Cancer sucks.
We all know that. We also all know from reporting from agencies like the Cedar Rapids Gazette, Iowa Capital Dispatch and others, Iowans have more instances of cancer than other states in the nation.
For the past two years, my sister Andrea has been battling ovarian cancer. She’s had countless chemo treatments, only interrupted when she encounters another bout of COVID or other illness going around. She’s had infusions. She’s had a benefit to help defray some of those costs last September.
In late June of this year, she and her husband made the decision to stop chemotherapy. The treatment wasn’t putting a dip in her cancer any further, which has spread to other parts of her body and was only wearing her body out.
As she puts it, she is in constant pain and she is trying to do what she can to prolong the time she has with her children and have more happy memories before the inevitable comes.
For the longest time, I’d operated on the “no news is good news” credo.
Monday of the shortened holiday week, that came crashing down, when Andrea let as many people know as quickly as possible the bad news. She’s continuing infusions to slow the spread of cancer currently, and she will continue fighting as long as she can. The next eventual stops on this journey are hospice and end of life, but how far out those are, I’m still uncertain.
As my former college roommate and now pastor Ed Pease noted on hearing what I’m dealing with (he himself dealing with the aftermath of flooding in his congregation at Rock Valley) – I’m probably going to be going through a complicated grief as I start coming to terms with the possibility of outliving a sibling. It could still be months away, or it could spring up much sooner, but not having an end date, I’m probably going to experience several of those same grief emotions during the coming months.
I’m not going to lie that Monday after reading my sister’s post to family and friends, I was devastated. I did what I do when I encounter extremely bad news. I ate ice cream and put on some mindless television. And the next day I started reaching out to friends to help buoy my support as I go through this.
Dad is going to be up the week of July 22 through July 28, so I imagine I’ll be spending some time with family that week. I’m still focused on this community even when I’m not here as you all know. I just like letting my community know when I’m elsewhere and why.
Not So Sunny Side – Complicated grief on bad news
Nathan Countryman, Editor
July 11, 2024
About the Contributor
Nathan Countryman, Editor
Nathan Countryman is the Editor of the Mount Vernon-Lisbon Sun.