Worn

Just spent another two nights in the hospital.  More needles , more pain, more suffering.  I am worn out and depressed.  In addition to killing cancer cells, the chemo also kills off all of Andrew's white blood cells, which makes him extremely susceptible to infection.  If he gets even a minor fever, they fear  bacteria could quickly take over his whole body.  So with a fever of 101, we have to rush to the hospital.  And commit to 48 hours of antibiotics. And we just spent last weekend there getting chemo.  And then next Monday, more chemo.  We need some mercy.  There doesn't seem to be any.

I am getting to the point where I don't want to talk or write about it anymore.  I just want to crawl into a dark dark cave and feel sorry for Andrew and for myself.  I keep thinking of the people in concentration camps and the orphaned children in Africa, and people all over the world who had/have it SO much worse than we do.  How did/do they get through even one day?

I get bogged down with worry and fear.  And the constant intrusion into our lives. And shuttling our crap back and forth to the hospital.  And the constant chasing Andrew down to give him his "treatments" of horror.  He cries when I wash his hair, let alone poke him with needles and force him to gargle "boogers" (his name for the yellowy pasty nystatin he has to have swabbed on his cheeks three times a day).  ENOUGH.  Yet we have many more months to go.

I feel so angry that I am so vulnerable around these doctors and nurses.  I don't like my role of "patient's mother."  I don't like to be vulnerable in front of other people, especially people I don't know.  I am rarely vulnerable in front of people I do know (except when I am writing).  I don't like to be seen in the miserable heap in which I find myself.  I just feel like "Who invited you?  I don't even know you.  How dare you intrude into my pain?"

I imagine these doctors and nurses not caring one bit, and doing their work, getting their paycheck, and going home to their nice comfy couches and cancer-free children.  I resent that I am at their mercy.

 I have to coach myself into not feeling angry.  I have to coach and convince myself into accepting that they are trying to help Andrew, even if their solution is to poison him first.  My gut is in complete rebellion, but my mind keeps trying to convince it.

When I used to hear about cancer happening to other people, it always made sense to view it as an unfortunate mutation, a horrible random thing that life throws at us.

But now that it has happened to my two year old son, it feels pure evil.  As if some evil being knew exactly the right button to push.  With one mutated cell, it is able to destroy lives, destroy families, create pain, create anger, create more evil, create a domino effect of horror.  The perfect plan of destruction.

I'm worn out.  And I'm not even the one who's sick.  God have mercy.