I want to rewind a little bit. First off, for some reason, ever since I was a little girl, I feared my mom dying too soon. It is something I thought about often, prayed often that it wouldn't happen, cried about, and told my mom she had better never die too young because I couldn't handle it. I was my mom's only daughter, and she and I were very close. My parents got a divorce when I was 8 and I spent the majority of the time with her. I would see my dad for 6 weeks out of the summer and every other holiday, but we didn't live close to each other. My mom was my rock. She was my person. She was the one person on this entire planet that I felt like I could rely on. She loved me uncondtionally. We got along great beside your typical teenage fights every now and again, but we hated being mad at each other. After high school, we didn't have anything to fight about anymore and so we were just best friends. I moved away after high school. I moved to Idaho, then to utah where I met my husband and settled down. She and my stepdad moved to Utah a couple months before I got married. It's so crazy, now knowing what I know. They were supposed to move to Utah so her family, her mom, siblings, my brother, and his wife and kids, me and my kids could spend the last years of her life with her. She wouldn't have wanted it any other way besides my twin brother being out here with his kid. Life would have been perfect for her. She was so extremely happy living here. We were all blissfully happy. I mean, my marriage struggled on and off, but whos didn't. I felt like my mom was there so she was the bandaid a lot of the times when I felt like things were really bad between Camden and I. This all comes into play later on, so I wanted to mention it now.
At the start of 2014 my mom started wheezing. We didn't think much about it because she had a cold. A month later I don't know if we thought much about it then because it was now February in Utah where the air is terrible and in the middle of winter, and it wasn't like she was wheezing terrible or all the time. She noticed it when she would climb the stairs or take deep breaths in. It wasn't affecting her daily life, and so we didn't worry that much. I believe it was maybe March or April and we are sitting on the couch in her living room and I could the wheezing. I remember really hearing it and saying out loud, "Mom, that is not normal. You have to get that figured out now.". She made an appointment with her doctor that week. When she went to the doctor's office they diagnosed her with acid reflex. They said the wheezing was not coming from her lungs but that it was, in fact, coming from around her windpipe and that acid reflex can cause that. Over the next several months they tried different medications to get it under control, and in the meantime, she developed a cough. The cough started about July. She thought she was just sick with a cold and didn't think anything about it. Coughs also seem to last forever. After I'm guessing a month in half of coughing she went back to the doctor. She was still wheezing too. So they thought maybe they misdiagnosed her and re-diagnosed her with asthma or COPD. They started her on medications that they said could take a good month to two months to kick in. She tried it and it wasn't helping. She went back in and they gave her a new medication to try. The time frame is probably now November beginning of December. In November she also had a couple of weird attacks around thanksgiving. She thought maybe it was her gallbladder but from what I remember never went in because the pains did not keep happening and they went away after a few hours. Also mid-November she noticed she had developed a sore spot on her collar bone. The sore spot over the next several weeks continued to get worse. So much worse than the coughing and wheezing got put on the back burner. The week before Christmas her whole neck started to get swollen and she could barely move or sit up without getting help. It was so crazy to just see her go downhill so fast. It was so scary. We had no idea what was going on. She made an appointment and the only one they had was December 23rd. She went in and they decided to do an x-ray. The next morning, which was Christmas Eve, they called and said she was being admitted to the hospital for a serious bone infection. That she would be put on IV antibiotics and that it could be a very long extensive stay at the hospital but for now they need her in there immediately and they need to find out where this infection was coming from. We were relieved in a way because we were finally getting some answers to what in the hell was going on. I met them there at the hospital. We were all very scared. I was terrified that they for some reason they were going to bring up the C-word. We asked the doctor do you think that this could be being caused by cancer. He said the x-ray didn't look like cancer and that nothing is pointing to cancer but that is scary and they need to run a lot of tests to see where this infection is coming from. I left my mom there. I couldn't do anything more and I had presents to wrap and things to do for Christmas. I told her I would be back. I got a phone call later in the day saying that it didn't look like it was an infection, and they were going to do some more tests and try and figure out what was going on. I loaded up my kids around 6:30 to head to the hospital so they could see her. I remember walking through the halls. I was walking so fast to get to her room. I wanted to know what was going on. If they had found out anything. My kids were running trying to keep up with me. I walked into her room and what I saw I instantly knew something