We have always been very open about Mr. 1inamillion’s cancer with anyone and everyone in our lives. Occasionally we do pay for that, but I grew up in a family and community with a very powerful prayer chain and believe that if people don’t know about it, they can’t pray about it. We are always, always, grateful for the prayers and firmly believe in their power. The kindness we receive from others is touching. I am appreciative of the questions and concern I receive on behalf of my husband. Except of course when I‘m not.
The family that surrounds a patient tends to blend into the shadows of a sarcoma. We are generally pretty accepting of that. We are the trees that are strong because we are flexible. We bend in the wind, go with the flow. Our wants and plans were tossed out the window on the way home from the oncologist. That’s just the way it goes, and usually that’s okay. Fighting cancer clearly outweighs most topics. There are some moments, however, that our presence should not be overshadowed. We should be acknowledged and be the point of concern. It might sound bitter and selfish, but it’s true. Sometimes the concern for Mr. 1inamillion is poorly timed and not appreciated. Occasionally I‘m even kind of offended by it.
Offended by concern for your hubby? Surely not! I know that might be what you are thinking, so I’ll share some examples and weigh them out for you.
Example # 1
Last fall Thing 1 confessed to me that he did not like going to Scouts since Mr. 1inamillion was sick. This was because most of the adults there asked how his Dad was doing and he didn’t want to talk about it all the time. This example weighs in as annoying. He’s a child and Scouts is supposed to be his opportunity to be just that. Let him be like any other boy there, focused on fun.
My suggested response for him to use when questioned was “He’s hanging in there, thanks for asking. How’s your Dad?”. It’s short, sweet and would catch them a bit off guard because they’re older and their fathers have probably passed to Glory already. Some may not appreciate the hint of sarcasm in my coaching, but I find humor to be a super coping mechanism. Besides, my father taught me well and it would be wrong not to pass on the gift of sarcasm to the next generation.
My request of adults is to simply let my kids lead on the topic and direct your questions to me. If they bring it up, please feel honored by their trust and let them talk. Otherwise, let Gabe and Lucy be all about Gabe and Lucy.
Example # 2
Perhaps we cross paths and you greet me with “Hey! How’s your husband?”. This is by far the most common occurrence and it is not annoying, but it does not rank as sincerely appreciated, either. I’m accustomed to it but I recommend leading with “How are you?”. It is just polite and will be met with gratitude. Otherwise you may just receive a "He's hanging in there, thanks for asking. How's your husband?".
Example # 3
This last example is probably over-sharing, but it really is the experience that has offended me and makes my point like no other example could.
Last week I had a doctor’s appointment of my very own. This is the doctor that delivered both Things 1 and 2. He is clearly familiar with our family and it’s certainly not odd for him to inquire about Mr. 1inamillion. This appointment was for an IUD placement. The kind doctor was questioning me about my husband’s health as he was rooting around inside me. He also asked how Mr. 1inamillion was handling the latest set back emotionally, because it is such a tough battle.
I understand his intent was likely an effort to distract me from the extreme pain he was causing, but a lighter topic of conversation would have been more welcomed at that very moment. It also might have been appropriate for MY doctor messing with MY hormones to have inquired about MY emotional health as well. But he didn’t.
After I was home from my appointment, Mr. 1inamillion asked how it went. He also asked about kind doctor and if kind doctor had asked about him. It might have been more appropriate for him to have inquired about risks to my health, side effects or how long I might be in pain. But he didn’t.
When cancer takes hold of one member of the family, everyone else tends to become an afterthought. That just becomes the norm, and in a lot of instances that’s okay. Except of course when it’s clearly not. Now kind doctor did say he would put us in his prayers. I am very grateful for that. He’s right, cancer is a tough battle. It’s also a little risky to have a family overshadowed by it, a mom with hormones unbalanced and emotional health unchecked.
Happy Mother's Day
One of the greatest challenges that face working moms is daycare. It's a heavy burden that carries so much worry and guilt. It’s easy to find someone to watch your children and not that difficult to find someone who will really care for them. The true treasure we seek, though, is someone who will love them. A person that abolishes the worry, a little of the guilt and lightens the load. Someone who loves them as their own, who becomes a member of our family and accepts us into theirs.
I am the baby in my family, yet I am a proud big sister. My mom provided childcare in our home when we were young. There were several kids for which she genuinely cared and there are a few lucky moms for whom she was the true treasure. Brandy was brought to us when her mom, Jane, first returned to work after maternity leave. She was loved beyond measure by our mother and became a member of our family. She’s amidst the family photos and, as a baby, even looked the part. Just with thick, beautiful curls. Brandy Jane was picked on like any younger sibling should be by us and my mom dreaded her growing up and going off to kindergarten like her true mother. She begged Jane to have another when Brandy turned five, but instead they packed up and moved. It was crushing.
