About That Birthday…

In a recent Twitter/Facebook post, I mentioned that my birthday, while good, was emotionally exhausting and promised an explanation. If you don’t want possibly too much medical information, you may want to move. Otherwise, here it is…

As some of you may know, my Dad has been fighting esophageal cancer for some time now. He was diagnosed in July of last year and had been taking chemo since then, more or less. Long story short, Dad was admitted to the hospital sometime in the second week of December and by the 22nd, had had 2 different surgeries. The prognosis after the second surgery was “without additional chemo, 6 weeks to 2 months.”

After his initial diagnosis, we knew we didn’t have much time, but this grim news really sent us reeling. I spent the next day, then, my birthday, I spent sitting at the hospital with Dad, giving him wet swabs for his mouth or, later, holding a glass of grape juice so he can get a drink. The giant snow storm came on Christmas Eve, so I wasn’t able to get back to the hospital (or out of my driveway) until Sunday morning, when I was able to take Andrew and Noah up to the hospital to celebrate Christmas with my parents. We had a great, mostly normal time, with Dad feeling well enough to interact with my boys. It was a special time.

Then came Monday. He developed a lump in his throat (and eventually all across his throat), which turned out to be a swollen lymph node. The surgeon felt it was the cancer coming on really aggressively. The medical doctor, though, felt it might just be a normal infection, so he prescribed some antibiotics. The next morning, the swelling had gone down, so it seems the MD was right. He felt, though, that the central line they had put in the week before might be the cause of the infection, so he ordered it removed. During the removal, it appears that Dad “threw a clot” which ended up in his lungs, causing his oxygen levels, blood pressure, etc. to crash hard. We (meaning the doctors) eventually intubated him and moved him to the ICU.

Over the next couple of days, we hoped he would recover, but it was looking more likely that he would not. On Friday, we decided to honor his wish not to be kept alive by a machine and had the tube removed. To our surprise, he came off the vent really well, with all his stats remaining pretty stable. Over the weekend, he did OK, though we had a slight scare on Sunday. Then came Monday.

Monday morning, I was supposed to start back to work. Since I work from home, I thought I’d just go up to the hospital and work from there in the waiting room near his room (I was, in fact, typing this :). At about 10:30, though, Angela came out to tell me that Dad’s breathing had changed, so we raced in. A little over an hour later, Dad was gone. With his family around, he breathed his last.

As I sit here now, a few days later on the evening of his funeral, it’s still hard to process. I keep wanting to tell him some funny thought I just had, or ask him where he keeps his tools. Despite the time we had after his diagnosis to start coming to some sort of acceptance, it has been harder than I could have ever imagined. It’s really, really awful. As I noted on Facebook and Twitter, we don’t grieve as those who have no hope. My Dad knew the Lord, so we know where he is, and we know that we’ll see him again. Selfish as I am, I want him here, though I know he’s much better off now. I miss him terribly already.

So… yeah… that was a hard birthday, especially now looking back. I hate the way it turned out, but I cherish every minute I spent at the hospital that day, the two weeks prior, and the week and a half after. I’d much rather have spent them here in Mom and Dad’s house, where I sit now, but it was my honor and pleasure to sit next to my dying father’s bed, doing what little I could for him.