(no subject)
I'm sitting here beside my dad. In the background, Southern Gospel music is playing - his request - however it's being drowned out by the irregular rhythm of my father's snoring. I just gave him a breathing treatment - a nebulizer. Hospice says he's getting congestion in his lungs and they're concerned.
Concerned.
I've been pretty speechless around my dad. He's never been one for verbosity and I am struggling to fill in the silence that encompasses both of us. It's heavy, the silence, and filled with words that shouldn't be said. Perhaps not shouldn't, but won't. They won't be said. Words about endings and beginnings and, well, even middles.
Grief is a heavy thing. It covers you like a blanket. There's comfort in it, at times. With grief you can shut off the world and lick your wounds giving you a moment's rest from the reality that fills ever waking moment you have.
My father is dying.
Cancer.
It started in his bladder. And his prostate. At the same time. No, not the same cancer. Instead with a roll of fate's dice, he got two different cancers at once that required two radically different treatments. His bladder is gone now, as is his prostate. Where his bladder once was a bag hangs out of his stomach, pouring his waste into a container on the floor.
It's vulgar. It's rough. It's vile and it's unfair.
However while his bladder is gone, the cancer remained. It spread. It spread first to a the muscle surrounding his bladder. They were confident, in the beginning, that radiation would fix it. New treatments were used. Trial testing. Phrases like, "medicine has come a long way!" and "They caught it early. That's such a good thing!" were thrown around like bandaids on pouring wounds.
Other phrases like "aggressive" and "complicated" were also thrown about, but softer, whispered as if to not make them a reality.
It became a reality.
The cancer moved from the muscles to his pelvic bone. Complaints of sore legs and painful chairs were growled. Dad would be unable to sit for long, standing up and talking about how his leg hurts. "Must have over did it on my walk yesterday." "Still sore from surgery." No. The cancer had spread, we found later.
Now it's in his lungs. The cancer isn't stopping until it takes over all my dad. It's like the Huns, marching on an elephant through my father, destroying everything in its wake.
Until there is nothing left.
As I sit here beside my dad, he in his bed and me in the wingback chair I got him for his birthday last year, I think about the future. We have weeks, maybe a month or two if we're lucky. Or unlucky, depending on how you want to look at it.
Most days I'm mixed.
He's already forgetting the years. Life is blurring together for him. It goes from a mix of him believing I still live at home, in high school or even younger to a future we both know we'll never have. In his moments of wake, he stumbles over his words as he talks about vacations he wants to take me, my mother, and Darren on. "There's so much of this world to see, Duffy. We'll see it together if you want."
I nod. I always nod. I have to because if I speak immediately tears cloud my words. "Yeah dad, we will. I want to see it. With you. That will be fun."
And he falls back asleep.
The vacations won't happen. At least not for him. The trips, the places to see, the things in this world that are so big and wonderful, for my dad they will remain pages on a book or images on a screen.
It's unfair.
It really is.
The doctors told us that this cancer is caused from smoking. My father used to smoke. Used to being the key word. Five years ago he quit, cold turkey, deciding one day he didn't want to smoke anymore after over 50 odd years of a few packs a day habit. He wanted to make a healthy choice. He would say how much better his lungs felt. How he could walk farther without feeling out of breath. How much money he was saving, giving up the habit.
Too little. Too late. The damage had already been done.
Unfair.
My dad is laying here, tube from his stomach, flannel pajama pants that I got him for Christmas last year, white shirt, arms folded on his chest, rasping for air as he sleeps. Next to him a coke with a straw a glass of water. Not too hungry these days. But very thirsty. I can see his bones. His wrists have become so thin. Stomach that once was bloated from his love of food is now flattened, like a balloon that a child popped to scare his mother.
His eyes are bright, sad, but bright. Tiem is short, days are long. So much I want to say. So much I want to tell him. "Thank you dad for believing in me." "Thank you for breaking the chain of abuse that you had." "I love you."
But I can't. Between the cancer and the pain medications, a coherent conversation is impossible.