They visited each time they returned to Kansas, wrote letters and sent Mom cards and Christmas gifts through the years. As a grown up, Brandy is fabulous. She’s tall, has completed multiple mission trips and speaks fluent Spanish. Clear and apparent signs she is not really ours. But after Mom passed, she and her family were here with us sharing the burden of grief. She shared the hurt with the man she soon married and explained, in Spanish, how a only child can have thirteen nieces and nephews.
When the first of our nieces was born, Mom was able to watch her and spare my older sister the challenge upon returning to work. After it became too much, she still saved Shelly from difficulty and pointed her straight to a true treasure. My nieces and nephew are loved and demonstrate natural abilities that clearly were not genetically inherited. They are athletic. We watch in amazement and say things like, “Look at that! Where’d that come from? It must be the Kendrick in them.”
I have faced the decision challenge of daycare a few times as a working mom. I easily found someone to watch Gabe when I returned to work. He was in good hands, but not great. Shortly after, I struck pay dirt. My father took an early retirement. Mom’s Parkinson’s was too far advanced for her to watch him on her own, but as a tag team they were the jack pot. Gabe and Lucy are completely self-confident children and often think the world revolves around them. In their defense they had Grandma and Grandpa’s complete, undivided attention for so much of their early years so in their reality, it sort of did.
We found people that cared for them at the local daycare after Dad broke his leg. When that daycare abruptly closed, I found my true treasure. The woman that had been cleaning for us was watching her grandsons and while she had no intentions of watching additional kids, she took on our Things 1 and 2. And loves them. She has become a part of our family over the last two years and we love her. We no longer depend on her full time care, but she takes them when needed and sometimes just because they want her to. There are some signs of her nurture overpowering a bit of our nature, too. Lucy loves to drink ice water and does not really care for chocolate. That is something she certainly did not learn from any of her actual relatives.
This Mother's Day, I am especially grateful for the true treasures that lighten and help balance the loads of parenting and work. For Debby who has loved my nieces, nephew, and my sister, through so much. For Purnie who recognizes my needs as much as my kids'. I am also grateful for Brandy Jane, who shares with us memories of my mother and proves the value of a true treasure is beyond measure.
I am the baby in my family, yet I am a proud big sister. My mom provided childcare in our home when we were young. There were several kids for which she genuinely cared and there are a few lucky moms for whom she was the true treasure. Brandy was brought to us when her mom, Jane, first returned to work after maternity leave. She was loved beyond measure by our mother and became a member of our family. She’s amidst the family photos and, as a baby, even looked the part. Just with thick, beautiful curls. Brandy Jane was picked on like any younger sibling should be by us and my mom dreaded her growing up and going off to kindergarten like her true mother. She begged Jane to have another when Brandy turned five, but instead they packed up and moved. It was crushing.
They visited each time they returned to Kansas, wrote letters and sent Mom cards and Christmas gifts through the years. As a grown up, Brandy is fabulous. She’s tall, has completed multiple mission trips and speaks fluent Spanish. Clear and apparent signs she is not really ours. But after Mom passed, she and her family were here with us sharing the burden of grief. She shared the hurt with the man she soon married and explained, in Spanish, how a only child can have thirteen nieces and nephews.
When the first of our nieces was born, Mom was able to watch her and spare my older sister the challenge upon returning to work. After it became too much, she still saved Shelly from difficulty and pointed her straight to a true treasure. My nieces and nephew are loved and demonstrate natural abilities that clearly were not genetically inherited. They are athletic. We watch in amazement and say things like, “Look at that! Where’d that come from? It must be the Kendrick in them.”
I have faced the decision challenge of daycare a few times as a working mom. I easily found someone to watch Gabe when I returned to work. He was in good hands, but not great. Shortly after, I struck pay dirt. My father took an early retirement. Mom’s Parkinson’s was too far advanced for her to watch him on her own, but as a tag team they were the jack pot. Gabe and Lucy are completely self-confident children and often think the world revolves around them. In their defense they had Grandma and Grandpa’s complete, undivided attention for so much of their early years so in their reality, it sort of did.
We found people that cared for them at the local daycare after Dad broke his leg. When that daycare abruptly closed, I found my true treasure. The woman that had been cleaning for us was watching her grandsons and while she had no intentions of watching additional kids, she took on our Things 1 and 2. And loves them. She has become a part of our family over the last two years and we love her. We no longer depend on her full time care, but she takes them when needed and sometimes just because they want her to. There are some signs of her nurture overpowering a bit of our nature, too. Lucy loves to drink ice water and does not really care for chocolate. That is something she certainly did not learn from any of her actual relatives.
