I hate cancer

With all the talk of writing about something "important" in bloggerworld, I'll write about my current tears as I type this. It isn't a social issue, won't make world headlines and sure is a far way from political but it's important. I just found out my mom is going to have to start chemo for the third time since February of 01. Third time her hair will fall out, third time she will have to drive 120 miles one way to have the poison pumped into her system, third time we will keep the nasty never ending replicating cancer cells at bay. For what purpose...to keep her alive.

I work in the medical field. It was my choice. Only thing I ever wanted to do. I work at the world's premier medical center. Big fat fucking deal! I can't keep my mom from slowly being killed by a cancer that should have been diagnosed years before it was. I have no control over the inferior doctor who ignored every one of her complaints for a year, did less than adequate exams and then documented "normal findings" prior to her being admitted five days later into the hospital in Feb of 2001 only to have half of her insides cut out two days later with late stage ovarian cancer growing in all these nooks and crannies. I have no control over the slow painful consequences of the disease. I can't make it go away, I couldn't have prevented it. I could bring her here to Mayo to the best doctor's in the world (or so they say). Would it make a difference? Who knows, she wants to stay at home.

Now, the kicker. She is one strong woman. Three rounds of chemo, excruciating back and shoulder pain from the chemo only accelerating arthritis, kidney stents that repeating get blocked, never ending fatigue. You know what she does for a living? She's a farmer. Technically, she is schooled as a nurse. She said the hell with that not long after she started working as a nurse and now does the one thing she always wanted to do. Have a farm. So after 4.5 years of battling this always fatal cancer, she spends her days out on the tractor stacking bales, swathing hay, checking the calves in the winter. In between she cooks/cater for local events, makes amazing wedding cakes. Why? Because if she sits on her keester and does nothing she hurts everywhere. If she is busy and does what she loves, she hurts everywhere but at least she is doing something. God Damn the fucking cancer! I'm a left wing catholic to the core and I talk to God in one way or the other multiple times a day but nothing can stop me from hating what this disease is doing to one amazing, strong, much too young to be facing what she is facing woman that I call Mom.

Yes, we are all dying. We could all be hit by a bus or have the earth implode and the entire human race disappear. Death is inevitable. There is even what people call "natural death". We get old, our bodies wear out, and we die. There is also "unnatural death". A death which is still inevitable but follows a path of sickness and pain. It strikes the young, the middle age, and the old. that is a death I would never wish upon my worst enemy. But, that is what is happening to my mom. And to think there are people who shrug their shoulders at that and say, "well, every one dies". That doesn't make the emotional and physical pain of an unnatural death easier.

So, I'm going home in 10 days or so to spend five days at home. I had planned to eat homemade molasses cookies, mom's potato salad and buns and vegg. I'm still going to do that. Only now mom will be two days out from starting her third round of chemo therapy. if you believe in prayer, say one please. I'm going to try to enjoy my time back in SD with my family, ignoring the little black cloud that wants to just hover over a farm in the middle of nowhere.