Lightning Strikes Twice

Family Tragedy

Before 2019, my life had never really been touched by cancer. Maybe a grandparent or two who'd died of it but i think that was more down to old age and a lifetime of smoking than anything else. But that was the closest it had ever come to me so i felt relatively unscathed. Theres a saying I've heard that says 'everyone knows someone with cancer' but i guess i thought id slipped through the cracks of life's algorithm. Oh how wrong was i.

In the earlier months of 2019, my 27 year old cousin, was diagnosed with lung cancer after several bouts of pneumonia. I remember thinking how incredibly young and healthy Keira was and how unfair life was sometimes. Watching my family struggle and fear for the life of one of our own was awful. With a risky surgery to remove half her lung and a long recovery accompanied by a tub of her own "lung juice" as she called it (that looked disgustingly similar to Fanta Fruit Twist), she beat it within a few months and was up and running with a smile on her face in time for the next hit to our family. 

Keira's tumour was close to home but after the initial shock passed off it didn't really affect me personally as i didn't get to see her that often during those months. Out of sight, out of mind i suppose? My elation at her cancer free news was short lived when my mum fell ill shortly after. She couldn't keep any food down for long, was losing a lot of weight in a short amount of time and quite frankly she looked like a dead woman walking. It was terrifying but she insisted that she was okay and denial is a powerful coping mechanism, so i believed her because i needed it to be true. Things continued on this way for about a month and things were looking worse every single day until the beginning of September. By this time, my mum was a skeleton of the woman she once was and drifted through the days in a delirious haze. We decided enough was enough and called 999 despite my mums nonsensical objections. She was rushed to hospital in an ambulance where she was immediately put on a drip and given loads of scans and tests. Turns out her entire digestion system was infected and she had been getting next to no nutrition for weeks. With the proper medication, a week in hospital and the help of a dietician, things were looking up and she was more herself than id seen in months. 

Now i have to give a little backstory for this next part to make any sense, my mum was constantly getting enlarged lymph nodes on her neck. The biggest she'd had was over a year ago and she'd had it checked out by a doctor and he said it was nothing to worry about and eventually it went down and all was forgotten. So when it came back bigger than ever, we didn't really think much of it. 

The doctors who were treating her infection on the ward however didn't feel quite the same way. They wanted to test it and so she was booked in for a biopsy and the day before my return to college for my second year of A levels, she was diagnosed with Stage 4 Hodgkins Lymphoma. I held it together while the doctor broke the news and, as cliche as it sounds, you could've heard a pin drop. My mums first question was "Am i going to die?", the question on all of our minds out in the open. "No of course not" was the reply from the doctor but it did little to comfort us because isn't that what they all say. He spoke about scans and treatment and answered any questions we had but I'd zoned out long before that. I managed to keep it together until i stepped outside for some fresh air and a minute to myself and i broke down right there at the entrance of the hospital surrounded by everyone else going about their daily lives like my world hadn't just fallen apart. I'd never felt so broken in my entire life and in all of my 17 years on earth, this day had by far been the worst. But despite that, i woke up the next day and went to college because i couldn't sit on my hands all day and do nothing and college was closer than home anyway. So i went but all day was spent in a trance, staring at my phone waiting for a message from my dad about how mum was doing and any updates from the doctors. 

Doctors were insistent on scans being done quickly and chemo starting imminently because, as we later found out, she had a life expectancy of about 6 months if no action was taken. I went with her to all of her chemotherapy sessions, organised her meds, read up on chemotherapy effects and remedies, organised her calendar and wrote down all of her upcoming sessions and organised transport with the hospital. My dad would've done it but he had to work to pay the bills, my brother was only 9 and my mum was in no state to do it all herself so i had a decision to make. With all of that on my plate, i couldn't also do college full time with all of the homework, the 3 hour round trip and revision that that entails so i learned from home. A sacrifice I'd have made any day for my mum and something I'd do again. 

Everyone knows somebody with cancer and I'm no exception.