Disclaimer: I make it my goal to make these posts easily digestible. I’ve written a number of things in my life and I know most people aren’t keen on reading an endless wall of text. That said, I know it is annoying to split things into parts. Some want to read it all at once, so you’ll see me experimenting with different lengths. However if the tone or subject matter is heavy, I do reserve the right to take it one sentence at a time. TW: Discussing cancer treatment in detail, leading into conversations about mental health and physical health, mentions of loss and death.
I believe my grandmother was between the ages of 83 or 85 during this time in my life. She has lived with us for as long as I can remember, and I loved it whenever we shared a little cafecito behind my mother’s back (she didn’t believe a kid should have caffeine). These photos of me in a white dress were of my communion, and they were taken the year before our health collectively collapsed. I feel like I barely had any time with her before the world snatched her away from me.
I wouldn’t be able to tell you the date of her diagnosis, but it was incredibly close to my own. During my complaints about the lumps in my neck, my grandmother had stopped eating and all but held a steady liquid diet that consisted of coffee and ensure. As you can imagine that isn’t the best diet for an elder especially given the impact it had on her weight. In between finding a second opinion for my own problems, my mother was making appointments to take her own mother in to see about her lack of appetite and if there could be any more happening. A tumor was soon discovered with scans, and it sat heavily in my small grandmother’s stomach. One biopsy later, and we were both slated to start our chemotherapy. What a way to find common ground.
I have this hazy memory that plays in my mind whenever I eat a hotdog. Random, I know, but I couldn’t even tell you why this stood out to me. Maybe it was because of how chaotic that day was, or maybe it was because that was the first hint I had that my mom was battling this out with us- alone. No one to take over juggling two vastly different people with the same illness afflicting them at the same time. From my recollection, this had to be either my second or third week of chemo. My regiment was as follows: three days of chemotherapy infusion, follow by the remaining days of the week carting around a ten pound bag of saline to flush my system. Don’t even ask me about the pills that I was on because I couldn’t even tell you – all I can say about it was that it hardly ever seemed to help with the side effects. My mom had gotten me a hotdog to eat as a quick snack and a way to get something sustainable in my stomach in order to take my medication. Unfortunately, I couldn’t keep it down.
In the midst of vomiting what felt like food I had eaten all the way up till last week, I recall noticing how my mother was ping-ponging between me in the living and who I could only guess was my grandmother puking in the bathroom. I desperately want to believe that she had at least Absal helping out, but who was I kidding? I clearly remember thinking that she looked like a head with its chicken cut off with how she came to me to wipe my face and hold me steady, only to rush off after a few minutes to most likely do the same thing to my grandmother. I wish I had more sense to demand that she call someone to help her – anyone. However, as an adult, I know that she was most likely doing her best to keep us safe. Chemotherapy basically strips a person’s immune system down to a point where you’re fare weaker than a newborn baby. Bringing in another person meant risking our lives, and she would never do that.
That leads me into another, albeit no less more, chaotic memory from those days. I mentioned, previously, that I had a catheter implanted in my chest to receive my infusions. I hated it so much as it required constant care and the smallest tug by way of my clothing or otherwise lead to a few painful moments. My mother took cleaning and caring for it as her main priority, much like she tackled for my grandmother, so she was always cautious with explaining to the people around me the importance of not touching it. Even I, at thirteen, understood the importance but a friend – who was the same age as me – failed to heed my mother’s warnings. I’ll never forget how absolutely livid my mother was when I told her that this friend had touched the end of my catheter. Honestly, it broke my heart as well because it took hours of convincing my mom to let a friend come to visit. After that incident, I never asked again – especially when it was discovered that this friend was just recovering from chicken pox before she came over. I hate to think that my friend betrayed my mother’s trust, but we were kids. They, most likely, didn’t understand.
My mother took to cleaning and tending to the catheter, and soon contacted the head of my medical team in order to inform her of what happened. Dr. Tripett. Her name is the only one that comes easily to me when I think about the people responsible for my recovery (I’m sure the spelling is off). In memories, it felt like I fell sick the very next day. I had already suffered through chicken pox in my younger years, so the blisters forming on my arms were diagnosed as shingles. Typically shingles is a diseases that plague older adults (and only if that adult has had chicken pox as a child), but it presented in me as a way to truly put my immune system into perspective. I really was at my weakest, and the clear boundaries we had put up for my safety felt as though they were barreled through by a freight train.
I spent three months in the hospital (as far as I know) attempting to recover while also staying the course for my cancer treatment. Three months in quarantine, locked away for my safety and the safety of the other children on the ward going through the same nightmare as well. Three months of being visited by people in full hazmat suits, treated like an infection and left alone for hours on end. Sleep was my only escape.
At least I could say it prepared me for the 2020 pandemic.
Over the years, my ability to tell the time between events during my treatments become nothing more than just a guessing game. I could easily consult my own records, but I’ve always had this fear of stirring up memories I may not want. Or worse, I’ll have to face the fact that most of my time gaps was due to the heavy medication – leaving me to not appreciating my mother enough, or telling my grandmother just how much I loved her whenever I was lucid. The weight of these ‘what if’s aren’t as heavy as the fear of unlocking that unwanted memory however. I’ve since come to grips with what I could remember, and I’m beginning to listen to reassurances from my loved ones that my mother and grandmother were aware of my affections during that time. It is a small comfort but a comfort nevertheless.
(…to be continued)
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