A word from our sponsor…

Be forewarned, not all kittens andbaby foxes in this post. 

I feel that I finally have a moment to catch my breath and put a few thoughts out there.  Since February 23rd I haven’t felt like I have had more than a moment to catch my breath and even as I write this I know there is a list of things that fall into the everything else category that need to get done.  However, I wanted to put a few thoughts of my own out there about the last 24 days and what the future looks like.

When we did the first trip to the ER at 3 am Shannon came to the spare bedroom door asking where her medical card was.  We had just switched her to a new health plan Jan 1 and she didn’t have the updated card handy.  I was sleeping in my boy room at home to stay away from the “flu” she had been fighting off the week prior.  I told her where I thought it would be and fell back asleep.  30 minutes later Shannon returned to the door informing me that she was headed to the ER.  It was 3 am and I was supposed to be in Princeton at 9 am for a fiberglass boat workshop.  I had just been elected to the Board for Antique Boat club in MN and our boat was up there as part of the workshop.  Then later in the day I had tickets to go and see the North Star Alumni play the Blackhawk Alumni at TCF Bank Stadium. I lay in bed thinking for a minute that Shannon would be fine by herself in the ER and I needed to be at the boat workshop.  Then a voice in my head spoke to me and said, this is part of being a husband.  “Get your ass out of bed, go to the ER with your wife.  If you aren’t there for her in times like this, then what’s the point”.  I hopped out of bed, threw on some clothes and met Shannon at the door.

The ER visit was what you would expect on an early Saturday morning in a downtown hospital.  A 3 hour wait behind a motley crew of some of St Paul’s finest citizens.  Shannon was finally seen and after some conversations with a very concerned looking ER doc we were sent home with a prescription for Tylenol and a consultation with a specialist for the following week.  Shannon was in rough shape, having had the flu for a whole week and now with some new symptoms that were causing her pain that she would have to gut out till our consultation. 

The consultation that Tuesday was when the blur started.  The saint of a Nurse Practitioner came in and took one look at Shannon and knew there was more than meets the eye.  She ordered a test, then walked Shannon over to another Doc who did a second test and based on how the results came back ordered a CT scan for that afternoon.  At this point I was starting to have a mild case of how the “hell did we wind up here” happening in my head.  On the way to Regions for the CT Scan I called a doctor friend of mine and gave him the 10,000-foot view.  He gave me a few things to ask about when we got to the hospital.  Shannon was looking worse by the minute and when she came out of the CT Scan all she could do was curl up on a waiting room chair with a warm blanket.  It was then that we got a piece of advice from my doctor buddy that I am sure helped Shannon’s overall odds in this whole battle. “Don’t let her leave the hospital”.  He told me that if he were in my shoes based on Shannon’s condition he wouldn’t let his wife leave the hospital.  He told me to take her right over the ER and get her admitted.  So that’s what I did.  I told the nurses to leave her IV catheter in because I was walking her over to the ER to get her admitted. 

From that consult the afternoon of 2/23 Shannon didn’t leave the hospital until 3/5. 

Those first 2 days in the hospital were the worst two days of my life.  None of the meetings with the doctors, save the first one when they didn’t have the full picture yet was fun filled or happy.  Having been in the military and then in sales I have learned how to read people, their tone of voice and body language.  I wasn’t buying what the doctors were selling.  The measured tone, careful choice of each word and general demeanor was filling me with sense of dread that I have never felt before.  With the lack of official diagnosis, the wanting to run just one more test to confirm what Shannon was dealing  each passing hour played a more direr outcome in my head.  I was playing this show out to the end, before it had even begun…  Through it all however there was one constant and it was Shannon.  She could see the terror, sadness, panic and helplessness in my eyes when I looked and her.  Every time I looked at her and apologized for crying or being sad she would put her hand to the side of my face and say in the sweet Shannon voice “don’t worry, I’ll be ok”.  Every time, “don’t worry, I’ll be ok”.  Unwaveringly and with conviction she looked me in the eye and told that she was going to be fine. 

My mind wanted to believe her but my heart was tearing apart.  I have never felt a sense of loss, heartbreak and sadness that I felt on 2/24 and 2/25.  Not Grandparents passing away, not losing a pet, or the North Stars losing the Stanley Cup to the Penguins.  It felt like my soul was splitting in two.  When my grandfather lost my grandmother and I saw his grief the following Christmas which was the anniversary of her passing I thought how can you bear such grief.  I have now been in that place of uncontrollable sadness, pain, and grief. 

At the conclusion of our meeting with the oncology team after they had just gotten done telling us all the greatest news you never want a doctor to tell you about a loved one I said this.  “We are done listening to your F-ing bad news, and we are going to start making good news of our own.”  That next morning Shannon made the decision to go for hard, aggressive treatment.  We would take action, attack this with everything we have, emotionally, spiritually, mentally and physically.  I realized that if I looked at her with eyes that showed I thought she was already gone it would wear off on her.  I knew that she would need me to be there for her to fight this battle.  No matter what the outcome I had to show her that I wanted her to be her now and I would fight as hard as she would.

People ask how I am doing all the time.  I really don’t have a response because I am on a form of auto-pilot.  An auto-pilot that has been 30 years in development.  From my parents upbringing, Boy-Scouts, my military training to helping my parents run our family business I have been preparing for “Everything Else” While I was never deployed overseas to combat I did pretty much everything else you could do in a peace time military that would prepare you if ever deployed to combat.  The Mt. Everest of the US Army is Ranger School and my flag is on the summit.  Little did I know 16 years ago when Shannon, then my girlfriend, came down for my graduation ceremony that I would be applying so much of what I learned both at Ranger School and elsewhere to help her fight her war.

This is sad, this is hard, this is emotional, this is horrific, but, I have no other choice.  Win, lose or draw, I am going to give Shannon 100% and then some.

I made snap decisions in those early days to get her an apartment when I knew our home would not be a good place for her to fight her cancer.  There is a level of clarity in decision making that when given a situation like this that very few people get to experience.  Will this get Shannon healthy, yes, DO IT!  No, DON’T DO IT.  It’s really that simple.  Complete the mission, GET SHANNON HEALTHY. 

For the time being we are doing ok, from a financial, daily needs, medical care standpoint.  I have received so many offers of help and I thank each and every one of you that has offered to help in any way possible.  Please stand by, we will need you.  This in not going to be over in a week, two weeks or even two months.  Shannon has a battle that is going to last many months and will be very hard on her, me and our families.  We will need you and when called I know you will be there to help us.  Please be patient, cheer us on for now and when called upon give Shannon the 100% and then some that I am giving her.  She and I will need it. 

We will be doing a benefit and online fundraiser.  With the loss of her job we will need money down the road to provide her all the tools necessary to defeat her cancer both inside the medical community and outside with other modalities of healing.  Rest assured you will have plenty of advance warning, there will be bands and lots of them and it will be AWESOME!

I am doing ok, if I wasn’t I would let you know.  But I have my own secret weapon… my old army buddies.  I can tell them anything, in any manner, at any time.  They would do anything for me as I would do for them.  I had one from Maryland that I have only seen once in 14 years offer to fly out to help, all I needed to do was ask. 

I have made this promise to almost every person who has offered.  If the need arises I will ask for help.  If I am not doing ok, I will let someone know. 

RLTW