was very wrong. My stepdad was laying his head in my mom's lap crying, the doctor was kneeling beside her bed, and she just sat there staring at me, with tears rolling down her cheeks. I just looked at all of them and said what? What is it? What is going on, and my mom just started shaking her head back and forth. I knew. I told them no. I kept saying no. Then the doctor came up to me and said, "It has been confirmed that your mom has cancer. She has cancer in her lungs, liver, lymph nodes, and bones." It is in the later stages and we know this because it has spread everywhere. We think it might have started in her lungs but will not know for sure until the biopsy is done. I'm so sorry,". I just started screaming. I was absolutely out of control. Even if I tried to control it I couldn't, even for my kids, I couldn't. They were screaming and crying because they didn't know what was wrong with me and I just couldn't stop. I have seen movies where someone finds out their loved one has died or something, and they are howling, screaming, crying so loud. I never understood it until that moment. It was one of the worst moments of my life. I went and sat in the stairwell. I sat there for a long time. I would have moments where I would start panicking like I was going to have a panic attack. I was hyperventilating and then all of a sudden just calm. I'd just sit there in a daze and then in the next moments I was just screaming again. I had so many things running through my head. So many unknowns. Was my mom really dying? Was this our last Christmas? Am I going to have to watch my mom die? Is there any hope? Can we fight this? Can she live? Can she survive this? I wanted all these questions answered and I wanted them answered now. I went and found the doctor. I needed him to be brutally honest with me. We went to the waiting area. It was like a scene out of a movie. I was there but I wasn't. I was watching from a different place. I was watching someone else's life. Not mine. The waiting room was empty. It was just him and me. I said, "Give it to me straight. How bad is this?". He begins to tell me if my mom decides to do chemo, wait for what? Decides to do chemo? Why would she not do chemo? Well, because it won't cure her. It will give her some time, but not long, and it will most likely be a very rough, hard chemo that will make her very sick. Her cancer has spread to other organs and when it does that there is no coming back. I couldn't even believe this is what I was hearing. It was so awful. So so so awful. There was nothing left to do at this point. They were discharging her with lots of pain medication and a referral to an oncologist. We all just went home. I remember getting home and having to do the whole Santa Clouse thing. I remember putting all the presents under the tree sobbing. Thinking about how my mom will never see my kids' open presents again. That this is our last Christmas together. To try and wrap that around your brain is just the most painful thing ever. I remember crawling into bed that night. Sick. I was physically hurting in a way I didn't know was possible. I didn't sleep. My husband just held me all night. We talked all night, cried and sobbed off and on all night until we saw the sun start to come up and our kids calling out our names because they were up and wanted to come downstairs. I just sobbed the whole time opening presents. I was a complete mess. My life had just forever changed and there was no going back. I didn't totally understand the saying, ignorance is bliss. I understood it that morning because all I wanted to do was go back to not knowing what I knew at that moment, and that was that my mom was going to die.
At the start of 2014 my mom started wheezing. We didn't think much about it because she had a cold. A month later I don't know if we thought much about it then because it was now February in Utah where the air is terrible and in the middle of winter, and it wasn't like she was wheezing terrible or all the time. She noticed it when she would climb the stairs or take deep breaths in. It wasn't affecting her daily life, and so we didn't worry that much. I believe it was maybe March or April and we are sitting on the couch in her living room and I could the wheezing. I remember really hearing it and saying out loud, "Mom, that is not normal. You have to get that figured out now.". She made an appointment with her doctor that week. When she went to the doctor's office they diagnosed her with acid reflex. They said the wheezing was not coming from her lungs but that it was, in fact, coming from around her windpipe and that acid reflex can cause that. Over the next several months they tried different medications to get it under control, and in the meantime, she developed a cough. The cough started about July. She thought she was just sick with a cold and didn't think anything about it. Coughs also seem to last forever. After I'm guessing a month in half of coughing she went back to the doctor. She was still wheezing too. So they thought maybe they misdiagnosed her and re-diagnosed her with asthma or COPD. They started her on medications that they said could take a good month to two months to kick in. She tried it and it wasn't helping. She went back in and they gave her a new medication to try. The time frame is probably now November beginning of December. In November she also had a couple of weird attacks around thanksgiving. She thought maybe it was her gallbladder but from what I remember never went in because the pains did not keep happening and they went away after a few hours. Also mid-November she noticed she had developed a sore spot on her collar bone. The sore spot over