The beginning of the end

When I first learned that my grandmother had pancreatic cancer in 2008 I had no idea what an impact her disease would have on my life. Of course, I knew that it was a death sentence for her the second my mom told me the news. My mind immediately fast-forwarded to an indefinite time in the future where she would not be and to say I was devastated would be an understatement. I remember living in a haze for weeks after I heard the news and it was almost like I had gotten news that she had actually died. I took a few extra days off from work and went home immediately to be with her. We sat at her breakfast table the morning after I arrived and looked at her lab values and scan results. Just a pharmacist and a nurse looking over some poor soul's unfortunate turn of events....tumor markers are low...that's good..."possible evidence of lesion on the liver"...what does this mean?...is it metastatic?...LFTs look good so it must not be too advanced in the liver...do you think it could actually be metastatic breast cancer instead of pancreatic cancer?...breast cancer is curable...this conversation was not painful for me. It was almost like I was back in school looking over a patient case and I was able to discuss these things without any emotion. What was painful for me was how she made a point to get up that morning and fix biscuits and gravy for me because she knew her gravy was my favorite. Every bite was excruciating and with each one I could feel a little bit of her slip away down into the inescapable pits of my stomach and my mind.

Spending time with her became extremely painful. I would wonder to myself if it would be the last Christmas I would spend with her or if it would be the last time she would come visit me at my house or if we would ever go to a restaurant again together. I was not able to stop my mind from always going to the worst possible thoughts. Chloe will forget about her, any other children I have will never have the chance to know her, the majority of my life will be spent without her. I can't figure out why the mind enjoys to continue torturing you when you're already in your worst imaginable mental hell. Thinking about terrible things seems to breed more terrible thoughts and it's a vicious circle.