Too little too late

I mean that title about this post really. Mainly because I'm going to talk about Halloween to begin with then onto more current events. I had a whole thing written up about Halloween already, but since Apple sucks a slippery one, I lost it. It was good too. So rather try and recreate it, I decided I should give it some time and try again so it didn't feel forced. Like a Stephen King novel or Will and Jaden Smith film.

So for Halloween I finally convinced my red headed son to be Tin Tin so I could be Captain Haddock with the sweet beard I've been harboring. (I say harboring because it is like a terrorist. Albeit a sexy one. A sexy hairy terrorist.) and my daughter got some princess of the forest thing going on because the original costume I had planned at the last moment decided to take a giant wet fart and it's what we cobbled together. In the end it turned out quite good. Now don't get me wrong, I like Halloween like everyone else, but some people are way too liberal with the fact that Halloween night is the one night of the year that scaring children is not only okay, but encouraged. (Although some people do scare children throughout the year, but to be fair the burn ward did do all they could.) We got Liam a blue sweater, white shirt, and made some knickers for him. Even got a small Snowiest dog doll. I had a black suit, a turtleneck sweater and I put black mascara in my red beard and slapped on a sailor hat. We looked great. Per example

 

And also

So we were ready. We went out and started to get some candy. Vickie, in a true testament of the desire to be a good mother, went out with us. She brought a large coat, a hat and everything you would want to keep warm. She still ended up cold. We got to the first street and it was dead as a door nail. I mean nobody on the streets and less in the houses. Then the over zealousness all started. We got to a house where the owner was staked out in front in the most realistic horrifying witch outfit. I mean it was a witch meets venom meets an annoyed demon spawn. Scared the shit out of the kids. Wouldn't go near her. Wouldn't go near the next house either, but eventually a woman sitting outside her house in normal clothes coaxed them back to the fold. Then no sooner than fifteen minutes later, some dude with the scariest clown mask I've ever seen did worse damage. It was like Pennywise was possessed by Satan's crotch sweat. 

Then my favorite was the cop who dressed up as a head wound victim, a head wound by meat cleaver, covered in blood on the ground, a speaker blaring stating to take some candy and get away from the body. Then as you got close he would twitch and start to convulse as you reached for a blood soaked sour patch licorice. 

What is wrong with these people? So we spend to hours out and got a decent haul for the kids. It was all fine until the next day when Vickie started to run a fever of 100.5. Now that doesn't seem that bad, but to her cancered self that equals 105. And that's quite bad. Luckily she didn't need to go to the ER like they said she would have to and I was off to get some antibiotics. Small price to spend some time with the kids. 

The last couple of weeks have been pretty much routine. We have been acclimated to a level of what needs to be and what has to be. I still get absolutely no sleep the night before Vickie goes in for a treatment. I still need to encourage her to do some of the more simple tasks of life and to get up for a bit, just to feel the floor under her feet and walk around a little. It gets daunting after while to be honest.

Where we are at now is we are down to the last treatment. Vickie got the harsher treatment this last Tuesday. Still in bed from it, but in higher spirits because in a week and some days she has one last dosage. (I say that, but last night she was not wanting one last treatment, begged me not to take her. Poor girl.) After all that we are on the road to recovery from there. But I have to tell you, this last stint is so incredibly hard to get through. It is being tortured. But, worse yet, you are being tortured but you don't have any information. They think you do, but you don't. So they keep on giving you dose after dose of pain. Or better yet, you have to sit there and watch. Watch as your loved one withers away. Watch as her strength is being sucked from her. As her life is being smashed by dulling soul breaking aches and horrifying muscle spasms that make her writhe and wince and pray for it to end. It's about as disgusting endeavor as you could ask.

But it all comes to end soon. Soon it will Vickie will be released from all of this and we can slowly regain our lives back.

Soon...

Not to get all Mormo on everyone...

... but the overflow is a bitch. I'm usually not late to church, but today I was. In fact, I'm here now and it's hell. 

The overflow at an LDS church is the peanut gallery of evangelical posturing. It's where the parents with 8-10 kids under the age of 5 go so their kids can run, yell, and drool all over the basketball court while someone at the pulpit is blubbering through some nephite reader's digest about how some mo-tard gained acceptance by being kind. (Even though everyone was nice to them afterwards, they were being patronizing and we all know it.)

It's where to go to stare at your phone or iPad without judgement. Where mothers and fathers hold crying children rather than taking the little shit out into the foyer. Where the newlywed couple goes to grope each other or fight quietly about towels or some other "problem", like how he forgot to say good night the night before or some other idiotic, fool hardy errand. It's where the outcast go to be weird and the late comers walk to be unnoticed. Well, they are noticed but only by the weirdos in the overflow. No harm, no foul. 

