Tenderly, tenderly
Feb. 18th, 2014 07:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
breakinglight11Mom had a bad CAT scan. Her lung cancer has not only grown but spread. It's in her adrenal gland, her lymph nodes. And her brain tumors are back. Can't repeat the big treatment again. There's so little left that she hasn't already tried. Anything they do now is a shot in the dark; they don't know what to do at this point. Going to spread more and shut down. Lymph nodes is bad. Lymph nodes is a death sentence.
Of course it's all a death sentence. Feels almost silly, melting down now. She's always been under a death sentence. We were sure she was doomed two Christmases ago, and here she is a year and two months later. We should be grateful. She got five years with the deadliest cancer there is when her initial estimate was four months. We should be grateful. What did we expect? THAT'S CANCER. What did we fucking expect?
But I'm not grateful. It's not fair. We expected her to have a full life, to get old and see us get married and have kids and succeed in the world. Not get eaten alive by sickness. Now's when she's going to get dragged under. I know I've said that before and we had miracles, but she's got no strength anymore. Not after five years of the chemo and the drugs and the creeping sickness.
No, that's not quite right. She's proved so physically tough that she won't even have the mercy of going quick. Her body is probably going to hold on until she's a wasted wreck. She's going to get so weak and sick and helpless and it's going to be drawn out and she's going to hate it and be miserable and it will be awful.
"Oh, but tenderly, tenderly, Lord. Day by day and week by week you broke her body on the wheel whist she still wore it. Is it not enough?"
When is it going to be enough?
Of course it's all a death sentence. Feels almost silly, melting down now. She's always been under a death sentence. We were sure she was doomed two Christmases ago, and here she is a year and two months later. We should be grateful. She got five years with the deadliest cancer there is when her initial estimate was four months. We should be grateful. What did we expect? THAT'S CANCER. What did we fucking expect?
But I'm not grateful. It's not fair. We expected her to have a full life, to get old and see us get married and have kids and succeed in the world. Not get eaten alive by sickness. Now's when she's going to get dragged under. I know I've said that before and we had miracles, but she's got no strength anymore. Not after five years of the chemo and the drugs and the creeping sickness.
No, that's not quite right. She's proved so physically tough that she won't even have the mercy of going quick. Her body is probably going to hold on until she's a wasted wreck. She's going to get so weak and sick and helpless and it's going to be drawn out and she's going to hate it and be miserable and it will be awful.
"Oh, but tenderly, tenderly, Lord. Day by day and week by week you broke her body on the wheel whist she still wore it. Is it not enough?"
When is it going to be enough?
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