Life – The Renegade Coder

It's been awhile since I've written a "private" article, but some things have been going on in my life that I think are worth writing down. February And the Era of Bad News Every year, I tend to get a little depressed in the winter. Apparently, the mix of short days and eternal grind is bad for my mental health. To try to offset that this winter, I ended up going on an antidepressant. In addition, I picked up meditation and exercise as regular activities. Unfortunately, no amount of wellness techniques could have prepared me for the news that I got on February 1st, my mom's birthday. As usual, I decided to wait the whole day to call my mom to wish her a happy birthday. After all, she's still working, so it makes sense to call her when she gets off work. However, before I could call her, my dad gave me a call. When I picked up, I could hear that he was in a car. According to him, he was heading home from the hospital where he had just spent the whole day with my mom. Now, my memory is pretty terrible, so I can't exactly remember what he told me. However, I do remember feeling an overwhelming sense of dread in anticipation of the news he was about to share with me: my mom had a lung tumor. Generally, I'm fairly optimistic, so I wasn't really that worried in the moment. However, the tone my dad took made the situation sound pretty grim. By the end of the call, I couldn't help but break down. Checking In Later that evening, I gave my dad another call to see if he was okay. Needless to say, he was devastated. Unlike me, he tends to assume the worst, so he figured he was going to lose his life. Hearing a guy crumble like that is already pretty hard to take in. After all, our society pretty much bans men from crying, and my dad is the quintessential example of a man's man. And as the son of this man, I find it particular hard to digest. I don't think anyone wants to hear news that one of their parents has a tumor. That said, I found it even harder to deal with the way my dad was feeling at the time. I mean, what do you even do? If you're like me, you probably break down a second time. Of course, by then I had already sort of come to terms with the news. The rest was just a waiting game to see what this all meant. The Waiting Game The rest of that week could only be summed up as a waiting game. In particular, I was waiting on the news of a biopsy that could tell us what kind of danger my mom was in. By Thursday of that week, I still didn't have any news beyond "it's malignant." When I went into therapy, I had a hard time explaining exactly how I felt. Like, I knew it was bad, but I didn't know enough details to cope. Hell, by that point, I didn't even have a diagnosis. By Friday, I was "celebrating" my 27th birthday. I honestly had really low expectations for the birthday which made it pretty great. For instance, I got a cookie cake for the first time, and I was a huge fan. By the end of that night, I still had no news, and we all assumed no doctors would provide news until the following Monday. Once again, we were stuck waiting. Reaching a Diagnosis Up to this point, I had sort of come to terms with the news. However, I still wanted to know exactly what was going on with my mom. Luckily, I got that news over the weekend. My mom was officially diagnosed with small cell lung cancer. At that point, I went crazy searching up information about this type of cancer. For instance, what's the survival rate? How is it treated? How long until it is treated? Who is most affected? What can go wrong? etc. After I got that out of my system, I was ready for the long haul. I knew my mom had cancer, and I knew that she was going to need my support. What a better way to provide support than to visit home regularly? From that point forward, I made it a point to grind on grad school during the week while making trips home regularly. Since then, I've been home twice with plans to continue visiting every 2-3 weeks. Dealing with Uncertainty One of the scary things about cancer is that is somewhat of a silent killer. In other words, it's not exactly like the person with cancer is demonstrating all kinds of symptoms. In fact, even with the knowledge that my mom has cancer, it's really hard to tell: she acts exactly like she would normally. Of course, the first real sign of cancer is the loss of hair following treatment. For me, that's the first time that the cancer felt real—when my mom was fully bald. Fortunately, we've really only had good news since February 1st. For instance, what was originally a 4" x 5" x 6" tumor is now down 80% as of March 3rd. In less than a month, my mom has started kicking cancer's ass. Of course, who knows what the future will hold. At this time, I'm hopeful, and I'm excited for my mom to be able to say she beat cancer. That said, that doesn't mean the time ahead will be any less hard. Anyway, I figured I'd keep this update brief. Life has been particularly rough lately, and I haven't been able to dedicate time to writing even with my reduced workload. Hopefully, I'll get some time soon. As always, thanks for your support. I hope you'll stick around!