Ellie Watson

English 102

Unit 1 Essay

Marlan Smith

9/24/2019

Revision: 12/11/2019

One Phone Call Away From A New Reality

During the spring semester of my freshman year of college, my mom was diagnosed with

breast cancer. When that call came in I was sitting in my dorm room with a couple friends

studying for a test. We often get so comfortable in our own reality, but forget that tomorrow

everything could change because of something we don’t expect.

A normal weekend going home to visit my parents would usually mean I got home on

Friday night around dinner time. On Fridays my family always watches a movie and eats copious

amounts of popcorn, and the younger kids usually fall asleep in the living room. Then we all

wake up Saturday morning and start working. Living on a farm means 7:30 AM counts as

sleeping in extremely late. Some of us would clean the house, and the rest of the family would

take care of the animals, yard, fix fence, etc. I always grew up doing outside work with my dad

because I was the oldest and able to do the farm chores and drive the tractor. Sundays were a day

we always use as a rest day. We’d go to church as a family, come home and eat leftovers for

lunch, most of us would take naps, then we’d make something really good for dinner. Mom was

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always so good at making home cooked meals every night, except sometimes I would cook on

weeknights. On Sundays, dad always made dinner. It usually was something creative and

different. Needless to say, dad’s creative and different cooking escapades weren’t as welcome

smelling up the house during the cancer treatments.

Soon after my mom’s diagnosis, what I considered to be “normal” began to look very

different. Priorities were different, there were outward signs of the disease in her body, the house

looked different. Everyone was settling in to this “new normal” as much as possible. Before the

words breast cancer became a significant part of our reality, my mom was awake everyday at

5:00 AM, she would read, workout, and go on with the day. The specific type of cancer she has

is called Metastatic Invasive Lobular Carcinoma. The most common risk factors include things

like; heavy drinking, smoking, obesity, living a sedentary lifestyle, and so on. Clearly, she did

not fit the bill. Now, I would come home on a Friday night to find mom asleep on the couch,

with a gray and white sherpa blanket. My mom also used to have gorgeous thick brown hair.

Now my mom lays on the couch with no hair. No eyebrows. No eyelashes. Chances are we are

lucky if she was able to eat four bites of dinner. She now lived in pajamas, not jeans and a t-shirt

or zip up hoodie like in the past.

The house was unusually quiet. Usually my parent’s home is full of noise from kids

laughing, people walking around, popcorn popping, and the occasional arguing because siblings

do what siblings do, right? There is no noise from my younger brother attempting to play

football in the living room only to have mom catch him before he almost breaks another lamp.

Instead, they were doing things like reading quietly on the couch across the room from mom.

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Usually I would come home from my college dorm smiling, laughing, and happy to see

everyone. Now my dad and three younger siblings faces are stoic and it looks as if everyone is

holding back their tears constantly. On the kitchen counter, there were pills, lots of vitamins, and

so many things that hadn’t been in the past. There were anti nausea and headache pills to

counteract the gnarly effects of chemotherapy. Looking back I know being present is what

mattered most, but being present in a reality so different from “normal” was a gut wrenching

feat.

My mom was always a servant at heart. She was always giving, volunteering, and being

present. Now, she had to learn to say no and to step away from the endless number of things she

was the leader of despite being what some would refer to as, “just a stay at home mom”. We

grew up going to a little tiny church in the next farm town away, and to say the least the choir

was pitiful. There was a sweet little old lady who always played the piano, and no one to carry

the tune. Who is the first to volunteer always? My mom. Another thing I always remember her

doing is at my little school she would volunteer to help cook hot lunch and coach sports teams.

When your school is so small your graduating class has a total of six, you know volunteer means

volunteer, there was no pay involved. It was hard for us all to see her active, volunteering spirit

stuck still on the couch so sick.

On Saturdays before cancer came and hit our family like a freight train, my siblings

would race to get their chores done so they could have friends over, go to sleepovers, or

whatever they wanted. Sometimes we would have friends or extended family over for dinner.

Not so much anymore, we were so blessed that people took such great care of us but during the

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hellacious months of chemotherapy, radiation, a round of sepsis, and a few day hospitalization,

people would drop dinners off and leave. Our home got to be lonely at times. Nobody wanted to

intrude, or bring germs around that could make mom more sick. Usually we would go to friend’s

homes instead of them coming to ours.

One reality can become another in the blink of an eye. After the first dose of

chemotherapy was given just a short week after we got the news, weekends were never the same.

The house that used to be full of laughter and people was now filled with medications and

uncomfortable silence. If cancer taught me one thing, I’d say go be present with your family

now. Ditch your smartphones at the dinner table and learn to just be present. I remember so

many people saying “make memories with her”, or “take this time to just be present”. Honestly,

once cancer treatment starts, it is too late for quality time to always be enjoyed. We can choose

to live everyday like it may be our last, or we may live a future of regret.

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