Hindsight

I keep replaying that last weekend in my head, isn't hindsight a wonderful thing? It's not just that last weekend either. Every second of every day is filled with thoughts of you, of things we did in the last five years, conversations we had and mostly signs that were there for so long telling us something was wrong.

Thursday night you had a night out planned with the boys. I didn't want you to go, after the results, the hospital, I was so worried but you were adamant. Off to the Claude you went with the boys from work, a pub you spent many a wild night night in during your younger days and you had a fantastic night. I picked you up early, you were tired but in good spirits.

The weekend went from bad to worse. Friday you were not so good but had planned to go and watch Wales play Samoa at the stadium with some of your family. It was to be a first for you and you were absolutely not going to miss is. Ten minutes before your lift arrived you collapsed, you recovered fairly quickly but you clearly were not going out. All I saw was a bad turn and knocked confidence, hindsight is screaming other things. Now I can see you were fading fast.

The night improved when your son visited, it was to be a night of fun and frivolity, the last ever, although we didn't know it then. You were positively glowing, it was clear how much it meant to you to have him here and say the things you had wanted so long to say. It was pleasant and fun, a few drinks and an incredibly upbeat evening.

Sunday we were supposed to be heading to Amsterdam for a few days, one of the many things we had planned but by Saturday it was clear we weren't going to make it. You needed help and the wheelchair just to get to the bathroom and you were far too ill to go up the stairs. The doctor came and the most useful thing he could offer you was a hospice place, we asked him to leave. You struggled through the day and it become clear your illness had moved to the next stage. Hindsight doesn't agree though, hindsight tells me you were dying before my very eyes.

Sunday morning and we should have been heading off for our next adventure. Instead my parents visited and helped me turn the dining room into a bedroom. You were so distant all day, hardly said a word. Your son was coming and you were waiting for his call, when it came it was to say he couldn't make it, you didn't show it but it was clear how upset you were. Throughout the day after the call you kept asking when he was coming, you had forgotten that he had called to say he couldn't make it and kept forgetting over and over. I made a mental note to buy you a notepad, it became clear that your thinking and remembering abilities were really being affected by the tumour yet still I didn't think I was about to lose you.

You slept well on Sunday night, I came and checked on you several times and it was nice to see you so peaceful after weeks of being unable to sleep. Hindsight, of course sees things differently.

Monday the doctor came, you told him you'd rather be dead than in the pain you were in. He prescribed morphine. Simple, you'd think but then I had to leave you to collect the prescription and hindsight knows that you spent your last two waking hours alone while I tried to find a pharmacy that stocked it, what a nightmare.

You took the morphine and slept, it was nice to see you so peaceful. I kept thinking that if the pain was under control and you could sleep, even if you weren't well enough to be up and about we could bring the fun to you. I told myself that tomorrow would be a better day.

I checked on you several times throughout the evening and at midnight when you still hadn't woken I sat with you for a while, just stroking your hand, I was hoping you would wake, we always said "I love you" and kissed goodnight but you never woke. I decided to sleep on the sofa so I was close to you if you needed me. I only thank God I didn't leave you that night.

I don't know if this is a normal way to feel, in fact I don't know anything for sure any more.

Tomorrow

When you're a child, all that matters is tomorrow. Tomorrow I start school, tomorrow it's the school play, tomorrow it's Christmas, tomorrow I'm going to a party, tomorrow I go up to big school, tomorrow I'm going to see a band, tomorrow I'm going to the pictures with my boyfriend, tomorrow it's my birthday. That's the stages the children are in.

Now we find ourselves living in the same way. Let's have a break before we go for the results. Our friends made some dreams come true before the chemo started, let's have a couple of days away between chemo sessions, let's have a weekend with friends.

We are like children again, living for the next thing and not looking beyond. Is that a bad thing? probably not and we'll stick with it for now.

Acting like a child, not a bad thing surely.

Is this a normal way to feel?

Chemotherapy

And so the hell on earth that is chemotherapy begins. No matter how much people who have had experience tried to prepare us for how awful it was going to be, nothing could have prepared us for this. How can something that is designed to make you better, make you so very, very ill.

Friday was chemo day and you were superb, I thought you were one of the lucky ones. By Saturday night you were feeling a little ill, Sunday you felt fatigued all day and by Monday you couldn't get out of bed.

For all we had prepared for how ill you would feel, to see you with a mouthful of ulcers, unable to eat, with no energy for anything is horrendous. It certainly makes you ponder on life, quality or quantity? We already know it isn't a cure and what's the use of having longer to spend it like this.

What I wasn't prepared for was how emotionally fraught you would feel, I guess it's easy to be philisophical about dying when you feel so alive, when you're feeling half dead it's a little more difficult. It's so hard to keep you positive and yesterday you sobbed, I've never seen you like that but can totally understand how you feel. I sobbed too, but I waited until I had gone out and sobbed in the car in a supermarket carpark.

All of these feelings after just one session, Friday it starts again.

Is this a normal way to feel?

Cottage Cheese

Yesterday was an awful day and I wondered how I was ever going to get through this and watch you go through the worse time of your life, at what would be the end of your life.

Today is different, your children came the other day, it was lovely to see the relationship you have with them. While I've been searching the net for new treatments and pioneering therapy your daughter has been looking up alternative treatments.

Flax seed oil and cottage cheese she said. I thought how can cottage cheese cure cancer and I must admit I dismissed her thoughts. Today I thought I would look for myself and found an interesting website.

I'm going to share it with you, in the thought that people in my position may be reading this page and taking as much comfort from my words as I am getting from typing them. Click here if you would like to read about the alternative therapy we are going to try, it's called the Budwig diet.

Will it work? I don't know, but it's not going to do any harm. They've already told us they are going to try chemotherapy to shrink the cancer and although we still believe this is still the best option, cottage cheese and flax seed oil is not going to hurt it is?

You? Today was a good day, the steroids they prescribed are kicking in and you're feeling well, the colour is back in your face and I walked in the room earlier and much to my dismay you were cleaning the windows.

I'm smiling, we've laughed. Is this a normal way to feel?

He taught me how to laugh

This is me, Katie Crunch. Actually as you may have guessed this isn't really my name, it's a name I was given in college for my inexplicable ability to find trouble and mishaps wherever I go. The years have passed but not much had changed, my ability to veer from one disaster to another had been so well practised it became part of my character.

Many years, various disasters, two children and a few hundred miles later then one day all this changed. I'd met a man, a real gentleman, just what I needed and the most stabling influence I had ever met in my life. He taught me how to laugh again, something that had been long forgotten and he taught me how to slow down enough to take in the wonders of every day, enjoy my children and to just generally enjoy 'being'.

Last week after five years together the crushing news came that this man, who brought so much into my life has cancer. Suddenly, after taking laughing for granted for so long I remember what life was like before I met him and I'm scared I'll forget how to laugh again.

He's being tough, worrying about everyone else because that's what he does. He worries about being a burden on me and I wish I could put him inside my head with the myriad of thoughts I have and show him how I feel. That every second spent in his company is an honour.

We're told this is a normal way to feel.