April 7, 2005
As my mom sits in her reclining chair with an IV in her arm feeding her cancer with an endless amount of Chemo drugs, she turns to me and says “I wonder what’s going on in there?…I think of the cancer as the hemedaphite that burrows itself under the toenails with a sledge hammer and the Chemo is the attacking Lamisil.” I guess if you’ve seen the TV commercial for Lamisil you know what she’s talking about. If not, being her articulate self, she explained the metaphor. I wonder, like she does, where all the drugs are going in her body. The nurse assured her that it’s all being absorbed.
Moments before, she was awoken by my touch to the bizarre sight of a group of nurses doing the chicken dance to the tune of a stuffed chicken. She must of thought the Chemo was taking an interesting affect and causing her to hallucinate. I believe it was some type of celebration for a patient that had completed her six months of treatment. She had been drowsy and tired most of the morning as a result of some of the drugs she had been taking, including Benadryl. Earlier she had woken herself up with the sound of her own snore. She turned to me and snapped, “Don’t let me do that.” I hadn’t even had a chance to react to her snore before she was all worked up and embarrassed.
Steve said he got a good vibe from this place. It’s a cancer treatment center in Lacey off College Street. The treatment room is a large open room broken down into smaller areas separated with a curtain. Each section has four reclining chairs for cancer patients to receive their treatment. As I look around at all the patients receiving some form of Chemo the same time as my mom, I wonder their life stories. Many of them are old and alone, and I look at my mom thankful that we’re all here with her. I also think that she still seems too young to be amongst the others. I notice for the first time those that are wearing wigs, others with ball caps or beanies, and the rest are proudfully bald. Earlier I noticed a woman with very short silver hair, very Sinead O’Connorish, that was strikingly beautiful. It appeared that she had probably lost her hair at one time and was now in the process of growing it back.
Mom is awake, has finished her lunch, and is now listening to her new RCA portable CD player. She hums to Tony Bennet while she listens and I remember her ballroom dancing with her imaginary partner last night in the family room. Dad chuckles and says that she’s like a teenager with that thing. He is very tender with her these days, and I think to myself that it’s now his turn to take care of her. Mom has always been the rock of our family.
The nurses are all very friendly and nurturing. As a write, the nurse comes up and asks Mom…“Are you okay, sweetheart?” Janice is my mom’s favorite. I heard one of the nurses telling a patient earlier that you couldn’t request nurses out of fairness. If you could, my mom would have wanted Janice. She also had cancer and has a personality that you instantly can connect with. I actually think Janice is the head nurse and does more supervising than patient treatment. Although I hear her now walking a patient back to his chair from the bathroom, telling him that he’s dancing himself back to the reclining chair. They have a knack for bringing a smile on their patient’s face and helping them forget, even for a moment, the severity of their visit.
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Charla, what an amazing post! Bald is beautiful! I'm so glad to hear that your mom is now cancer-free and healthy! My mom was diagnosed with ovarian cancer almost two years ago. She, too, lost her hair but like your mom looked great even without it! Chemo is such a harsh treatment and your mom's musings brought back some of our thoughts as well. Here's to keeping both of our Mom's cancer-free and with us for a very, very long time!
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