I have been thinking about doing this blog for quite some time now. I'm not ambitious enough to write a book but have wanted to share my experiences of being a caregiver to my husband who has brain cancer in some way.
I also have never blogged before so bear with me as I try to figure it all out. I'm not sure where to start so I guess I'll start at the beginning for now though I am only going to tell the background of how we ended up here. After that I plan on telling more the daily/weekly stories of what is going on in our lives with maybe some references to things we've already been through.
My name is Anna and I am 40 years old. Is this where I thought I'd be at 40? Absolutely not! Hence the reason for the title of my blog.
My husband, Tim, was diagnosed with Grade 3 anaplastic oligoastrocytoma four years ago. New Year's Eve 2008 to be exact. He was 38 at the time. We have two daughters who are now 10 and 13. Up until about a year before his diagnosis, we were living a perfectly normal if not better than normal life. Tim was a perfect husband and father. Extremely gentle, always involved with the kids, he cooked & cleaned, he grocery shopped, he paid all the bills, and was always up for hanging out with our friends. Slowly over that year before diagnosis, he was doing less and less around the house, didn't really want to see any of our friends, and was angry at myself and the girls (as well as extended family) most of the time. He tried to pick fights with me constantly and seemed to be more content if he was able to get a rise out of me.
We (his parents, my parents, and myself) kept blaming it on his work. He did complain a lot about work being stressful and about fighting with his boss so we thought this was what was going on. Eventually by the end of that year, I had a long list of things that just "weren't right." These included, but weren't limited to, the anger already mentioned, headaches, very low tolerance to noise, being unwilling to help with anything anymore, and short term memory issues. We finally went to see his PCP where I shared this list. I was somewhat convinced it had something to do with his cholesterol meds as I had found some anecdotal evidence to support this on the internet. His doctor didn't think that was it but agreed to trial off of it to see. He also decided to send Tim for a cat scan "just to rule anything else out."
That appointment occurred on Tim's birthday (December 30th, 2008). Because his anger and yelling had gotten so bad at that point, right after the appointment, I went down the Cape to my parents house to join my children who were already there. We just needed a break from him for a while so planned on staying for Christmas break and then going from there. Tim went for his cat scan on the 31st by himself. I never expected in a million years the call I got that day from him saying they were transporting him to Mass General because they had found a tumor.
My dad and I immediately got in the car and drove to Mass General - not an easy feat considering it was the middle of a blizzard! It took us three and a half hours to get there! He was sent for an MRI which confirmed the tumor. Within days, he went in for his first of three craniotomies. The biopsy from that told us that it was cancer.
Imagine going from feeling like you're on the verge of divorce due to all of the unexplained anger and yelling, and now you find out your husband has cancer and you have to drop all of those unresolved emotions and step up to the plate to take charge of his care. It has been a rollercoaster these last four years. I've been home with him full time for about a year now and life is never just even keeled anymore.
I'm going to stop here for now but will try to blog at least once weekly about what we are going through at the time and hopefully fill in some of the gaps over time as well.
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