What an eventful year it was. Our family floated through fairly unscathed - in July I got really sick. Like chills, body aches, loss of taste and smell sick. No congestion, no difficulty breathing, I did have this weird symptom, though, where every time I would breath in, it would burn like it does when you get water up your nose and the pain goes straight back into your head. But my temperature never got higher than a 99. On day 6, I went and got a covid test, and it was negative. I texted my friend Cari, who is a nurse, and her thoughts were that I tested later in my illness and my viral load was too low for the test to detect, or it was just one of the many false negatives. Either way, it sucked.
Perry got pneumonia 4 times in 2020, none of them covid related. The girl is just super susceptible to respiratory illnesses. We eventually got her checked out for asthma and sure enough, she’s got it. She now takes singulair every day to help keep it at bay.
To top off the dumb year that was 2020, my dad was diagnosed with cancer in early December. He went to urgent care one day for chest pain and difficulty breathing. They did a chest X-ray, found some nodules. and said it could be anything from a simple infection to cancer. Lucky us, it was the latter. The initial diagnosis was metastatic lung cancer, that had spread to his brain and ribs. If you google that, the prognosis is not good. They got 10 days of radiation to his head scheduled about a month after his diagnosis, with a biopsy half way through the treatment. Radiation started taking its toll, and then his lung collapsed after his biopsy. That pushed the last few radiation treatments back 3 days because he was hospitalized until his lung healed. He came home from the hospital weak and unable to walk without a walker. Mom has become a full time care taker.
Radiation is done now. His hair started falling out maybe 4-5 days into treatment, so i helped him shave his head one morning. That was hard. Dad is still having difficulty getting around. He’s got extreme fatigue, which makes it hard for him to do anything. The biopsy results came back showing that what he’s got is actually melanoma, not lung cancer. The bad news is that it’s advanced stage 4 melanoma. The good news is they don’t treat melanoma with chemo, but instead use immunotherapy. I don’t know much about it, but i know it’s supposed to be less intense. his first treatment is tomorrow.
I spent some time with my parents today at their house. Dad looked rough, even compared to when I took him to radiation last week. He’s lost a lot of weight in the last month, has obviously lost strength, and his mind is starting to lose steam. Mom said that at his dr appt today, he asked who scheduled his brain surgery. There was never talk of brain surgery in his treatment plan. It’s heartbreaking to see him dwindle. The joy he used to carry isn’t there right now, he’s just tired and foggy. I’m hoping and praying with everything I have that it comes back. I just want my dad back.
With radiation, they say that it kills all the cells that it hits, but the healthy cells eventually regenerate. I need those healthy cells to start fighting their way back. From the day we got the diagnosis, I’ve said that I don’t want to watch my dad whither away, but that’s exactly what is happening. It took 2 weeks for him to lose his ability to walk, lose his hair, for his mind to start failing. If you ask him how he’s feeling, he’ll say, “for an old guy with all this crap going on, I’m doing pretty good.” But I know he’s grieving. His eyes were watery when I finished shaving his head, but he’d shrug his shoulders and say, “it was a necessity.”
You know, I’ve heard so many people use the phrase, “cancer sucks.” But you just don’t get it until you experience it first hand. My dad was happy and seemingly healthy a month ago. The moment treatment started, everything got worse. It’s not fair. Cancer sucks, but cancer treatment sucks the most. That is what’s hurting him the most right now.
My mind takes me to the worst places. I’m trying hard to just really be present in my time with Dad right now. I thought I at least had 10 years left with him, and now I just don’t know how long I actually have. It’s just crap. And it’s not okay. None of this is fair.
