Rewind

Last January we found out that the second line of treatment with a new chemotherapy drug to treat Mel's cancer had failed when they discovered that all the abdominal pain he was having was due to the fact that his tumor and infiltrated a large part of his liver but even more serious at the time, it had grown into his colon.  We had tests done and saw the surgeon. He recommended that rather than Mel having extensive abdominal surgery, we go ahead and have a stent put into the colon where the tumor was.  This was the same kind of stent used in heart attacks and what happens is the stent is deployed into the area of blockage, in this case Mel's colon, and then it expands to open up the blockage.  We had been so hopeful when he first started chemotherapy because the original chemotherapy drug he was on significantly shrank all of his tumors, then we had this huge setback, but believed this would be a good option.  Neither one of us wanted him to go through any major surgery.

This procedure was done on January 13, 2011.  When we got to Denver, Mel first had to have several liters of fluid to get his creatinine level under better control.  This is an enzyme that indicates kidney function, and since Mel had only one kidney, we had to be extra vigilant with this.  After receiving the fluids, we were sent to have the stent deployed.  Afterwards, they decided Mel should stay in the hospital overnight to receive a couple of blood transfusions.  The doctor who placed the stent was very confident that the stent had been deployed where it needed to be and appeared to be functioning appropriately. 

We went home in high spirits and great hope that this would take care of the problem.  We were, however, very concerned about the next line of treatment.  That is because there are only three drugs approved by the FDA for use in treating Stage IV kidney cancer, and we had already gone through two of them. The biggest reason for this is that kidney cancer usually never gets to Stage IV.  Most of the time it is caught much earlier in its earliest stages, but in Mel's case we had been told his tumor had been there for 12-15 years.  There were drug trials that they were doing on patients, but when you are given the diagnosis of Stage IV, the FDA will not allow you to be on a clinical trial. 

Our oncologist never gave up hope and always talked about patients he had been treating with Stage IV kidney cancer that were four or five years out from the original diagnosis.  He never gave us numbers in terms of survival rate, and we never asked.  We had great faith that God would heal Mel, and we also thought if these other patients were alive five years out that we had at least five years to look forward to.  At the beginning of this journey, we both agreed that because we had the kids, and they were so young, that we would be as aggressive as possible with the cancer to buy Mel time with the kids and me.  We would soon find out how naive we had been, but never did we give up on the power of prayer and prayed for a complete and total healing.

Snowflakes

Some days are so swirly or blurry.  I know that sounds strange, but sometimes my mind feels like the snowflakes that have been falling for two days.  The past couple months have been really difficult.  It has been like I have been living through the few months leading to Mel's death all over again.  For instance, I remember that Christmas dinner was really the last meal that Mel ever ate, and he lived till February 20.  During that time he would drink a milkshake or some ice cream and drink some liquids but that was about it.  I was so worried about him.  He was also having significantly more pain, which I hated.  I couldn't bear to see him hurting.  It was so hard for Daniel to understand why Mel couldn't play with him and pick him up like before. 

My mind also goes to Daniel, and I think how Daniel never knew Mel when he was well.  Daniel was 13 months old when Mel had his heart attack in May 2009.  It was just about seven weeks after the heart attack that he started showing symptoms of the kidney cancer.  I think back to how elated we were when Daniel's adoption went through.  I sometimes wonder why God took away the only daddy Daniel will ever have after He had blessed us with Daniel and took him from being an orphan and then take his daddy away.  I guess I will never know this answer.  I have come to some peace in realizing that at least I will have a child at home for at least another 14 years, since Daniel is almost four. 

Mel was an over the road truck driver when Daniel was placed in our home.  Daniel was three weeks old when Mel finally got to see him in person.  That was pretty much the end of Mel's truck driving career.  He also had started not feeling well around that time.  The doctor had done many tests and could not find anything wrong.  In thinking back I wonder if that was really the beginning of his cancer symptoms.

When Mel quit driving truck, he took a job working nights at a plant in Pueblo.  He would come home in the early morning and sleep until about 10:00 a.m. when Daniel was ready to take his first nap.  Mel would get up and change and dress Daniel and feed him a bottle.  When Daniel was born he was born with cocaine and marijuana in his system, which caused him to have a lot of stomach problems.  His little tummy would get so hard and his body would start to shake. He had to be tightly swaddled all the time to control his withdrawal shakes and pat his bottom and his back to help his tummy.  Mel had a special way of laying Daniel across his chest and patting his back to get him to sleep for his naps.  After that Daniel would never nap for me, only for his daddy, but he would let me put him down at night when his daddy was at work.  It was so cute to watch Mel, who was so big, and Daniel who was so tiny when he came to us.  I am glad they had that special bond together, and in hindsight I am so thankful that Mel quit driving truck when he did.  It allowed us all more time together, but most importantly Daniel got to bond with a daddy who adored him.

