Dreams

I keep having dreams about the day that we found out that Kagan had cancer.  It is like a never ending series of events that seems to play in my head over and over again.  During hours that I am awake it less vivid and revolves around the rush of the day but during the night it is all about 15 minutes of time that covers hours of my slumber.

We had already been to the peditrician many times, had ultrasounds, blood test and x-rays determining what Kagan was going through.  Then the peditrician scheduled us with an appointment with the ENT doctor. 

When we arrived at the doctor's office we waited for a little over a hour before we got to go to see the doctor.  Since our doctor had called to squeeze us into this appointment that day we were just worked into the schedule. The office was quite large and included a play room with an on staff "babysitter" to play with the children during the wait. Kagan and I just sat and chatted and watched the Disney channel together as we were tired from all the running around that had happened earlier in the day since we had been to a few other offices in the early part of the day.

The doctor was named Peter Orbello.   He entered the room wearing one of those head mirrors that you see on the Bugs Bunny cartoons.  Since we had not spent much time at the ENT's we were not quite accustomed to what I know learn is very common in the standard equipment for such a doctor.

The doctor checked Kagan over and said that what was going on was not normal.  He sat back down at the little desk area beside the chair I was sitting on.   He opened the file and noticed they had just received the faxes from the peditrician's office with the results of the earlier xrays and ultrasound.  On the reports read "POSSIBLE LYMPHOMA".  He rollled his chair a few inches towards me and said "Have you seen this?"  I said "No, I have not."  He said " We need to get you to see an oncologist today give me a few minutes to go and make a few calls.".

He left the room and I remember looking up at Kagan's face and seeing the worry on his face.  I stood up to go over to him to talk to him and the doctor ushered in a nurse and said that we needed to go see Dr. Rossbauch leaving me no time to speak with Kagan but I was able to put my arm around him.

Now at this point is where my fifteen minutes of terror comes in during my dreams.

As we were being checked out on a late Friday afternoon, several nurses came out whispering about what was happening with Kagan.   Then one nurse said " Dr. Orbello got him into the oncologist today and they are headed there now.".

I stood with Kagan at the counter of the doctor's office waiting on the referral slip holding Kagan's hand.  No one had told him what was going on at this point.  He had just heard that we needed to go to an oncologist and everything in my being was praying he had no idea what type of doctor that was.  I wanted to tell him BEFORE he knew.

As we stood there for what seemed hours (actually only 2-3 minutes), two nurses came over and patted me on the back and said "It is gonna be okay mom".  Yet, their fear for me was evident and I held my high and tried to hold back any emotion.

Tears began to roll down both mine and Kagan's eyes.  No words said, just me there holding my son's hand and attempting to be strong.  THIS MOMENT haunts my drams!

Another nurse handed us some kleenex ( a whole box to be exact) as now 5-6 people stood there and watched us.  Just like the spectators or looky lous at an accident they stayed back a few feet but we could still hear the faint chatter of their voices.

We left the doctor's office and I started to explain what I THOUGHT was going on without causing fear to Kagan.   I mean, afterall, I really did not know what but in my heart I knew this was not going to be good.   Strangely enough, he knew too!

Before we heard the words aloud they screamed within my heart.  I knew at that moment my son had cancer and I was not prepared for what we were about to learn.  I was also not prepared for what reactions that Kagan might have.

Each night the dream seems to challenge myself to relive this moment. I have heard you can't have the same dream twice but who ever says that is clueless because somehow this dream happens over and over. 

We are very fortunate that Kagan's prognosis is such a good one.  I am speechless as to how well he has taken this whole thing.   It is even a blessing that August 8th will be the milestone that we are waiting on to see what happens next.  Just a few months ago that seemed like forever  and now it is less than a month away.


The lessons learned are that even though the thoughts still invade my sleep the reality is that Kagan is doing better each day.  That in itself affords new dreams and I will be happy to dream them soon.