Too little. Too late.
And so I sit and breathe and pray, growing angry and sad and so so grateful all at once.
My dad has cancer.
Concerned.
I've been pretty speechless around my dad. He's never been one for verbosity and I am struggling to fill in the silence that encompasses both of us. It's heavy, the silence, and filled with words that shouldn't be said. Perhaps not shouldn't, but won't. They won't be said. Words about endings and beginnings and, well, even middles.
Grief is a heavy thing. It covers you like a blanket. There's comfort in it, at times. With grief you can shut off the world and lick your wounds giving you a moment's rest from the reality that fills ever waking moment you have.
My father is dying.
Cancer.
It started in his bladder. And his prostate. At the same time. No, not the same cancer. Instead with a roll of fate's dice, he got two different cancers at once that required two radically different treatments. His bladder is gone now, as is his prostate. Where his bladder once was a bag hangs out of his stomach, pouring his waste into a container on the floor.
It's vulgar. It's rough. It's vile and it's unfair.
However while his bladder is gone, the cancer remained. It spread. It spread first to a the muscle surrounding his bladder. They were confident, in the beginning, that radiation would fix it. New treatments were used. Trial testing. Phrases like, "medicine has come a long way!" and "They caught it early. That's such a good thing!" were thrown around like bandaids on pouring wounds.
Other phrases like "aggressive" and "complicated" were also thrown about, but softer, whispered as if to not make them a reality.
It became a reality.
The cancer moved from the muscles to his pelvic bone. Complaints of sore legs and painful chairs were growled. Dad would be unable to sit for long, standing up and talking about how his leg hurts. "Must have over did it on my walk yesterday." "Still sore from surgery." No. The cancer had spread, we found later.
Now it's in his lungs. The cancer isn't stopping until it takes over all my dad. It's like the Huns, marching on an elephant through my father, destroying everything in its wake.
Until there is nothing left.
As I sit here beside my dad, he in his bed and me in the wingback chair I got him for his birthday last year, I think about the future. We have weeks, maybe a month or two if we're lucky. Or unlucky, depending on how you want to look at it.
Most days I'm mixed.
He's already forgetting the years. Life is blurring together for him. It goes from a mix of him believing I still live at home, in high school or even younger to a future we both know we'll never have. In his moments of wake, he stumbles over his words as he talks about vacations he wants to take me, my mother, and Darren on. "There's so much of this world to see, Duffy. We'll see it together if you want."
I nod. I always nod. I have to because if I speak immediately tears cloud my words. "Yeah dad, we will. I want to see it. With you. That will be fun."
And he falls back asleep.
The vacations won't happen. At least not for him. The trips, the places to see, the things in this world that are so big and wonderful, for my dad they will remain pages on a book or images on a screen.
It's unfair.
It really is.
The doctors told us that this cancer is caused from smoking. My father used to smoke. Used to being the key word. Five years ago he quit, cold turkey, deciding one day he didn't want to smoke anymore after over 50 odd years of a few packs a day habit. He wanted to make a healthy choice. He would say how much better his lungs felt. How he could walk farther without feeling out of breath. How much money he was saving, giving up the habit.
Too little. Too late. The damage had already been done.
Unfair.
My dad is laying here, tube from his stomach, flannel pajama pants that I got him for Christmas last year, white shirt, arms folded on his chest, rasping for air as he sleeps. Next to him a coke with a straw a glass of water. Not too hungry these days. But very thirsty. I can see his bones. His wrists have become so thin. Stomach that once was bloated from his love of food is now flattened, like a balloon that a child popped to scare his mother.
His eyes are bright, sad, but bright. Tiem is short, days are long. So much I want to say. So much I want to tell him. "Thank you dad for believing in me." "Thank you for breaking the chain of abuse that you had." "I love you."
But I can't. Between the cancer and the pain medications, a coherent conversation is impossible.
Too little. Too late.
And so I sit and breathe and pray, growing angry and sad and so so grateful all at once.
My dad has cancer.