Drink up your Prosure,
dear. You can’t afford to lose any more weight.
She gave a reluctant nod and took hold of the mug from me,
slowly stirring the warm lumpy liquid to get a more even mix. She hated the
drink. It tasted like milk blended with rotten fish. But still it annoyed me when she squirmed to
show her disdain for it.
Jenny had lost too much weight. And I was deeply worried. Her usual 45 kilo petite figure had whittled
down to a pitiful 35 kilo and she looked gaunt and frail to the bone. Sometimes the worry turned to panic, and I
got angry with her for daring to be fussy with the Prosure consumption. Her oncologist had prescribed the distasteful
beverage for mandatory consumption. Don’t
treat it like it is food, treat it as medicine. That was his strict instruction. The Prosure
was formulated to help cancer patients prevent weight loss. That was how it was
also touted in the brochures.
Without much else to turn to, we placed a lot of hope on
that powdery formulation. Jenny consumed copious amount of the yucky stuff.
And we monitored and recorded her daily consumption. I often have to cajole and
coax her, reminding and nagging her even just so she would not fall short of
the recommended intake.
Looking back, it is hard to say if she could have been worse
off without it. We could never be sure. But tough as the Prosure regime was it
gave us at least some form of assurance that her body was receiving the
nutrition needed to keep her going.
In hindsight now, we were of course gullible to the core. Cancer was a tougher adversary than can be
fought with mere diet plans.
And with stomach cancer, Jenny had a really bad deal. Is
there another cancer that could have been kinder to her? Probably not, but as
far as quality of life goes, stomach cancer is at the bottom of the pits. Her stomach
felt tight and bloated a lot of the time. Eating became a dreadful chore. And
then there is the nausea induced by the brutal chemotherapy, causing her to
puke whatever little she could consume.
The chemo treatment played further havoc on her already fragile state.
Pumping chemo drugs into the body is akin to unleashing large scale area
bombardment to destroy a few hidden terrorist elements, using a war scenario
analogy. The toxins destroyed a lot of
good cells while trying to hunt down the evil cancerous cells. The oncologist
had planned for 8 chemo cycles but by the time the 2nd cycle was
due, Jenny was already feeling the strain. She was constantly tired and had
incessant bouts of diarrhoea, nausea, vomiting much of the little food she
could consume. Ulcers ruptured in her mouth and blistered her gullet making
swallowing near impossible. She was a pale shadow of her former self. And I
felt utterly helpless watching her suffer.
Because her eating capacity is so limited, her diet had to
be carefully selective. Bird’ nest
concentrate, ABC fruit mix, double-boiled chicken soup and other brews of the
highest nutrition were regular features of her daily diet.
But Prosure and high nutrition diet aside, in truth, we were
running on empty. The chemo turned out
to be ineffective and even debilitating and Jenny’s condition eventually
deteriorated.
It is hard for me to suppress recycling this dreadful
episode of the final chapter of our lives together. She, undergoing the
harrowing treatment and gradually succumbing to the disease. And me, as the
failed and incompetent care-giver.
I am tempted at times to ask myself a few “what-ifs”. What if we had taken advice from others who
had cautioned us to not go the chemo route and place so much trust on modern
medicine? What if we had chosen
alternative medicine? Would Jenny still be alive?
It is a futile mind game that leads to nowhere.
And what if I now contract cancer? The chances are not small. Call it the bane
of modern society and lifestyles. Statistically in our country it is known that
1 out of 3 to 4 persons would at some point in their lives be stricken with the
disease. Will I then resort to chemo treatment also? And allow the toxic
substances course through my veins and take its brutal toll, making me sicker
than I should be? Frankly, I am not sure.
We placed a lot of faith in our oncologist. With each visit,
he gave us a lot of hope and confidence.
It all proved to be very misplaced.
On hindsight, he was really putting a false front. Yes, he oozed confidence and injected a
sure-footed sense of optimism in all his diagnoses. I suppose he was well trained
to take such an approach, in that respect. It made sound business sense
also. But in truth he was never ever
sure. Jenny was like many of his other patients, cash cows for the milking. Another
life specimen for experimenting, to aid his own learning and add to his armoury
of knowledge and experience. It is learning that is abundantly paid for by our
insurance money and finally at the expense of my beloved Jenny’s life.
Cancer has stopped short Jenny’s life and journeying
alongside her and watching her suffer each day has severely dented my confidence
in the medical profession. But I do not feel bitter. Just a feeling of acceptance. I am resigned to accept the consequences of
our choice and decision of entrusting her life completely in the hands of our doctors.
We do not blame ourselves also, because how would we have known better? We were
faced with a case of Hobson’s choice. Cancer in reality is a terribly formidable
disease to overcome. And fourth stage cancer is a death sentence with almost no
further avenues of revocability.
Jenny, I feel so sad each time I replay how your life had
wound down. But the sad truth I suppose is that everybody has to die. One day
at some point in time. It is the consequence of being mortal. And we have very
little control on how and when this would happen. So with that, rest well and
rest easy.
No comments:
Post a Comment