June as a dichotomy

The date of Brandon's disincarnation has come and gone for a second year. The date is one thing but I am more moved by the day of the week. This year the date was a Monday, but the day of the week forever remains Saturday. Then there are the days in between disincarnation and the funeral Mass celebrating Brandon's life followed by his cremation. (And who came up with the tacky term "cremains"?)

I expected a less-than-pleasant first week of June, but the intensity of feeling was unexpected. In many ways it hit harder this year than last. The sadness of missing someone so essential, so much a part of who I am is indescribable. (Being an intrinsic aspect of one's "becoming" changes a woman forever, and the child becomes part of the mother in a literal and figurative way.) The sadness of missing him came in waves of what felt like punches to the gut. It came with heart palpitations and a heaviness in my chest. The word "heartache" is so very apt.

Once past the days of the week and the dates on a calendar, I returned to my cute little vacation home in the land of Denial for a needed hiatus. Not sure how long I'll stay, but at least I can begin to appreciate the beauties that are June. 

That Brandon's disincarnation occurred in June creates a dichotomy. June has always been my favorite month with its magic, but now it is also my worst. How can such profound sadness possibly co-exist with the flowers, fragrances and fireflies of the month? (And some years June has also been the month when I've been privileged to watch the fairies dance.) However, I feel both the sadness and the joy that is June. 

Somehow I can't quite believe this is coincidence.

Reflections on "Done"

Tonight marks 52 x 2 = 104 weeks since Brandon whispered, "Done." I asked if he understood what the oncology resident was telling him and offered a quick explanation of what she had said. Brandon's eyes locked with mine and he again whispered, but more decisively this time, "Done." 

The sound of his "done" haunts me. I hear each "done" over and over and over -- the first resonating with the struggle to get one word out when it was taking everything he had to simply inhale and exhale; the second resonating with the strength of his decision. For a long time I interpreted that second "done" as meaning he knew his body could take no more. His cancer had gone too far. He knew, and his second "done" meant he accepted. 

In the first year after Brandon's death, the sound of that second "done" so rang in my ear that I didn't realize I was missing a crucial element. It suddenly struck me at some point in this second year that his expressive eyes, the window of his soul, were trying to tell me his second "done" meant much more. Yes, I think he knew and accepted, but I believe his eyes were telling me he had accomplished what he was supposed to accomplish during his too short life. He had "done" what he'd come to do.

Oh, something my soul recognized during our eye contact and the second "done" -- a "reverse birthing" process had begun. And the labor contractions triggered by his whispered "done" were thousands of times more painful than those preceding his physical birth. 

No, I’m Not Angry With God or Cancer

Once in awhile someone tells me I must be angry. Angry with God. Angry with the universe. Angry with whatever caused Brandon’s cancer. Sometimes someone says surely I ask, "Why?" 

I’m not and haven’t been angry – not with God, the universe or whatever caused some of Brandon’s cells to go whacko. And I don’t ask, “Why?” Why my baby, our Brandon? Why our family? Why now instead of many years from now? Why not someone who isn’t a good person – why not someone who hurts others? Why not me instead of him? But my work is in health care. I know “shit happens” and shit is nondiscriminatory. So perhaps the question should be, “Why not?”

A few weeks ago I finished the book The Fault in Our Stars (TFIOS) by John Green.  I hesitated reading it, as I knew it was about young adults with cancer. I wasn’t sure if I could handle it, especially when others told me how they’d sobbed through several chapters. Still, like a moth to flame, I was drawn to it. Since the movie is soon to debut, I figured it was safer for this moth(er) to check out the book in the privacy of her home rather than the film version in a public movie theater.

Although I confess to a few moments of teariness, I did not cry as I’ve come to know “cry.” No tears rolled down my cheeks. I did not sob. I did not hear the guttural sounds I’d never known I was capable of uttering until moments after Brandon’s soul and body separated, but which I’ve heard many times since. I’ve cried my river in the last 1 year + 51.9 weeks. At times I feel as if I’m crying a new river. I guess much of TFIOS seemed to be no more than “been there, done that.”

Still, I found myself highlighting several passages. Those passages spoke to me. I include a few here.

“What am I at war with? My cancer. And what is my cancer? My cancer is me. The tumors are made of me. They’re made of me as surely as my brain and my heart are made of me. It is a civil war… with a predetermined winner.“                                                            Augustus Waters                                                            

Brandon didn’t lose “his” battle with cancer, because if he battled his cancer, he’d have been battling himself. Some tiny thing that was part him forgot to act properly and it became a big thing. He did his best to put a stop to it, but puny humans cannot always put a halt to this part of themselves even with today’s treatments.

