Everything is so surreal.
A month ago, he was fine.
Now, he lays there, suffering.
Five weeks ago, my father, Al, was looking forward to playing softball with the guys from work. Out of the blue, he started having abdominal pains. Thinking he had an ulcer, he was careful about what he ate and popped a few Tums. A week went by, and nothing got better.
I was staying at a friend's for the night when my mother, Sandy, called to tell me she took my father to the emergency room. The doctor was worried it was his gall bladder.
What the hell does a gall bladder do, anyway?
Tests, tests, and more tests. It's not his gall bladder. Good. We don't know what it is yet. Bad. It's probably not cancer, my mom tells me.
Last Wednesday, I stayed home sick from school. My mom calls to let me know she received some test results. Finally. She doesn't want to tell me, she wants to wait until later.
"Just tell me this, is it cancer?" I ask, concerned.
She pauses. This is bad. "Yes."
Fast forward to 6pm that evening. Family "meeting." Dad's nodding off on the couch again while Mom lets me in on the details.
Metastatic liver cancer, she says. I don't know what that means, I say.
The cancer spread to his liver. We don't know from where yet.
There's just too much mystery for me. I need to know everything. They agree to tell me everything they know, as soon as they know it.
PET Scan on Monday morning. Results on Tuesday.
They've found the primary site of the cancer.
It's in his lungs.
My father quit drinking 20+ years ago, and quit smoking a month before Christmas.
If there is a god, I want to punch him in the face right about now.
