Everything is about balance, right? Something good, something bad.
Well, I had my good (the concerts) and now for the bad...
The cancer that my mother-in-law has is spreading very rapidly. It started in her lungs, spread to her spine and now appears to be in her bones and breast. A year was probably being awfully optimistic.
I'm feeling rather detached about the whole thing - not proud of that fact, but it's true. It's not that I'm being a bitch (which I am) or brave or whatever it's that it's easier for me to deal with one thing at a time. I have to help change her diaper, I go in and do it. It means that my husband doesn't have to and, regardless of whatever problems we may have right now, I don't think he should have to see things like that. I do what has to be done and then put it in a corner of my mind and get on with things. I'm a coper.
Mr Vanian is not a coper. He doesn't talk about it a whole lot but we both know the time is coming closer and neither of us have a freaking clue how to deal with this shit. When Dad died and when Rocky died other people took care of things. I just had to sort out my feelings and move on. Now, I have a feeling that a whole lot of the taking care of things is going to fall on my shoulders.
Not that I'm thinking about it. Just worry about it when it happens.
My husband has aged a lot over the past few months. In bad ways, sure, he looks older and he has white in his beard, but in good ways too. He does the dishes a few days a week and he cooks a two or three nights a week. He runs errands and does shopping when it needs to be done. If his mother wasn't dying, I know none of these things would have changed. Does that mean I'm glad she's dying? No, of course not.
Cancer is the thing that scares me more than anything else in the world. I've lost too many people to cancer (my sister-in-law, my uncle, my brother) to ever want to see anyone else suffer from it. But at least something good can come from her death, right? I don't think that's too callous a way of looking at it.
Speaking of cancer... You may know that my sister has been fighting it for a while now. Well, ornery bitch that she is (family trait) she's kicking its ass. (Thank the Gods.) Just to look on the bright side. Her middle daughter, though, has just had tests done recently... Like the tests I had earlier in the year... Checking for brain tumors. Well, luckily, I didn't have any brain tumors (and they swear my brain IS human - who knew?) so let's hope my niece's tests come back the same.