the next several weeks continued to get worse. So much worse than the coughing and wheezing got put on the back burner. The week before Christmas her whole neck started to get swollen and she could barely move or sit up without getting help. It was so crazy to just see her go downhill so fast. It was so scary. We had no idea what was going on. She made an appointment and the only one they had was December 23rd. She went in and they decided to do an x-ray. The next morning, which was Christmas Eve, they called and said she was being admitted to the hospital for a serious bone infection. That she would be put on IV antibiotics and that it could be a very long extensive stay at the hospital but for now they need her in there immediately and they need to find out where this infection was coming from. We were relieved in a way because we were finally getting some answers to what in the hell was going on. I met them there at the hospital. We were all very scared. I was terrified that they for some reason they were going to bring up the C-word. We asked the doctor do you think that this could be being caused by cancer. He said the x-ray didn't look like cancer and that nothing is pointing to cancer but that is scary and they need to run a lot of tests to see where this infection is coming from. I left my mom there. I couldn't do anything more and I had presents to wrap and things to do for Christmas. I told her I would be back. I got a phone call later in the day saying that it didn't look like it was an infection, and they were going to do some more tests and try and figure out what was going on. I loaded up my kids around 6:30 to head to the hospital so they could see her. I remember walking through the halls. I was walking so fast to get to her room. I wanted to know what was going on. If they had found out anything. My kids were running trying to keep up with me. I walked into her room and what I saw I instantly knew something was very wrong. My stepdad was laying his head in my mom's lap crying, the doctor was kneeling beside her bed, and she just sat there staring at me, with tears rolling down her cheeks. I just looked at all of them and said what? What is it? What is going on, and my mom just started shaking her head back and forth. I knew. I told them no. I kept saying no. Then the doctor came up to me and said, "It has been confirmed that your mom has cancer. She has cancer in her lungs, liver, lymph nodes, and bones." It is in the later stages and we know this because it has spread everywhere. We think it might have started in her lungs but will not know for sure until the biopsy is done. I'm so sorry,". I just started screaming. I was absolutely out of control. Even if I tried to control it I couldn't, even for my kids, I couldn't. They were screaming and crying because they didn't know what was wrong with me and I just couldn't stop. I have seen movies where someone finds out their loved one has died or something, and they are howling, screaming, crying so loud. I never understood it until that moment. It was one of the worst moments of my life. I went and sat in the stairwell. I sat there for a long time. I would have moments where I would start panicking like I was going to have a panic attack. I was hyperventilating and then all of a sudden just calm. I'd just sit there in a daze and then in the next moments I was just screaming again. I had so many things running through my head. So many unknowns. Was my mom really dying? Was this our last Christmas? Am I going to have to watch my mom die? Is there any hope? Can we fight this? Can she live? Can she survive this? I wanted all these questions answered and I wanted them answered now. I went and found the doctor. I needed him to be brutally honest with me. We went to the waiting area. It was like a scene out of a movie. I was there but I wasn't. I was watching from a different place. I was watching someone else's life. Not mine. The waiting room was empty. It was just him and me. I said, "Give it to me straight. How bad is this?". He begins to tell me if my mom decides to do chemo, wait for what? Decides to do chemo? Why would she not do chemo? Well, because it won't cure her. It will give her some time, but not long, and it will most likely be a very rough, hard chemo that will make her very sick. Her cancer has spread to other organs and when it does that there is no coming back. I couldn't even believe this is what I was hearing. It was so awful. So so so awful. There was nothing left to do at this point. They were discharging her with lots of pain medication and a referral to an oncologist. We all just went home. I remember getting home and having to do the whole Santa Clouse thing. I remember putting all the presents under the tree sobbing. Thinking about how my mom will never see my kids' open presents again. That this is our last Christmas together. To try and wrap that around your brain is just the most painful thing ever. I remember crawling into bed that night. Sick. I was physically hurting in a way I didn't know was possible. I didn't sleep. My husband just held me all night. We talked all night, cried and sobbed off and on all night until we saw the sun start to come up and our kids calling out our names because they were up and wanted to come downstairs. I just sobbed the whole time opening presents. I was a complete mess. My life had just forever changed and there was no going back. I didn't totally understand the saying, ignorance is bliss. I understood it that morning because all I wanted to do was go back to not knowing what I knew at that moment, and that was that my mom was going to die.
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