Write it down.
Nearly a year has gone by since my mother has passed and through that time, I’ve written so little about her. A few words, a few lines here and there but passages of my mom, about her, her life, what she was like and her death-so little. It struck me how my mom was so eloquent and accepting of her illness and her impending death that she wrote about it as often as she could. While we, the living, it took us longer to comprehend.
So the next few days will be an attempt. There is no particular order to any of these. Sometimes I remember a random memory and that’s what I’ll write down.
Three years ago, my mom was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer. I can still recall that day clearly. I was having lunch with 2 of my colleagues when my phone rang. It was my brother, Lio.
"It's cancer."
You know that moment in the movies where time slows to a standstill and the voices and noises around you are echoes? That's what that moment felt like.
"O, ano nangyari sa 'yo? Ba't tulala ka?"
"My mom has cancer."
"Ha? Oh no..."
I don't remember much of what was said. But I got out of there and ran/walked in a daze. I ended up in the Stella Orientis chapel where I sat down on one of the pews and cried. I was shaking.
Later that evening, before my parents arrived home from the hospital, my siblings and I were all gathered around the living room. I remember thinking how odd that we were all there in the living room on a weeknight when we would usually only be complete on the weekends only.
My mother lived with cancer for two years. In those two years, we've tried all sorts of treatment: radiation therapy, oral chemotherapy, Eastern medicine, faith healing as well as diet and lifestyle changes. When she was still well enough to walk or go outside, she and my dad would take regular pilgrimages. The results of each of the treatments were like a see-saw: one month or two would show positive results, the next month would worsen. This cycle would repeat itself several times.
In mid-March of 2012, the doctors found fluid in her lungs and performed a pigtail procedure to drain the fluid. She was literally drowning and we didn't know it. During her stay in the hospital, the doctors talked to us and told us to start "preparing," whatever that meant. Her oncologist couldn't give us a specific timetable but we just had to be ready. Again, whatever that meant.
Things changed at home. My mom would no longer be able to go to the bathroom on her own, so we got a nurse to go to the house and care for her. Simple tasks that she would have been able to do easily a month before now needed an extra hand. We told her to screw her diet and eat whatever she wanted. Polvoron, Sarsi, Magnum and Jamba Juice were her regular cravings. I remember joking with my brothers that I could bike to Fort (the only Jamba Juice branch at that time), grab Jamba Juice and be home in thirty minutes. Check. I was glad JJ had extra sturdy paper bags and juice holders.
April 2012 was when she started having her "close calls." Several times that month we ran into her room, thinking my mom was going to die that day. By then I was so tired. Tired of thinking. Tired of worrying if today was the day or not. Tired of her strength and her unwavering faith in the Lord. I was tired of being scared. I remember all of us squeezing ourselves in our parents' room, praying the novena and the rosary over and over, and I remember wanting to shout, "I'm not ready!"
Yes me, I wasn't ready. I was the selfish one.
There was so much I wanted to tell her, so much I wanted to say. But I didn't know how or where to start. Would she still understand me? What would she say? Is it too late?
In the end, all I needed to say were 3 things. "Thank you. I love you. I'm sorry."
Scenes from my reckless teenage and not so teenage years passed before me. It was then that I understood the burden of mothers. To carry the weight of each of her children's miseries. And to forgive over and over again.
So the next few days will be an attempt. There is no particular order to any of these. Sometimes I remember a random memory and that’s what I’ll write down.
Three years ago, my mom was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer. I can still recall that day clearly. I was having lunch with 2 of my colleagues when my phone rang. It was my brother, Lio.
"It's cancer."
You know that moment in the movies where time slows to a standstill and the voices and noises around you are echoes? That's what that moment felt like.
"O, ano nangyari sa 'yo? Ba't tulala ka?"
"My mom has cancer."
"Ha? Oh no..."
I don't remember much of what was said. But I got out of there and ran/walked in a daze. I ended up in the Stella Orientis chapel where I sat down on one of the pews and cried. I was shaking.
Later that evening, before my parents arrived home from the hospital, my siblings and I were all gathered around the living room. I remember thinking how odd that we were all there in the living room on a weeknight when we would usually only be complete on the weekends only.
My mother lived with cancer for two years. In those two years, we've tried all sorts of treatment: radiation therapy, oral chemotherapy, Eastern medicine, faith healing as well as diet and lifestyle changes. When she was still well enough to walk or go outside, she and my dad would take regular pilgrimages. The results of each of the treatments were like a see-saw: one month or two would show positive results, the next month would worsen. This cycle would repeat itself several times.
In mid-March of 2012, the doctors found fluid in her lungs and performed a pigtail procedure to drain the fluid. She was literally drowning and we didn't know it. During her stay in the hospital, the doctors talked to us and told us to start "preparing," whatever that meant. Her oncologist couldn't give us a specific timetable but we just had to be ready. Again, whatever that meant.
Things changed at home. My mom would no longer be able to go to the bathroom on her own, so we got a nurse to go to the house and care for her. Simple tasks that she would have been able to do easily a month before now needed an extra hand. We told her to screw her diet and eat whatever she wanted. Polvoron, Sarsi, Magnum and Jamba Juice were her regular cravings. I remember joking with my brothers that I could bike to Fort (the only Jamba Juice branch at that time), grab Jamba Juice and be home in thirty minutes. Check. I was glad JJ had extra sturdy paper bags and juice holders.
April 2012 was when she started having her "close calls." Several times that month we ran into her room, thinking my mom was going to die that day. By then I was so tired. Tired of thinking. Tired of worrying if today was the day or not. Tired of her strength and her unwavering faith in the Lord. I was tired of being scared. I remember all of us squeezing ourselves in our parents' room, praying the novena and the rosary over and over, and I remember wanting to shout, "I'm not ready!"
Yes me, I wasn't ready. I was the selfish one.
There was so much I wanted to tell her, so much I wanted to say. But I didn't know how or where to start. Would she still understand me? What would she say? Is it too late?
In the end, all I needed to say were 3 things. "Thank you. I love you. I'm sorry."
Scenes from my reckless teenage and not so teenage years passed before me. It was then that I understood the burden of mothers. To carry the weight of each of her children's miseries. And to forgive over and over again.