Geez, just saw a young toddler with a short skirt and thigh high socks. She looks like the most adorable whore. Good going, Mom!

I'm usually not this late, usually I can get a place to sit near my parents. My entrance today, however, was very much late and left no recluse with family. 

Three children, one after another, just fell. All around me. Each child's cry more loud and annoying than the last.

It's a battlefield here and the battle is not to say anything about someone else's awful parenting. Because you certainly wouldn't want to do that. That would be rude. 

It's been a rough week with a weekend that was full up with family staying from out of town. Yay. I had been running around doing a bunch of stuff to the extent that as I as trying to get to bed last night, my back was in such dire straits I could hardly breath without struggling in pain. Now I know back pain, after being in the construction trade for 10 years. It wasn't a slipped disc, this was too high. It wasn't physical damage, the pain wasn't constant. No, this was just a simple pinched nerve, but it was a bad one. Quite painful but nothing a hot shower and a quick neck pop couldn't fix. Although it did fix it, I was left with an incredibly sore back from the pinch in the middle of my back. So Vickie, being full of medication herself, offered me a pain killer. I didn't want the two she offered so I just took one and it knocked my ass to the floor. I didn't wake up until about 15 minutes before church started. Which is fine by myself, but with two little kids who hate getting ready for church is a freaking chore. So here I am. In the back of the church. 

Of course the reason for the back pinch really wasn't because of running around. It's just a stressful time. So close to the end, just three more treatments and it seems almost torturous to be so close and have so much more to go. 

Oh well, that's the way it goes. 

Oh good, the speaker is done. I do have to say I am pretty impressed with the way he could 'liken' (I hate that term, ugh) the story about a kid being bullied and how his older brother made him feel better by talking about it, so some great service was given. Yeah, because talking about stuff solves everything. Bullies love nothing more than words. Buh.

The unrelenting poison

Chemo is indeed poison. It is a poison that kills you just enough. It is introduced to the body in an intravenously way and makes its way through the blood stream. It attacks all in its path, hopefully the mutated cells that make up the cancer, then backs off enough to let you live. You know, with no immune system, in bed in pain, taking an assortment of pain killers and anti-nausea pills and generally feeling quite awful. Like after listening to a Coldplay album. 

It gets worse after time. The body can take the poison all right for awhile, but there is a breaking point where the body throws its arms in the air and waves the white flag of surrender. Writing this it seems like chemotherapy is less of a medical remedy and more like a dare concocted at a trailer park. Vickie has been taking in the chemo "medicine" every other week. She would feel pretty awful until the next Sunday after a treatment and by then she could function a bit more. One week bad, the next week tolerable. But it doesn't do that anymore. Now it's just two weeks of feeling like you've just attended a Brad Pitt film festival. (I know a lot of you might think that wouldn't be a bad time, but come on, when was the last time you actually wanted to see one of his movies? Like a thousand years and counting) It has made life different, as you would guess. 

I feel that now I'm more of a caregiver than a husband. More of a babysitter than a father. And worse yet, I feel like a Mexican washer woman down at the creek washing a load of clothes for a few pesos each, only to come home to a dead beat, drunken husband. The man who takes those few pesos physically from me to go down to the bar for some tortilla soup and tequila shots, just to come home late and drunk, smelling like another woman's perfume. I won't take it Carlos! I won't!

Okay that went to a weird place, but nevertheless the sentiment is still there. 

We are getting a lot of help though. From our church, from our family, from friends, from the cancer center. The list is plentiful and willing. It has been very nice, but does seem sometimes we are out welcoming our stay a bit. Trust me, I wish we weren't. I would give anything not to have to lean on so many, but all I can be is grateful and all I can do is reciprocate the service in some capacity later on in life.

Still, there's fun you can have with is all. Every time Vickie does anything I always tell her how 'inspiring' she's being. When people ask how she is I get to say "she's dying inside, OKAY." Then act all indignant and huff away. The other day I told someone that my wife having cancer was the best thing that happened to our sex life, just to see what they would do. They ended up saying nothing and walked away. I laughed until I about pitched up a lung. 

Time keeps on slipping.

It seems there is no time for anything anymore. Time for the kids, time to go grocery shopping, time to wash clothes, time to sleep. The culprit? Work. Luckily and very unluckily school starts this week. Luckily because it means all the work I've been doing is coming to a close. Most of the jobs are done or close to done and we are supposed to be cutting back hours. That's good. But now my kids are going back to school. Bella to first grade and Liam still gets to do some pre schooling. I had no time to take them anywhere or do anything extraordinary this summer. That is what the summer is for. To explore, to get away, to get out of dodge, baby. I didn't have that opportunity this summer. This was the summer of 60 hour work weeks. Of working seven Saturdays in a row. Of being so tired I couldn't even function as a parent. 

