Wednesday, August 28, 2019

Enter Leukemia

Early this year I attended a series of Memoir workshops at Write From the Heart in Lancaster.  A few classmates had already or were currently being treated for cancer at the Barshinger Cancer Center.  Little did I know how much time I would soon be spending there.

And little did I know how strong I'm not.  For purposes of this blog, I'll call my boyfriend "Hubby."  Since we've been together for 29 years, give or take a couple early on, the title fits.  And if he knew I was working on this blog, he'd kill me.  He's the one with leukemia and he hates the attention even if the intention comes from a loving, caring place.  To respect his wishes (sort of) I'm going to blog about MY side of the situation.

When you're with someone all the time, you can tell when they don't feel good or when something's wrong.  Such was the case for about a year with Hubby.  He was tired quite a bit and that was unusual for someone who goes - goes - goes.  He didn't look right.  His posture wasn't as strong, his movements seemed tired and took some effort.  Once upon a time in the last year, he was made aware of a "restriction" on a lung.  He kept that to himself.  Until he started getting out of breath doing work he'd done daily for longer than we'd been together.  And he tired out more and more easily.

About two months ago, he went to the family doctor which was HUGE.  He doesn't go to the doctor unless something is broken.  You could say it was.  He was anemic.  Now that made no sense because he eats more red meat and dark leafy greens than anyone I know.

The very next morning at about six o'clock, the doctor called him back.  "He's pretty sick," he told me.  He needed to go for blood work.  Hubby said, "I hope I don't have leukemia" after he talked to the doctor himself.

We went to see another specialist doctor.  Hubby did some research and found that she was listed as a hemoglobin doctor in one place on the internet, and a cancer doctor on another.  In her Slavic accent, she told us, "zere's zomezing cooking," but she didn't know what.  An infinity of blood draws and one bone marrow biopsy later, we found out.

I had two weeks to steel myself for the appointment and prepare for the worst possible news.  I did pretty good sitting there like a trooper, standing by my man to reassure him we would get through whatever it was.  And then the specialist came in followed by a nurse with a clipboard.  It reminded me of when the HR person at work walks in with a manager and they close the door.  It's never good news.  This wasn't either.

I hung tough as the specialist explained in great detail, with some show-and-tell on a laptop, about how the red blood cells weren't making it through his bloodstream like they should and how the white blood cell count was high.  I listened with academic focus to the terms and jargon until I crashed into a wall at "malignancy."  At that point I just fought back tears until I couldn't.  Chronic Lymphoma Leukemia.  I kept hearing him say, "I hope I don't have leukemia."  He was military calm taking in everything being explained to him.  Then he looked at me and my tears caused his tears.

"You're young.  You're healthy otherwise."  Chemotherapy once a month for six months should put you into remission for many years.  That's what I heard.

Chemo Day 1
One of the three medicines they would put into his body was stronger, more vicious is what they should have said, than the others.  They would  baby-step that drug and slow-drip it into him throughout a full day to see how he tolerated it, bumping the dosage up in intervals.

I'm sure I lost years of my life that day.  One of the reactions to the Rituxin was chills.  But not just goose bump give-me-a-blanket chills.  Involuntary body shake chills.  Like watching a horror movie of someone being electrocuted.  The nurses played it so cool.  They called over other nurses.  They paged the specialist.  They watched the computer monitor.  Hubby looked helplessly at his body that seemed to be a separate entity.  What the hell is my body doing?!  No control over it.

A half hour, maybe twenty minutes later, Benadryl, Demoral and steroids melded into the Perfect Storm and the shaking stopped.  This was Day 1 and this was the stuff that was supposed to fix him.