How Do You Die?

July 1973.  Two months old with my mom and her dad, Ed Regan.  As I add more and more of these old pictures the look of love my mom had on her face toward me, my brother, sister, dad, or any of her family, is always there.  

For the first seven plus years of my life, all I had really done is learn new things.  I had learned how to walk, talk, eat, dress, play sports, and whatever else a seven year old can master.  Getting cancer in the second grade is not something you expect to learn about.  Once I was told my problem stemmed from this disease, the question of "am I going to die," arose.  I knew people died from cancer, that was what made the word so scary, but they were old people.  I assumed in my mind they had learned how to die and knew what to do to make death happen.  I didn't know how to die.  

The only way I knew how you could die, was if you stopped breathing.  Why would I do that?  I had taken swimming lessons and could only hold my breath for about thirty seconds.  Once you couldn't hold it anymore, you started breathing again.  I couldn't understand how the cancer made you die.  How would it make you stop breathing and not let you start again?  I never asked for a detailed explanation.  I just knew I didn't know how and we started moving forward. 

My mom did a good job of explaining to me how the treatment process would work.  She kept things very simple for me to understand.  Looking back it really set a goal in my head of getting better and established a finish line.  I would take chemotherapy for two years and have six weeks of radiation.  The medicine was very powerful so it would kill all the cancer.  It would also kill good cells and make me feel sick, but once the two years was up, I would be healed.  It really became that simple in my mind.  Every time the thought would come into my head of dying, it was always pushed out with, I don't know how.  



May 1978, just turned 5.  Again in the baseball gear...home white pants and road gray top.

 I just wanted to get back to playing at recess and sports.  Maybe this is why children are able to battle cancer so well.  They have less to worry about because they don't understand how it all works.  In my mind I had to deal with this for two years and would then be fine. 

Week one had just ended.

Jan. 20 - clinic, Dactinomycin
Jan. 21 - clinic, Dactinomycin