The last one was the worst because I already have a wife who trying her damnedest not to be a nonfunctioning parent but has no choice. I had a choice and mostly took the correct route but very regrettably didn't take it as much as I would have liked. Fatigue can do strange things to a person. It is a monster that takes away your personality. In some cases, your sanity. It takes away the things you enjoy the most. Interests you once loved are now a burden. Loved ones are just annoying bags of flesh that do nothing but irritate you no end. Fatigue robs you of yourself. 

But that's now over. I have two days before school starts. That means only two more days for long hours and then it's done. Back to normal hours. Back to normal life... Wait. That's not true. Not normal life but the life we accept until mid December when the chemo is done and over with when I have my wife back and healthy. Right. I'll be going back to a life with a cancer patient going through agonizing cramps coupled with dull soul crushing pain, but at least with proper sleep and more time to care of everybody a lot better. So it's a bit of a win. 

Tired. Oh, so tired.

It's been exhausting lately. Much more exhausting than it should be at least. I've been working a lot as of late and then I come home to juggle my new responsibilities as "parent who can move around." Don't get wrong, Vickie isn't comatose or anything, so she still carries out a vital role giving the moral and administrative support that I need. Also, this only happens for a week or so before she starts recovering. It's when she begins feeling well and she can move around and do more when we know its time for her to go back in for another round of magic stuff. 

But back to me for a second. (Narcissist, isn't it?) Usually during the summer we are busy at work. It's the time when the school district let's have the summer break to fix or upgrade the schools in the area. It's good work but the only drawback is we only get the summer to begin and finish, sometimes, very involved projects. This year is no different, except this year they had more than 75 different projects. Almost three times as much than the previous years and some of the work is on big projects. We have a good number of projects this year alongside a fast track elementary school we have been trying to finish in 8 months. You know, before the new school year starts in 2 weeks. We are almost finished but it does mean that I've been pulling down 55+ hours a week for the last month. A labor intensive week for that long can demoralize and exhaust a man quick. That's exactly what has happened to me. 

Usually you get breaks during the day. I don't really have that. Being ahead of the work for our contractor, I'm usually bombarded with questions so much that to make up for lost time I need to work my way through. Most guys break hard during lunch anyway, lounge around slowly eating, that sort of thing. Well, again, I don't. My work has been close to home. As in, a block from home, so I go home for lunch. I do this for a couple of reasons. 1 to save money. 2 to see my family. And 3 to feed my family. If I don't come home for lunch each day it's not a totally sure they will eat. That includes my wife. So I go home, make lunch for Vickie, Bella and Liam and if I have time, get myself something. Sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn't. It usually does though. 

But wait. Didn't I tell you how tired I've been lately? Yes, sleep. Our old friend. Our good ol' buddy. He can give you the kiss of life in one second or turn around and knee you in the balls the next. He's been kneeing my fleshy klackers a lot lately and it's been in such dire straits that I found myself setting a timer on my phone for ten minutes and sleeping on the laundry room floor for the last ten minutes of my lunch break after making sure my family was fed. It wasn't so bad. There was a dirty pillow I could use and it was pretty cold in there. Awesome. Now that I write that down it seems much more pathetic than when it happened. When it happened it felt great. Until I had to wake up. Then it turned into a fight to the death to keep my eyes open. I desperately wanted to find the contraption from 'A Clockwork Orange' to get through the next 5 hours. 

When I get home it's pretty much the same. Drag my carcass up the stairs, shower and find the sheer will power to do dishes, see if Vickie needs anything, make dinner, do more dishes, see if Vickie needs anything, perhaps some laundry, play with the kids, see if Vickie needs anything, read them a story, put them to bed, see if Vickie needs anything and then go to bed. 

But it's all worth it. The checks have been pretty good, my family is being taken care of and my work is flourishing. In a couple of weeks it won't be incredibly insane and hopefully I will go back to 8 hour days and sob at my paycheck again. Until then however, I will sit here having to constantly backspace, re-type every other sentence and re-read everything three times so I don't sound like I have a severe learning disability. (Well that I do have)

Not part three

I know I said I'd do this in three parts, but I'm a filthy liar. It's a well known fact, just ask my kids. Most of the time I'm telling them either we are going somewhere (movies, bookstore, ice cream) but its all a lie to shut them up. We all do it, it's fine.

