Whatever will be, will be.
Wednesday, Apr. 17, 2013 3:03 PM

�Life is a beautiful magnificent thing, even to a jellyfish.� ― Charles Chaplin

I feel so dizzy today. When I close my eyes, it only makes it worse, like I'm going to topple over. I know it's not from lack of sugar. I've had my daily Dr. Pepper for the day. In fact, I think the only way I made it to work today without wrecking was from the caffeine boost. I wonder if it has anything to do with my left side. I've been feeling nothing but shooting pain up and down the entire side for the last month now. It takes all my willpower just to lift my left arm up high enough to toss my hair back into a ponytail these days. I never realized how much I rely on my left side before.

Speaking of hair, and this is a completely random thought, but my bangs have grown out to the point where it looks like my bangs are doing a Farrah Fawcett thing. Wouldn't be so bad if my hair was doing that, but my bangs? I mean, come on. It probably wouldn't be so noticeable if I took my hair out of the ponytail, but I struggled very hard to put my hair up today so I'm not about to take it out. Hmph!

Have I mentioned lately how much I love my new office? If I could, I'd live here. Just connect my bathroom/bedroom off to the side, pack up the kitties, and I'd have it made. My house drives me nuts. It's always so disorganized, and its like a trail of filth follows Kent and JR around. Honestly, I have no clue how I ended up in this situation. Was I completely blind to the incompatibility between the two of us, or was I so lonely or desperate that I felt I had to marry? I know I felt a lot of pressure around me to not be single. It's like you're an old maid if you aren't married by the time you're 25. Either that, or people assume you're gay (not that there's anything wrong with being seen as gay, because there isn't). If I could go back in time and do it all over again, I'd let people assume I was gay or that there's something horribly wrong with me because I'd much rather be alone and single than repeat the last five years of my life.

I know I was blinded by love, to a degree. There were happy moments in the beginning that made me feel like marriage was the right decision to make. I just think things moved too quickly. One minute I'm living alone in a beautiful completely organized and clean home, and the next minute I'm dealing with a child with severe issues, a husband with health and substance abuse addiction problems, and a home that's seen better days.

Yesterday, I came home from work to find Kent completely passed out on his couch. He was passed out the entire night. Not once did he wake up until around eleven this morning. For awhile I hoped that he had passed away in his sleep. I couldn't hear him snoring or breathing, so for a small amount of time last night, I felt a strange sense of freedom. Is that wrong of me? Sometimes I find myself writing his obituary in my head, and it takes me awhile to realize just how morbid that is. Anyhow, my sense of freedom disappeared when I woke up and found him with his head bent between his legs sitting in the garage. That's all he does, by the way. That's his entire existence. Some days I want to scream at him to do something with himself, but I have to bite my tongue because what would he do? He can't do a thing. His body has made him completely useless.

The scary thing is, all of the symptoms for "when death is near" are what I'm witnessing with Kent. The thing is, I've been witnessing these symptoms for the last two months now, and just when I think he's about to pass on and leave us behind, there he is... popping up out of bed to get water or hold Haley in his arms. It's almost like he's on the brink of death every other day, only to surprise the universe with some inner will to live. It's no longer a roller coaster ride for me to go through these ups and downs. In fact, I think when it really does happen, I will be numb or indifferent for awhile. Possibly in a state of disbelief because it actually happened.

The doctor told us there's nothing left he can do but treat Kent's cancer with chemotherapy. In other words, the chemotherapy will keep him alive, but there is no chance that it will kill off the cancer completely so that he can be in remission. It's because he has such a rare form of cancer: Zollinger-Ellison Syndrome. The worst part is, because of this syndrome, he has the condition multiple endocrine neoplasia type 1, which basically means that instead of just having a main tumor on his pancreas, he has multiple malignant tumors all over his insides. I know that people say, "there is always hope. With the right foods and a change in lifestyle, he could beat this." What they don't realize is that his cancer isn't like other forms of cancer. SInce chemotherapy can't cure him and he's too weak to have all of them (and there are thousands - literally) surgically removed, it's only curable by a complete sweep of all his intestines - and the survival rate for people who receive transplants - let alone every intestine in the body - is low. Last I heard was you were in the clear if you survived 6 years or more with a transplant. Before that, during those 6 years, you have to hope your body doesn't reject the newly implanted organ. Imagine having to do that with everything: your liver, your intestines, your kidneys, your stomach.... Not only was it much too expensive, and we were sick and tired of Kent being a guinea pig by this time, the fact that his chance of survival decreased ten fold with the transplant was enough to keep us from going in that direction.

I don't know why I'm talking about this today. I suppose it's because it's constantly in the back of my mind. Just gotta keep on keeping on, I guess. Whatever will be, will be.