because this does count.
Why the charity I chose?
As most of you know, I lost my Grandma to cancer almost three years ago - three years at the end of this month, actually.
She was a smoker. Smoked for 40 years or so. She found out she was sick Christmas of ’98. She didn’t tell us then, though. I had just found out I was pregnant with Jay the month before, and it was the first chance her and my Grandpa had to meet Bryan.
When I was five months pregnant and back in Colorado, 1100 miles away, I heard her voice for the last time the night before her first surgery.
That March, she underwent two surgeries - one removed part of her lung, the other was the removal of her voice box, part of her tongue, and a tracheotomy. Following that were weeks of reconstructive surgery and radiation.
She learned to talk with a box implant as well as a hand-held vibrator to the throat (she called it ‘Fred’), as well as learning what she could and couldn’t eat (chocolate tasted horrible to her after, she couldn’t chew most things, etc) and how to shower and even dress differently/accordingly.
I won’t pretend to know all she went through, or even how hard it must have been on her and my Grandpa. I just know it was hell on me to be so far away from her. My Grandparents raised me - I don’t even what to think where I would be without them.
There were constant complications, cancer showing up in new areas, medical bills (California has a law in regards to smoking-related illness. You pay more. A lot more.) and a million other things.
What was amazing though? She. Never. Complained. She cried, sure. And GOD. I never knew what to say and it kills me even now I handled it wrong. She got upset, cried, was sad - but she never complained.
For another three years this went on. Then she found out the cancer had spread to her other lung. They couldn’t remove that piece - she wouldn’t have enough lung left to breathe. Radiation was out, she’d already done that.
That left chemo.
And chemo made her sick.
Suddenly the woman who was never still was always lying down. Unable to clean (my Grandparents are utter neat freaks), unable to cook (I never remember her NOT making dinner before this. Never.), unable to move at all. The T.V. that was never on during the day before suddenly was. She couldn’t move off the couch, and so that was what she did. She was never happy about it.
Then the back pain started.
At first, the scans showed nothing. A slipped disc, perhaps? They didn’t know, but they told my Grandpa to keep moving her. “Do not let her sit still! You’ll make it worse. Doesn’t matter how much she screams or cries, you have to keep her moving.”
And she cried. All the time.
By this point, they knew the chemo wasn’t working on her lungs, so they were willing to try the radiation again, despite knowing how dangerous it would be. The problem now was she couldn’t even sit up - the pain in her back was that bad. But the insurance company refused to pay for an ambulance - back to the California law about smoking related illness. It would have been 200$ a day out of Grandpa’s pocket, every day, for six weeks.
Needless to say, they didn’t have that money. My mother suggesting admitting her to the hospital. So, that’s what was done. That was Wednesday.
Thursday I went in for a root canal. At this point, I was seven months pregnant with my daughter, and it was the beginning of July 2003.
That afternoon I came home to frantic calls from my mother, “WHERE ARE YOU? I’ve been trying to reach you all day! Please, call me. We’re at the hospital and you need to be here. The doctor said your Grandmother isn’t going to live through the night.”
The back pain she’d been having for weeks? Cancer. In her spine.
All the forced walking? Forced moving? Exercises? They’d done nothing but hurt her further. My Grandpa still beats himself up badly over that. :/
Needless to say we left right away for the hospital. She took her turn with each of us to say goodbye privately. Bryan took Jay in… he was three at the time and so scared of hospitals and didn’t understand what was wrong with his Nana.
She made it through that night and several weeks more, but so many times she stopped breathing. Every time, I would hold my own breath and pray. I knew it wasn’t fair, she was in so much pain… but I didn’t want her to die.
Three or four weeks later, I don’t remember for certain, the doctors came to us and told us there was nothing else they could do for her. She was either to go home, or to a hospice centre. She was still mostly lucid at this point, and her and my Grandfather decided on bringing her home.
One of the things I remember most about this time was when I had gone shopping for baby clothes. I showed her some of the things I’d picked out, and she just cried. Cried long and hard. She knew she wouldn’t be there to see my daughter, I think. I wonder sometimes if I should have not showed her the baby things that day. The look on her face… I can see it clearly.
She became less and less lucid after that. For the last two or three weeks she wasn’t even awake. But I couldn’t stop praying she’d be okay, and that she’d at least get to touch the great-granddaughter she so desperately wanted me to have.
She died on August 31st, 2003. My daughter was born the week after we buried her.
I’m not good with details or storytelling or even making a point, but I wish I could pour even an ounce of how much it all hurts into this entry.
It was cancer that killed her, yes. It was cancer that stopped my daughter from ever knowing the most important person in my life, and I want others not to ever have to go through that. I want us, in all of a glorified technology, technology that can wipe out thousands of people in a single instant, to be able to create a cure for cancer. For everyone - for the people suffering from cancer to those suffering for their lost loved ones.
But… I also want people to feel the pain of how much it does hurt someone else when you smoke.
*sigh* That was long-winded and I doubt it makes sense, but there you go. That’s why I chose the charity I did.
