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I can do this; I just have to stay strong…for the family.
“Miss Drayton do you understand what I’m telling you?” I nodded at the old man in the white lab coat with his sterile stethoscope hanging from his neck; I had never seen this doctor before this morning. He wrote something on his clipboard in chicken scratch, I had always wondered if they did that so that the patient couldn’t understand what the doctor was writing. He stood slowly slipping his pen into his chest pocket, “ Why don’t you take some time to tell your family, think, and just let it all sink in. Time is on our side right now so we’ll keep you here and I’ll be back tomorrow to discuss your options and let you meet the specialist I’m referring you to, okay?” My head was spinning and all I could do was take a deep breath and nod, five doctors in two days and it’ll be six out of three by tomorrow. The doctor patted me lightly on the shoulder and walked out of the private hospital room and closed the door behind him.
I pulled my fleece lined jacket tight against my sides and hugged myself for a long while just taking deep breaths and staring at the floor before my eyes eventually traveled to my purse. I slowly dragged over the plain gray, sack like bag that contained my wallet, my IPhone, and some loose change that jingled in the side pocket. That jingle always annoyed my roommate when I walked in late to our small two-bedroom, one bath third floor apartment. I picked my phone out of the bag and cradled it in both hands before unlocking the touch screen and turning it to my recent calls list. “ICE MOM” was at the top of the list and I slowly pressed down on her name. The phone rang in agonizing slowness until I heard silence as my mother fumbled with her phone.
“Mom, I’m in the hospital…"
***
My family crowded into the private hospital room; I hadn’t realized that my siblings would be coming along as well. Lately I’d been a little lax on visiting my family since college started this fall and I felt guilty for keeping them in the dark about what I was about to tell them. My twin brothers occupied a corner of the room as they were messing about with the latex gloves like teenagers do and my three youngest sisters were all dressed alike in pink dresses and pigtails all under the age of ten. My mother and father were the last to arrive with baby James all a fuss between the two of them. Mom took a seat on the bed next to me while dad tried to entertain James with a pair of keys…that jingled.
Mom took my hands in her delicate pale ones, “We came as fast as we could honey, why didn’t you tell us you were put in the hospital a week ago when they admitted you.” I gave her a questioning look, and she waved it away, “I chatted up your nurse on the way up the elevator. Now tell us, why are you in here?”
I looked my mom in the eyes and then looked down at our hands and squeezed them slightly, “I met with my gynecologist about two weeks ago for my routine check-up and he found some…some anomalies in the tests he ran.” I took another shaky breath, “He took an ultrasound and found a cyst on my left ovary and…and he tested it to check if it was malignant. “ I looked up from our hands, “The test came back positive, I have…ovarian cancer.” One of my mother’s hands slipped from my grasp to cover her mouth and a tear fell from the corner of my eye but I continued on, pushing through the emotions running through my mind, “They think they might be able to remove my left ovary without having to perform a full hysterectomy but I won’t be sure until the specialist talks with me tomorrow.”
All noise had ceased to exist except for James and the damn jingle from the keys he kept halfway in his mouth and hand. I could tell my mother was trying to find something to say, wracking her brain for the right words to comfort me therefore, my father took charge of the situation. He ordered all of my siblings out of the room and into a waiting room down the hall and left the twins in charge of the others. He returned and moved my half catatonic mother to a chair and took the place she had vacated beside me.
I could see the lines in my father’s face deepen as he secured and arm around shoulders to hold me as the tears started to come. I may be twenty-three but my father always knew the best way to comfort me with his arms wrapped around me whispering assurances that everything would be okay…
 Sanity-In-A-Handbag · Tue Jul 24, 2012 @ 05:57am · 0 Comments |
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