Hey everyone sorry for the lack of updates the past 2 weeks,
we’ve been pretty busy and haven’t gotten much sleep…but I wanted to try and
keep everyone updated as much as possible..
So, remember that time in my first blog I said that we were
hoping Josh would “fly and work right on through it” because of his age, this
new diet and everything else we were doing?
PSHHHHH. I feel like the doctors gave us false hopes of this
being easier, or maybe NOT easy, but that he wouldn’t get these crazy side
effects as bad as most people.. Because let me tell you, HOLY EFF! Chemo is NO
JOKE on the body. Josh seems to be getting EVERY SINGLE side effect. Including
the “rare” ones. Even the doctor was
like WHAT THE HELL?
So, week 2 of treatment, we were NOT prepared for what was
to come. To put it bluntly, Josh got his ass KICKED! Monday through Wednesday
was an absolute nightmare. Sick is an understatement. Tuesday-Wednesday, he didn’t eat a single
thing. He was gagging at the thought of water and couldn’t keep it down for the
life of him. It was AWFUL. No medications were working. Everything just kind of
sucked and there was literally nothing we could do about it, but just try and
make it to the next day, hoping it was better than the last.
Thursday-Sunday was a lot better which thankfully; we were
able to have a nice relaxing Easter. He was eating, and drinking again. He
stopped taking a lot of the medications and got out of his chemo zombie mode. Speaking
of which,
Does anyone know how many take home medications you get
along with chemo? A SHIT TON! And almost all of them cause shitty side effects.
One of them being drowsiness. Doesn’t seem like a big deal right? WRONG. When
all your medications cause it, all you do is sleep. You don’t want to eat. When
you are awake, you are in a total daze. You feel so disconnected. There were
days it felt like “Josh are you even in there?” So, the minute he felt “better”
(I say that lightly because better still isn’t great, but we will take all the
“better” we can get!) he stopped taking almost all of his medications because
he hated feeling that way. We BOTH had breakdowns over the lack of life we had
been living the past few weeks. He cried, I cried. We just felt trapped. He
felt a prisoner in his own body. Like he had to take the meds to not feel like
shit, but hated taking the meds because he still felt like shit and completely
out of it. I felt trapped because as the
caregiver there is literally NOTHING I can do to help him most of the time. I
am there for him for whatever he needs. But when these medications are so
powerful, that you just have to sit there and watch the person you love go
through hell, is probably the hardest part of all. As a mom and a natural
caretaker, I struggle with this issue EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. How can you help when
there’s nothing you can do? I probably asked him a thousand times “ is there
anything I can do to make you feel better? Does anything sound good? How are
you feeling? Can I do anything for you?” Feeling helpless is the worst feeling
in the world. We tried all natural, we tried crazy medications that the doc
gave him, I mean, I tried EVERYTHING. There is NO WINNING IN CHEMO. The only win is
the very end, when it has done its job. Until then…IT BLOWS! Anyway, so since
he was feeling better he wanted to wean off the meds a bit this past week since
the chemo meds he was getting next 2 weeks don’t have same side effects as the
ones he was getting the first week.
So, The next day he
woke up and it was like the old Josh was back. He was smiling and interacting
with us, and left the bedroom for longer than an hour. It was a huge
realization of how much life and joy Josh brings to the home everyday, because
with out it, it felt very empty in here. It felt, off. It’s a realization of
our family being a unit and when one piece stops working, the whole fucking
thing falls apart.
