cancer, and other scary things
20 November 2005 @ 01:54
I need to write this. It's been bouncing around in my head for days.
In June, Andr� said he was going to see a doctor. In July, the doctors said that there was a possibility that he had a rare form of cancer called Ewing's sarcoma in his jaw. Level two. I was away from home for four weeks, without a phone, without a constant internet connection, and stuck with a rather erratic schedule that only touring and Army life will provide.
Every day on the road we would pass a hospital with a cancer center. Every day my buddies, my squadmates, my squadleader asked if I heard anything new. How he was doing.
Somehow I reached the crazy conclusion that I would get whatever paperwork I needed to get together, call a recruiter and my Senators, and marry Andr� during my trip the following month. Just to get him here for treatment. I would go fulltime Army when I came back. There would be the possibility that I would be in training for up to a year, or more. While he would be in treatment.
He wouldn't hear anything of it. He said that he would rather suffer (and possibly die) there in Brazil than marry me only to get access to treatment.
Still, I was completely and totally prepared to make this huge trip to see my boyfriend, who, for all I knew, was going to be starting down this path of disease and treatment and depression. And I couldn't even be there for any of it. Not to mention the nagging thought in the back of my head that it would be the very last time I saw him alive and well. I remember feeling frantically crazy about learning Portuguese.
I can't exactly remember when the doctors told him that it wasn't cancer. Sometime after I pulled duty, sometime before I got on the plane.
Do you know what that period of time is like after you find out that someone very near and dear to your heart isn't on the brink of death? It's like the entire world is perfect, just for a second. And then all that crap that you weren't dealing with comes crashing down around you.
His was obvious. The pain before, during, and after my visit -- the pain that made everyone think it was cancer, the pain that he is just now seeking treatment for. He was hit hard with depression shortly after I left, really deep depression. His aunt shook him out of it.
Me? Not so obvious. Shir and I talked about it a little when she was here. Basically, I felt like I had distanced myself from him -- an effort of self-preservation, maybe? Still not sure. Spent many a night reconnecting, sorting through our differences, and trying to regain some sort of normalacy.
But, there is no normalacy after something like that. Every little pain he mentions is going to have me wondering about his health. There will always be that little sliver of doubt in the back of my mind as to whether or not I'm a good person for the feelings I had while he was sick, and while he is dealing with his current series of treatment. Not to mention other happenings, both good and bad.
I guess this is part of being a grownup?
--Annie