Daddy blurts out "I have Cancer"
The thing about illness or cancer when it happens in the family, nothing slows down....words are said, maybe wrongly or not as planned.....but it the problem is when your dealing with the big "C" there is not a lot of time for looking backwards.....
Blurting out the words to the children that "I have cancer, and am going to die" although it was not the best way to let our children know what was happening and knowing the tears and the pain that ran down their faces and the silence that filled our dinning room that evening could not be taken back....It had been said....fear filled all our hearts...yet even though you wish it was a different way as had been planned, you have to continue to go forward....as it goes with terminal illness there is no time to waste....
After the shock of my husband blurting out the news to the children, and I sat there at that time knowing that no words would come to my mind, I also knew that I would sat down with the boys and we would talk about what daddy was going through and that we would be together as a family no matter what happens....at that point there was nothing I could do but try to stay calm ......and see what the tomorrow would bring....
Next came the scheduling with the doctor's what we had to do next. We had already been told that there would be surgery done....but first we had to spend time letting our families know.....so that was our next step....
Even though when things happen like this...an terminal illness, things go pretty crazy....not much time to breath....
The next week, we had gotten the appointments set up..surgery scheduled...I swear the surgeon was blind....He had on these real long skinny black glasses...I figured he needed them to see....and there were no glasses that strong...well, when doing skin grafting they use those glasses...but he was old too...so still kept me wondering...
I think when your faced with an illness that you have been told leads to death there are all types of emotions.....sad, lonely, scared, funny....and that is the one funny that I would have not think would be part of something so scary......
Death, dead, dying....these words are words we hate when someone is sick, or we have lost a child or loved one....but we never realize how often we use those words just in our everyday talking.....We had told my family and we were headed to see Lee's mom....she worked at the hospital and we had not been able to catch her so we decided to catch her on her break.....
We get to the hospital, and we get out of the car....we start to walk toward the hospital and almost at the same time we turn to each other and we say:
"I'm scared to death"....there it was....the word death...something that we had been dealing with for some day know....saying we were going to beat this thing, that it was not going to get us....that we can prove everyone wrong...typical words used when facing a terminal illness....but the word you avoid most is the word "death"...and here we are....walking into the hospital to give his mom the most horrible news she has ever had to hear.....and out of our mouths come that statement..."We're scared to Death".....just as we are looking at each other we realized.....How many times we use the word "Death" every day and not think anything about it................We started laughing, not at "death" but at ourselves for using the word we had been running from for days.....We laughed and laughed until we got to the elevator.....Finally, I told Lee, we have to quit laughing...what will your mother think of us coming to tell her that you have cancer.....yet as the elevator was going up....we were nearly belly rolling pee in the pants laughing...
By the time the doors open we had composed ourselves....I wiped the running make up off and we put on our serious faces.....as we knew this was going to be a very hard day for her..................
What did the laughter do for us.....It drained us of the stress that we had had building up inside of us from that day Sept 13th.....when our world fell apart.
Surgery....the next step......
con't
Blurting out the words to the children that "I have cancer, and am going to die" although it was not the best way to let our children know what was happening and knowing the tears and the pain that ran down their faces and the silence that filled our dinning room that evening could not be taken back....It had been said....fear filled all our hearts...yet even though you wish it was a different way as had been planned, you have to continue to go forward....as it goes with terminal illness there is no time to waste....
After the shock of my husband blurting out the news to the children, and I sat there at that time knowing that no words would come to my mind, I also knew that I would sat down with the boys and we would talk about what daddy was going through and that we would be together as a family no matter what happens....at that point there was nothing I could do but try to stay calm ......and see what the tomorrow would bring....
Next came the scheduling with the doctor's what we had to do next. We had already been told that there would be surgery done....but first we had to spend time letting our families know.....so that was our next step....
Even though when things happen like this...an terminal illness, things go pretty crazy....not much time to breath....
The next week, we had gotten the appointments set up..surgery scheduled...I swear the surgeon was blind....He had on these real long skinny black glasses...I figured he needed them to see....and there were no glasses that strong...well, when doing skin grafting they use those glasses...but he was old too...so still kept me wondering...
I think when your faced with an illness that you have been told leads to death there are all types of emotions.....sad, lonely, scared, funny....and that is the one funny that I would have not think would be part of something so scary......
