Collectively Wise

He promised he would never put them in a nursing home.

[Anonymous Personal Story]

I am originally from Long Island, New York but in 2002 I moved to Seattle, Washington. When I turned 36 I met a man and knew I had finally found the “ONE”. But first we shared something in 2006 that made our relationship stronger. I began caring his terminally Father.

I had the rewarding experience of taking care of him in his final months with his body so riddled with cancer the only option was to make him as comfortable as possible. I do regret however, that I never knew him before he got sick because the strength he showed even in his final days would put most healthy people to shame,but he never once complained, not even on his worst days.

Grown Son Cares for Mother with Late Stage Cancer

[Anonymous Guest Post]

When my mother was diagnosed with throat cancer, my family and I had much hope that current medical treatments and therapies could improve her condition and return her to a healthy quality of life. She was 82 when first diagnosed with throat cancer; and while some of the treatments seemed to make a temporary improvement, unfortunately they were unable to put the cancer in remission. I still live with her to try to help her out and share expenses, as the medical treatments are not cheap. She is retired and I am disabled, and we live off of social security checks with some minor assistance from family living out of state.

We both live in a 55 and up community in Boca Raton, Florida, and I am a 57 year old male.

Eight Days to Say Goodbye

[Anonymous Guest Post]

I am a 30 year old woman that’s lives in Florida. I have always lived close to my parents.

My father has been ill for about 5 years and all the doctors that he saw could not figure out what was making him so ill. He was unable to eat because it was painful; he had rapid weight loss and constant abdominal pain. My father had tests run, but I do not believe they ran the appropriate tests. The doctors gave up and told him it was all in his head.

In July of this year, my father was taken to the emergency room for painful abdominal masses; my father was diagnosed with stomach cancer. He emergency room doctor sent my father home with hospice care.

A Husband's Recovery Inspired by Lance Armstrong

[Anonymous Guest Post]

It is said that the idea of ‘living happily ever after’ post-marriage is an illusion. In 2003, I didn’t think of it that way as I was married to the man of my dreams and we were hopelessly in love with each other.

However, three months into my marriage, Murphy’s Law began to work as tragedy struck my family. What started off as my husband coughing blood and reporting pain while urinating, turned out to be testicular cancer when we went in for scans at the Boston hospital. The doctor gave my spouse 35 percent chance of survival and said that the tumour had spread to his lungs and brain.

Surgery was performed immediately to remove the malignant tumour. Through orchiectomy, his diseased testicle was also removed. Then came the hardest part: chemotherapy. The combination of drugs they hit my husband with during chemo was nauseating even to me when I looked at him. The chemicals left a toll on him after every session and he could hardly taste food properly.

I used to lie down next to [my father] and take care of him, as if he was my child.

Illness, in any form, often leaves a person in predicament . The condition of those who suffer from chronic diseases and cannot take care of themselves is so dissuading that the patient mostly prefers to refrain from normal activities and live in a state of isolation. In many such cases, the affected are left in the lurch, with their own family members either unable or unwilling to provide the much-needed care. For those who reach the terminal stage of their life owing to illness, there is nothing to replace love and care as they largely help to soothe their emotions and thus offer peace amid bewilderment.

The experience that I have had in taking care of my father for an extended period of over five years before he ultimately died in 1997 in the Southern Indian metropolis of Chennai (formerly `Madras’), when I was 28, is not only unforgettable but also something that I would like to share with the society, hoping that it educates care-takers of many other parents, struggling elsewhere in the world, to shower love and affection on them in times of such serious health crisis.

Soon after my father was diagnosed with acute renal failure on account of multiple stone formation and put on dialysis (after one of the kidneys that was severely punctured by the stones was removed), he looked physically very fragile and mentally more sick, demanding round-the-clock attention from the family to carry on his day-to-day activities. His bones were so brittle that a slight fall could have led to multiple fractures and he was also suffering from sudden loss of memory. Most of his problems , were due to his decades-old smoking habit, supported by occasional drinking, that surprisingly died down only after Doctors warned him of his nearing death.

Mom and I and Cancer live in Memphis, Tennessee

[Guest Post]

Mom and I and Cancer.  I live in Memphis, Tennessee with my brother.

My mother had breast cancer for more than three years. It started in the summer of 2006, she started getting some lumps in her breast and she wouldn't tell anyone. Instead she would keep it a secret and would start using herbal remedies that smelt awful, and then she started to seem very depressed and would ask me to pray for her. I didn't know what she wanted me to pray for, she only told me "just pray for me." It got to the point that I knew something was wrong and I confronted her.

September 2007 she went to a free clinic and was diagnosed with breast cancer. For one year she pulled off the "I can take care of it myself" attitude until she developed a second tumor inside the wall of her uterus and she couldn't walk well. I had to lay her down many times and cook for her although she really wanted to work around the house herself.

She still decided to do nothing about her condition and we my brother and I finally had enough. I urged her to go find a specialist, my brother even agreed to pay if insurance could not cover the whole cost. She found a good breast cancer specialist, and with insurance covered she was scheduled for surgery. The day of her surgery, we all waited patiently at school to see how she was doing.

Turns out she didn't go.

Mature Man Reflects on Caring for Father with Throat Cancer

[International Guest Post]

I live in Trivandrum, the southern tip of Indian peninsula. I am sixty years old male. I was working in the State Forest Department making me to stay a long period away from home where my father lived. He was a widower and house keeping was done by an elderly lady who was with us for a long period. He was then seventy years old and very healthy. He used to narrate us the gymnastic experiences of his youth and even at this age his physique was good. I didn’t even remember him bed ridden even for one day.

One day while at home he complained of a sore throat that does not resolve even after three weeks. I advised him to gargle with salty hot water, which I used to cure a sore throat during acute cold. After one week I got a telephone message from him that the ENT specialist in the local hospital has advised him to have a thorough check up at the Medical College where more facility is available. He requested my presence during the checkup. After a preliminary medical checkup the doctor has ordered for a series of medical tests. He has fixed a date for laryngoscopy. A laryngoscopy is an examination by use of a tube with a small lighted camera. A cranial CT scan was also conducted. Studying the results he has further gone for a biopsy. It took altogether about one month from the preliminary tests to determine it was a throat cancer. He explained to me that the cancer has affected the vocal cords and voice box.