Dear god I thought I was the only one! This last twelve months have been without a doubt the very worst of my life!
Last year my dad was a diagnosed with cancer, 17th November and literately from diagnosis to him passing was 6 weeks. It’s pretty much the hardest thing I have had to go through. When he was initially diagnosed he was ok although he had a terrible year leading up to it. He had a heart attack in the January of the year which he got over quite quickly, after that in July he had an operation on his stomach to remover an aneurism. Due to the surgery he had a blood clot in his pinky toe which they had to remover in the September and just as he was getting over that he called me on the 17th of November to tell me he had kidney stones and there was an ambulance coming to take him and my mum up to the hospital that was in the afternoon and later that evening he called and told me they had done scans and it wasn’t kidney stones it was cancer, they kept him in to biopsy the cancer, it was in his lungs and chest. Because of everything he had gone through and the meds he was on he had to wait a week for the biopsy for the drugs to clear his system. The following week we went back for the results, me my mum and dad and my sister. They told us it was a very aggressive cancer and that they would give him radiotherapy to try and reduce the masses one of which was on his wind pipe. He was having good and bad days leading up to Christmas and had had a bad day on Christmas Eve so my mum hoped he would have a better one in Christmas Day but sadly he didn’t. He managed about an hour before he had to go to bed where he spent the rest of the day. We took turns staying up with him for the next few nights before I managed to arrange for nurses to come in and care for him through the night and allow me my mum and my sister some rest. On the 29th of December my dad was on a morphine drip and was unconscious more often than not that night he came too for about twenty mins and all three of us got to talk to him and he looked like he understood but he could not really communicate back short of grunts and head movements. We told him we loved him and my mum told him if it was too much just to go, we hated seeing him in this much pain. He couldn’t even lay down as the mass pressing on his wind pipe was so uncomfortable we had him in a recliner chair so he was at least comfortable. That night the nurse appeared and we were moving him to change some of his sheets and he had an accident, the nurse said she would sort it so me and my sister went into the kitchen while the nurse and my mum tried to sort him out the nurse called us back through and told us it was time. The three of us sat holding my dads hands in floods of tears and he slowly stopped breathing. It’s was the most painful thing I have ever watched in my life, it truly was devastating to watch my dad die right in front of me.
The next few days to weeks were spent making the arrangements for his funeral which helped me my mum and sister greatly as we put all of our efforts into making it the funeral he wanted. He had started to do it himself but had ran out of time sadly but we knew most of what he wanted such as a bespoke coffin and we managed to get one that they printed photos on as he wanted an allotment scene we got photos of him in his allotment and they printed it on the coffin it was amazing and there were so many comments on it, we even found a florist who did a vegetable arrangement instead of flowers.
His funeral came and I got a bit drunk and had a good cry at the end of the night and then things went back to normal or so I thought, at least it felt like it did, I went back to work then on 24th of March the day after my Grandads birthday I got a phone call from my mum and she told me he had died that morning, at this point I just felt like this year was kicking my ass. I was planning to go and see him that day for his birthday, he had been having a bad time of it for about 6 months he had breathing problems and had been in and out of hospital during that time. I just felt so knocked down. I couldn’t believe it first my dad then my grandad, these were the two main male role models in my life growing up. I’m not really one for crying and although I was upset I didn’t actually cry I don’t know why but I didn’t. So my Granda’s funeral came around and I dealt with that as best I could.
So moving on a couple of months later to May and my mum had a knee replaced so I agreed with my sister to come and stay a couple of nights a week to help out with my mum as both my mum and sister are disabled and it was a bit much for my sister to look after my mum on her own. Anyway as my mum was recovering and starting to feel better and regain movement my dog was struggling, he had been diagnosed with cancer 18 months previous to this and I had him on so many meds and had operations to help him but sadly it was his time. He had gone off his food which was not like him so I made the decision to put him to sleep, the vets came up to my house in the evening and while he was in my arms they give him the injection and for the second time in a year someone I loved died in my hands.
Then just last month my uncle died of a cancerous brain tumour after about 5 months from diagnosis where they told him he had about 18 months. It brought back so much of what I had watched my dad go through. It was so bad for me and my sister that we could not bring ourselves to go to the hospital to see him because it reminded us so much of outperform dad.
I honestly feel lost and like my life has no meaning.
Anyway what I would like to say to those of you who have taken the time to read this is thank you for being here, the time I have spent on this site recently have been some of the happiest and most fun I’ve had in quite some time, also if things seem bad right now to you they could be so much worse so chin up, enjoy yourselves as much as you can in as many ways as you can before you can’t.
I know I’m still new in some of your eyes but honestly the way I’ve been welcomed here has been amazing
thank you all so
The next few days to weeks were spent making the arrangements for his funeral which helped me my mum and sister greatly as we put all of our efforts into making it the funeral he wanted. He had started to do it himself but had ran out of time sadly but we knew most of what he wanted such as a bespoke coffin and we managed to get one that they printed photos on as he wanted an allotment scene we got photos of him in his allotment and they printed it on the coffin it was amazing and there were so many comments on it, we even found a florist who did a vegetable arrangement instead of flowers.
His funeral came and I got a bit drunk and had a good cry at the end of the night and then things went back to normal or so I thought, at least it felt like it did, I went back to work then on 24th of March the day after my Grandads birthday I got a phone call from my mum and she told me he had died that morning, at this point I just felt like this year was kicking my ass. I was planning to go and see him that day for his birthday, he had been having a bad time of it for about 6 months he had breathing problems and had been in and out of hospital during that time. I just felt so knocked down. I couldn’t believe it first my dad then my grandad, these were the two main male role models in my life growing up. I’m not really one for crying and although I was upset I didn’t actually cry I don’t know why but I didn’t. So my Granda’s funeral came around and I dealt with that as best I could.
So moving on a couple of months later to May and my mum had a knee replaced so I agreed with my sister to come and stay a couple of nights a week to help out with my mum as both my mum and sister are disabled and it was a bit much for my sister to look after my mum on her own. Anyway as my mum was recovering and starting to feel better and regain movement my dog was struggling, he had been diagnosed with cancer 18 months previous to this and I had him on so many meds and had operations to help him but sadly it was his time. He had gone off his food which was not like him so I made the decision to put him to sleep, the vets came up to my house in the evening and while he was in my arms they give him the injection and for the second time in a year someone I loved died in my hands.
Then just last month my uncle died of a cancerous brain tumour after about 5 months from diagnosis where they told him he had about 18 months. It brought back so much of what I had watched my dad go through. It was so bad for me and my sister that we could not bring ourselves to go to the hospital to see him because it reminded us so much of outperform dad.
I honestly feel lost and like my life has no meaning.
Anyway what I would like to say to those of you who have taken the time to read this is thank you for being here, the time I have spent on this site recently have been some of the happiest and most fun I’ve had in quite some time, also if things seem bad right now to you they could be so much worse so chin up, enjoy yourselves as much as you can in as many ways as you can before you can’t.
I know I’m still new in some of your eyes but honestly the way I’ve been welcomed here has been amazing thank you all so much for helping me feel again.
