Chest X-ray

My Mom's lung cancer journey began on April 30, 2014.  It started with a chest x-ray.  Two and half weeks earlier at the Purdue nursing reception I had said to her she needed to go the doctor. I don't know why it took her that long for her to go to the doctor. There isn't much on her calendar in those two and half weeks that would've prevented her from going sooner.  I don't know why I didn't ask.  It doesn't really matter, but it is an unanswered question I have. I have many unanswered questions about that chest x-ray. None of them are really of any importance in the end, but I am left puzzled.

She had an appointment with the doctor at 1:15 PM for her shortness of breath, cough, fatigue, weight loss, and depression.  A chest x-ray was done. The results showed pneumonia.  She sent me this text.

PTL=Praise the Lord. She was ecstatic about this because she was told, I think, that there was no cancer.  She was terrified she had cancer.  She believed she had escaped.  She'd stopped smoking the night of the Purdue reception. She was going to start fresh. She thought she had a second chance...and that breaks my heart.

I have so many questions. I would really be interested to see what that chest x-ray showed. How did it not show the huge mass? The collapsed lung? Did the doctor read it preliminarily in the office and the pneumonia obscured it? Did the radiologist then read it later and said "Hey we need to look at this further." Did the doctor see how bad it was and not want to tell her yet until he had further data? Did someone really tell her there was no cancer? Did she just assume this since she was told pneumonia?

I know my sister-in-law Carly, a radiation therapist, was still worried about cancer.  Ryan told me she had seen patients with masses the size of softballs obscured on chest x-rays by pneumonia. "No you guys," I thought, "She said there was no cancer." I responded back that I've had hundreds of patients with chest x-rays showing pneumonia, never once had it obscured a mass. She said no lung cancer.

None of my questions really matter, she was still treated expeditiously. That Wednesday she also had a blood draw called a D-dimer done. It came back elevated possibly indicating a blood clot in her lungs. She was called back on Friday morning to come in immediately for a CT scan of her chest. And that CT scan showed the truth.

Easter 2014

Last year Easter was on April 20th. Spencer, Amelia, and I were traveling to Anderson to spend the day with Spencer's family.  Mom was going to spend the day with Ryan and family. We weren't too far from home when Plumb's Need You Now came on the radio.

Well everybody's got a story to tell
And everybody's got a wound to be healed
I want to believe there's beauty here
Cause oh, I get so tired of holding on
I can't let go, I can't move on
I want to believe there's meaning here

How many times have you heard me cry out
"God please take this"?
How many times have you given me strength to 
Just keep breathing?
Oh I need you
God, I need you now.

Standing on a road I didn't plan
Wondering how I got to where I am
I'm trying to hear the still small voice
I'm trying to hear above the noise

How many times have you heard me cry out
"God please take this"?
How many times have you given me strength to
Just keep breathing?
Oh I need you
God, I need you now.

Oh I walk, oh I walk through the shadows
And I, I am so afraid
Please stay, please stay right beside me
With every single step I take

How many times have you heard me cry out?
And how many times have you given me strength?

How many times have you heard me cry out
"God please take this"?
How many times have you given me strength to
Just keep breathing?
Oh I need you 
God, I need you now.

I started crying quietly as the lyrics resonated with me. The past few years had been painful. The dissolution of my family being the most heart wrenching. I think in divorce the focus is usually on young children and how it will affect them, little attention is paid to adult children of divorce. I know this because I looked for books for support and guidance. I found one long out of print and another called The Way They Were. It was so depressing in its truths that I stopped reading it. Adult children in a divorce are treated as adults. They shouldn't be.  They should always be treated as children.  Many of the happy memories I had were erased as not being true. I was left with almost a lifetime of tainted memories. 

I feel it necessary to say I do not blame one parent over the other. For those of you outside our family who do, well, you probably don't know the whole story. I digress.

I was sad. Easters had been special, but there were not going to be any more as a whole family. Those days were over. The family I had known for 30 years was gone. My childhood home was gone. My happy memories were gone. What happened to my family was so completely ordinary, but the pain I felt was extraordinary. 

I lamented my troubles that morning not understanding God's plan...not understanding why God had chosen to dissolve my family. I did not understand why God had allowed so much pain to come into my life in the past few years. 

I looked back at the morning in the next months in disbelief. I had no idea what was coming. I laughed at my sadness. My complete and utter ignorance of the mountain ahead. 

"You thought you were sad Danielle..." I shook my head at myself. 

I had no idea God was not done. He was coming for my mother next. 

I understand or I should say I make myself believe there is purpose in everything, but I still live in a daily fear of what next? Spencer? My girls? 

