Six Letter Word [Kaylor]

December 2016 (Part 2)

trigger warning: marijuana use (mostly medicinal)

Having my mom stay with me the last week of chemo was weird. We haven't lived together since I moved out at eighteen, almost nine years ago. It was like we had to re-learn each other. She didn't know what I liked to eat for breakfast anymore. Or where I kept the coffee mugs. She didn't know the routines that Karlie and I had established, living together both before and after our wedding. I didn't know how she liked her coffee. Even when she'd been in town after my thyroidectomy, she'd stayed at Karlie's old apartment, not with us. It felt like we were dancing awkwardly around each other, just slightly out of sync. She hadn't watched the video of Cara shaving my head. I didn't realize she hadn't seen it, until she walked into the house, took one look at me, and got all misty eyed because she hadn't seen me since Thanksgiving day, and so she hadn't seen me since I shaved my head. That was hard for her, that visible reminder that I'm sick. She didn't lose her hair when she was doing treatment, so it was a first for both of us. I know it was hard for her, because I'm her baby and there was nothing she could do to make it better.

It was even harder for her to go to chemo with me. She flinched when Deshaun accessed my port, even though it didn't hurt me at all. Made me wonder if maybe some of my fear of needles came from her. My counts were even lower, so we scheduled a shot of a white cell booster for Wednesday after radiation. It had to be given under the skin rather than intravenously, so they couldn't use my port, which sucked. After the first one, they said they could teach me how to give them to myself, but they had to give the first one to make sure I wasn't allergic or anything. I know my mom didn't like hearing where my numbers were, but she appreciated that I had worn a mask into the hospital and anytime I was outside my infusion room, even during radiation. But she really hated seeing the side effects once chemo started. The vomiting was the worst it had been since the first week. They wouldn't let mom take me home right away because I was so sick, they were worried about dehydration, so I had to get extra fluids and some electrolytes. I think it scared Mom, how sick I got. It wasn't exactly a picnic for me either. I wished Karlie was there, even though she couldn't have done anything more for me than Mom did, rubbing my back and murmuring soothingly. They talked about maybe sending me home with IV fluids still connected, but ultimately decided there was enough in me to be okay.

Mom didn't sleep in the bathroom with me that night, like Kar would have, but she did sleep in our bed so she was very close by. She took care of the cats and made sure I ate and took my meds, as much as I could stand to eat, and she ran out and got Gatorade to try to help with electrolytes, and mostly she let me sleep off the effects of chemo on Tuesday and Wednesday, other than when I had to go to radiation. Wednesday's injection after radiation took only a few seconds, just long enough to swab an area on my stomach near my belly button and slip the medication just under my skin, but then I had to hang out for a half hour to be sure I wouldn't have an allergic reaction to it. I was so tired, I fell asleep waiting. I felt fine after that, other than tired, until Friday. In between, Karlie and I Facetimed almost constantly. She was doing awesome things at the Adidas headquarters with a bunch of their designers and athletes, and I had seen tons of pictures, including a few of the Adidas athletes wearing Karlie's prototype designs, which was so impressive. She was getting to go to all these exercise classes and was loving it, although she missed me and wished she could be with me.

Friday though, Friday I was unprepared for. I was in the middle of baking cookies when my muscles started to ache like I was getting the flu. Within an hour, the pain was so intense it was all I could do to lie on the couch. The slightest movement was agonizing. It migrated from my muscles to my bones. I didn't know bones that weren't broken COULD hurt. And my head hurt with the worst migraine I'd ever had. Ever. My mom hovered around, trying to figure out what she could do for me, but even digging out the hated narcotics from surgery, like they suggested when she called Dr. Miller's office barely made a dent in the pain. It hurt so much she had to call Mike to carry me to the bathroom, then stand just outside while I did what I had to do, then carry me to bed so I could lie in the dark and try not to move. In desperation, she called Karlie, who had the driver take her straight to the airport. She was scheduled to head out Saturday morning, so she wasn't skipping much at Adidas, fortunately, though I was in too much pain to really care, at that point. I was willing to try anything to make it stop.