Now, my mother will kick my heinie if I talk about any of this in a sloppy, sentimental or overly dramatic way, but I think the sensitive viewer will admit that finding out that your mom has cancer is one of those things that makes you very preoccupied and introspective.
Having said that I must hasten to add a number of facts:
She’ll still probably live a long time. By the numbers – and we’re kind of funny that way, as a family, thinking about probabilities in as realistic a fashion as we can – it’s true.
She’s going to get excellent care.
She’s not scared, freaked out or lying on the bathroom floor washing tranks down with red wine, while my dad frantically beats on the door calling her name. Actually, I find it rather amusing to even suggest that she’d do such a thing, it’s so far away from what she’s like. In fact, I’d pay good money to watch her pretend to do that.
Everything that’s about to happen is going to be an inconvenience. That’s the way she’s treating it, and I’m going to line up behind her on that one, although you can bet your sweet ass I’ll be visiting her somewhat more frequently in future, now that my 8 months of navel gazing are done. I’ll be more comfortable knowing what the course of treatment is going to be, but I’m not going to waste two seconds feeling sorry for her or me. If you have her contact info you can fire off an email to her directly or you can post comments to this if you feel so inclined.
The waiting is hard. We’ll be better when there’s something to be done.