Death, dead, dying....these words are words we hate when someone is sick, or we have lost a child or loved one....but we never realize how often we use those words just in our everyday talking.....We had told my family and we were headed to see Lee's mom....she worked at the hospital and we had not been able to catch her so we decided to catch her on her break.....
We get to the hospital, and we get out of the car....we start to walk toward the hospital and almost at the same time we turn to each other and we say:
"I'm scared to death"....there it was....the word death...something that we had been dealing with for some day know....saying we were going to beat this thing, that it was not going to get us....that we can prove everyone wrong...typical words used when facing a terminal illness....but the word you avoid most is the word "death"...and here we are....walking into the hospital to give his mom the most horrible news she has ever had to hear.....and out of our mouths come that statement..."We're scared to Death".....just as we are looking at each other we realized.....How many times we use the word "Death" every day and not think anything about it................We started laughing, not at "death" but at ourselves for using the word we had been running from for days.....We laughed and laughed until we got to the elevator.....Finally, I told Lee, we have to quit laughing...what will your mother think of us coming to tell her that you have cancer.....yet as the elevator was going up....we were nearly belly rolling pee in the pants laughing...
By the time the doors open we had composed ourselves....I wiped the running make up off and we put on our serious faces.....as we knew this was going to be a very hard day for her..................
What did the laughter do for us.....It drained us of the stress that we had had building up inside of us from that day Sept 13th.....when our world fell apart.
Surgery....the next step......
con't
Replies
Laughter is a wonderful stress reliever. Just because we laugh does not mean we don\'t care. The evening of the day my mother died, all our neighbors came to her house. We laughed and laughed about Mom and some of the good times. In fact a very dear friend of Mom said she would have to calm down before she went home as her husband would just not understand! It was indeed a stress relief - Mom was 59.
I honestly can\'t remember much about the day Lisa died.
I appreciate your journals - I am looking forward to the continuation.
Hugs,
Marlene
When our family flew to Maine to take care of all the horrid necessary details after Corrie was killed, we stayed at a tiny hotel (the only one in town). The mother of the girl who had been with Corrie and escaped with a broken arm, was staying at the same hotel. Apparently she saw our gathering in the restaurant on that first night and decided it couldn\'t possibly be us because we were all making silly jokes and giggling inanely. Rick was telling ridiculous story after story. Stress relief as Marlene says. And then, on the plane coming back from Maine three days later, we spent a great deal of time laughing ~ about what I have no clue. We had booked first class tickets and there were six of us ~ the four of us plus my nephew and our unofficial son-in-law who went to Maine to help us navigate and make sure we ate and got where we needed to go. Finally, one of the other passengers complained and said that our noise was keeping him awake, to which I screamed at him ~ \"we are carrying the ashes of our dead daughter with us ~ don\'t tell us to be quiet!\" If we\'re not laughing, we\'re screaming or weeping...
I, too, get very tired of how much time and energy I dedicate to thinking about death and dying. Ugh!
We\'re here ~ waiting for more of your riveting story!
Love and big hugs ~ Debbie
I wish you love and strength. Hugs, Marcia
I think the emotions are all over the place, when we are dealing with grief. Kind of foretaste of the roller coaster that comes after and all the ups and downs.
I can understand the strong emotions/laughter, with you and Ken, about having to tell \"Mother\"--how hard that would be...so stressful...almost an unbelievable thing for a son to have to tell his mother...
Love+Hugs, Donna
Laughter is a wonderful gift when all seems black in the world... Hugs
MaryLou
You have had some of the unpredictable emotions that we assume we are not to have...that we are only assigned tears and frowns in this disorderly conflicted grief...but it is not the way it is. I remember when my father died how my mother wanted it to be like the old fashioned wakes they had in her childhood....we stayed up all night in the funeral home..due to their understanding of my mother\'s need for this...and we sat around the table in the employees\' break room and got the midnight sillies...laughing and such...it was beyond real. My father would have loved to have \"been\" there was all I could think....so conflicting.....
I am waiting for more of your tragic journey.....pulling for your husband yet, knowing the end....love and hugs, dale...brandon\'s mom
It is so hard to share these realities with people who we love and who love us sooo much.
Sandi your heart has been through so much.
xox Sarah