In This 🏡 No One Does Hard Things Alone!

I bypassed sick Saturday and was ecstatic! I wasn’t sick! I didn’t puke! Until Sunday when it was all downhill. It’s 12:32 am and I’m just cleaned up and back to bed, with my pail and the knowing this isn’t over. Part of me wants to spare you the details but the details are also the reality that is my current life. Mikey didn’t get the pail fast enough. He was trying. Our bed was covered. With Kalvin at my side we now had a problem as the puke just kept on coming. No one wants to wake their kids in the middle of the night but the fact is we needed more hands on deck. The vomit after chemo is toxic. All bodily fluids are. They say if bodily fluids get on anything they need to be removed wearing gloves and washed separately in hot water. It’s no wonder I feel like a contaminated bag of garbage. Kalvin just wants to support me so he’s whining as Kyran keeps him safely away. As I’m sitting in my bed, covered in my own contaminated vomit, with my swollen, itchy, blistered feet now saturated I find comfort in Mikey. He’s always here. He doesn’t get to go home. This is his home. Our lives intertwined, his promises of caring for me in sickness being taken seriously. He helps me feel uncontaminated, as he starts the clean up and sends me into the shower. I know this sucks for Mikey, he hates watching me struggle. Not a day passes that he doesn’t say he wishes he could take the pain. It’s really hard never getting an escape from any of this. Mikey’s only escape is work and groceries, and his walks with Kalvin when he knows I’ll be okay. I don’t know that people realize that for the “patient” and their family they don’t get to go back to their regular life, this is the new normal for now, and nothing about it feels normal. With nightstands filled with pills, creams and gingerale, I’m thankful for Mikey. Thankful that I’m home to him because doing this alone would be unimaginable. I’m thankful for my kiddos, and sad they have to see all of this. Sad they sleep with one ear open incase they’re needed. Sad that nothing is normal for them right now. I just want to be mom. My heart aches for their worry. As a mom you feel it when someone or something is hurting your kids, that something is cancer that’s hurting my family and for that I am angry. When I told Mikey I wanted to break something to help me move the anger he was right there for me, saying let’s go. I have to feel my feelings, whatever that looks like. Wanting to break something is new, I’ve never felt that before. Cancer really is f&@$?!g with the wrong person. And in this house, no one does hard things alone.

I had to say goodbye to Renee today. As a kid goodbyes were the absolute worst after her family moved away. As I got older, I got used to them, and they got easier. They’re the absolute worst again, I can’t help but wonder is this the last goodbye? And it’ll chew me up. Time is more precious than ever before. Kylee and Renee made some shirts and packaged some hats. My support squad is so special to me. I know I’m blessed with love and support from many corners of this world. When I looked at the website analytics and saw 3944 people tuned in to read here over the weekend I felt the chills. When I see my inbox full of messages to keep sharing my story, messages of hope and love, messages reminding me that talking helps others. I can’t help but wonder…. did cancer pick hanging out with me awhile so I could shed some light on it? Did cancer choose f$&!?&g with the wrong person so it could be more understood by 3944 people? On that note, one more symptom no one talks about … 💩

Stick with me people. I have something to say. Toxic 💩 burns. And also, I’m doing a poll. If you have diarrhea and you know you’re not finished but you don’t feel like sitting there forever so you get up knowing full well you’ll be back …. is it one bout of diarrhea or two? I really am curious. Some people would sit there for hours and say one. So to me, it’s one. For the record, the rule for cancer patients is a hospital visit if you’re outside the normal daily output for diarrhea. If you can still feel it brewing it’s one. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Where’s my support squad?

Thanks for being here. For ALL of it. I love you.