The Next Chapter

The oncologist meeting was this morning. Andy has declined a lot over the past 2 days, and it was difficult to transport him to the wheelchair this morning, to the car for the ride to the hospital and from the car to the wheelchair again. The difficulties of moving him emphasized how much he’s declined in the past 2-3 days.

The oncologist was kind and compassionate as she told us that Andy was too weak and full of cancer to treat. We asked for her best guess on time left, and she said weeks to short months. She said he needed to be re-admitted to the hospital.

This was not entirely unexpected for those of us who have been with him and seen the rapid decline over the past few days.

They took us out to a room where Andy could be in a chair more comfortable than the wheelchair, which he kept slipping down in as he was having trouble holding himself up straight. They checked his vitals and discovered his blood pressure was dropping so quickly that they decided to admit him to the ER instead of the hospital, and within an hour or two of that, we made the decision to move him to a respite facility, based on his advanced directive instructions.

I felt so weak that I thought I might collapse, and though I had just been prescribed new anti-anxiety drugs, they were useless in my car. Then Trevor reminded me that we had Andy’s meds with us so I took some Klonopin.

Then someone came in to have me sign a bunch of paperwork about the respite facility, and as she talked about the rules and benefits I realized I could not pay attention at all, and then she said we could choose our own funeral home and then I started crying and couldn’t stop.

Andy is mostly lucid when awake, but has been asleep most of the day, including during my little breakdown.

I’m writing this from the new facility which is a lovely peaceful place and I think he will be much more comfortable here than in the hospital or even at home, where we are not prepared to care for him.

I know so many of you love him so much and I’m sorry to have to break this news to you.

I’ll keep you updated in the days ahead. I feel lost. I know there is a path to get through this but I feel like I’m crawling through an overgrown forest floor on a cloudy starless night.

Thanks to all of you who love Andy.