These are some pictures I had taken as a gift to Mel when he met Daniel.  Daniel was two weeks old in the pictures and so tiny and precious.  Sorry I couldn't figure out how to rotate them.

Baby Love

When I got pregnant with Nicole, I was 38 years old.  The doctor suggested we have testing done to see if she had Down's syndrome or anything like that.  We chose not to have any of those kinds of tests done, because that information would not have changed the fact that we were having a baby and that this baby was a blessing from God no matter what.  I was so excited to be pregnant.  I loved it!!!  I was so in awe of the fact that the love Mel and I shared had created this wonderful being growing in my womb. 

When Nicole was born, Mel cried, and of course I did too.  He always like to brag that he was the first one to hold her.  Nicole was born with a head full of jet black hair.  When anyone commented on her hair, Mel's response was that she got it from him because he had to have gone somewhere.  Nicole was such an easy baby. 

I had worked for 17 years at a hospital doing medical transcription before she was born.  After Nicole was born, I just could not bear the thought of leaving her every day. We decided that I would stay home and work from home as a medical transcriptionist.  I had the best of both worlds.  I got to spend every day with our precious baby and I could also work to contribute to our household.  Mel worked a very early shift, 5:00 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.  From the time Nicole was very young she knew the sound of Mel's truck and could hear him coming two or three blocks from home.  She would get so excited to hear him coming!!!  After he got home from work Mel would take care of Nicole and fix dinner so I could get my work done, and then we had our evenings free to spend time time together.

We used to watch the news every night, and every night when the weather came on for some reason Nicole was very fascinated by the weather.  I don't know what it was, the person's voice or what got her attention so much.  When she got to be about 4 years old (and continues to this day), she gets very irritated with weather reports.  She always says "Those people aren't God, only God knows what the weather is going to be like".  It almost offends her to listen to the weather. 

We also used to watch the TV show Cops.  From the time Nicole could stand she would stand on the couch next to Mel with her little arm over the back of his shoulders and wearing his hat and trying to sing the theme song to cops.  Everywhere she went she would sing "Bad boys, bad boys, whatcha gonna do when they come for you".  It was so funny listening to her trying to sing.  Mel also taught her to whistle.  She started whistling when she was about 18 months old.  It was hilarious, this little person toddling along whistling.  People laughed everywhere we went when she would whistle.

Until Nicole was about 2 she really was partial to me.  She loved her daddy, but if she had her choice, she chose mommy.  Little did I know that was about to change!

Look at all that hair, our beautiful baby girl!

Cancer a 4 letter word

Patty Emerson
I wrote this in January 2011 when we found out my husband's cancer had spread throughout his body

In memory of my husband, Melvin Emerson 03/29/1951 - 02/20/2011, who valiantly fought cancer for 14-1/2 months

For all the others who have fought the fight and lost

And for the ones who have have fought and are winning

Cancer is a 4-letter word

How in the world do they expect you to cope

When they tell you the one you love most is so sick

How can you even process or think when all that's left is faith and hope

I waited 37 years of my life for this gentle man to be sent to me

They tell me I am strong and I can handle this beast called cancer

How do they know this when in my heart and in my head I cannot stand to be

A widow, a husband-less wife, a single mother, with no one to share my dreams

They say love lasts forever, but I want to know what happens when forever ends

My heart is so heavy, so filled with fears, and anger filled thoughts

I can only hope and pray that to me an angel God will send

Someone to help me on this path and to find the wisdom I have sought;

How can I grasp such a disaster, our own September 11 attack

Only it happened on a cold day in January, 2011

Our daughter, our baby son, how do we tell them and give them what they need

When all we can feel is our own grief.

I want to scream out loud to God, why, why, why, but would that stop the beast?

The medicine makes him sick, I have watched him grow old in front of my face

Just a matter of a few months and the man I used to know has begun to cease.

You see cancer changes us all, just the passing of the word through your lips

You say it over and over to try to get used to it, but it is a concept that cannot be embraced.

He tells me he wants me to find love again, doesn't want me to finish my life alone

There is not a fiber in me that can even grasp the thought or imagination of this

You see he was my first of firsts when it came to the love I craved and thought would never be mine

He made me the mother that I know God created me to be

How can I possibly even think these things, when all I need is for him to be well and by my side.

The Baby Issue

When Mel and I met, he had already been married twice, I know, I know not a good sign, but I knew with God's presence in our relationship we had as good of a chance at marital success as anyone else. We did have a few issues to deal with, though just like everyone else. One of the first issues we dealt with was the fact that Mel told me very early on that he could not stand cats.  I told him that was a problem because I had two of them.  I also had a pretty cool dog so I think that offset the issue of him not liking cats.  By the way, he came to love them as much as I did.  My oldest cat Butsy had an issue with Mel, however.  Butsy was used to sleeping on the pillow at the top of the bed next to me.  When we got married, Butsy would sit and stare at Mel every night as though saying who are you and what are you doing in my spot?