I was watching a movie later that summer with my Mom, August: Osage County. It was a very depressing movie that I do not recommend but one line struck me.

"Thank God we can't tell the future, we'd never get out of bed."

Plumb's song still resonates with me.

Need You Now

Something is Wrong

On Saturday April 12th, 2014 we had plans to go to Purdue.  It was the Purdue School of Nursing's 50th anniversary. There was a reception for the recipients of an award I had received when I graduated. Mom was going to go with me. I could've taken Spencer, but I wanted to take my mom. She had been there when I had originally received the award...one of my proudest moments. 

We had plans to go to the reception then return to Indianapolis and eat at The Melting Pot. We had been planning to eat there for years. I had bought her gift cards for Christmases and birthdays to pay for it. We planned, but we never set a date. We had finally set a date for Saturday April 12th. We were finally going to go to The Melting Pot.  

She called me on Friday and said, "I think we should cancel the dinner, I'm not hungry." What? How could she not be hungry? It's not even Saturday! How did she know she wasn't going to be hungry tomorrow? I was upset. I thought she was being dramatic. Wow, her depression had really gotten out of hand. She should have her Zoloft increased. I said fine, but I didn't cancel the reservation. She just needs to spend some time with me. I'll put her in a better mood and then she will want to eat. 

She came on Saturday. She needed help with her dress. She had borrowed it from a friend. It was a black wrap dress her friend thought she would look good in. And she did, but she also looked so small. She's losing weight. 

We drove to Purdue and parked in the parking garage across from the student union. We walked to the Union and she started to lag behind. Come on mom! Why is she being so slow? She had always been a fast walker. I was getting annoyed. She finally caught up with me and we walked inside. There were stairs. We were running late, I climbed them ahead of her. She got to the top, she had to pause, she had to rest. "I'm sorry Danielle," she said. She was out of breath. She looked panicked. "Are you having a panic attack Mom?" Sigh..she is being so dramatic. Why is she trying to ruin the night? Pull yourself together mom, I thought. "No," she said, "I'm just so short of breath." 

We made it to the reception. It was nice. I wish I had one picture of my mom and I from that event and how lovely she looked in that dress, but I don't. Afterwards we went to the bathroom. I waited on her. I was chatting with two other young women, prior graduates. She started coughing. "Wow, that lady's cough is really bad," they remarked. "I know," I said, "That's my mom." We walked out of the building and discussed her cough. She was so embarrassed people had noticed. I told her to go to her doctor. I was sure she had COPD. She'd been a smoker since she was 19. She at least needed an inhaler. "You don't think I have cancer do you?" she asked. "Well, are you coughing up blood?" I asked. She said no. "Then you're probably fine." I said. I got the car and picked her up so she didn't have to walk far. 

We did go to The Melting Pot. We had a great time. She raved about the new dress I wore.

The same dress I would wear to her funeral five months later.

We had three courses...cheese, salad, entrees. She had a glass of wine. She was happy. It was a wonderful night.

And she slept the whole next day.

Purpose

Mainly, this blog is for me, for me to get out my feelings and share my grief journey.  Most importantly I want to tell the story of my Mom's battle with metastatic small cell lung cancer. She was diagnosed and gone in 4 months.  She was here, she was healthy, and then she was sick and then she was gone. I still shake my head at this.  How can someone so strong die so fast? It happened so fast I'm afraid I'm going to forget it. That is another purpose of this blog, to help me remember as a lot of the details have already faded.  These details while may seem insignificant are important to me. I want to remember all of them. I remember I was eating a hamburger when she called to read me her CT scan. I want to document every day I felt was significant, even if there isn't much to say. I also want others especially those she loved to know her story and the background of what happened.  She kept it under tight wrap for whatever reason.  She didn't let me tell her brothers until the day before she started chemotherapy.  She didn't want to tell my brother Sean until all the tests were back and she knew the full extent of her disease. I hope to share her story as accurately as possible but I know some of my memories may be skewed, the details wrong.  I'm also sharing my perspective which may be different than others.  I want people to know that what I will describe are feelings I have or have had and while they might not be logical or true, I felt them. I have several moments of blame and guilt. How did I not see the signs? Did I steal her hope? Should I have taken her to the hospital? Did I hasten her death? Did I leave her when she needed me most? The answer to all these questions I'm pretty sure is no, but I still feel them and I think that's perfectly normal. The rational side of me knows I did everything I could for her and tried my best to give her a "good" death.  My Mom and I had a beautiful relationship, it was not perfect, it had its healthy share of dysfunction, but I think that's normal too. She was my best friend, she was my world. I hope to share her story and journey through my grief in a way that would make her proud.

The Beginning...May 10, 2014

The end...September 18, 2014