If I don't get it out, my head will explode

A year ago dad weighed 186 pounds with a little Buddha belly on his Filipino frame.  That was a few weeks before we found out he had stage IV lung cancer.  The journey from then to now has been something almost beyond my comprehension.  I was this very grounded, very practical, but very silly woman of 47.  Everything that I knew to be true in my life, all of my constants, have turned out to be anything but. 

I've never blogged before.  Writing a physical journal falls by the wayside.  It gets buried beneath the paperwork and schoolwork and newspapers or bills that wind up on the desk in my home office.  I'm going to give this a try.  I'm going to send my pain, frustation and fear as far away from me, into the universe, as I can to get it out of my head.

He lied to me.  My father, my hero, my most treasured friend lied to me.  "They're just going to put a scope down my throat."  He'd been having trouble swallowing over the summer.  Now everything tasted like a mouthful of pennies.  Okay, a bronchoscopy.  Maybe he's got some erosive changes from reflux.  Not a big thing.  Until.  Until the call from Aunt Jean to tell me it wasn't a bronchocsopy that was being performed, but a lung biopsy for a mass found in the left lower lobe of his lung.

The telephone call that came after went like this:
Me:  Hey, whatcha doing?
Daddy:  Nothin.  Reading the paper.
Me:  So how did the test go?
Daddy:  Oh, not bad.  My throat's a little sore.
Me.  Your throat's sore?  From a LUNG BIOPSY?
Daddy:  ........ I didn't want you to worry.

That's the thing.  He never wanted to cause worry or put anyone out by asking for help with anything.  He never wanted anyone to fuss over him, but he gave everything of himself to everyone else. 

So we moved to Cancer Land.  We started radiation therapy immediately.  We started chemotherapy in a dingy office with old recliner chairs, linoleum on the floor and a TV bolted to the wall.  The radiation wasn't too bad, but chemo kicked daddy's ass.  Hard.  The vomiting started almost right away.  I'd steel myself as he was sick then quietly take the basin away, clean and return it.  Mom retreated to the upper floor and stayed there for the next five months. 

That was the beginning of the end.  For him.  For me.  For our family.