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By Daniel McNabb

We have all heard that expression sometime in our lives “Count Your Blessings”. Did you ever take the time out to really do that? Oh, I know “what have I got to be thankful for?” Bills are behind, kids are disrespectful, job is not going well or the spouse is not listening to me. I don’t want to take anything away from you, these are things that I also complained and groaned about.

My, how events in your life can change your perspective. I know some of you have experienced what our family is going through and some of you are also going through it right now. My heart goes out to you.

I want to share some of the typical things that we and other families with a loved one who has advanced cancer experience day to day. Let’s leave out the daily phone calls to maybe a doctor, pharmacy, social security, palliative care, or many other support or medical care and talk about the important stuff.

Sleep, food, conversation, children and other things. Other things might include the medicine, which seems to consume so much of the time. Teresa is very organized, and with so many prescriptions she had to have a chart for her and me to know what has been given. The day is basically 3 rounds of drugs: morning, afternoon and evening. I wish it was that simple. Two major things play into the equation, Pain and Sugar. No, not the sweet tooth, Diabetes (because of the steroids for swelling) and sugar levels keep us evaluating glucose readings and food intake. I seems like sometimes it’s just a guessing game on how much to take.

Pain, something that we have a special doctor to manage but is the biggest challenge. We see the pain doc every two weeks, but every week is different and new things develop. Then it’s up to us to figure out how much to take and what. That brings me back to the charts, we write everything taken and what time just in case we forget. Can you imagine if you forgot if you took 200mg of Morphine and went ahead and took it again. Some people might not wake up from that, we have to monitor all of it.

What makes all of it more difficult is the changes that have happened lately and the physical effects they have. The newer pain in her lower back and the tumor that bled into her left leg have affected her mobility and the amount of pain has increased. It’s not cut and dry how much of the instant release Morphine to take. You have to look and see how long ago you took Methadone, how much and when you last took the extended release Morphine. Based on that and the amount of pain, and if you want to stay awake, you decide how much to take. This is not a decision she makes on her own, it’s hard to think straight when you are on so many painkillers. No matter what we do right now they still don’t do the job, so we have resorted to applying prescription Laticane Patches on the most painful spots.

With the mobility issue and the lost of the use of her left arm simple things take on a whole new meaning. I now have to walk her up and down the stairs, a fall would be devastating. She needs assistance in just about everything you and I take for granted. Dressing and bathing is very difficult with one arm. If she needs anything (like a drink or meal) I have to carry it for her and anything she needs I have to go get it for her.

If you can imagine, taking so many different prescriptions can really mess with your body and system. There has been more than one occasion when Teresa has called for me because something isn’t right.  One time it was feeling flushed and her heart racing that scared her.   She just needed someone there to be with her to deal with each of these things.   She, or anybody in this condition needs someone to be with them all the time.  

I wanted to tell you these things to give you an insight in to what are life is really like right now.  Taking care of the kids and the house on top of this does not leave you much time for work either.  It is tough, I don’t know how anybody could get through this without having faith in God.  We always trust in Him and He always provides for us one way or another.  I didn’t share this with you to make you feel sorry for us, I just want you to understand.  I just want you to count the blessings you have and be thankful for what the Lord has provided for you.

Otherwise, today we spent half the day at the hospital and Teresa started her Chemotherapy again.  Tommorow we will be there again for the first half of the day getting CT scans to get a baseline scan on the tumors.

We have been blessed to find  Rolling Hills Church and all the great people there.  There support lately confirms are faith and allows us to share the works that God can do in our lives.  I look forward to sharing again with you on here in future posts, but don’t worry Teresa will be writing too.  God Bless.