Turbo Cancer: Day 139 - October 28, 2022
Faith
On this day, last year, my mom wrote:
Yesterday good! Penny came with lunch. I walked a bit more than usual, pooped in the am with suppository.
Grateful for the day and each day you choose to give me.
We are all terminal. We are here for a limited time. It is good to be grateful for each day we are given.
But sometimes we forget. We can easily get bogged down in the routine and stress of everyday life on earth.
Being diagnosed with a terminal disease brings the reality of death into focus. We all know that one day, far off in the future, we will die. My mom had expected to live another twenty happy, healthy years. Suddenly, she wasn’t sure if she had another twenty days.
Every single day of her illness, my mom was grateful. There were good days and there were bad days. There were great days and there were unbelievably torturous, painful days.
But my mom was grateful for each of them.
I am grateful for each of them, as well.
Taking care of my mom through her turbo cancer was hard. Taking care of my mom after my son had died felt impossible. I just kept doing it. I knew that it was what I was supposed to do.
Just as I know that telling the story is what I am supposed to do now.
During the six months of Turbo Cancer, stress became a solid entity. It pressed in from every direction. The air was heavy. Walking across the room felt like walking through tar. Grief was a boa constrictor, wrapping itself around my body and compressing my heart and my soul.
At times, I felt robotic. Something else had taken over my brain. Something kept me moving forward.
My son had died and my mom was dying. I was in so much pain. My pain was connected to my mom’s pain. The two had come together and were sharing the same space.
I constantly prayed for strength and compassion. I was given what I needed: strength and compassion.
For most of my life, I have been a self-centered, weak human being with a bloated sense of entitlement. Taking care of a suffering, dying woman was not something that came naturally to me. Nobody would have expected me to come through in the way that I did. Even I would not have expected myself to come through in the way that I did.
I don’t know that I could do it again. I hope never to be put in the position to have to do it again.
I was not prepared for the job, but God gave me what I needed to be the person who could do what he wanted to see done.
My mom had worked hard to be a good person. She had lived a life of faith and gratitude. She had fed the hungry, housed the homeless and cared for the sick.
My mom was an extremely good person, but she was destined to suffer. Maybe her suffering and death held some greater purpose. Maybe her spirit had agreed to experience suffering. Maybe her story would help others to see the danger of trusting the snakes.
I don’t know. I have faith that God has a plan.
Whatever the reasons for her suffering, suffering was what she had to endure. It was the path that was laid out before her.
It is what happened.
God could not take my mom’s pain away, but he could send help. He used me as a vessel. Into me he placed the angel who would come to help my mom.
From this day, last year, my mom’s illness would last another forty-five days. Things would get worse and worse. I am haunted by the forty-five days. There are terrible images permanently etched onto my brain. Now, I look at the world through those images.
I see all of the beauty of the life that surrounds us, but I see the suffering as well. Sometimes, it breaks my heart.
Standing by and witnessing my mom’s illness was a traumatic experience. However, God gave me the strength and compassion necessary to carry her along, and ease her burden.
It was an ugly time, but it was also a beautiful time. It was a special time. It was the time when I rediscovered the connection I had had with my mom when I was a child. It was a time of profound love and caring.
My mom was the woman who brought me into this world and who raised me. She had been there for me through the easy and through the difficult. She had always loved me, even when I ancted unlovable.
My mom had a unique ability to give of herself. Throughout my life, she had given a lot of herself to me.
In her last six months, I was able to repay her for a small part of her love and care. We developed a sturdy, unbreakable bond that I still carry with me, today.
The days of my mom’s illness were hard.
I am grateful for every single one of them.
I miss her so much.
God not only sent you strength and compassion, He sent you insight. Thank you for sharing.
It was in all that pain that you found Him, praise His name! But holy moly, what a journey to take! You are touching so many, Kristi, with your amazing love for your Mom! Be blessed!