Hanging on

And now from a (removed) post that has been heard, onto one that is much more important.

I've had a recent conversation with my mom on my mind. She gave me quite a deep thought to ponder. I was updating her on my friend Don and his wife with Glioblastoma, the most deadly of brain cancer, most often when it's found it's too late, people are given months to live.

As those who read me know, they and their journey have given us lots to think about. But mostly that life is what you make of it, that all of our journey's are too short, and certainly way too short for the crap that most of us fill our time with. Their fate has also made me ponder the people who rather than leaving footprints have left soulprints behind. Much deeper, more lasting.

So we chatted about Don, his wife. She knew that Don's wife had a routine MRI in Sept and was given just a few months, the tumor had started to regrow they always knew it would happen, not if, but when. They started to make arrangements, hospice, one last Christmas (hopefully), a stair lift inside, ramps outside, most of the strength in her legs and back gone from the meds and the impact of the tumor worse than that. They declined more surgery, experimental treatment and decided to just wait for nature to take its course.

I told her that Don and I had breakfast, like we do every other month to catch up. We meet friends from work and chat about everything. This last time, in early March, his wife had just had another MRI, with shocking results.

The tumor had stopped growing.

Unheard of in Glioblastoma patients. The physician wondering what changes she had made, what she had done, all to try to find something to help her and other patients. But there were no insights to give. The rest of the breakfast a mish mash of conversation from the 4 of us there that day. But I can't help thinking about Don and his wife, what things are like and how they are doing, and if "when" might turn to "if".

So my mom and I chatted about this, she shared more of the story of a friend of her's who was recently injured in a serious horse accident who survived cancer before that and another who had a relative die of glioblastoma. It was a deep call, but one I'm glad we had.

I struggled to come to terms with the meaning of life, of how cruel it can be to some and easy on others. I struggled to understand the concept of holding on through "one more Christmas" as your life slipped away. We talked a bit about the quality of life and how sad it is that for some, the end of their life is known as pending much sooner rather than later and yet their quality of life is so poor, how good can hanging on be. To not be able to walk, to experience the warmth of the sun without pain, or the wind on your skin without fear of a cold.

The end of the conversation came with my mom saying something profound in response to my sadness over the idea of dwindling quality of life so much so that you couldn't enjoy life. My mom said:

I guess it all depends what you're hanging in there for.

Gave me pause to think about it in a different light. That one last smile, that one last moment, giving one more piece of advice to a growing child or adult child, spending one more birthday or holiday or one more movie night on the sofa.

Yeah, I guess your quality of life is not the same for everyone even if their physical conditions are the same, it all depends on what you're hanging on for. And my mom surprised me with one more statement:

I'm hanging in there for you guys. You're going to need me. I joked with her about why, wondering what she meant, perhaps reading into it too far given the conversation we had. She said with our daughter coming home she wanted to be there for us.

My mom amazes me and surprises me at times. Thank you for that call mom.