The Tamping Down of Expectation

When I was pregnant, I was convinced that I was carrying a boy. At the time I worked in an office represented by many cultures, many of the woman had their own twist on how to tell what gender the baby was. Some would emphatically declare that it must be a boy by the way I walked, others  held by time-honoured traditions of the direction in which  my wedding band swayed on a string above my belly or by which foods I craved (it was tomatoes if you care to know). Others inquired as to how badly I suffered from morning sickness (to the point of being hospitalized by having changed weight of fifteen pounds in the wrong direction). Everywhere I went in the building another woman would have another gender test for me. All indicators pointed to a boy they would say. And I would rub my belly and smile.

I was so sure, and had convinced my husband to the point that when my daughter was born we hadn't even given a girl's name much thought. Sure, we had flown a few names up the flagpole over the months, but we found ourselves so ill-prepared as to what do name this child that we got teased by my nurses that they weren't going to let us take her home until we had a name for the birth certificate.

She did of course get a name, and one that she never had to share with another girl in her class all the way through school. That wouldn't have been the case for our initial choice of Alexander!

The truth is, I so desperately wanted a girl that I dared not even entertain the thought that I might be blessed with a daughter. I believed that if I set my expectations for a boy, I would have just what I expected, I would be quite content and never look back.

Over the last weeks I've gone through the same exercise with my radiation treatment. Expect it not to work, therefore I would have nothing to be disappointed about if this was unsuccessful in the reduction of the bone pain in my legs.

I've gotten just what I expected.

There was some initial hope after the first week of treatment. I was walking more easily and definitely experiencing less of the type of pain that I'm infinitely familiar with. As the second week of treatment started was having the pain flares I'd been warned about. Intense pain, but unfamiliar at the same time - and hence it was chalked up to flare vs. intensification of my usual pain.

Then the fatigue really kicked in. Followed by a few more days of less pain, last week I even was able to go out for some short shopping trips. I'd even managed enjoying the treat of a lunch out at a nearby restaurant at the invitation of a friend. Without the company of my wheelchair pad even!

Then everything turned upside down on Friday. One of my friends was due to come over and a part of me was telling me that I wasn't up to it and should reschedule. Another part of me was very much looking forward to seeing this friend and decided to go ahead with our plans (and I'm not regretting it K!)

But I knew something just wasn't right. My heart was rebelling, the pacemaker was in continuous cycling mode, and by bedtime I didn't quite know how to deal with it. My daughter was home for the weekend and I didn't want her to know that I was deeply concerned.

Out for a bit Saturday morning with my daughter and a friend and I could sense that trouble had most definitely arrived. Off to bed for the rest of the weekend, and it's where I've been pretty much ever since.

Monday was an especially frightening day. The dishwasher repairman was able to fit me into his schedule, and his ten minutes in my apartment was the only time I've seen another person all week.  I have to wonder what the heck he was thinking, his office had called on short notice leaving me next to no time to take my pain meds and have them kick in (which takes 60-90 minutes). Why was this woman having such trouble standing up? Drunk perhaps at 10:00 am?

Already that morning I'd started with a bad case of the chills that progressively got worse. And so did the pain. And so did the cardiac problems. I won't give you the play by play, but it came down to being so very weak and dizzy that I had to crawl along the floor to get back to bed. And just strong enough hours later to answer the phone when a dear friend called to check on me, and this friend recognized that I was in some serious trouble. I didn't even have it in me to call 911, even though earlier I'd taken the bag I have ready for hospital trips out of the closet with a sense that it was going to be a rough day. My friend assured me that she'd take of everything and on my behalf placed calls to the hospital and local friends to get me help. God bless her.

The radiation experiment? Not successful. I'd set my expectations low, and had predicted that in case of failure I'd have no reason to be disappointed. The investment of time (daily visits to the hospital for two weeks and the subsequent fatigue) and the sacrifice of how two "not so bad looking legs for a forty eight year old " look (the tattoos are small, but damn it - they seem to leap out at me, and the discolouration from the treatments makes me look like I fell asleep in the sun wearing shorts and socks) seemed reasonable a gamble.

So I shouldn't be feeling sad, right?

Tomorrow I have my appointment at the local cancer clinic with my pain specialist. One of the doctors who cheerfully told me that there was a really good chance that this was going to give me pain relief. I just had no idea  that if it happened at all that it would be so short lived.

A Cancer Society volunteer drives me tomorrow, but I go into that appointment by myself. I've not dreaded anything this much for a long time and I go in with the single goal of not falling apart into a puddle of tears.

The tamping down of expectation didn't work this time. I'm grief stricken and don't know how to get past this disappointment right now. One more in a long line of significant letdowns.