My Mother is a writer, a very good writer in fact. She has published a few books and written for magazines and newspapers. I hope you take the time to read this, you won't be disappointed. My Mom and Dad would have celebrated their 53rd Wedding Anniversary this month. So in honor I would like to share this story published in the Tapestry, a regional magazine.
It's been nearly half a year since the status of widow was brutally forced upon me. The first few incredibly painful months are thankfully behind me. I have been able to get through several days at a time without crying, or simply throwing myself on the couch with my face to the wall and begging the Lord to take me to wherever my husband is now and if that is not possible then at least, I pleaded, let me know he is somewhere good and he is safe and happy.
I have always been a spiritual person and for most of my life believed in the Church's version of an everlasting life. Maybe the shock of losing my mate of 50 years so suddenly and unexpectedly has sent my entire being into some sort of spiritual darkness. Even the deaths of my parents, losses that caused dreadful pain for our family, had not really prepared me for the season of grief I am now attempting to stumble through.
Perhaps f I hadn't already been bombarded with my own serious health problems just a few months prior to becoming a widow, maybe I might have had more strength to hold up to the shock and agony of it all.
Somewhere close to Thanksgiving this past year, in the quiet of my bedroom one dreary, gray early morning I discovered a lump in my breast. How could this be, I asked the darkness. And was what I felt really a lump?
Even now after the fact, I have no idea what made me feel for that lump. I wasn't accustomed to doing self-breast exams, though I knew I should. But I had nursed all of my eight babies and my doctor always seemed pleased about that. "Not only is this so good for your baby," he would assure me," but we now believe that nursing a baby is one big step in preventing breast cancer for the moms."
I truly believed I was immune to something like breast cancer. I hardly paid attention to the information and warnings I often heard about this disease so certain was I that I would never be a victim. Also, there was no history of breast cancer in my family, and so I simply rolled over and tried to return to sleep.
But sleep would not come. I wa feeling a strange sort of dread I couldn't shake. For the next few days my fingers kept wanting to return to that piece of flesh that was abut to betray me. One minute I would feel sure it really wasn't a lump, but another probe and I would have to admit to myself that it did feel almost as if there was a malted milk ball somehow caught there in the outer side of my breast almost under my arm. But still for a few days as I groped for the spot repeatedly, I did nothing sensible like calling to schedule a mammogram. Then early in the next week it was as if some voice (not my own) spoke to me once again in the wee hours of the morning. "Smart women do not ignore lumps in their breast", it said. As soon as the clinic opened that morning I called for an appointment.
From that afternoon, when my doctor felt the lump and way too cheerfully said he guessed "that it deserved a mammogram, maybe even a ultra sound and possibly an MRI", things moved quickly. My son Michael works in a large hospital in Milwaukee as an ultra-sound technician, and any time I have needed an ultra-sound I call him and ask him what it is I want to see---or don't want to. He described what the film would look like if the news was bad.
Shortly after the procedure I was called into the radiologist's office and I knew the minute I saw his face that I was about to see what Michael had told me I didn't want to see. It was there in all its graphic ugliness. I really did have breast cancer. How could this be?
In another three days I was scheduled for a biopsy (which for me was the most painful part of the entire procedure) and the next day when the results came in confirming that the lump was not a malted milk ball, but a cancerous growth, my lumpectomy was set for the next morning. My lymph nodes were clean and that was good news, but I would need seven weeks of radiation which was to start about three or four weeks after the surgery. since our home is at least 55 miles from the nearest hospital offering a radiation program we were definitely facing a dilmma.
About the time of the lump discovery my husband had come down with a bad case of influenza and it was then we discovered that he had also suffered a stroke that destroyed part of his peripheral vision making it almost impossible for him to drive safely. I knew getting myself to the hospital every day for seven weeks was going to be a real challenge----maybe not even possible as I was feeling pretty exhausted after the surgery. But thankfully as is so often the case, someone comes along riding a big white steed and takes care of the problem. We have been so fortunate this way . For this rescue the man riding the big white horse was our son Tom, a hydrologist who lives out in Flagstaff.
