Cancer Sucks!

 Cancer sucks in every way shape and form.

Yes, nowadays there are so many more treatments out there and more and more people are able to have successful surgeries and treatments to be "cured" of cancer and go into remission.

Then there are the ones that don't get cured.  Signs show up when it's too late do really do anything. And that's the hardest part.

My brother died of cancer at 39.  I was 24. I had only known him for a few years (1/2 brother, met when I was 19).   My ex's uncle died a few years ago.  He got through a first bout and then it reared its ugly head and came back strong.

I've seen casual friends who have had breast cancer and have beat it.  I have a loved one who has gone through FIVE different surgeries for cancer in different parts of their body.

I have a dear, dear friend, who is going through it now, and and another dear friend's husband who is going through it now.    Their prognosis' are not good.   Both are having treatments to extend their time.

Time.

We take it for granted at times.

I'm sad.  I'm so incredibly sad that they are going through this and the outcome is not good.   I plan on going to visit my friend to make memories with her. That's what I have to call it.   I want to go do it, but yet I also don't want to go do it, because I know I won't see her ever again after that.

I visited a great aunt almost 7 years ago because I was told she was getting up there in age and didn't know how much more time she had left.  She had outlived her husband, she beat ovarian cancer in her 80's. She was 87 at the time I visited her.  I made the most out of every minute I was there with her.  We both loved geneology so we talked a lot about that.  She was quite the spitfire too.   A few years after I visited her she came down with renal cancer.   Because of her age, immunotherapy was the only treatment for her (or so I have been told).  The last time I talked to her on the phone (a few weeks before she passed away) she told me she was ready.  She had lived such a long life and it was okay for her to go.  She died a few weeks before her 91st birthday.

I am extremely grateful for the memories I got to have with her and I need to keep thinking of it this way for my friend as well.  She was there for me when I was first married.  She was in the delivery room when I was in labor with my first daughter.  If her name hadn't sounded so weird with our last name, her name would have been my daughter's middle name.  Although now that I think about it, I think it would have been just fine.  I mean how often do you call your child by their full name (usually only when in trouble).  

I want to be there for my other friend as well, who is going through it with her husband.  

It's just so incredibly sad.

And I'm so sad too for them.

Honestly, I wrote this down so I could get it out somehow.