So for those of you who don't know. On April 4th 2010, I stood in my fathers living room and explained to him that he no longer had a choice "You are, one way or another, going to the hospital" I told him. This was in fact, the hardest thing I had ever done at that time. (The next year brought plenty of moments to trump that one.) Almost eleven hours later that very same day my father was diagnosed with Cancer. With tears in her eyes the Doctor told me, it's bad, it is the worst I have personally seen, enjoy what ever time you have. In the weeks following we learned the ugly name Large B-Cell Lymphoma. The doctors shared with me the startling statistics that "IF" they got all of the masses there was a 40% chance he could make it 2 years. I heard the heaviness of the words "stage 4" and learned a new emptiness as the word terminal became a new part of my vocabulary. I knew even in those early days my dad would live with me for the rest of his life, even if I had no idea what that looked like.
The next 6 months were spent driving back and forth every day to and from the hospital. In a brief stay at home and I learned the sign to watch for when someone is becoming septic (yep! I wish I had known those earlier) Then after another month of, back and forth, to and from, the ICU everyday, he was home again.
Then came a new PET Scan and the words no one wants to hear, "I am sorry but the Chemo didn't work". That was a hard pill to swallow because he had been doing SO well. So we set up the appointment for radiation. Once again I was driving to and from the hospital everyday but this time with dad as we went through 6 weeks of Radiation treatments. This was a horrid time where he just slowly deteriorated and it seemed like he never came back.
3 months almost to the day after his Radiation was over delirious and sick he was admitted back to the hospital ICU. It turns out staphylococcal pneumonia is very deadly. During the first week of February I saw something in my father I had never seen before, true fear. Unfortunately we didn't catch the pneumonia fast enough and in the process after a prolonged period with out proper oxygen dad suffered some permanent brain damage and if that wasn't enough the onset of mini-strokes has also complicated matters. We were told he would never make it past the pneumonia and yet he has. But the onset of new infections in his sinuses eyes ears and bladder have continued to eat away at his body.
One week after his admission to the hospital he was sent home on Hospice care and now I am his full time Nurse and Caregiver. Unable to walk or care for himself yesterday he was placed on a catheter. I feed him clean him and care for him each day.
As a family this has become our life. I have heard people say that we are being unfair to our children by exposing them to this and stealing from our time with them. To that I would say this, The most important thing I can teach my children is that when God presents you with an opportunity to minister you must take it and meet the challenge with all that is in you. God has given us a wonderful opportunity to minister to my father and I am grateful. There will always be challenges in life and I am enjoying teaching my children to meet those head on with joy and faith.
Everyday is precious and I am thankful my dad is teaching me to live every day as though it might be my last. This situation has taught me a lot about life. It has stretched me in ways I never imagined but it has also taught me alot about the love of my husband. I can't thank him enough for being such a wonderful rock not just for me but also our children and for dad. He is teaching me how to trust as I learn to depend on him but ultimately on God.
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