Week 3 was soooooo much better. His body had a chance to
recover a bit since we only did 2 treatments in the past 2 weeks vs. everyday
like his first week. Girls were on spring break from school and we actually got
to enjoy some of it with them and with Josh. He was relatively back to normal
other than some sleeping issues and his appetite. Both are far better than they
were, but still, not exactly where we want it to be. He was able to stop taking
medication all of last week, so that’s great, he isn’t in the zombie mode
anymore and thank god because he hated every minute of it. Bad news of week 3
is that the inevitable happened…his hair started falling out. We came in on Monday
and not a single hair was out of place, then suddenly the next morning woke up
in a pile of beard hair and then the following day his head of hair. So, we
wanted the girls to be a part of this whole process, so they weren’t scared or
confused as to why daddy is looking different, or have them come home and just
see daddy’s hair is all gone. So we had the girls shave daddy’s head! We
grabbed the clippers and let the girls go to town, and they had so much fun
doing it. I’m glad we let them be a part of it, because now, THEY made daddy
cut his hair, and it wasn’t the medicine. It’s not a scary or weird thing for
them. They seem to be doing ok with everything, and they are such good
caretakers. They love to be daddy’s doctor! Just little love bugs those 2. <3
Chemo hasn’t been easy on Josh, or our family. He hasn’t
been able to work, at all. Most days he wasn’t able to get out of bed. Which
means I couldn’t work either. My mom was in China, my sister in California,
aunts, uncles, friends and grandmas and our whole network was out of town. (Great
timing huh lol!) With kids in school and after school activities it was super
hard and stressful planning rides and pick up times for the girls and
everything else, they had to skip some of their dance classes, it just proved
to be too much. Our schedule was crazy, we’d drop kids off at school, go to
chemo for 6 hours, have my other sister or my dad pick the kids up, then get
home to make dinner, get Josh comfortable, and kids doing homework and bath
time and story time and bed time… Lets just say this caregiver was SPENT by
week 2. After a couple meltdowns and adjusting to only a few hours of sleep
each night, I think I’ve got this down now. Lol. 6 hours of sleep is a great
night sleep these days. ;)
We wouldn’t have been able to get to this point with out all
the people around us supporting us the way they have. Bringing food (shout out
to one of Josh’s coworkers from his Birches family, Lisa, you’re a freaking
angel! - She has brought us dinner at least once a week, she started a go fund
me page for us, and she is probably one of the most giving & most kind
hearted person we’ve met.) And then of course my Mom, lets all just thank god
for moms huh? I have no idea where we would be right now if it weren’t for her
and her non-stop support. (Love you mom
and thank you!) Times like these really show you how important your family is,
and whom your true friends really are. Not to mention, the outpouring of
support from people we barely know or haven’t been in touch with for years has
been humbling to say the least. You guys
are amazing. Just THANK YOU. Everyone
who has donated to our go fund me page, I can’t tell you how much that has
helped us. With us not working and just trying to survive, this has meant so
much to us and helped our family get by!
We could have never asked anyone of this, or done this ourselves. (Again,
thank you Adrienne & Lisa for being amazing and starting those!) The people in our lives are absolutely
wonderful, and we couldn’t be more grateful. You guys have brought us to tears
with your kindness on several occasions, so thank you!!!!
We started cycle -2 yesterday (woohoo half way done!) with
this being a long week of treatment again (we go mon-fri 6 hours everyday this
week and then the following 2 Mondays) His white blood cell count is pretty low
right now, so we have to be extra careful in the germ territory for him, he can
easily get sick. We almost weren’t able to start this cycle, but they think he
is strong enough to power through it.
Regardless of this news, we are going in with a positive attitude.
Hoping it will be a little easier this time around, now that we know what to
expect and what medications to avoid, and so on. The doctors say it could
really go either way. He could get side effects worse or his body could be a
little more used to the chemotherapy drugs. So far we are hangin' in there.
Send positive vibes and prayers we can get through this, and hopefully we can
both go back to work again soon, and get our life back on track to normalcy.
We have tried to remain strong and positive even in the
hardest and weakest of times, when there seemed to be no light at the end of
the chemo tunnel. It has been HARD. It has been absolutely terrifying, full of
anxiety and weeks of sleepless nights..We live hour by hour. Hoping each hour
is better than the last. Each day is better than the last. We look forward to
the end, however we still have a few very long weeks ahead. But for now, today,
right in this moment, I can say we are positive and hopeful!
April, we mean this in the best way possible, but we can’t
wait for you to be over. His last day of chemotherapy is on the 18th,
assuming all goes well the next few weeks. They expect him to have a “chemo
hangover” which will probably suck but if its anything like the past week, I
think he will be better just in time for his 35th birthday, which is
on the 28th! We hope to enter May with Josh turning 35 and cancer
free, girls will be finishing up kindergarten, their recital, their birthday
and everyone else’s birthday we love in may! (May is always our busiest month
of the year!) Lets just all agree; it
can’t come fast enough! Again, thank you guys so much. We couldn’t have made it
this far without all of you! Xoxo! -Angelica
The go fund me pages- (2 people started one on same night, but all for same cause. Use or stay up to date with either one!)
https://www.gofundme.com/xuv8ydac
https://www.gofundme.com/79vf4784
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