Grief

I am sitting at a lounge at the Denver Hospice waiting for my husband to die.

It's a strange thing watching someone die, there is a certain peace to it. The hospice is a calm place, especially at 3:30am. I had to take a break, so I am sitting in a lounge next to a warm fire.

It's been a while since I wrote anything, now I feel like I have so much to say. I have been in the weeds with my husband's cancer for almost a year. Small Cell, stage 4. I was able to wrap my head around it when he was first diagnosed, I did not need to read any WebMD bullshit to know what the outcome was. Sure I had some hope but I was always cautiously optimistic.

I felt sad for him and I still do but now there is a part of my brain that just wants it all to be over. Selfish? Maybe. It's just been a long ride, I am tired and he is tired and I am looking for sweet relief for both of us.

They say there are 5 stages of grief. I never really knew what those were until I googled it tonight. For a long time, all I felt was anger, I was angrier at him than anything. Smoker for 50 years, fucking cigarettes, but then the anger would follow guilt and then sadness. Such a waste of feelings when you think about it. It never feels good to walk around like a volcano ready to explode, but that's what I did these last two months.

The last 4 nights before we got here were really rough, especially the night before last when my brother in law woke me up from a dead sleep at 1am because my husband was on the floor in the living room, crawling to the patio door to get air because he was basically suffocating. Here I was, angry again. Hauling portable oxygen tanks across the room, hooking up the additional oxygenator, and telling him over and over again as I tried to lift him off the floor "In through your nose, out through your mouth." He says "Do you love me?" after I get him settled back again and I could not answer him. No, at that moment in time, all I felt was resentment. The volcano brewing again.

He did well for a while, remission for almost 4 months but then it came back again like a vengeance. I had some kind of hope, I guess, what is that stage? Oh, yes, bargaining. I asked the oncologist, so what's the next step, but I knew the answer already.

We put the oncologist on speakerphone and listened to what he had to say. What would you do, we asked? He said, go home, spend time with your family. So there is nothing else? I heard him sigh, and then say, no, not really.

What a fucked up cancer this is. Smokers cancer, that's what they call it. I fucking hate it, I hate cigarettes and when I see someone smoking I want to smack them upside their head and go what the fuck dude?

We have been together 30 years and If I had a dime for every argument I had with those cigarettes, I guess I would not be here right now. I would be on an island drinking a cocktail. But here I am. It sucks ass.

I guess that's where the danger lies, which stage of grief is that? Number two? Today we all went to talk to the social worker in a nice comfortable lounge area while my husband was sleeping soundly. His kids, his brother, myself. What did the social worker say? Oh yea, he is transitioning. I guess that is a nice way to say "dying." Before I was able to research all of this grief, I guess there was every stage in the room, denial, bargaining, anger, and finally for me, acceptance. I cried, but I also accepted what was happening. In a way, it was peace for the first time in several weeks.

I stopped and said to myself, the volcano is not working for me anymore. I need to honor my husband's life and remember him for all the positives. Let that shit go, focus on the future, move forward.

This cancer turned my world upside down, and I am ready to move forward. I never want to think about cancer anymore.