"I just talked to the Cancer Center Mom and they have a program and would be able to offer what you need. I can take you on the way to work each morning and they have a van that will bring you back after you're done with the treatment."
And so on New Year's Day 2007, our good son Matthew put us on a plane in Minnesota and Tom picked us up in Phoenix. For the next nine weeks we made our home with two of the most gracious and generous people in this world. Both Kathy, our daughter-in-law, and Tom took such wonderful care of us. I was told I shouldn't lose weight since I had been scanned and tatooed for the treatment. If I were to lose weight they would need to do it again or the radiation beams would not hit the right place to kill off the cancer cells if there were any left. About three or four nights a week Tom would bring home luscious pies to stuff me with after he added several mounds of whipped cream I began to worry that my real challenge would be not to gain too much weight.
Other than the fact that I am so fair-skinned that even the smallest doses of sunlight can turn my skin painfully red in just a short time, the radiation was never painful, but it did take its toll as far as energy was concerned. By about the fifth week, I wanted to stay in bed most of every day.
During these days Warren seemed more weary than usual. We thought it was the altitude, but except for being cold much of the time and occassionally bumping into a wall now and then as a result of his destroyed peripheral vision, I didn't feel that he was going downhill physically He was always by my side for the surgeries and went with me each day for the radiation treatments. And we did enjoy those weeks with our children. It was a sweet interlude. I spent hours poring over garden and herb books and catalogues while Warren read many of the books that had piled up on his "some day" list. And we took little side trips to many of the state's scenic spots on the weekends as well as lots and lots of naps. I was wishing to get some energy back before spring so I could hit the gardens with renewed vitalilty.
The radiation treatments counted down, and finally all 35 of them were completed and we were on a plane bound for home. We had some jet lag to recover from and my doctors had told me to expect the fatigue to last a month or two, but we were functioning......for a week or so. I had a speaking engagement in La Crosse that week and although I was almost too exhausted to do it, I managed to perform.
In the meantime Warren seemed even more tired and developed a cough. All of our married years it has been close to impossible to get that man to a doctor, but this time he did go willingly. He said his back was hurting. It was pneumonia.
After some powerful and expensive medicine he seemed better for a few days, but then he began to run a fever once again. I took him to the Emergency Room Sunday evening. The pneumonia had attacked the other lung and so they kept him that night. He has some tests the next day and that evening when I visited him he had the IV's and the oxegen both removed and we thought I would be bringing him home the next morning.
But that was not to be. After being home in Wisconsin less than two weeks, Warren died early the next morning with out any of his family by his side. The doctor said it all hapened in about 15 minutes. I still have not been able to get my mind or my heart around all of this.
Is there a moral to this painful saga? I really hope so. First of all, it seems that no one is really immune to trouble or disease. Breast feeding aside, I know now that cancer can and will strike anyone and I have learned that it is very important to listen to your body. If your inner voice tells you it feels like a lump, it probably is. Thank goodness mine put up enough fuss that I did get to a doctor, hopefully in time.
While I know my life will never be the same and the huge empty spot that was the essence of my husband within me will never recover completely, I want to believe that even from the hideous pain the death of a loving spouse brings, there might be some lesson.
I've been told that it is normal to have many regrets after the death of a loved one and I have had those. Why didn't I give him a really big, warm, loving hug, and a real kiss that last night instead of the quick little peck? Because I was tired and there were lots more nights to do that I thought.
Somday I will make it up to him.
Someday we will take that long summer and drive clear up to Alaska.
Someday I will make it a habit to set the table each evening with linen cloths and candles and lots of other romantic touches.
Someday I will give him the very best massage he has ever had and
someday I will quit complaining about all the "judge" TV shows he watches. (Judge Judy, however, will probably always be just a little more than I could handle.)
But sadly, I know now that our
someday, my husband's and mine, has already come and gone and I wish so very much we could have understood how fragile
somedays are.
For my remaining years here on earth I have vowed to remember each day that I can no longer squander my
somedays. From now on,
someday must be this day.
Thank-you for the visit. Cindy
.JPG)
