My memory is not the greatest. Never has been. I'm sure part of that happens as you get older and life gets busier. My friends and husband sometimes tease me about it. It can be frustrating at times. But I've always been like that. Great short term, but not so great long term. I was the best 'crammer' in the world during high school, college and grad school. Always got pretty good grades. Now I can barely recall my high school homeroom teacher I had for four years. I can see her face now, but for the life of me, can't recall her name-- sad, no? Forget about me trying to recall any prof from college. Heck, I have trouble remembering the kids names most days. I tie places we've lived and events to the births of my seven children, each born in a different state, except Three and Four.
But there are things I do remember.
Eleven years ago, this February, I remember being three months pregnant with our third son, watching my two older boys play in the park when I got a call on our new cell phone. My husband had been seen at the clinic on base for shoulder pain. He had had x-rays and an MRI done. He called to talk about the MRI results, but started talking about needing a CT scan... osteosarcoma ...oncologist .....surgery... My head spun. What? Wait a minute. Slow down. Sarcoma? Oncologist? Isn't that cancer stuff?
"I don't know," came the reply.
"Well didn't you ask?"
"Nope. I just tried to listen to what they were saying. What they were saying I need to do. I have an appointment at Barnes -Jewish Hospital for a CT scan and a biopsy."
I remember we were sitting on our bed when the call came from the base oncologist the day after dh's biopsy. The day after. The orthopedic oncologist at Barnes had said it would be about a week before we'd know for sure. This was the DAY after. It was around 3pm, on a Friday. You should know-- one of the things about a clinic run on a military base-- business stops at 4:30. Period. Clinic closed. Done for the day. And so this call, coming on a Friday at 3pm, the DAY after the biopsy was, to say the least, a bit surprising. "I want you guys to come in now. I have the results."
I remember sitting across from the oncologist at 4pm, in a military clinic, on a Friday, three months pregnant, hearing her say to my husband, "I have good news and bad news. You have Stage III Diffuse Large B-Cell Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma. Good news: Very treatable, especially in the world of cancers. If you have to have a cancer, this is one of the ones to have. Bad news: it spreads fast. Real fast."
She continued, "So you can take some time if you wish to research your options. To look and see what treatments are out there. But I'm only giving you a month. Because after that, without treatment, you'll be dead. It's that fast."
I remember wanting to throw up.
I remember my heart beating in my throat as my husband walked across the hall where they started his first of six rounds of CHOP chemotherapy right then and there, at 4:30, on a Friday afternoon, in a military clinic.
I remember not crying--- shaking, head spinning, but not crying. It was all a bit surreal.
I remember in the days following, the oncologist remarking that we were lucky I was pregnant with our third child because there would be no more children after six rounds of chemotherapy. She said it was a "good thing we already had our large family”, because CHOP would leave him sterile.
I remember hearing my husband's muffled groans of pain behind a closed door while he underwent a bone marrow biopsy.
I remember making sure to get our photo taken before all his hair fell out, a small part of me wondering if this would be the last photo of us together.
I remember him coming home laughing and crying at the same time after trying to go on a run after being on chemo. "It's weird. Kinda funny, kinda not. My legs just won't go. I want them to go. I really want them to. But they just won't."
I remember praying for God's will.
I remember being afraid to ask specifically for God to heal my husband, because I was afraid He wouldn't. That His will might be different than my true heart's desire. And my faith wasn't big enough at the time to deal with that. So I just prayed to be able to accept His will.
And I remember feeling ashamed that my faith wasn't big enough or strong enough to be able to directly pray for my husbands healing. So I asked others to do what I couldn't. And I'm thankful to this day for each and every one of those prayers.
I remember my husband being so very strong during that time. He didn't broadcast his illness. Most folks didn't even know he was sick until he lost all his hair, followed by eyebrows and eyelashes. Most thought he had just lost a bet when he showed up to work bald. His demeanor never changed. He never questioned. Never said, "Why me, Lord, why me?" Never.
I remember my husband changing his work schedule, so that he could receive his chemo treatments on Friday afternoons. That way he could come home and sleep all weekend (when the prednisone didn't keep him awake) and be rested enough to put in a solid week's worth of work. The oncologist wanted him to work half days. "Not a chance," he said.
I remember studying everything I could so I could best understand his disease, his treatments and his needs. We ignored survival rates of those previously in our situation-- we focused on our own situation.
I remember him playing on the couch with the boys. Most of the time he had to lay down while playing, but the boys never noticed their daddy was sick. He made sure to give them his best.
He was, is, and forever will be, my hero.
I remember when the doc and technicians asked my husband if he believed in miracles, because the results of his scans following his last chemo treatment were clean. No trace of cancer.
I remember feeling very blessed to be seven months pregnant with our third son, knowing that, for the time being, we were victorious against cancer. The world was a special color that day.... no doubt about it. And we could breathe again.
The story continues... there was one more battle with NHL. The second battle, was a bit easier, physically speaking--we had caught it early. But mentally, I think it might have been a little tougher. If it came back once.. could it possibly....???
I remember each successive pregnancy, and there have been more than four, being such a blessing-- even our losses. Each and every one has been a gift. A miracle under normal circumstance, but when you consider where we’ve been ... extraordinary.
And I remember, one year ago this month, sitting in an oncologist’s office listening to him give my husband the ‘okay’ for a year deployment.
I remember the onc telling him there was no more need for follow up CT and PET scans, blood draws, etc.
Another victory.
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Today I sit separated from my husband by 7000 miles or so. He returns to us late April after a year long deployment.
The kids and I are making lots of plans to celebrate this victory too.
And I know that we will certainly remember them.
