In two days, I will mark an anniversary. Not the anniversary of a death, a birth, a marriage, but of the day when it was official that my mom was dying. October 4th, 2010, we received the news from her latest CT scan that the last four rounds of chemotherapy had failed to do anything against the cancer. They gave us 2-3 months. In the end, it was less than a month's time. Last year, on October 4th, I lost hope. Being the realist I am, and the logical thinker, there had not been an abundance of hope before then, but when you love someone, you cling onto the possibility in your heart, despite what your head says. For the next month onwards, we lived in 'Crisis Mode' 24/7, spending LONG hours at the hospital, eating meals cooked by either the hospital cafeteria or by one of the greatest blessings in life, good friends and fellow church members-that is, if we ate at all, I certainly did my fair share of meal-skipping in there. I did what I called 'hospital hopping', going to the hospital early in the morning, sometimes before 8am and staying until I had to leave a couple of hours later to bus to my classes, then coming back to the hospital the minute they were finished. This would be a challenge for any student, but the fact is that my mom was in the hospital close to our house, which, on the bus, is a good hour's ride, if not more. Thanksgiving came and went without our noticing. Like this year, we had very nice weather the first week or two of October-up above 20 degrees celsius. Outside, the world was smiling, but inside, we were crying. We survived, although I don't know exactly how. I can't even count how many things I managed to knit during that time, but it was certainly a lot. In particular, I remember four specific projects that I worked on, the first was a blanket for the baby my friend had in January (the one the blue sweater was for). I remember four prayer shawls that I worked on during this time-one was the one my mom never managed to finish, plus three others. And I remember working on a blue dress for my friend's little girl (she received the pink sweater). That project never got finished. It will, someday, it is sitting in my knitting basket and will someday be enjoyed by a little girl of about two (or older...if it is my own daughter, she will probably be small like me). October 5th only emphasized the feeling of hopelessness as my grandma died that day, and none of us were able to go out (she lived across the country on the west coast).
October taught me a number of things...how much I really care about my family, despite the problems that may exist, and how much they care-and cared-about me. How many people around the Faculty of Music were there for me. That the members of my church are very good cooks (I needed some bit of humour in here). The hospital gets easier to understand when you go up to the 6th floor probably more than 100 times (my uncle joked that the hospital must have been designed by a man who used to create corn mazes). That sleep is a wonderful thing, and staying up late-2:30 or later sometimes-doesn't make me feel great (still haven't always learned that one, although it's rare to be up past 1:00 even on a weekend now). Death takes both longer and shorter than we can ever imagine. I am stronger than I thought or think I am, but it is not a sign of weakness to cry on a bus home, or feel comforted in some small way by sleeping with my baby afghan. October brings back numerous unpleasant memories as does November, and it seems very hard to believe that we are now at the 11 month mark since my mom died. Life goes on, sometimes fast, sometimes slow, but always moving, and will never stop. But we should, sometimes, even in the midst of Crisis Mode, to think, to reflect, and to be grateful. Yes, I wish cancer had never happened, and I would love to have my mom back, but that won't happen. Cancer touched my family-or more to the point, pounded us with ten pound weights for more than a year (I'm counting in the healing process during the 'raw months')-and that won't ever change, but I hope it's made me a better person. I long for the day when they announce a sure-fire cure for cancer, and I pray that it comes soon. No family should have to walk a cancer journey.
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