I took it very badly for a long long time. I grieved my whole children's childhoods.
Not too many years later, when I was 44, the doctors now told me that I had cancer. In between those years I lost my dad to it, many uncles of my mom's and an aunt, so, I never saw anyone survive it. Only suffer from it.
I suffered the losses greatly.
The day I came home from the hospital I sat on the loveseat and just sat there and sat there. After my husband left for work and I put the boys on the schoolbus I would just retreat there, and wouldn't move. I sat in the dark, no tv on, no drape open, I wouldn't make even a cup of coffee. I just sat there. For weeks. For a couple months.
Then, along came my cat. Who is now 23 years old. He sat on the top of the loveseat and he would touch the drape and then, touch my hand. I knew what he wanted, but, I would tell him to go away. He would just sit with me in the darkened room. Until, one day, after he touched my hand and after I told him to go away, he took his furry little paw and for what it was worth he slapped my face! Then, I guess, not knowing what to expect, he backed off rolling into a little ball. I looked at him being so afraid and started to pet him telling him, " it is okay." I opened the drape and the blind and he started to look out and he wanted me to, so, I obliged him. Each morning he would do this. One morning, in the month of May, he wanted me to open the window. There, I could hear the birds and smell the fresh air. Together we watched a Robin feeding her young, we even saw a mole, we named Loy running about.
I started to make coffee in the morning. I started to look forward to my mornings with him. I started to see life through my cat's eyes.
I decided to take the chemo. A man who is from NZ, a friend of mine, wouldn't leave me feel sorry for myself, he was brutually honest, in saying, " pull your thumb out and get on with living." Between him and the cat, I had no choice, I started on the dreaded chemos.
And, suffered I did. It was not easy. But, I kept my childrens faces in my minds' eye and focused on it. So, I am here. After fighting it for nearly 6 years on chemo, I am here.
I know their will be a next for me. I am living with cancer. It is incurable. I have been in remission for 5 years now, but, I know, it won't last forever. I accept that.
I have given lots of thoughts about that day with my mom so many years ago now. I have asked myself, if I would want my sons who are the light in my life, wanting to be me...that day. Do I want them to feel the pang of pain watching me suffering?
I have made my decision. When nothing else can be done for me, when treatments are failing and nothing new is on the horizon, I will take my life into my own hands and call it good.
And, even the cat won't have a thing to say about it.