The final continuation from: At the Beginning: My Diagnosis and Shared Fears.
TW: Discussing cancer treatment in detail, leading into conversations about mental health and physical health, mentions of loss and death.
I left off at my three month stay in quarantine at Memorial Sloan Cancer Center. As I recall those lonely hours, it dawned on me where my appreciation for my solitude came from. After all, if you’re not centered with yourself, spending hours upon hours on your own would be the definition of torture. I have many insecurities, most of them physical, however my solitude was something I have grown fond of over the years. The friends I had before I was diagnosed either were kept away by their parents, told they couldn’t come over because of my health or simply didn’t understand that they couldn’t simply ‘catch cancer‘ by being beside me. There was only one friend who tended to fight for the right to see me as often as she could. Sometimes we were forced to share the space at opposite ends of the room just to make sure I don’t have another lengthy stay in the hospital. I remember thinking that this is a friend I hope would spend the rest of her life with me as my younger sister. I’m happy to say that this has come true – her presence in my life (see image) during moments where distance should have separated us has become rather inspirational.
~ Apologies. I struggle to stay on topic.
I can’t remember the days leading up to my discharge from the hospital. In my memories, it felt like from one moment to the next I was suddenly sitting in my mother’s favorite recliner for my home-school lessons. I still needed to maintain some semblance of an education after all, and I had always loved school. Despite my affection for each subject, I was always falling victim to my medication. A couple of weeks before the incident I’m going to detail shortly, my mother had gotten me a pet bird (after getting reassurances from my doctor of course). I wasn’t very unique when I came up with his (her?) name. Tweety was a black-headed caique and incredibly friendly. It didn’t take long for us to form a bond and so he was of the impression it was his responsibility to keep me awake during my lessons.
I have a fond memory of waking up to my teacher trying to coax my feathery friend away from me as he was willing to let me sleep through the lesson rather than wake me up. Tweety had no such sympathies. Whether it was because he took my education just as seriously as my mother did, or he wanted a treat – I couldn’t tell you. What I can say was that he made my days bearable. If Nikki wasn’t able to be at my side, then at least I had my little feathery friend.
By this point I really couldn’t tell you what was happening to my grandmother. In the jumbled up mess that is my memories, I can’t recall ever seeing her before my mother’s untimely death. I didn’t even know that her chemotherapy wasn’t working as well as everyone had hoped up until I rejoined her on the island of Puerto Rico. The only thing I can remember is her sharp anger after my mother’s funeral, how in her pain she blamed me for her passing.
After the final rounds of my chemotherapy, and in the middle of my radiation, my mother will be diagnosed with what I believed to be ovarian cancer. As an adult, I was made aware that this would be her second battle with cancer, but at the moment of finding this out, I thought it to be her first. I wasn’t privy to many details. My mother – for all the love and good she has done in my life – had a tendency of sheltering me from things she didn’t think I needed to worry about. Her diagnosis was one of those things. I don’t think she expected the cancer to take her. After winning her first fight I’m sure it was easy to remain optimistic. I matched that optimism up until Absal told me she was going to be admitted into hospice. Before I even had an opportunity to let that news settle as my new reality, the guardian that my mom had chosen to be her financial replacement began siphoning everything out of her estate that she could get her grubby little hands on. As much as I would like to get into the details – that’ll all be shared in my post solely addressing her and the heartless things she did even before my mom passed away.
Absal took over taking me to my appointments full time. I ached to see my mother but there were days where I just couldn’t watch her fading away in her hospital bed. It is hard to sum up my emotions during these pressing days. There were times I imagine I was crying my eyes out while dealing with the weakness that radiation caused but I can’t remember them clearly. It was hard to accept that she wasn’t going to come home. Not even the news of my remission offered much comfort because she was the sole reason why I had made it to the end. I want to say that I cared for my grandmother with the little strength I had to offer, but it would be a lie because I can’t even remember. All I can recall was that final visit to my mother’s bedside, and how her weak but soft words coaxed tears out of me because it didn’t immediately occur to me that this woman was feeding her lies about me. And to think, she was in pain up until the very end and all she thought about was me and my happiness.
Nikki walked with me to the funeral home to pay my respects to my mother a final time. The wake was to last three days to give enough opportunity for everyone to make it, and I personally don’t feel like a single person should have shown their faces. Nobody cared when she was warm and alive – I don’t see a reason to pretend when she was cold and ready for burial. The author of her funeral guest book told me all I needed to know about the so called family left behind. Mr. Robert – my high school home-school teacher who only met my mom due to my cancer treatment, took care to arrange her guest book after Absal, my brother, set up everything to bury his own mother.
I didn’t see not one cousin help set everything up – after my mom made sure they didn’t have to stress about burying their father (her brother). I didn’t see not a single friend check in on me or my grandmother – the two remaining ‘cancer’ patients struggling through her loss. No other family reached out, no one else regarded us with anything more than a glance and no one understood the amount of anger and pain that rushed over me when I saw her in her coffin. It was near impossible to contain all my grievances, and so a few members of my so called family received a few choice words. All I remember the shame that dusted their face as they were scolded by a teenager.
And that was all the time I was given to grieve.
As an adult, I know not to hold my grandmother responsible for her final words against me. She was hurting – having lost one son to cancer some years ago only to lose her only daughter as well. I hear those words for what they are – pain. Agony.
But as a child? I lost the only person (I felt) that loved me. With how the family quickly alienated me because of my diagnosis, it was easy to believe that my mother was the only one who cared for me. I had Absal looking over me and making sure I was fed, but I was struggling with the aftermath of my treatment. So many things were happening to me, physically and mentally, that I had little to no idea how to cope with. There wasn’t anyone to complain to who could give me any support, or know what to do. I didn’t even celebrate my recovery, nor the birthday that came after. It felt like my life came to a screeching halt.
And then I realized – I was the only one left. I was the only one to survive.
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