Last night I found out that my aunt is dying. Or might be. She has pancreatic cancer, and is barely functioning. She's been really sick for over a month now, and nobody told us. Granted, over time we've become more distant as a family. She's a pretty self-involved person, but that doesn't change the fact that I love her and she is my aunt. My father's only sister. The mother of my cousins, most of whom don't talk to me these days, but that's a story for another time. And now my cousin tells my mom that she's in the ICU, hospitalized, on a respirator. What? For how long? How long has she been sick and nobody told us?
Is it fair that I'm angrier than I should be upset? I mean, I'm sad, hollow, almost, in that I can't even fathom that this woman who is so out there, so energized to the point we'd call her a little bit crazy, is laying there in a hospital bed, not able to move, completely bloated and beyond repair. But I'm pissed. Really pissed that nobody told us. Maybe I'm trying to stay in denial that she could really be that sick. Maybe I'd rather be angry than sad. I don't know, but I just don't think it's fair that my father has to see his sister like this, without even knowing it could be coming. For him to have to think back, like I did last night, to the last time he saw her looking like herself, and know that she may never look that way again. How fair is that?
This sucks. Plain and simple. My aunt may be dying. And it's not fair. As crazy as she is and has been, she's my aunt. She's young, she beat breast cancer. She's not supposed to have this battle happening inside of her right now. And it's all I can do to simply shake my head at it all and hug my daughter tightly to my body.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Comments are like air to a writer.
So please - say something - help me BREATHE!