Happy to be Alive!

Three years ago today, I received the scariest and most devastating news that I’ve ever heard. My oncologist called me with results regarding a CAT scan I’d had a few weeks earlier. I was in a wheelchair because of all the pain in my leg. It was cold and rainy that afternoon, and I remember it so well because we were having a new front door installed (we had to get it done before the end of ’09 so we would qualify for a special home improvement tax break lol). Anyway, my oncologist’s nurse called me around 12:30 that afternoon and said they wanted to talk to me in person. I told her that we would try our best, but we were having a new door put in and it might take awhile. So she made the appointment for 3:30 and the Champion guys were done by around 2. I knew the news was bad. I started crying and praying as soon as I hung up the phone, begging God to give me strength to handle whatever the doc had to say. I was in so much pain that I couldn’t take the two steps down into our garage to get in the car, so I scooted down the steps on my butt. John wheeled me in my chair for the rest of it.

When we got to the doctor’s office, they took us back almost immediately, and my doctor came in to the exam room to deliver the news. He started with “unfortunately…” and put his hand on my shoulder. I just took a deep breath and listened as he told me and John about how the chemo wasn’t working and the CAT scan had detected several lesions on my liver. Me and John just looked at each other, stunned. I was too scared and too surprised to cry. I was just so sure that the chemo was working. My doctor ordered an x-ray on my leg to see if the radiation had helped at all, and to ensure I didn’t have a fracture, so I could start physical therapy. Over in the Radiology department at the hospital, it was dead. After all, it was 4:00 PM on New Year’s Eve. While everyone was off making big party plans, me and John sat alone in the waiting area, quietly wiping tears, trying to hold it together. The x-ray technician had to lift me out of my wheelchair and hold me on the table because I literally could not move my lower body. He told me to hang in there and as long as I didn’t have disease in my liver, I would be fine. “You will do great as long as it’s not in your liver; anywhere but your liver…” he said. Then I told him that I had found out an hour earlier that it was in my liver. He said, “Oh, well you will still be fine, I just know it.” He was embarrassed for putting his foot in his mouth, and I was kind to him. He didn’t mean it badly. In addition to that, he had been carrying my 150 pound ass all over the exam room, so I had to cut him a little slack. On the way home, I said something like, “well this is it, this is how I’m going to die…” but John never accepted that. He just told me I was going to make it. I think he said it 2-3 times during the ride home. Maybe he was trying to convince himself.

When we got home, all I wanted was to watch something mindless and funny on television, and have a double cheeseburger from Burger King. I was afraid to eat onion rings because they always give me indigestion, and I knew that my mind would trick me into thinking those tumors on my liver were the cause. After we ate, I had to call my sister because I knew she would be wondering what was going on. She had been at work all day and I was off (I was working from home, but had vacation time that day). John went into the office bedroom because he couldn’t stand to hear the conversation between me and Cat.  As soon as I heard her voice I started crying really hard and she knew. We cried together and she agreed to break the news to our parents. I just couldn’t do it. I wasn’t even sure how I would be able to look at my parents without crying, much less be able to tell them the awful news. After me and Cat got off the phone, I cried really hard for about a half hour, then I called for John to come back into the living room so we could watch something funny. We flipped channels and found “Paul Blart - Mall Cop” on one of the movie channels. Normally, movies like that don’t do much for me, but it was just what both of us needed. We laughed throughout the whole movie. I was still scared and worried, but for an hour and a half, it was nice to laugh and think about something else.

Today, three years later, my life is so different. I’ve had lots of ups and downs since then. But today, I’m up walking around – no scooting down steps on my butt LOL. I’m working in the office instead of at home, propped up in bed. As of October 24, my liver is still clear of tumors (next scan is at the end of January). I spent this afternoon cuddling on the couch with my pup, helping John install a window sill in one on our bathrooms, and eating a great homemade Indian meal that John made after he finished the window work. Now we are watching the Twilight Zone marathon on the Sci Fi channel and my mind is much more at ease. I still get really scared, but three years ago, I didn’t think I would live to see another New Years Eve, much less three more New Year’s Eves!! To be honest, this post is hard to write, because thinking about how things were three years ago still scares me to death. Sometimes it’s hard to believe it even happened. It’s like something you read in a book or see in a movie.  But I need to think of how awful things were, so when I have a self pity moment,  I’ll remember  how great my life really is now.