This Mother's Day, I am especially grateful for the true treasures that lighten and help balance the loads of parenting and work. For Debby who has loved my nieces, nephew, and my sister, through so much. For Purnie who recognizes my needs as much as my kids'. I am also grateful for Brandy Jane, who shares with us memories of my mother and proves the value of a true treasure is beyond measure.
Present Plans
Each year the classes at our Mayberry’s elementary school write and illustrate a class book. Lucy’s class book is titled “When I Grow Up…”. For her page, she wrote “When I grow up I want to be a doctor”. She’s only six but I admit I am already prodding her a bit in this direction. I want her to be able to support me in a manner of which I hope to grow accustom. Her brother already demonstrates a great motivation to help others and to gab with all people he encounters, so I think he’s destined for politics or the ministry. I am likely too much of a liability for a successful politician and those folks don’t look truly happy anyway. There‘s really no money in the latter, so the pressure is on Thing 2 to keep me comfy in cruise line deck chairs.
We were reading her book last night and after a bit of very dramatic discussion about the fact that the picture that accompanied her page was NOT what she drew, we headed to the kitchen for desert. She chose a fortune cookie and chomped away while I read her the tiny strip of wisdom. “Your present plans are going to succeed.” “What does that mean?”, she asked. “It means you will be a doctor just like you wrote in your book.”
“I’m going to go into space.”
“You are? When will you do that?”
Without pausing a moment to contemplate it, Lucy replied, “After I get fired from my job.”
“Really? Why do you think you will get fired?”, I ask.
“For not doing my job right. I don’t really know how to be a doctor.”
Very valid point. Med school and aerospace? That’s pretty big and varied plans for a little girl who throws fits over kindergarten homework. Maybe it’s time to nudge towards acting. That might be a less expensive education and allow her to pretend to be all sorts of exciting things when she grows up. Truth be told, not being a doctor but playing one on TV could very well keep my face lifted and my rear comfortably planted poolside.
We were reading her book last night and after a bit of very dramatic discussion about the fact that the picture that accompanied her page was NOT what she drew, we headed to the kitchen for desert. She chose a fortune cookie and chomped away while I read her the tiny strip of wisdom. “Your present plans are going to succeed.” “What does that mean?”, she asked. “It means you will be a doctor just like you wrote in your book.”
“I’m going to go into space.”
“You are? When will you do that?”
Without pausing a moment to contemplate it, Lucy replied, “After I get fired from my job.”
“Really? Why do you think you will get fired?”, I ask.
“For not doing my job right. I don’t really know how to be a doctor.”
Very valid point. Med school and aerospace? That’s pretty big and varied plans for a little girl who throws fits over kindergarten homework. Maybe it’s time to nudge towards acting. That might be a less expensive education and allow her to pretend to be all sorts of exciting things when she grows up. Truth be told, not being a doctor but playing one on TV could very well keep my face lifted and my rear comfortably planted poolside.
Throw a stick in it!
Exodus 15: 22 Then Moses led Israel from the Red Sea and they went into the Desert of Shur. For three days they traveled in the desert without finding water. 23 When they came to Marah, they could not drink its water because it was bitter. 24 So the people grumbled against Moses, saying, “What are we to drink?”
25 Then Moses cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a piece of wood. He threw it into the water, and the water became sweet.
Our current bible study is focusing on the Israelites journey out of Egypt and our own wilderness seasons. (Gee, what amazing timing and how very appropriate.) I’ve really been consumed with thought on this story of the water of Marah over the last week. Just throw a stick in it, problem solved. I’ve been asking the Lord this last week to throw a stick in this chemo. Make it easier, more bearable, please! Just throw a stick in it, please!
As I’ve been pleading with the Lord for a stick, I’ve been grumbling. My angst was rising in anticipation of Matilda’s return. Stupid bag. The pump robs us of sleep. It restricts his movement, his comfort. We hate the bag. This morning on the drive to treatment day 1 my mind quiets enough to hear the whisper. Matilda’s the stick. UGH! WHAT? The bag’s the stick. The pump is not carrying chemo this regimen, it’s the hydration that keeps it moving, protecting the organs. Making it bearable. Sigh.
Sitting at the stoplight at Emporia and Murdock, just ahead is the cancer treatment center to the west, the hospital to the east. Matilda lets him be home at night. Alright, alright. Matilda’s the stick.
So I’ve stopped grumbling (for now, I’m sure). And I’m even a little happy. Turns out the old Matildas have been retired. We get a brand new pump! A brand new bag! And the unlock code is still 57!
25 Then Moses cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a piece of wood. He threw it into the water, and the water became sweet.