And that brings me to another statement of TFIOS “hero” Augustus Waters:  

“Even cancer isn’t a bad guy really: Cancer just wants to be alive.”

Augustus may have referred to dealing with cancer as a civil war, but when the cancer, the part of the body that’s gone haywire, overwhelms its own body, the cancer dies too. In wanting to be alive, cancer sets up its own demise. I feel sure Brandon would have been willing to “share.” Hell, he’d have been willing to serve as the poster boy for cancer if it meant he (and his cancer part) could have stayed here in this world with his wife, daughter, family and friends for a long time.

“The pleasure of remembering was taken from me, because there was no longer anyone to remember with. It felt like losing your co-rememberer meant losing the memory itself, as if the things we’d done were less real and important than they had been hours before.”    

                                                              Hazel Grace Lancaster   

Relationships come in all shapes and sizes: couples, parent and child, siblings, friends. For every relationship one is part of, there are shared moments that are special. Such moments are brought up, discussed, laughed at, enjoyed and savored over and over as time passes. TFIOS narrator Hazel nails the feeling when one’s co-remember is no longer present and will not be present to co-remember ever again.

Creation of a co-remembrance

This weekend marks 2 years – 104 weeks since Brandon and his cancer died.

“It seemed like forever ago, like we’d had this brief but infinite forever. Some infinities are bigger than other infinities.”                                                                                     Hazel Grace

I used to wonder

I used to wonder how actors could cry on cue. 
I no longer wonder. 
I can do it too.

All I must do
Is drop the mask of denial.
Step out of the numb.
Feel the real.
Acknowledge what's true. 

That there will be no more of his hugs. 
No more of his jokes.  
No more Mother's Day tuna tartare.
No more dancing the worm or busting his chin
Or explaining what happened with his unique quirky grin. 

I used to wonder how anyone could cry on cue.
I no longer wonder.
I do it too.

Mother's Day - Year 2

I thought Mother’s Day would be easier this year. Not. I must’ve been enjoying time in Denial but found myself on a quick trip back to Reality by Friday. It came in fits and starts on Saturday, especially during the afternoon and later evening. I cried me a new river.

Mother’s Day itself felt rather anti-climactic. There were certainly many happy moments with my four living children this weekend. Carolyn, due to have her first baby this week, and her husband Kris hosted a wonderful Mother’s Day brunch. I had a chance to be with all in-town children and children-in-law and grandchildren. FaceTime allowed me to catch up with both of my out-of-town sons and their families. Carolyn and I visited my mother, who celebrates her 85^th birthday next Saturday. I am blessed. Still.

Before heading home, Carolyn and I stopped by the cemetery. Both of us shared that it was not a place where we feel Brandon’s presence, yet I wanted to stop. No tears. More a feeling of numbness. Numbness can be good when memories of Mother’s Days past include years of special dinners prepared by a son who on Mother’s Day, a few weeks before he died, told me, “Mom, you know Mother’s Day is my ‘thing’!”

I found this yesterday afternoon, and it pretty much sums it up…

The Cord

We are connected,

My child and I, by

An invisible cord

Not seen by the eye.

It’s not like the cord

That connects us ‘til birth.

This cord can’t be seen

By any on earth.

This cord does its work

Right from the start.

It binds us together,

Attached to my heart.

I know that it’s there,

Though no one can see

The invisible cord

From my child to me.

The strength of this cord

Is hard to describe.

It can’t be destroyed.

It can’t be denied.

It’s stronger than any cord

Man could create.

It withstands the test,

Can hold any weight.

And though you are gone,

Though you’re not here with me,

The cord is still there

But no one can see.

It pulls at my heart.

I am bruised… I am sore,

But this cord is my lifeline,

As never before.

I am thankful that God

Connects us this way.

A mother and child

Death can’t take it away!

                                Author Unknown 

Happy Easter

It’s Holy Week for Christians, and it began with Palm Sunday and the reading about Jesus’s arrival in Jerusalem to the waving of palm branches and shouts of “Hosanna!” Did Jesus, did his family members and friends think that triumphal entry was a sign that all was well and Jesus had “dodged a bullet,” as our family believed Brandon had “dodged a (cancer) bullet”? Considering the New Testament scriptures describing Jesus last (Passover) meal with his friends, Jesus seems to have become aware that all was not well, although most of his disciples apparently remained blissfully unaware. Were they so oblivious, or like me, did they take brief vacations to the land of denial because the alternative was unimaginable?

