![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
The Cancer Entry
May. 28th, 2006 07:50 amI never thought we would be one of the familes with cancer. Let alone one of those families with serious cancer. "Extremely aggressive," in Dr. Greene's words. And I never thought that of all the things that might take my Grandpa away from me, it would be cancer.
Grandpa hadn't been feeling well for a week or so. He couldn't eat, felt nauseated, and his stomach was bloated. On Monday he had had blood drawn because he got a new doctor, so on Thursday my Mom called to see if there was anything on his blood work to explain why he wasn't feeling well. They said his liver values were extremely elevated, and wanted to get him in for a CAT scan. So on Friday, we took him to the hospital and had a CAT scan. While we were sitting in the waiting room, a cute little old lady in a walker started talking to the nurse about how she had named her cancer Hortense. I turned to Grandpa and whispered it to him and we giggled, and I thought, 'Thank God we don't have those kind of problems.'
Next, they we went and saw Dr. Greene, our general practitioner while we waited for the scan results to come in. Dr. Greene pressed on his stomach, asked how he felt, blah blah, and asked us not to leave before the scan came in. So we waited about an hour and a half, and then he came back. He opened the door and said, "I've got news for you, and it's not good." The thought that passed through my mind was, 'How bad can it really be?' And then he said some more stuff, the only bit that I remember is, "...extremely aggressive cancer that has taken over most of the liver, and parts of the lungs... blood test from January was clean, so it's extremely fast-moving..."
I just can't get over how someone who sees 2 doctors a week could be completely overrun by cancer. Just Monday the new doctor said that he was in perfect health, except for the diabetes, which is a constant struggle. My Grandpa is just about the most important person in the world to me, and I wasn't ready for this. I mean, with his diabetes as bad as it is, I was always half-prepared for the worst, but I also half-expected him to live another 20 years, like his mother did. And I never, ever expected this. It's just so unbelievable. He's never been a drinker. Never smoked in his entire life. Never dipped, or even enjoyed a cigar. And he's got cancer, and it's going to kill him.
My Grandpa has always been one of my favorite people. I've always been super-attached to my Mom, but Grandpa was always my favorite. He was always my playmate when we'd go visiting, and had never-ending patience with me. He always put me first, never had anything else that he had to do. We'd play pretend games in the car to keep me entertained, and he'd tell me stories from his youth (we called them Long Ago and Far Aways, as in, "Grandpa, tell me a Long Ago and Far Away." "Okay. Long Ago and Far Away, when I was a little boy..."). When I was about 7 and I had a rock-collecting phase, he had pretty broken glass tumbled so the edges weren't sharp, and he'd give me a pretty pouch of it every time I went to see him. We used to sit in the floor and color together, or build with blocks. In the mountains, where there was NOTHING for a little kid to do by herself, he'd make up games to keep me entertained, or we'd walk up the the spring and make mud pies together. And he'd never get bored with me and try to talk me into going back to the house - he always waited until I was done playing, would just sit on his rock and wait for me to get bored and want to do something else. Whenever he went somewhere, he'd bring me back a present. We watched "The Sound of Music" and "The Wizard of Oz" together over and over.
I can't believe this is how it's going to be.
Grandpa hadn't been feeling well for a week or so. He couldn't eat, felt nauseated, and his stomach was bloated. On Monday he had had blood drawn because he got a new doctor, so on Thursday my Mom called to see if there was anything on his blood work to explain why he wasn't feeling well. They said his liver values were extremely elevated, and wanted to get him in for a CAT scan. So on Friday, we took him to the hospital and had a CAT scan. While we were sitting in the waiting room, a cute little old lady in a walker started talking to the nurse about how she had named her cancer Hortense. I turned to Grandpa and whispered it to him and we giggled, and I thought, 'Thank God we don't have those kind of problems.'
Next, they we went and saw Dr. Greene, our general practitioner while we waited for the scan results to come in. Dr. Greene pressed on his stomach, asked how he felt, blah blah, and asked us not to leave before the scan came in. So we waited about an hour and a half, and then he came back. He opened the door and said, "I've got news for you, and it's not good." The thought that passed through my mind was, 'How bad can it really be?' And then he said some more stuff, the only bit that I remember is, "...extremely aggressive cancer that has taken over most of the liver, and parts of the lungs... blood test from January was clean, so it's extremely fast-moving..."
I just can't get over how someone who sees 2 doctors a week could be completely overrun by cancer. Just Monday the new doctor said that he was in perfect health, except for the diabetes, which is a constant struggle. My Grandpa is just about the most important person in the world to me, and I wasn't ready for this. I mean, with his diabetes as bad as it is, I was always half-prepared for the worst, but I also half-expected him to live another 20 years, like his mother did. And I never, ever expected this. It's just so unbelievable. He's never been a drinker. Never smoked in his entire life. Never dipped, or even enjoyed a cigar. And he's got cancer, and it's going to kill him.
My Grandpa has always been one of my favorite people. I've always been super-attached to my Mom, but Grandpa was always my favorite. He was always my playmate when we'd go visiting, and had never-ending patience with me. He always put me first, never had anything else that he had to do. We'd play pretend games in the car to keep me entertained, and he'd tell me stories from his youth (we called them Long Ago and Far Aways, as in, "Grandpa, tell me a Long Ago and Far Away." "Okay. Long Ago and Far Away, when I was a little boy..."). When I was about 7 and I had a rock-collecting phase, he had pretty broken glass tumbled so the edges weren't sharp, and he'd give me a pretty pouch of it every time I went to see him. We used to sit in the floor and color together, or build with blocks. In the mountains, where there was NOTHING for a little kid to do by herself, he'd make up games to keep me entertained, or we'd walk up the the spring and make mud pies together. And he'd never get bored with me and try to talk me into going back to the house - he always waited until I was done playing, would just sit on his rock and wait for me to get bored and want to do something else. Whenever he went somewhere, he'd bring me back a present. We watched "The Sound of Music" and "The Wizard of Oz" together over and over.
I can't believe this is how it's going to be.
