Janet Update (and why it took a long time to publish this blog)

I was chatting with my Dad last night and I found myself commenting on writers block. It suddenly dawned on me why I was procrastinating on updating this blog. I was really having trouble finding good news to talk about. When its good news I have no problem telling you all the details. The writers block occurs when there is no good news. With the progression of Janets Ovarian cancer its not always good news. With that as an introduction let me update you on Janet's condition.

Janet went in for paracentisis on Tuesday at VGH. This was the first time she was drained at VGH and she was very pleased with the medical staff. She had a lady doctor from Ireland who actually did the procedure, which involves inserting a needle into her abdomen to drain fluid. Janet is naturally pretty anxious about this procedure and the bedside manner and compassion of the doctor and nurses have everything to do with how much Janet despises or tolerates the actual process. Karen Corcoran, who has made accompanying Janet for paracentisis her personal crusade since last May, accompanied Janet through entire procedure. The VGH medical staff drained about 2.95 litres of fluid from Janet and she was much more comfortable afterwards. Corco made sure that Janet got her standard celebration meal consisting of White Spot fries and large amounts of triple O sauce for dipping. By the time Janet got home on Tuesday afternoon all was well and after the excellent results from the last paracentisis I had high hopes for similar results this time. I was looking forward to a few days of getting lots of calories into her.

Unfortunately it was not to be. By Wednesday night Janet had thrown up much of what she had eaten. It was obvious that even though she felt more comfortable after the draining procedure, she was having almost as much trouble keeping food and calories down as before the procedure. It has been a struggle all week for Janet to keep any food down. Janet is incredibly thin and each calorie counts. For Janet to lose calories at this time is significant. The past few months have been a battle of calories. Calories retained equals winning, calories lost equals losing. This week we have been losing more than we have been winning.

So we are not getting the same "lift" from the procedure this time that we got last time. Janet is weaker and thinner and requires more assistance with daily living. I won't go into the details and lets not dwell on the bad stuff and lets move on to the good stuff.

We started with the home support staff this past week. We had a home care worker in all day Monday and 4 hours each afternoon on Tuesday through Thursday. This was great for me because I was able to leave the house knowing that Janet's care was in experienced hands. Its also good for Janet to get a rest from me. Janet also likes the back rubs she gets from the home support lady while she is having her bath. Apparently I am too rough (no kidding.) In addition to being able to do some leisurely grocery shopping I managed a bike ride around Stanley Park and was able to have lunch out with both my parents at the same time. It was all good.

Janet and I also spent some time last week getting various business affairs tied up and organized. One of the big highlights from those efforts was that the lovely Janet officially retired from TELUS at the close of business on Friday February 15th. This officially brought to a close a career with BCTEL/TELUS that spanned 38 and a quarter years. A true career achievement in anybody's books.

All of you who read this blog have supported Janet and I in many ways throughout the past 8 months. Your love, laughter, good wishes and fond memories have sustained us through many bad moments and we are both so very deeply grateful for that. I want to share a couple of things with you which I hope will help to sustain you in the years ahead. These are things that I have learned from the past 8 months while intimately sharing a life with the lovely and vibrant Janet.

The first is about our attitude towards death. Those of us who are healthy tend to view death from a healthy persons point of view. We naturally don't like the idea of dying because it will stop us from doing all the stuff we like to do, eating, drinking, laughing, loving, thinking, talking, partying, playing etc. When you are really sick though, death is something else. Very sick people aren't doing any of the fun stuff anyway and just living requires a great deal of effort. It also involves enduring some pain and discomfort even if this aspect is well managed. Its worth stopping to remember that death to a very sick person is not like death is to those of us who are fortunate enough to be healthy. I think if you take the worst you ever felt physically in your entire life multiplied it by two and then asked yourself if I had to live like that for the rest of my life how would I feel about dying. You would be approaching how a very sick person feels about death.

I know that Janet does not look forward to death but she does not fear it either. She will be ready for it when it arrives. Please remember that in the days ahead.

This brings me to another important thing I have learned. Death is a certainty, as one of my friends father once said to him "John, none of us are going to get out of this alive." That is most definitely true. We should all live our lives as though each day were our last, because it may be. One of the reasons why Janet does not fear death is because she has really lived her life. Janet grasped at every opportunity to have fun, to eat, drink, talk, laugh, love, think, party and play that came along. She never said no to a single one. We should all do this, because it really smooths out the road on that last mile of the journey.

Okay enough of this really deep stuff.

We are taking things one day at a time around here right now. There is a chance that if you have a scheduled visit with Janet coming up it will get cancelled. We are going to close off non family visits to Janet after this coming Monday and Tuesday. The core support team (and you know who you are) will be an exception. As life has become more of an effort for Janet the reality is it is more difficult for her to have visitors and I also think that as she is not as much fun to look at and be with as she used to be, its harder on the visitors as well. Those of us who deeply love her do not care how she looks or how much fun she is to be with, our cups already runneth over in that department.

If you have not visited Janet and feel it is something that you must complete in your life's journey please send me an email (marknden at gmail dot com) and I will try and arrange something. I would encourage you first though to picture Janet in your minds eye in one of her finest stylish outfits, wearing a pair of her killer shoes and her perfect white smile contrasted against exactly the right shade of red lipstick and ask yourself if you really need to have that image changed. I know that one day I will be re-inserting that image back into my minds eye and living with it forever.

Thank you for being there for us.