I wish I could tell you these days are easier; they're not. I wake up and wonder how today my brain will focus both on me living and my father dying. To consider them both at the same time is overwhelming, unbearable. But I feel like I need to find a way to do it.
When we visit my dad, I expend all my energy trying to etch his face onto my brain, as if it hasn't been there my whole life. He's lucid and we bring up nice family memories. There are some smiles and laughter. And he eats whatever food we bring him, albeit a small amount. In some moments it almost seems like we're not going through what we're going through.
Then he is tired and wants to sleep. When we hug goodbye, I can feel his back bones. We leave, navigating through house clutter, the new additions of a wheelchair, shower seat, and walker.
When I come home from visiting, all I can do is sit in a foggy quiet. It doesn't seem like speaking or writing or watching anything would make any sense. There is that quiet, then a hum I can almost feel, a hollowing out to make more space for grief.
When I come home, I wonder about the headaches I sometimes get, if they're due to stress, not sleeping well, or maybe they're my body not tolerating the maintenance medication. Maybe it's worse and the cancer back already. My mind goes everywhere. I feel physically ok. But then I think, I felt okay before it all happened in March.
To go through these days is not to trust the ground I'm walking on. Not to trust the air. I make lists all day of what I'm thankful for, they are endless. To be honest, though, I'm scared and unsteady. I know that nothing is permanent, and yet I don't believe that any good news is coming. I do believe this is a distorted thought, but I'm inside out now, I'm on eggshells, I'm having a hard time finding my way.
27 December 2019
16 December 2019
The small right-nows
Hello to anyone reading,
December has been challenging. All my fears and weirdness about piecing my life back together and moving forward have taken a back seat to the situation with my Dad, who is not doing very well.
Although his radiation treatments worked well on the tumor, shrinking it and relieving his initial pain, the treatments themselves are taking a big physical toll on him. His fatigue is way beyond that normally associated with radiation -- or maybe not, considering his age and physical well-being prior to the lymphoma. It's hard to say, but we've stopped after 8 treatments.
His blood pressure is low and he says he's cold all the time. It could be that the disease, which was also present in a few other spots in his body, has begun to overwhelm him. I don't want to believe this (who wants to believe the process of dying has already begun?), and yet part of me knows I need to begin to accept it.
It's very strange to think that the cancer can be treated but a body is too tired or old or weak to allow it. Maybe he just needs a break from treatment to gather his strength, and then he'll be able to get more treatment. Maybe the cancer is slow-growing enough that he could have a few more years. Maybe maybe maybe maybe. All the maybes are exhausting.
I know that dealing with a parent getting older and facing the end of his or her life is a normal, if not excruciating stage of life. But facing it now, what seems like maybe 5 entire minutes after I was declared NED (no evidence of disease) (it was actually about 2 months) is something else, I think. I am not coming to this life stage with 100% of myself. Or at least with 100% of the self I thought I knew.
So now what? Now be more mindful of the small, right-now joys, things I might not have noticed before, or thought of as specific joys: my sister's goofball dog curled up in front of a fake fireplace. My dad having a good morning, eating his cereal and talking about the local newspaper. My husband elated at watching a rocket launch on tv. Now, notice these moments more, try etching them to memory. Find what is good right now.
And at 10:30 pm every night, take the medicine that is supposed to keep at bay the scary disease you had just months ago. Look at the pill before taking it, silently thank it and ask it to please do its job please, because I want to live, to keep living, hard and sorrowful as it can sometimes be.
December has been challenging. All my fears and weirdness about piecing my life back together and moving forward have taken a back seat to the situation with my Dad, who is not doing very well.
Although his radiation treatments worked well on the tumor, shrinking it and relieving his initial pain, the treatments themselves are taking a big physical toll on him. His fatigue is way beyond that normally associated with radiation -- or maybe not, considering his age and physical well-being prior to the lymphoma. It's hard to say, but we've stopped after 8 treatments.
His blood pressure is low and he says he's cold all the time. It could be that the disease, which was also present in a few other spots in his body, has begun to overwhelm him. I don't want to believe this (who wants to believe the process of dying has already begun?), and yet part of me knows I need to begin to accept it.
It's very strange to think that the cancer can be treated but a body is too tired or old or weak to allow it. Maybe he just needs a break from treatment to gather his strength, and then he'll be able to get more treatment. Maybe the cancer is slow-growing enough that he could have a few more years. Maybe maybe maybe maybe. All the maybes are exhausting.
I know that dealing with a parent getting older and facing the end of his or her life is a normal, if not excruciating stage of life. But facing it now, what seems like maybe 5 entire minutes after I was declared NED (no evidence of disease) (it was actually about 2 months) is something else, I think. I am not coming to this life stage with 100% of myself. Or at least with 100% of the self I thought I knew.
So now what? Now be more mindful of the small, right-now joys, things I might not have noticed before, or thought of as specific joys: my sister's goofball dog curled up in front of a fake fireplace. My dad having a good morning, eating his cereal and talking about the local newspaper. My husband elated at watching a rocket launch on tv. Now, notice these moments more, try etching them to memory. Find what is good right now.
And at 10:30 pm every night, take the medicine that is supposed to keep at bay the scary disease you had just months ago. Look at the pill before taking it, silently thank it and ask it to please do its job please, because I want to live, to keep living, hard and sorrowful as it can sometimes be.
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