As most of you know, I lost my Grandma to cancer almost three years ago - three years at the end of this month, actually.
She was a smoker. Smoked for 40 years or so. She found out she was sick Christmas of ’98. She didn’t tell us then, though. I had just found out I was pregnant with Jay the month before, and it was the first chance her and my Grandpa had to meet Bryan.
When I was five months pregnant and back in Colorado, 1100 miles away, I heard her voice for the last time the night before her first surgery.
That March, she underwent two surgeries - one removed part of her lung, the other was the removal of her voice box, part of her tongue, and a tracheotomy. Following that were weeks of reconstructive surgery and radiation.
She learned to talk with a box implant as well as a hand-held vibrator to the throat (she called it ‘Fred’), as well as learning what she could and couldn’t eat (chocolate tasted horrible to her after, she couldn’t chew most things, etc) and how to shower and even dress differently/accordingly.
I won’t pretend to know all she went through, or even how hard it must have been on her and my Grandpa. I just know it was hell on me to be so far away from her. My Grandparents raised me - I don’t even what to think where I would be without them.
There were constant complications, cancer showing up in new areas, medical bills (California has a law in regards to smoking-related illness. You pay more. A lot more.) and a million other things.
What was amazing though? She. Never. Complained. She cried, sure. And GOD. I never knew what to say and it kills me even now I handled it wrong. She got upset, cried, was sad - but she never complained.
For another three years this went on. Then she found out the cancer had spread to her other lung. They couldn’t remove that piece - she wouldn’t have enough lung left to breathe. Radiation was out, she’d already done that.
That left chemo.
And chemo made her sick.
Suddenly the woman who was never still was always lying down. Unable to clean (my Grandparents are utter neat freaks), unable to cook (I never remember her NOT making dinner before this. Never.), unable to move at all. The T.V. that was never on during the day before suddenly was. She couldn’t move off the couch, and so that was what she did. She was never happy about it.
Then the back pain started.
At first, the scans showed nothing. A slipped disc, perhaps? They didn’t know, but they told my Grandpa to keep moving her. “Do not let her sit still! You’ll make it worse. Doesn’t matter how much she screams or cries, you have to keep her moving.”
And she cried. All the time.
By this point, they knew the chemo wasn’t working on her lungs, so they were willing to try the radiation again, despite knowing how dangerous it would be. The problem now was she couldn’t even sit up - the pain in her back was that bad. But the insurance company refused to pay for an ambulance - back to the California law about smoking related illness. It would have been 200$ a day out of Grandpa’s pocket, every day, for six weeks.
Needless to say, they didn’t have that money. My mother suggesting admitting her to the hospital. So, that’s what was done. That was Wednesday.
Thursday I went in for a root canal. At this point, I was seven months pregnant with my daughter, and it was the beginning of July 2003.
That afternoon I came home to frantic calls from my mother, “WHERE ARE YOU? I’ve been trying to reach you all day! Please, call me. We’re at the hospital and you need to be here. The doctor said your Grandmother isn’t going to live through the night.”
The back pain she’d been having for weeks? Cancer. In her spine.
All the forced walking? Forced moving? Exercises? They’d done nothing but hurt her further. My Grandpa still beats himself up badly over that. :/
Needless to say we left right away for the hospital. She took her turn with each of us to say goodbye privately. Bryan took Jay in… he was three at the time and so scared of hospitals and didn’t understand what was wrong with his Nana.
She made it through that night and several weeks more, but so many times she stopped breathing. Every time, I would hold my own breath and pray. I knew it wasn’t fair, she was in so much pain… but I didn’t want her to die.
Three or four weeks later, I don’t remember for certain, the doctors came to us and told us there was nothing else they could do for her. She was either to go home, or to a hospice centre. She was still mostly lucid at this point, and her and my Grandfather decided on bringing her home.
One of the things I remember most about this time was when I had gone shopping for baby clothes. I showed her some of the things I’d picked out, and she just cried. Cried long and hard. She knew she wouldn’t be there to see my daughter, I think. I wonder sometimes if I should have not showed her the baby things that day. The look on her face… I can see it clearly.
She became less and less lucid after that. For the last two or three weeks she wasn’t even awake. But I couldn’t stop praying she’d be okay, and that she’d at least get to touch the great-granddaughter she so desperately wanted me to have.
She died on August 31st, 2003. My daughter was born the week after we buried her.
I’m not good with details or storytelling or even making a point, but I wish I could pour even an ounce of how much it all hurts into this entry.
It was cancer that killed her, yes. It was cancer that stopped my daughter from ever knowing the most important person in my life, and I want others not to ever have to go through that. I want us, in all of a glorified technology, technology that can wipe out thousands of people in a single instant, to be able to create a cure for cancer. For everyone - for the people suffering from cancer to those suffering for their lost loved ones.
But… I also want people to feel the pain of how much it does hurt someone else when you smoke.
*sigh* That was long-winded and I doubt it makes sense, but there you go. That’s why I chose the charity I did.