Stomach On Its Head

That moment when you call your cancer-fighting son into the bathroom to get in his detox bath and you notice hives. That's the moment your stomach hits the floor and starts convulsing. You hold it together on the outside because you just can not let them know anything is wrong. You get them situated and quickly jump online to find the side effects of the drugs that were just pumped or injected into him hours before.

Sure enough, "hives" is a side effect. Now you know you MUST call the after hours phone number that you were drilled about and even forced to sign your freedoms over on one the millions of papers you've had to sign. So, they KNOW you know you must call this number. But that means we'll be sent immediately CHOC... right? Turns out, no. No we do not need to push the boundaries of lawlessness to get our child into the CHOC ER. We need to give him Benadryl and watch him.

Thankfully I had already monitored his breathing, checked his temp, and observed a happy, energetic, playful Dempsey. Granted, his injection site is aching more than it has but this is the third time that thigh has had a needle stabbed into it releasing toxic chemical into his fragile body... so... yeah... I would be aching too!

In all other respects, besides the hives, he is "fine". I can here him messing with Sawyer, mimicking Wreck it Ralph (Qbert), messing around with me during oil time, etc. All happy as a clam. Praise God.

My nerves? Oh, I have them! I can feel where every single one of them begin and end. Some of them are even in a mosh pit at the party Adrenaline is throwing... without my permission, nonetheless.

I hate this feeling. The feeling of being drugged without your consent by your very own body because of the love for your sick offspring. The feeling of helplessness. The feelings of fear and panic. All these feelings, moshing around inside me. I've never wanted to be an ostrich as much as I do now... since the cancer word entered our lives. I just want to stick my head in the sand.

So, please forgive me when I'm a tad bitter that life is "normal" for you. That your entire family is "healthy". That you get to go on vacation "as planned". That you get to celebrate your child's birthday with your WHOLE extended family in a PUBLIC place with not a thought about germs or crowd control. Seriously, please forgive me. Most days I am happy, elated even, that life is going as it should be for you. But there are days... moments... like today/ tonight where jealousy takes over and shoots off a canon of bitterness over every social media post, photo, normal experience y'all are having while we are... not.

Sawyer was saying good night to me just now. As I pulled him in for a tighter hug, I had to hold back tears. He's "healthy" and his world is made so much smaller because Dempsey has cancer. Sawyer is an extrovert and is forced into introvert living. I look at him and sense his soul changing. I'm so afraid I'm failing him. But what can I do? It's super hard on Dempsey to see Sawyer go off with friends. That makes it harder on Sawyer to go. But he needs to go. The space and separation from Dempsey is good for him and the experience with friends is good for him. But Dempsey is left at home, sad. When Dempsey does get to see friends it's in a super-controlled environment, for a short amount of time, with a prep session for the friends about him being "accessed"... if he is at the time.

It's exhausting. Trying to balance everything. It's no wonder people throw their hands up, curse, and just blindly walk the cancer journey that the "professionals" have deemed "best". I just can't be that person. I will not let this cancer hold any part of Dempsey ransom!! He is worth more than the "best" medicine has to offer. He deserves to THRIVE through cancer and his childhood. He deserves to not worry about a secondary cancer popping up like an unwelcome, unwanted weed in his garden of life! That is why I'm exhausted... because it is constant work and worry making sure he is taken care of.

Of course I've considered whether or not lunch at a restaurant was a possible cause. I've considered the fact that I didn't get much aloe vera juice in him yesterday as a cause. I've considered all my short-comings as a possible cause. I KNOW it's the drugs!!! I KNOW they did this to him. I know this will happen to him again. People tell me it's going to get worse too. Dear Lord... worse? How do function when that happens?

Totally unrelated but adding to my anxiety is the fact that husband missed out on an all-staff meeting, lunch, and photo op because this mommy just cannot handle watching Dempsey get injected with poison. Infused is a little different... there's no added trauma. Still poisons but less physical trauma. It's the trauma part that is a wall for me. Guilt. Oh the guilt.

PLEASE JUST PRAY AS YOU FEEL LED. I have no strength to list all the ways we need prayer. God knows it all. I rest in that for this part of the post.