There are moments in a person’s life when everything suddenly pivots on a point, and you know immediately that life will never be the same again.
This month, I had one of those moments. In fact, I had more than one of those moments. It all started when my wife went to the doctor with some abdominal pain. The doctor suspected appendicitis, but that’s not what the CT scan found.
Instead, it was a tumor the size of a melon that had sprung up like a dark cloud inside her abdominal cavity.
That was on the 30th of August.
I wrote about the first few days of this journey and was overwhelmed by the kind messages that came in the form of comments and emails from people — complete strangers who were somehow offering their solidarity and support. Many people have asked for an update on my wife’s condition since that article, so here goes…
Fast forward one month to where we are today, the 30th of September. My wife has been in hospital for almost the entire month. She has had two rounds of emergency surgery — both times to save her life.
Another coffee in the hospital waiting room at midnight (photo by author)
This is a photo that I took as I sat in the waiting room at the hospital during the second of her surgeries. It was a six-and-a-half-hour marathon… and in this picture, I am waiting for the surgeon to phone me with news. She had already had a perforated bowel and sepsis (blood poisoning).
It was such a horrible thing seeing my wife in so much pain and not being able to do anything about it. I hate feeling so useless. I am a fixer of problems, but I was hopelessly out of my depth and had nothing to offer but my words and my hand in hers.
As I sat in the waiting room, the seconds seemed to stretch into eternity. Time took on a different quality, each passing minute carrying the weight of uncertainty and worry. The sterile walls and hushed conversations became a backdrop to my racing thoughts, my heart pounding in rhythm with the ticking clock.
When the surgeon finally called, every nerve in my body was on edge.
The surgery went well, and the tumors are out.
Tumors… plural.
Once they were inside, they found other tumors as well. And we now know that my wife has advanced stage 4 bowel cancer. The tumor on her ovary was a secondary site… the cancer had spread.
“No… you can’t see her tonight. She will be in the ICU and out of it until the morning. Go home and try to get some rest, and come back tomorrow.”
I’ve taken a few lonely walks in my time, but the walk from the hospital waiting room back to my car was one of the loneliest of all. The car park was eerily quiet — deserted, in fact — and the echo of my footsteps was a solitary soundtrack to the night.
The empty parking lot at 2 a.m. — just my car in the far corner (photo by author)
The drive home was a blur, the road stretching out before me, the world passing by in a haze of streetlights and shadows.
Arriving at an empty house, the silence enveloped me. The familiar spaces now felt foreign, as if they were holding their breath, waiting for her return—the empty bed, the untouched belongings, each one a reminder of her absence. The weight of loneliness settled in, a heavy companion in the quiet darkness.
The lingering question
I write for many reasons. I write to help people, to challenge people, and to entertain people. But I also write to process my own thoughts. And after all that has happened, I have many thoughts that I need to process and one lingering question…
Why?
Why did this happen to us? Why did my wife have to face such a devastating diagnosis? These questions echo through my mind, reverberating with a mix of disbelief, anger, and sorrow. It’s a natural response, I suppose, to search for some semblance of reason or meaning in the face of such adversity.
Then, in my more philosophical moments, I conclude that we are not unique or entitled to some extra level of protection by God. It’s silly that some Christians believe that they are somehow exempt from suffering, as if following the man who was brutally tortured and crucified would somehow lead to an easy life.
When we ruminate on the “why” question, we waste our energy.
Instead of seeking an elusive answer to “why,” I’ve decided it’s more important to focus on “how.” How will we navigate this journey? How will we support one another? How will we find strength in the midst of uncertainty? How will this situation make me into a more loving and compassionate human? And, most importantly, how will we make the most of the time we have left?
I’m reminded of the words of Viktor Frankl, who wrote, “When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” It’s a sentiment that resonates deeply with me now. We do not have control over the circumstances that brought us here, but we do have agency over how we will respond.
So, how we will respond?
We are going to be kinder to one another. We are going to throw caution to the wind and make up for lost time. We are going to make memories. We are going to cherish every sunrise, every shared smile, every small victory, and every moment of laughter.
We are re-planning that big family holiday that got canceled because of COVID. We are going to splash out and get some nice family photos done… before my wife starts her chemotherapy in a few weeks’ time.
They are going to throw everything at this cancer to try to prolong her life, and we are going to face it head-on with determination and hope. She is unbelievably brave and stoic, my wife — inspirational, in fact.
As for me, well… I’m trying to be a pillar of strength, but that doesn’t mean I am impervious to fear or sadness. I am holding space for my wife’s pain while doing my best to acknowledge and process my own.
Life is hard.
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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.
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You may also like these posts on The Good Men Project:
White Fragility: Talking to White People About Racism | Escape the “Act Like a Man” Box | The Lack of Gentle Platonic Touch in Men’s Lives is a Killer | What We Talk About When We Talk About Men |
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Photo credit: iStock.com