The night we came home from the surgery my hubby and I slept on the couch and set an alarm to wake up every 3 hours to keep on top of the pain medication. It was similar to having a newborn and waking up to feed your baby. You just do what needs to be done and you don't really notice the lack of sleep...or at least I didn't. After my husband was asleep, I was restless. My mind was still in overdrive. Suddenly it impacted me and I said the words to myself as tears slipped down my cheeks, "My husband has cancer." Sadness enveloped me and I distracted myself with a book. The next morning I was thrilled to have our children returned home. I had missed them so much! They were happy to be home and told us about the fun they had the night before. It was a very lazy day. The children watched a lot of television while sitting close to daddy...he was thankful to have made it through the surgery and glad to be with his little ones. I spent the day caring for them all and working around the house trying to make things easier on them.
The second day after surgery I went back to work and the kids went back to school. My husband was well enough to care for his basic needs and had everything he needed at his fingertips. I didn't realize it, but I was under stress that entire day. I felt bad for leaving him and not caring for his needs one more day, and I wasn't sure how he was emotionally. After having so much prayer support and depending so fully on God, I didn't keep it up. I didn't spend much time reading my bible and I didn't spend a lot of time praying at all. I was busy caring for everything around me as usual, but I didn't care for myself. It was as if I had a lazy attitude thinking that the prayer support and the time I spent with God should have carried me through the rest of this journey too. Isn't it amazing how we neglect our relationship with our Lord and Savior so quickly? I just didn't want to take the time to slow down my own activities and focus on what really mattered.
Thursday came and the doctor had asked my husband to email and ask about the pathology reports. He emailed and we didn't get any news. I was at work again, but fortunately, my boss allowed me to work at home. It was calming to be at home where I knew I could help my husband if he needed me. No answers came that day.
Friday I returned to a full day of work. It wasn't very productive. All I could think about were the answers I was hoping for and stressing over what it might do to the rest of my life. I was physically shaky and I left work for the day with the most painful headache I'd had in a long time. The doctor called my husband and said the reports weren't in yet...news would have to wait. On Monday, the doctor was in surgery so we couldn't get any answers that day either. Finally on Tuesday we got the long awaited news. It was cancer and it was an aggressive cancer, a CT scan was scheduled next to see if the cancer had spread at all. The news about the aggressive cancer came as a bit of a shock, although I knew it was possible. The CT scan was a routine thing and I wasn't worried about it.
I had researched this type of cancer and I knew what we were up against, or I thought I did...I continued to neglect my prayer time and scripture reading.
No comments:
Post a Comment