In the last post you will notice that I held back quite a bit. The effects and affects of that first treatment were horrific beyond print. It's psychological sting ran too deep for mere splattering of words onto digital canvas and too extensive for the casual reader. I'm sure those dark thoughts will be locked into a dungeon within the folds of lard that make up most of my brain. Not most of brain, that'd be an understatement. So be honest, most of my senses also are mainly lard based, but I guess that isn't for here... Yet. 

We are a month in and two treatments down. After next Tuesday, we will be in the single digits for how many treatments left and mentally that's a relief. Chemotherapy is a head game, and for awhile there we were losing that game. I don't know if you know this, but cancer? Well, he's a real jerk. And you know chemo? Well he's an awful friend who does you ONE favor and after that he just walks all over you. Borrows money, hits on your girlfriend, grabs your sisters ass, and every time you tell him to knock it off he just brings up how he bailed you out that one time. That one time. Remember kids, Chemo, not even once. 

Well that somewhat fragile relationship gets strained easily. The symbiotic link between patient and chemo quickly goes from grateful to regret in a split second and it's as painful to watch as it is to live. As a bystander the only hope is the fact that most people talk about the time afterwards as though it went quicker than they thought it would. I do hope that is the case, otherwise the strain both mentally and physically could too much to bear. Although, to be fair, it is the summer and that means a lot of school work for me to be done before the school year starts. Which means I'm pulling down 60 hour work weeks until Aug 14th. Yay. It also means that I am so tired that I can't help out as much as I would like to. I am so. Damn. Tired. I don't wish these grueling hours in the southern utah heat like this. The checks may be nice, but I'm not impressed. I'd rather have the ability to help Vickie with her day. Carry on, however, carry on.

As for now, I await Tuesday, another round of treatment and a long week of work. 

Yay.

The Big Update. Part 2

It took awhile to wrap my head around the first dose of chemo before I could write about it. After the first week of treatment was over, it felt as though six months of my life had been taken away. Like I had been put into the torture device from The Princess Bride and Christopher Guest was just leaning over me saying "I have just taken a year from your life, tell me how you feel."

After the first day Vickie was fine. It seemed like maybe this wouldn't be so bad, that we could manage this pretty easy. The next day after Vickie felt the same and she was up doing things, feeling tired but okay. The day after that it began. The pain started creeping up on her slowly, like a mountain lion stalking a hiker with three loud children covered in bits of trail mix. Luckily she had plenty of pain medication, right? Well yes, she had a lot of anti-nausea and a pain killer that took the edge off, but never really alleviating any pain. So as Vickie didn't really rest as much as she should have, thinking it wasn't going to get her down, the pain came slowly but when it arrived it took hold and didn't let up, like an extra from Reefer Madness.

Vickie got her first dose on a Tuesday. Thursday the pain started and by Friday at lunch I came home from work to find her sobbing in bed from the pain. What the hell do you do? You can't shout at the damn cancer. You cant fight it. You have to learn to deal with it. Well we were failing at dealing with it, so we needed to do something different. By the time we realized that the pain killers weren't pain killing Vickie was in dire straights. She called about getting a change in medication but by the time we changed it up the pain had taken over. The new pain medication was no match for the mountain it needed to overcome. On Sunday night I had taken my kids over to my grandfathers community pool. I usually don't go swimming on Sunday but when it's over 103 degrees outside, well all bets are off. When I was driving home I got a call that my Mother was driving Vickie to the ER. I dropped off the kids as quick as I could and drove out there to relieve my mom. We ended up at the ER because Vickie was not only in pain, but a fever had flared up. When you have a fever while on chemo a 100.5 degree fever in actuality is a 105 degree fever. I got there and Vickie was already in a room, in pain. The Doctors had to wait until they did a bunch of tests before they would give her any heavier medicine. Luckily that only took around 4 hours. It was 4 hours of massive back pain for Vickie and hours of getting whatever I could for her. Or at least getting the nurses to get her whatever they could. FInally after hours of waiting the tests were in and she got the pain meds she needed to get the back spasms to go away.

It seemed like a nasty government psychological test to see how much the human brain can withstand before it turns on itself. 

The next day we got Vickie a full body massage and a neck adjustment. That seemed to do the trick. But we were still kind of perplexed to why she had such a bad reaction to the chemo. It seemed more harsh than what the doctors told us it would be. After her massage the dude said she has quite a few knots and perhaps the chemo made her nerve endings more sensitive. This sensitivity made them ache with immense pain. Or whatever. Who knows? The doctors also said it may be that Vickie had "fallen to the communists" and it was wreaking havoc in the inside of her. Makes sense. During that time women's hormones and body chemistry are going mental, take that with the chemicals of chemotherapy and that can only be a cocktail of disaster. 

Now it's over. the first dosage I mean. She's gone through a second dose with not nearly as bad of a result. Time will tell how nasty it will get...