Hi Jule,
Thank-you so much for your replies. Just writing to you last night helped get the feelings out of my head and I got off to sleep for a few hours. How hard does it feel to get yourself up for work when you have a bad night? But then once I get into a class room and get teaching it really sort of puts me right again.
I do have some good friends and a supportive boss and my 22yr old daughter has been pretty amazing as well. Having her close has helped us both in the past few months. But in the last few days, since we heard they had found a tumour on Mum's spine, I have felt so scared and sad that I realise I have been keeping things at bay a bit and not thinking or talking openly about how big and terrible it is with anyone except my daughter, and even we don't talk about it all the time.
We have road tripped to see Mum twice since the diagnosis and that has been really good, though the particular kind of hardness of being at a distance is replaced with reality of the constant anxiety about how she might be feeling all day every day. I respect and feel so grateful to my sister who has moved back home to care for Mum and our step dad who is ten years older.
When we come home I do feel a bit in the dark sometimes though Mum and my sister really try to keep us in the loop as much as possible.
And then, after a bad night, fearing bad news today, it was good news! Doctors say that all the tumours, including the one on her spine, have shrunk a lot and her marker levels have dropped right down. I don't really understand what it all means in technical terms but everyone is much happier tonight. They are keeping on with the chemo which has its own scary issues (she has developed numb feet and hands so far) but at least it is doing the job on the cancer right now.
When she first got the news in March/April that she had multiple tumours including in lymph nodes we were all feeling so bad and finding it hard to maintain optimism or to know what we could reasonably hope for. That fact that she was already having pain was so confronting.
One thing she was determined to do was to go on a planned family cruise (first one ever for us) in New Zealand in December, and her doctors had remained fairly reassuring that she would be able to come. Today she got that hope back after being feeling pretty shaken last week. I am so thankful for that. I just so want her to have that to look forward to and enjoy, whatever next year might bring.
I turn 50 in December, and the trip started out as my big birthday plan, but has become so much more now.
It was wonderful that your Mum got to go with your sister to see her wedding dress.
My heart goes out to you Jule, that big, big distance is so tough, along with all the other really tough things. Do you have the good supports around you? But I agree, writing here is in itself amazingly helpful. I am glad you have found comfort in it.
I hope you have a good sleep and a good day tomorrow. Thanks again, so much, for your kindness.
Take care,
Gabe