Our current bible study is focusing on the Israelites journey out of Egypt and our own wilderness seasons. (Gee, what amazing timing and how very appropriate.) I’ve really been consumed with thought on this story of the water of Marah over the last week. Just throw a stick in it, problem solved. I’ve been asking the Lord this last week to throw a stick in this chemo. Make it easier, more bearable, please! Just throw a stick in it, please!
As I’ve been pleading with the Lord for a stick, I’ve been grumbling. My angst was rising in anticipation of Matilda’s return. Stupid bag. The pump robs us of sleep. It restricts his movement, his comfort. We hate the bag. This morning on the drive to treatment day 1 my mind quiets enough to hear the whisper. Matilda’s the stick. UGH! WHAT? The bag’s the stick. The pump is not carrying chemo this regimen, it’s the hydration that keeps it moving, protecting the organs. Making it bearable. Sigh.
Sitting at the stoplight at Emporia and Murdock, just ahead is the cancer treatment center to the west, the hospital to the east. Matilda lets him be home at night. Alright, alright. Matilda’s the stick.
So I’ve stopped grumbling (for now, I’m sure). And I’m even a little happy. Turns out the old Matildas have been retired. We get a brand new pump! A brand new bag! And the unlock code is still 57!
Matilda, %$^!!
I haven’t revealed it thus far in the blog, but I must confess to you that I have a bit of a potty mouth. When I say ‘a bit of’ I might be stretching it. Truth be told that at many moments of frustration I rival any sailor. It’s been a working challenge of mine and I have slowly been making progress. Just yesterday morning we had a paint spill and my first response was “Oh crikey!“. There was however an earlier spill of a open container of joint compound from atop a ladder that did not receive the same mild Aussie response. Last night, though, I was speeding down the dirt road and a wild turkey began to cross and I never made it passed “Oh, oh”. I also managed to brake completely in time. (Yes, we really do contend with turkeys on our way home from the big city to our Mayberry. And no, I did not ask him why he was crossing.)
It’s not much, but it is progress and I’ll take it. I am very fearful, however, as I know that progress lies in jeopardy. Tomorrow night I face off with my arch nemesis. The anger is building inside of me and I am practicing ‘fudge, phooey and poo’ in anticipation. I am also randomly reciting the number 57.
You see, tomorrow night is when Matilda invades my home. The name sounds harmless, I know. She’s dancing, right, how bad can she be? Matilda is the name given to the pump that comes home with Dane so he has meds flowing into his system 24 hours a day until Saturday morning. The pump whom I must reset and whose bag I must change late at night. I admit my weak hands struggle with removing the empty bag from her vacuum tight seal and on a few nights I have hacked it away with scissors. Yes, I know that’s against nurses’ instructions. But let me tell you, the instructions are not always sufficient.
Take for example, resetting Matilda. She’s moody and those typed up instructions we received last time? WERE NOT RIGHT. Or perhaps the instructions were right and it was her programming that was CLEARLY incorrect. My hands are plenty strong enough to push buttons, thank you very much. The unfortunate on-call guy who took my phone calls can attest to the fact that I was totally correct and Matilda was completely at fault.
So I will begin the days this week with yoga and continued bible study about wilderness times. I will practice my G-rated vocabulary words and I will be ready. So bring it, Matilda! And bring your white flag of surrender with you. Because I’m bringing my scissors. And your unlock code, 57.
It’s not much, but it is progress and I’ll take it. I am very fearful, however, as I know that progress lies in jeopardy. Tomorrow night I face off with my arch nemesis. The anger is building inside of me and I am practicing ‘fudge, phooey and poo’ in anticipation. I am also randomly reciting the number 57.
You see, tomorrow night is when Matilda invades my home. The name sounds harmless, I know. She’s dancing, right, how bad can she be? Matilda is the name given to the pump that comes home with Dane so he has meds flowing into his system 24 hours a day until Saturday morning. The pump whom I must reset and whose bag I must change late at night. I admit my weak hands struggle with removing the empty bag from her vacuum tight seal and on a few nights I have hacked it away with scissors. Yes, I know that’s against nurses’ instructions. But let me tell you, the instructions are not always sufficient.
Take for example, resetting Matilda. She’s moody and those typed up instructions we received last time? WERE NOT RIGHT. Or perhaps the instructions were right and it was her programming that was CLEARLY incorrect. My hands are plenty strong enough to push buttons, thank you very much. The unfortunate on-call guy who took my phone calls can attest to the fact that I was totally correct and Matilda was completely at fault.
So I will begin the days this week with yoga and continued bible study about wilderness times. I will practice my G-rated vocabulary words and I will be ready. So bring it, Matilda! And bring your white flag of surrender with you. Because I’m bringing my scissors. And your unlock code, 57.
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