As the clock ticks, counting down the minutes, hours, days, this Holy Week moves beyond the initial triumph and beyond the camaraderie and concerns felt during a special meal with dear friends. It shifts to a favorite quiet place, the Garden of Gethsemane, and to very human Jesus struggling with what he knows is coming, even as he prays, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not what I want, but what you want” (Matthew 26:39). Yet despite his continued struggle, he prays again. The prayer is similar but not exactly the same. This time his words bear a sense of acceptance. “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done”  (Matthew 26: 42).

The quiet struggle in the peaceful environs of the Garden of Gethsemane seems years away from the escalating suffering Jesus endures on Good Friday, yet only a few hours later Jesus utters, “It is finished” (John 19:30) and “gave up his spirit.” What did Jesus mean when he said, “It is finished”? Was it simply the last words of someone who knew he was about to die? I don’t think so.

Piet by Franz von Stuck (1891)

I watched Brandon’s mostly silent struggle as he – and we – realized the cancer was overtaking more and more of his body. I watched as there seemed to be a shift from “let this cup pass from me” to “if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.” And I was looking into his eyes the first time he whispered, “Done,” and I was still looking into them the second time he whispered, “Done,” after I’d explained what that meant. Although I do think Brandon’s “Done” meant he understood he was soon to die, I now believe it meant much, much more.

With Jesus’s utterance of, “It is finished,” I believe Jesus was saying that he’d completed the work he had come to this life to accomplish. It struck me several months ago when reflecting on the look in Brandon’s eyes that his “Done” was telling me the same thing. Whatever it was/is that he was here to accomplish, he had "done" it.

Today is Easter. Without the physical and emotional turmoil in the Garden of Gethsemane, without the physical and emotional pain and suffering of Calvary, could there be Easter? I don’t claim to understand the Resurrection; I’ve had my moments (years) of doubt. Still, I believe in the Resurrection, even as I think it is quite different than many imagine. There’s a reason Jesus’s close friends didn’t initially recognize him when he appeared to them after his resurrection from death. What that reason is remains part of the mystery.

The artist didn't know he was capturing Brandon's welcome to another life!

Brandon lived his own Garden of Gethsemane. He lived his own Calvary. And I believe he lives his own resurrection with our God and “appears” to us from time to time in ways which are not always recognizable. And that is part of the mystery.

AC - We Thought He'd(we'd) Dodged the Cancer Bullet – Part 3

Where was I? Oh, yes, between the March 5, 2010, “Mom, the doctor called this morning; I have cancer,” and Brandon’s March 29, 2010 surgery, members of a “tumor board” met to discuss how to act on Brandon’s pathology report and we went with him to a “meet the head and neck surgeon” appointment. (I got the impression not many parents accompanied a 36 year old to such appointments!) The surgeon reviewed his plan for the surgical procedure.

Although he didn’t give the procedure a name, he went over possible outcomes based on what he might find once the surgery began. It was possible that very little tissue would have to be removed but he wouldn’t hesitate to do what was necessary to remove any disease from Brandon’s right maxillary sinus. He explained that he might have to remove some of the bone in that sinus, including bone of the hard palate, which would create a cleft palate.

March of 2010 went by in fog of hope and fear. Many prayers were said. Many tears were shed. 

The day of March 29, 2010 Joe and I joined Christina and her parents at the hospital as Brandon was admitted to the pre-op area. When the transport team came to wheel Brandon to surgery, we all gave him a kiss and then headed to the waiting room for several nerve-wracked hours. We had no idea what the surgeon would find or how extensive the procedure would be. At some point one of the OR nurses said the doctor had asked her to call and tell us things were going well – whatever that means.

Finally, the surgeon called us into a consult room. Brandon was in the recovery area and doing well he said. He’d stripped the entire right maxillary sinus of its mucous membrane. No cancer was detected in any area other than one small bone facing the nose. (One of the turbinates, I think.) He’d removed that bone and sent it with the other tissue to Pathology. Brandon would be followed closely with check-ups every three months for several years, but everything looked good. (I got the impression the surgeon was taken by surprise when I threw my arms around him.)

March 29, 2010 - Post-maxillectomy

March 30, 2010 - the day after

We took Brandon home to recover and after a few days he headed back to his own place. I’d found out the name of his procedure was a “maxillectomy,” and it often involves the removal of much of the hard palate or of bone underneath the eye, which means the eye must also be removed. (I was glad I hadn’t known the name of the procedure before the surgery, which really isn’t like me! I usually want to know every detail in advance!) Of all the bones that may have been affected, Brandon lost one that seemed the least consequential. Yes, it would cause discomfort and its removal involved some long-term unpleasant side effects, but compared to what might have been….

And our family breathed a collective sigh of relief and felt thankful thinking Brandon/all of us had dodged a lethal cancer bullet.