What we did on our summer vacation, or…

Wild blueberries in the woods, August 2014 (photo by Laura)

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…life since my last post, on April 9th.

On April 11th, Tom had a biopsy for prostate cancer, after concerning results from his PSA test and then a physical exam. On April 13th, his father had a severe stroke and was close to death for several weeks. On May 9th, Tom got his diagnosis of prostate cancer which came as a shock no matter how prepared we thought we were, and surgery was scheduled for July 3rd, with a six-week recovery period. Given the sharp rise in his PSA, the biopsy results and his Gleason score, surgery rather than any other alternative therapies seemed prudent. The good news is that the pathology report was clear and the cancer seems to have been confined to the prostate, which is the best news we could have hoped for. But it’s also surgery whose consequences include complications such as incontinence (enough that many men refuse to undergo what can be life-change surgery), and we’re dealing with those now. If you or a loved one are dealing with prostate cancer and have any questions, feel free to email me (email address at left). I will say right now: get your PSA tested, especially if there’s a family history, as there was in this case going back at least several generations. Some relatives haven’t been tested, which we can’t fathom. It’s a simple blood test.

My father-in-law’s stroke has been much more complicated and much less hopeful. While he is no longer near death, as he was in the first weeks — so much so that his sons and some of the grandchildren built a casket for his cremation — he remains unable to stand or walk, and the stroke combined with his Alzheimer’s (and his Alzheimer’s might well have been brought on by two earlier strokes) has wreaked havoc with his memory and his speech, which especially at the end of the day can descend into gibberish. He’s no longer the husband, father, and grandfather he was, which has been a profound blow to each of us. He moves into the nursing home later this week. More bossy advice: make sure you, and the elderly parents in your life, have personal directives (living wills) and powers of attorney in order; if you need a thorough form for a personal directive, I highly recommend this one for its specifics. And talk about the details with each other and your kids. We have talked a good deal about what makes a good life, what makes a life worth living, and what we each think about so-called heroic measures.

My mother-in-law and I are dealing with somewhat similar situations, 25 years apart, though for her there will be no recovery. She is dealing with the loss of her husband, because, in her words, he’s not the man he was and “I lost him several months ago”. And instead of eagerly anticipating our 20th wedding anniversary or a possible one week holiday to BC in June, as we had hoped, we were instead driving to dates for bone scans and pre-surgery appointments. Either way, at 50 or at 75, the prospect, and reality, of losing the love of your life is considerable, and overwhelming.

We’ve had some highs since things started going wonky — Daniel’s 15th birthday and my 50th at the end of April, Laura passing her road test to get her driver’s license in June and her 17th birthday, as well as the most recent nifty progress on the house (the walls are up) in early July, just before Tom’s surgery; however, one of the hardest things Tom ever had to do was put away his tool belt and hammer, knowing it would be several months before taking them up again. The kids have stepped in and stepped up to do all sorts of work. At the beginning of June, Laura started a full-time job in town, to which she’s been driving herself since late June; it was a relief to head to the hospital in the big city knowing that the kids could cope with the farm and house on their own, without taxing the extended family’s resources any more than they already have been. The boys started haying a few days after Tom got home from the hospital, doing their work and his cheerfully without any complaints, with Tom supervising from the truck or a chair at the edge of the field. The boys have also been planning their “farm diversification project” — more sheep, some goats, and some pigs. Davy has been using Google Maps to plot how many fence posts they need to cross-fence some pasture for more livestock. The kids all went to 4-H camp and had a collective ball. We picked wild blueberries after we dropped them off and after we picked them up — three ice cream pails full (I think this is a western Canadian measure — I checked a plastic lid and it says “4 litres”, so we have 12 litres, eight of which I’ve turned into jam, blueberry muffins, and blueberry crumb cake, which lasted not quite 12 hours in this house).

But we’re all here. A little worse for wear and in dire need of a vacation or three, but still here.

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