The most important issue we dealt with was having a baby.  You see Mel already had two grown children, and as I said we were "wiser" (really translating to older) when we married I was 37 and Mel was 46, but he finally agreed to have "just one" baby. I got pregnant with Nicole in July 1998, you see we didn't have much time to waste, not with the old proverbial "biological clock" ticking.  Nicole was born April 19, 1999. A few years later Mel and I decided we would like to have another baby.  We thought that once our lives here on earth were done Nicole and "the baby" would have each other.  Of course by now the old clock had been ticking another three years, but I thought well God did it for Sarah, and she was much older than I was.  However the old ovaries were no longing making many eggs much less "good eggs".  That was when we decided to do foster care to adopt, and God miraculously blessed us with Daniel on March 14, 2008, through the enormous gift of adoption.  We all three were so beyond happy and grateful to God that out of all the people in the world wanting and longing to adopt a newborn baby that He chose us.

We were blessed.

The beginning of Us

When Mel and I were dating, I used to say he was my knight in shining armor, who just happened to roll up on a Harley rather than a white horse.  He was also the "bad boy" I could finally keep.  You see I was never very good at choosing the men to date, they were always "bad boys", but by the time I met Mel he had mellowed enought to be just the right amount of "bad" in a good way.  We used to just sit for hours and talk, talk, talk.  He talked a lot more than I did.  He definitely had the gift of gab.  I used to call him my Chatty Cathy (remember the baby dolls with the strings you would pull and they would talk). He used to ask me why I would get so quiet, and I always told him that for us to be socially acceptable that I had to be quiet otherwise people would see us and run the other way.  I also used to tell Mel that he better never get sick on me or I would put him in a home, because I was not going to spend the prime of my life caring for him (I liked to tease him that he was 10 years older than me).  He always said he gave money to an Alzheimer's unit just to invest in his future, and we laughed about that.  Our wedding day was beautiful.  It was an unseasonably warm day for Colorado in December.  We got married on December 20, 1997.  Mel started crying when he saw me walk down the aisle with my dad.  When I got to the front of the church and he took my hand he kept saying "I love you so much, you look so beautiful".  I felt like a beautiful princess on that day. For our wedding reception Mel decided he would pick the song we would dance to as our first as husband and wife. He chose "The Rest of Mine" by Trace Adkins.  When Mel passesd away I looked back on that song and was in awe of how foretelling they had become.

There's no guarantee that we'll see tomorrow
Heaven only knows how long we have
So there's no way I'll ever for one second let you wonder
Just how long my love for you will last

'Til my last breath, 'til I'm called on high
'Til the angels come and I see the light
To the very end, 'til I give in
To the last beat of my heart
No I can't swear that I'll be here for the rest of your life
But I swear I'll love you for the rest of mine
'Til my last breath, 'til I'm called on high
'Til the angels come and I see the light
To the very end, 'til I give in
To the last beat of my heart
No I can't swear that I'll be here for the rest of your life
But I swear I'll love you for the rest of mine

No I can't swear that I'll be here for the rest of your life
But I swear I'll love you for the rest of mine

And he did love me to the very end. The most important thing to Mel was Jesus Christ, me and our kids and his son Aaron and his granddaughters.

Cancer Survivor

I am not your typical cancer survivor.  You see I have never had cancer, but my husband had cancer and died from it.  I never thought I would be a widow at age 50 with a 12-year-old daughter and a 3-year-old son to raise.  Mel and I met when we were both wiser and at the time God had planned for us to meet.  We met on a "blind date".  We knew fairly soon that we were supposed to be together.  Mel asked me to marry him four months after we met, and we set our wedding date for December 20, 1997.  We were quite different, but we really "got" each other.  With Mel (and of course God) I experienced the love I had always dreamt of, but always fell short of finding.  I knew without a doubt how much he loved me, and I adored him.  Mel was the kindest man I had ever known, and that was what initially drew me to him.  He really cared about me and how I felt.  He was also very romantic.  I want to share our story because I have found that most people (including me), when they hear the term cancer survivor they automatically think of the people they know who have or had cancer.  I have discovered that the ones left behind (like my kids and I) when a loved one dies of cancer we are also Cancer survivors, just a different kind of survivor.  I also hope to let people who care to know what it is like to travel down that road and somehow try to survive the devastation of your life.  So read it if you want to, comment if you want to, share your story if you want to, or never read my blog.  It's up to you.