Amanda’s Story
Try never to speak phrases like, “My mom is annoying!” , “My mom is calling me again!”, well in my presence anyway. Some might not believe me but I have never used those phrases, even before my mother was diagnosed with that evil disease, Cancer. I love her, I miss her, and every single day is surely a battle without her. My beautiful mother, Barbara, was first diagnosed with Colon Cancer in her early 50s, then a few years later came along Lung Cancer, and she smacked both of them out of the way. It was not easy for her, for any of us, but that chemotherapy and all the other medical help did its job during those extremely painful times. “Mom or Barbara (depending on who said it) is going to be alright, right?” was something that constantly came out of the mouths of all of us, especially mine and my sister’s.
Mothers are our angels, well many of them. I recently, about a year ago, gave birth to my first child, my son Jason, and honestly, I yet to believe that I can even compare to my own mother. Besides being her daughter, she was also my best friend, my favorite teacher, the #1 psychologist for a number of her family members and friends. You may ask me “Why was she so good at all this?”, and my answer to that, not that I can fully understand how anyone could be this good, would be “Barbara has faced it all.” I cannot possibly explain in detail every traumatic event that she had experienced throughout her life, but I will mention that before the cancer, she had to overcome the loss of her son, my brother, 25 years old, and her husband, my father, 41 years old. I hear often and believe that there is nothing worse in this life than losing your child. Therefore, after losing her son, it did not make it any easier to open her door to policemen one night informing her that I, her daughter, was in a horrific car accident with a low chance of survival. I survived after multiple surgeries, including surgery for a traumatic brain injury. I soon returned to college, work, and life altogether. Mom, who was by my side every minute of every day during this experience, deserves a great deal of credit and praise for this specific event.
There are too many amazing qualities about Barbara to describe, but the most admirable characteristic was the love that she had for everyone else. She never ever wanted anyone to waste his or her time feeling sorry for her, but only she thought that would be a waste of our time. We wanted to know about how she felt instead of continuously crying about our own minor problems to her, and when we did cry to her over the silliest occurrences in our own lives, she helped us solve them. Mom never used the line “Get over it”, but instead worried to herself about making us feel better and helping us to overcome anything that we were experiencing. For example, when I called her to cry over something like the pain from my wisdom tooth, which I did, at 30 years old, her response was “I’m picking you up right now and taking you to the dentist, and I’ll make sure that they make you feel better today.”
Colon cancer sucks and so does lung cancer, but Stage IV Pancreatic Cancer took her away from us on February 14, 2019. For a little more than three years, she kept this disease from us, and instead told us that she was visiting the hospital in New York, NY to rid the nodules on her pancreas. On some days, she even made sure we did not attend hospital visits with her. When we did spend time with her there, everything seemed just fine. One day she told us that the pancreas was clear and now they just have to rid the nodules on the liver. Did we really believe her or did we just make ourselves believe her? Who could imagine life without Barbara? She’s only 63 years old. Well she was 63 years old when she told us to come over to her house one day, January 10, 2019, to inform us that she can no longer receive chemotherapy due to the negative effects that it would only have on her. She said that she was going to be alright for a long time, but when she began to cry, something she rarely ever did in front of others, we knew that we may not have this beautiful woman, both inside and out, in our lives for much longer. Unfortunately, we were right.
After the day mom told us she could not receive chemotherapy anymore, her life went down hill, and of course so did our lives. Each day after she really did become worse. She told us that the hospital worked something out with another hospital in Bronx, NY so that she would not have to travel to Manhattan anymore. She lied. The truth was she was receiving hospice care. Talk about denial. There was no way that mom was leaving us. We need her. My newborn, who was due April 3, 2019, has to meet her. I could never imagine achieving anything in life without my mom, my best friend in the whole world, being right there next to me like she always was throughout my life. I can never even explain how difficult it was to find out that I was pregnant on August 7, 2018 and had to wait for my husband to come home to tell him first. I told my mom everything and she was always the first person to know.
As this woman was struggling, but fighting, while receiving hospice at home, she still made sure everyone else around her was not struggling. She never worried so much about herself, her own feelings. She only smiled when everyone else was smiling. Mom had to be rushed to the hospital on a cold day in February 2019. On that day, the priest entered the room to supply her with her last rights. I don’t even know what to say right now, because at the moment, that had to be a nightmare. It could not be real. Then, just moments later, she was brought to her own room, out of the ER. As the days passed, she maybe seemed okay, to us anyway. The only really positive detail about this horrific week was that she never forgot any of us. When she was awake, which was not too often, she said our names to us, so she was still there with us.
On Tuesday, February 12, 2019, an ambulance brought her, my sister, and me to a hospital in Bronx, NY, more of a hospice type of facility. Our thought of this particular place was that individuals are brought there at the end of their lives, but not mom. Mom was still going to beat this illness even though she was brought here. She got a bit worse on Tuesday, a bit worse on Wednesday, and Thursday night, Valentine’s Day, we lost her. We think that she passed on the specific holiday because she was and will always be our cupid, our definition of love.
Can I describe my life not without my mother? Not so much. Grief is difficult and definitely unexplainable. Very often, especially in the mornings, I say to myself, “I have to call my mom.” Some days I am so angry, others I am so jealous of others, especially women my age, 36, still having their mothers around, and other days, often, I just cry. I’m sorry to admit this, but sometimes, I am so jealous of hearing that others survive the cancer, but she did not. She fought, and fought, and fought some more, but cancer is brutal. Barbara beat colon and lung cancer, and lived with pancreatic cancer for a little more than three years. Talk about strength!
I’ll continue my life with my lovely son and the rest of my awesome family that help me fight this battle without her. Life is very painful, but it also is beautiful. Barbara taught me and my sister that. My sister feels the exact same feelings that I do and makes me feel a little less crazy, especially when I go crazy. Neither of us are at our best, but if mom could speak to us right now, she would be telling us that she is very happy, regardless if she is or is not, and that we better move on. I try hard to smile a little more and to be a little more thankful in this life, but I miss her. I miss her so much sometimes that I am unable to describe how I truly feel. I find myself constantly repeating, “Why her? Why you mom?”
Nobody expressed care, concern, and of course love better than my mother did to us. Life without her, her voice, smiles, laughs, and hugs is almost impossible to fully explain, but I’m sure a large number of you out there get it. As Harry S. Truman has said, “No one in the world can take the place of your mother.”