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People always look so sympathetic when you tell them you survived stage four cancer. Most are inspired and amazed as you explain that you had no family close to lean on and how difficult the treatments were. And with me, in my head, I’m always like, “Oh yeah, that’s right, stage four cancer is a big deal.” And I start to remember the pain and the waning quality of my life as the combination of chemotherapy and daily radiation brought death into my infested body. How I couldn’t swallow or think or eat or smile as my spirit lay dormant and dying in the depths of my gut, and I entertained leaving the world as a suitable substitute to those shitty treatments. And every time I catch it, the fact that a horrifying, life-threatening episode in my life doesn’t even register, I wonder how insanely painful your life must have to be when an all-encompassing battle with stage four cancer seems to slip your mind.
Then it dawns on me, I don’t have to wonder. I already know.
Whatever souls are made of, hers was made for mine.
Jen is the same way. We marvel at the fact that most couples would find this earth-shattering. Don’t get me wrong, it is. But we somehow always viewed the cancer and the treatments as simply something we had to do. Like paying taxes, or switching careers, or spending 3 weeks with your in-laws. No one looks forward to it, but you suck it up and move on. Jen and I are built like that. Roll with the punches is an unspoken rule. But looking back on it, these moments were no cake walk. Struggling through the winter of 2012 was daunting, full of moments when I wanted to give up. Full of moments where Jen would bare her teeth and anchor firmly within the opposing forces of both deep sympathetic nurturing and kicking my ass into high gear. Often at the same time.
If my aches were unyielding or my liquids wouldn’t stay down, she would love me, she would clean up all my messes and she would try to make me comfortable in spite of the hateful words that poured from my lips. If I ever said I didn’t want to keep going, that it was too much, she would sternly and unequivocally let me know that I was not only a “selfish son of a bitch” but that I was being weak and, in fact, “sounded like a pussy.” Both approaches meant the same thing, and, as always, they were thoughtfully used at exactly the right moments to inspire the desired result. Whether I was being coddled or kicked in the pants, it was understood completely and deeply that I was needed and I was loved and we were in this together no matter what the outcome.
These moments were full of both sorrow and extreme joy. And every time we tell someone about the trips twice a day to the hospital – one to get radiation and the other to get infused with water – or how I pumped liquid Vicodin into my stomach through a feeding tube in order to talk or how my heart would ache as I sat next to the patients who had weeks to live, the response was always the same. Something about how tough I am and how strong and how lucky. I just don’t see it that way exactly but get why some people do.
Because in my head, I simply utter, “If you only knew.”
The badass of this story.
The truth is, my wife is the badass of this story. It was Jen who was in her third trimester, Jen who not only had an infirm, withering pile of skin and bones for a husband, but also a baby under two who was trying desperately to figure out why her daddy was slowly fading away. I didn’t smile, I had no energy, and whether it was clothing or blankets or the people I loved, I didn’t want to be touched. This strong, unshakable woman not only pack-muled me all over God‘s creation, but she made sure we ate, the bills were paid and all my needs were kept straight. And although I was extremely volatile and miserable, she never complained even when tears would fall uncontrollably down her determined face. She is my hero, my angel, my salvation. I often joke about how all I had to do was lay there and take it, it was Jen who did all the work. But it’s true, and she is a real person and not an exaggerated character in my story.
In every way you can possibly imagine, I owe this woman my life, my loyalty and my very soul. Three things that quite possibly only have value because she is present. I have no idea how tough it really was to carry the burden of the physical side of that journey, but if the shoe was on the other foot, I don’t know if I could bear to watch my wife lose 40 pounds like some starving victim in a concentration camp and tell her it’s all going to be over soon. I love her more than most people understand, and my deepest regret is that Kyle Houston is the best she got. She deserved better than me but couldn’t be more needed or loved by anyone in this lifetime. Maybe it’s a trade-off?
Jen wasn’t the only one riding this out until the wheels fell off.
And Harper, my daughter, was such a trooper through all of this. Although she is definitely Daddy’s girl, she has Jen’s spirit and tenacity. During the times when the pain in my throat was excruciating and swallowing liquids was my only task, Harper would hold the cup of water and the straw in her tiny hands and not leave me alone until I took a sip. She was precious, and sweet and relentless beyond her years as if she knew what I could take and when it was too much. She pushed the envelope, not like a boot camp instructor but more like a mother who understood that tough love and time were the only prescriptions that would fix what ailed me.
There is this memory imbued indelibly in my mind’s eye, like a rare work of art, that speaks equally to everyone and yet only to me of my devoted daddy-caretaker. Every time I was being fed with a gravity bag, through a surgically reamed-out hole just below my heart, she would stand there holding the tube with one hand, sucking her two middle fingers on the other hand. A baby by age, with less than two years of attachment to her daddy, standing brave and strong, letting me know that her mother wasn’t the only one who would ride this out until the wheels fell off.
There would be no way to separate us now.
In so many ways our family pulled together and created bonds that we could never have had any other way. It was literally just the four of us—Mckenna riding shotgun in mama’s belly, and I will always hold dear the final memories of this chapter in our lives. I drug my pale and weakened body down the parking lot stairs and up to the Kaiser birthing room where Jennifer braced herself for the pain and the beauty of childbirth. I can’t speak for my courageous wife, but to me the whole episode was a perfect ending to such a tumultuous time. The birth of Mckenna Lynn Houston would forever become the landmark in all our minds that it was not only over but the healing would now begin. All the nurses were so impressed with Harper, although in the beginning they kept asking if we could call someone to pick her up.
“It’s not a good idea once mommy starts showing pain,” they all repeated.
But nobody knew, how could they, that our family was different. That our family was destined to do EVERYTHING together. No matter what the event. They had no idea what the three of us had weathered over the past couple of months and there would be no way to separate us now.
So we confirmed it wasn’t against the rules, assured everyone that Harper wouldn’t cause a problem, and politely ignored the advice that clearly applied to someone other than us. My body was frail, struggling to produce platelets as my final chemo treatments were only a couple of weeks earlier. But I have never felt quite so safe or stress-free, lovingly positioned next to Harper on a foldout couch in the delivery room as we lay spooning and watching Sponge Bob Square Pants.
And there, in the background, trying desperately to hide her pain and agony, my wife gave birth to our baby.