I feel terrible. I had been meaning to post sooner, still exploring the idea of this web log, but it seems the rains have opened up on my small world recently and I am completely out of sorts. Usually I balk at the expression, “When it rains it pours”, in a secret mental effort to fend off any unwanted bad tidings, but today the Murphy’s Law cliche’ chants incessantly in the back of my mind like a scratched and broken record.

My Monday was an average day of getting back into the swing of the week, beginning with a routine appointment at the Vet’s office for my dog’s six month dental cleaning. I got off of work and picked up my daughter from pre-school in time to run to the Vet’s before they closed and rescue the tiny four-pound member of our family we call Tinkerbelle, from the “scary place”. I should have known something wasn’t right the minute the large, blonde, usually rude receptionist smiled at me and uncharacteristically said in a kindly voice, “Dr. McCoy will be out in a minute to see you.”

‘Oh, they must have pulled some teeth’, I decided and hoped she wouldn’t be in too much pain. When the Vet came out he got right to the point, and like a cartoon character being slapped in the face in rapid-fire motion, I stood barraged with a list of serious medical ailments my ten-year old Chihuahua had suddenly come down with.

“Her top cainine teeth are so bad we are going to have to pull them next time she comes,” he began. “We will try to get them to last that much longer, but she will probably be in pain.” He shifted his weight and continued. “We removed a mole from her neck that was benign and one from her stomach that was cancer. Breast cancer.” My mouth dropped open and I started to speak, but he wouldn’t let me interrupt. “She also has a heart murmur. A stage two. It is causing fluid to fill her lungs and she runs the risk of heart failure.”

There. He was done. I knew my mouth was still open, but what to say eluded me. ‘Cancer!’ was my first thought, and I flashed on my dear friend Linda, who had finished her second bout of chemotherapy a few days ago. I had just spoken to her this morning, we speak every morning, and she sounded good, stronger and braver than she felt after her first round of treatment. My mind wandered back to Tinkerbelle and vague thoughts of whether Chihuahua’s were able to get chemotherapy when the Vet stepped in to ask and answer my obvious questions. No on the Chemo, just watch for more lumps. Heart meds, water pills and special food for the heart condition as well as schedule an appointment for her stitches and teeth…and I was on my way home with one sick little dog.

The number and scope of the news kept me numb until my husband came home and I was able to repeat what I had been told. With relief, I let him take over in the duties of nursing our little dog and I immediately got up to answer the nagging urge to call my friend Linda — just to tell her about my day.

“Hi. How you feeling?” I asked when the phone picked up on the first ring. (Linda has a habit of picking up the phone as soon as it sounds, sometimes so fast you don’t even hear it ring on your end.)

“Oh, not so good right now,” her voice sounded raspy. “I think the stuff is hitting me hard and a little later this time.” She took a moment. “I, I’m starting to bleed too,” she added with a note of fear in her voice.

Suddenly I felt silly — selfish and inconsiderate. My news of Tinkerbelle seemed unimportant compared to what I knew she was going through. I knew the raspy sound in her voice and the bleeding was because her digestive tract had been stripped by the harsh chemicals in the chemo “cocktail” she had been given, and what we hoped would be an easier treatment period was showing signs of a hard body slam.

I bit my lip and kicked the washing machine. ‘Damn it’, I thought, and asked her if she needed anything.

“No, no. Skip will be home in a minute and I took a pain pill. I’ll be alright. I’m gonna beat this thing. I’m gonna do it.”

“Yes you are. You bet you are!” I hung up after making her promise to call if there was anything I could do and told her to get some rest. ‘Tomorrow is her birthday’, I said to myself, ‘I hope she feels better then. Dear God, let her feel better.’

Tuesday morning, first thing, I called. “Happy Birthday! How you feeling?”

The news wasn’t good. Now she was vomiting and could barely talk. If this didn’t end soon, it meant going into the hospital. “I don’t have a fever yet and that is the good news,” she said, mustering up some sort of positive thought. She just wanted to rest and try to get through this and I hung up the phone softly, wishing her as much warmth and comfort her way as my being could send.

That night the dreaded fever came and yesterday morning she was admitted into the very hospital that she recieves her chemo from. The almost three hour ride was torturous — every part of her body screamed in pain and the vomiting was uncontrolable. Mercifully, by afternoon she was resting as comfortable as possible and for a brief moment, I said thank you to God for giving her some measure of rest and held my breath as if to hold her in warm, loving thoughts.

This is a hard post. In the past few days the world has presented my house with sad news. Although I am not the one directly experiencing the pain, I am still deeply affected simply because I care. I desperately want to say the right thing or do something to change the hurtful parts and make everything better. I don’t like feeling helpless… like I said, I am out of sorts. Change is inevitable, I know, and I’ll try to accept what today brings, keeping my eye steadily on tomorrow knowing, this too shall pass…..

Linda, you know I love you. You are a dear, dear friend, an inspiration as a writer, a motivator of my book. I respect your deep sensitive nature, your creativity and the loving way you look at life. You are unselfish and brave, thoughtful, kind and giving. May the soft wings of angels comfort you. Be well my sweet friend. Be well.

Dawn

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 14th, 2004 at 11:36 am and is filed under General, What is this Place?. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.