All right, so here i am sitting at my parents' computer. Both of my dogs are laying right next to me and either one of them or both have some nasty-ass gas. It stinks to the high heavens and the wind isn't working in my favor.
Anyways, I was playing a game of Yahtzee! when I started thinking about my mom. Sometimes i just start thinking and i cant turn it off and then it escalates out of control. When this happens, it usually ends up that I begin to think that the subject of my thoughts either dies, or gets seriously injured. I have even brought myself to tears by thinking about attending the funeral of a close loved one. It's not that its a passing thought, i have spent hours replaying and going through every detail. It can get sick sometimes.
Well, to get back to my mom. She was diagnosed with colon cancer in February of 2007. They didn't catch it until it had spread to places other than the colon. Well, she went and had surgery to get the mass removed and the she started chemo. To make a long story short, she had to have 2 or 3 other surgeries to fix what the chemo was doing to her body. what happened was that there were fistulas that were growing from her intestine to her vagina and also to her bladder. She was getting these fistulas because the chemo was too strong and it was interfering with the healing process. Whenever she went to pee, she had poop coming out of the wrong whole. So, imagine trying to push a regular turd through a pin hole. Yeah, it would be like passing large kidney stones sometimes twice a day. because of the excruciating pain that my mom went through, she stopped eating and she lost a large amount of weight. She weighed close to 300 lbs before she was diagnosed with cancer (she's a tall woman) and after she lost the weight she weighed 120 or less....She lost this weight in a month's time. My mom is also on high blood pressure meds, that she didnt know she was supposed to take with food. So, since my mom wasnt eating, she was lethargic, and she started to not pee as much. Turns out that the reason she was supposed to take the meds with food was because if not, if could cause kidney failure. That's exactly what happened. the day that my great aunt came over and saw how bad my mom looked was the day that my mom got to live. She had my dad take my mom to the ER. the doctors told my mom and dad that if she didnt come in that day, she would have died the next.
Anyways, my mom got more surgerys to fix the fistulas. This time, my dad took her to see a specialist in montana. She started to heal and it was great to see her eat food and enjoy it again. She was no longer scared of food.
She went through about a year of intense chemo. She had two types, long and short. I dont know what this meant, but it was making her better. Just recently, mom stopped taking her Chemo drugs because her cancer count is WAY DOWN and now she is only taking one med to help shrink the tumors. During this whole ordeal, my mom became unable to work, because when she lost all that weight, she was just a skeleton with skin. Everytime i came the two hours to visit her i hoped and prayed that she would look better, but for 3 or 4 months every time i came up she looked worse and worse. I would put on a happy face for her, but as soon as i started the car for the ride back, I would cry. I cried for the whole two hours on my way back home. It was dark times.
To get back on track, my mom gets to start work again on Oct 13th. I'm so excited for her. She has come such a long way. Even though her position is only going to be part time 2 or 3 times per week, she will be getting back out and doing something. My mom likes to keep busy, but i can tell that she is a little nervous about it because, lets face it, she's not like she used to be. Because of her extreme weight loss (she has gained some of the weight back. She doesnt look sickly anymore) and chemo, she has lost a lot of muscle mass and she has neuropathy in her legs. But i told her that she has to start out slow to get her feet wet so she can figure out what she can handle. And if she figures she can handle more, then more power to her.
Before my mom was diagnosed with cancer, when i was in jh or hs, my mom and my grandma had a falling out. My gram was/is a pill popper and an alcoholic. Since my mom's near death experince, they have started talking again and tomorrow we are all going out to a buffet for my grandma's 80th birthday.
It seems that this whole experience has changed how my mom views things. She was easy going before, but she is even more so now. Little things that would have gotten on her nerves before, dont seem to bother her now. My dog can get into the garbage and my mom laughs about it instead of getting frustrated. She does laugh more, and it can be the smallest thing and she will let out a chuckle. One of the really big differences is in the relationship that my mom and dad have. My dad realizes that my mom almost died. This scared him. He is now more helpful around the house, he talks to my mom more, shows her that he loves her more, is more protective of her (this annoys my mom, but make me giggle. I think it's cute). And even he has begun to be more open and carefree with life. Albeit not much, but if you knew my dad, it would almost be a 180.
I think the moral of this story is to not take your loved ones for granted, because in a blink of an eye they can be gone. I love my mom very much and since his whole mess started, i think that we have become even closer. Her bravery, tolerance, and persistance is an inspiration. For her to have gone through this, she is the strongest person that i know. I love her very much.
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