Its been awhile.
A ton of things have happened since I last posted. For one, my father passed away. He died in a such a horrible way, something I would not wish on my worst enemy.
Late spring we found out that Dad had Multiple Myeloma, a cancer of the blood & marrow. We were hopeful because there seemed a good chance he could pull through and go into remission. So he started chemo. After some time passed he got a bone marrow test to see if the chemo was having any effect. I don't know if any of you have had, or know someone who had, a bone marrow draw but it is extremely painful. My poor father went through many of these to see how his cancer was progressing, and like most guys didn't complain, but I could tell by the way he looked and sat that it really bothered him. When he got his test back he found that the cancer had spread to 80% of his body. That was bad.
So he started a new round of chemo, but this time it was with a new drug, one with really promising results.
Only Dad got worse.
Sometime around mid October things went downhill quickly. He started bleeding internally from all the anti-clotting drugs he was taking for a previous blood clot in his lung. My 16 year old brother had to call 911 to get him to a hospital. The end result made Dad unable to walk from that point on. He managed to get around for awhile on his rolling desk chair, scooting with his feet or being pushed.
The 4th or so bone marrow test in early November confirmed that not only did he have Leukemia as well as Multiple Myeloma but he had about 2-4 weeks to live. By this time he was completely bed bound, a hospital bed was placed in his living room. I immediately took time off from work to be with him, as did my sister Emily. My little brother Duncan still went to High School everyday, even when he knew that he could have stayed home as well. The twins Annie and Hillary did the same with college. I think that they just wanted some normalcy in their lives and it freaked them out that dad was going to die.
People told me and Em that we were wonderful for helping our Dad out in his time of need, but I can't even imagine not doing it. He was completely reliant on us for feeding him, helping him go the bathroom, massaging him, rolling him, washing him, getting him drinks, and other odd jobs. Including the time I drove an hour away to get clementines, because he was craving them. I couldn't find any peaches though, they weren't in season yet. God, you have no idea how upset I was that I couldn't find peaches for him.
He was in immense pain. More pain than I can ever imagine. They had him on so many pain meds, Oxycontin, Diluden, and so many others. He didn't like taking them because they made him groggy and sometimes hallucinate. But near the end it was so bad, he stopped fighting it and just took him.
He was to start hospice on a Friday, because his last appointment was on a Thursday, and Hospice will not kick in until you stop all treatment. He wanted to be 'topped off' with a blood transfusion and some platelets on his last appointment, which always made him feel better. So this last appointment was very important to him, it meant possibly more time with his family.
That Thursday morning, I drove over to his house with my son to drive him to his appointment. My sister Emily informed me he had a rough night, and was breathing badly. He sounded awful. His friend Carl was also their to help us get him into the car. Carl was a big, strong guy, and I don't know what we would have done without him. Their was no way me, my sister em or my step mom Kathleen could lift him. He was pretty much dead weight at this point.
Carl got him into my car and me, Dad and Kathleen drove to the clinic, while Em stayed with my son and relaxed a little. She had slept on the couch every night next to Dad those two weeks, helping with every little detail. So when I came over, she was relieved for a bit of the 24 hour care that my Dad needed.
When we wheeled Dad into the clinic, the other chemo patients looked a bit frightened of Dad. I look back now and can see what they must of saw: A man struggling to breathe, bare chested because it was too painful for my dads arms to be moved into a shirt, with no mobility whatsoever, in a drugged state, in the last stages of an obviously deadly cancer. It must have scared the bejesus out of them. This could be their future.
The nurses immediately took notice of Dad. They hovered around dad, trying to make him comfortable, as one of them rushed out of the room to get the doctor.
When the doctor showed up, he told my dad that he couldn't get the transfusions, he was too sick. My Dad, as out of it as he was, looked visibly dejected. Then, for reasons unknown to me to this day, the Doctor bent down and looked into my dads eyes and told him that this was probably the day he was going to die. I look back at this, and ask myself why did he have to say that? That was cruel thing to say to my father. At that moment I saw my father loose all hope.
The doctor then turned to me, Kathleen and poor Carl that he needed to go to a Hospital asap. I asked if we could take him back home so he could die there, where he wanted. The Doctor advised us against it, saying he could die on the way home. An ambulance was called.
I rushed over to the High School to get my brother.
