A Difficult Week
This week really tested me. Just when I thought, wow, I am starting to feel renewed post-Easter…two horrible things happened.
One is that I had to admit my aunt into the hospital, which I knew was only a matter of time. Her breast cancer has spread to her liver and lungs and she’s having a hard time coping with her persistent cough (due to pneumonia). Her morale is low because her best friend (my mom) is still out of town until next week, and she senses the gravity of being ill and on borrowed time.
My mom is on standby though… as soon as I call to tell her to come home, she’s on the first flight back.
My tita is probably one of the most stubborn people I know, but she listens to mama and she has learned to listen to me. Just to arm myself with good luck tokens, I wore my mom’s jewelry and a beautiful silk kaftan of hers, and also packed a care bag for my tita filled with stuff that my mom would’ve packed for her, like a cashmere cardigan in fiery red, crocs, a silk robe, and plenty of plush pillows and blankets (hospital bedding SUCKS).
I’m channeling Apipa (mama).
I’ve come to understand and empathize with my cousins as well, especially her daughters, who I think really care for their mom, but just get shot down by her each time - you see, my tita is too proud to let other people take care of her, and often times, she can be pretty scathing with her words when she feels safe enough to hurt you after you’ve told her to do something for her own good.
Family drama really gets played out in hospitals.
The second difficult thing that happened this week is that on the same morning that I admitted my tita in the hospital, I had to rush Tank, our family pet, to the hospital as well. He was accidentally run over by our driver - don’t get me started on how this could have been avoided - and suffered injuries. He was in the hospital for 4 days and this morning, I was finally able to take him back home to my parents’ house.
I was pretty hysterical when I found out that his caretaker let him off-leash while the driver was taking the car out to fetch me at my place. Of course, I was just hysterical because Tank is our baby and I was sobbing the entire hour it took to get from my place to the vet. I felt such sadness. I just wanted to get to him as fast as possible.
But Tank is such a strong dog, he is such a strong, HAPPY dog, that I think he just thought that it was all just another one of his adventures. He has 4 huge wounds on his belly and 1 really big wound running down his right hind leg. He is also on 4 different kinds of oral meds and a pain killer, but he is such a fighter - I think that he may actually survive this.
The vet said that his muscle and fat protected him, for the most part, and miraculously, the big boy can still walk - slowly, but he’s still walking and not even limping. However, his lab work revealed really off the charts liver chem results, which could mean that he either had a pre-existing condition, or he’s internally bleeding; the former more than likely, but just to check, we’re going to have his liver ultrasound done tomorrow. We already got an ultrasound done on Monday (at a place that was 30 mins away from the original clinic - ack!) but it wasn’t the best reading of his liver because he was still fidgeting and protective over his body. I didn’t want to take him today because I just wanted him home, comfortable and not stressed, but tomorrow, after a night’s rest we’re going to get his liver ultrasound.
After 2 hours of pacing and getting used to his new spot in the house (I am sleeping with him downstairs in the guest room, where there’s plenty of AC and I can monitor him), he finally just collapsed and is now snoring :). I want to cry but I won’t :). I’m just so happy that he’s finally getting some rest.
Tomorrow, his ultrasound, and then I’m off to be with my tita as she goes through chemo. Again. Cancer sucks.
