If I Could, I Would Shrink Myself...And Remove Whatever Makes You Hurt But I am to Weak to be Your Cure

Last Thursday Mom and I got up bright and early and hit the road down to Orange County. I posted on my Facebook that I was going to be in town and got a few well wishes from friends to have fun while I was there and a teasingly angry email from my best guy friend from high asking why he hadn't been informed that I would be around and that we should head out and get a drink together. I hadn't made any solid plans to see friends, though, because the reason we were in town was not a fun one (it never seems to be these days!)- we were there because my Grandma recently found a large lump in her breast that turned out to be cancerous and she was being rushed in to surgery. She had had breast cancer about 8 years ago and on the other side, but this cancer is completely different.

Friday morning we got up and were at the hospital by 7am. Grandma seemed in good spirits considering and went in for surgery at 10:30. The doctor came out when it was done and Mom went over to see him. I thought he would just give her a general debriefing like I had seen other doctors come out and do with other patients' families so I opted to stay with our stuff and hold on to our seats. When Mom got over to the doctor, he directed her in to a small office and closed the door-"Ah, shit" I thought, this can't be good news. And it wasn't. Grandma had made it out of the surgery fine, that was one hurdle, but the bad news was that the cancer had spread in to both lymph nodes they had checked so they had had to remove the other ones and were going to process those to see if the cancer had spread.

Friday afternoon Grandma was pretty groggy, but not in a lot of pain because they had her on the good drugs. When we returned on Saturday morning, Grandma didn't remember that we had been there before and after her surgery the day before and she didn't think she had had the surgery yet, either. She told us that she was very unhappy because if she had had the surgery, she had heard it wasn't her doctor who had performed it, but an associate (which wasn't obviously the case) and she told the case worker who came in to the room to check on her just that (which we then had to correct). She was released Saturday afternoon and went from being in a lot pain and bitchy to being nice, happy Grandma who snuggled on the couch with me (a first in about 10 years since I am not the favorite granddaughter I once was since I am not skinny and Grandma has extreme disdain for anyone who is overweight) when she had taken some vicodin!

We left on Sunday afternoon to head to Cambria where we stayed the night to decompress after such a stressful weekend and Mom and I drove in two separate cars because Grandma decided she didn't want her car anymore and we took it so that Dad could sell it and make sure she got a fair price for it. It's a good thing she decided she didn't "want" to drive anymore because legally she can't. After getting in to two accidents in two consecutive Tuesday nights and taking out a total of 5 parked cars, her license has been revoked and her insurance is dropping her. We were just really fortunate that Grandma didn't hurt herself or anyone else.

If you ask me, this getting old thing doesn't sound like too much fun! I am feeling really badly for my Mom,too, because she is getting all of my Grandma's drama dumped on her. I don't mean to make it sound like we are cold, heartless people-the cancer stuff is a not drama at all and we are concerned for her about that, there is just a TON of other stuff that is drama, plain and simple, and, thus, avoidable that I'm choosing not to air on here that my Mom has to deal with in regards to Grandma all the time and it is definitely taking a toll and wearing Mom down.

We don't know the results of the other lymph nodes they removed yet, but we should know by the weekend so I'm sending some positive energy in to the universe that the cancer hasn't spread and I'd appreciate any positive energy or prayers you could send up for her, too.