Cancer Sucks, Part 3

My mom called me last night. It's definitely cancer. It's bad. The doctors are very discouraged. We won't know until tomorrow whether it's small-cell or non-small-cell lung cancer. He has a PET scan on Friday that will tell us if it's spread anywhere else other than his right lung.

My brother called me last night after he had talked to my mom. Hearing my older brother cry over the phone breaks my heart. We talked for a while - and that was good for both of us I think. Neither of us wanted to upset my mother any further, so I think crying to each other helped get that out.

We are extraordinarily close to our grandparents - we see them frequently, talk to them several times a week - and though we realize we're lucky to still have them, we still can't believe that one of them is so sick. He doesn't look sick. He was putting a new mailbox in at their house just two days ago. He played with MacGyver two weeks ago at my parents. We just took for granted that they were so healthy.

But then ... my grandmother on my dad's side stopped cancer treatments a year ago (for breast cancer) - and she's still around, doing ok. So you never know what can happen. But it's devastating news. Even though they are old ... it doesn't lessen how important they are in your lives or what a void they would leave if they weren't around. My pastor says to just take one day at a time. Tomorrow we'll know more than we know today. Next week we'll know even more. Take the news as it comes and try to be positive.

But again ... Cancer sucks.