Still waiting

Three weeks after diagnosis, and we're still waiting to find out if the cancer has spread.

We saw the oncologist, Dr. Enzinger, last Friday. A personable, humane sort of doctor, also a big specialist in gastric cancer. He answered all of our questions. Next: an MRI last Sun. morning, the results of which were "inconclusive." Today, Curtiss saw 2 doctors, a surgeon and a radiation oncologist. More tests have been ordered, a PET scan and an ultrasound. One is this Friday--don't know which. We still don't know if it is stage 4 and there will be no surgery, only chemo and radiation to keep it at bay because there is no cure. Or we will get the relatively cheery news that a cure is possible, but only if his entire stomach is removed and he then gets chemo and radiation for 6 months. I naively expected to get this news today. But cancer diagnosis is sneaky, tricky, and impossibly complicated, as it turns out. And it flows at its own glacial pace. Fortunately, Curtiss is OK with this--he says he isn't ready for more information to process at this point. So I must try to be OK with it, though I am not. I am angry that the process doesn't tell us anything and that the PET scan is no more reliable than the MRI in getting the pictures we need (according to the radiation oncologist, with whom Curtiss had a pleasant chat.) These tests are costing a fortune and so far telling us nothing!!!
And we have to wait, and wait, and wait, to find out if Curtiss can be cured or not.
What good is modern medicine if it can't give us clear and timely answers?

My aunt Joan (whose daughter, my cousin Reesa, is a Hodgkins Disease survivor for about 20 years and is considered cured) asked me to promise her to be as upbeat around Curtiss as possible. It's what is expected of caregivers, apparently. Well, I can try, but I might not succeed. I've been taking my rage to my therapist, but I have very little money and can't afford to see her every week. My aunt is relentlessly upbeat and determined (which may well be the reason for her surviving a heart attack which the doctors expected would kill her) It works for her, but it might not work for me. Sure, I get it that C. is the one with cancer and the outlook is infinitely worse for him than for me--it isn't about me. But I am caught in the cancer crossfire, as C.'s partner, as someone who loves him. Am I supposed to be a rock and never crack?
My mother chastised my dad for being sad around her when she was sick. "Don't do that again," she said. Of course, it was Dad and not me, and Dad can be impossibly and impenetrably glum and totally inconsolable. I'm not like that. On the other hand, it is a terrible strain for me to pretend to be cheerful when I am having a bad fifteen minutes, or five minutes. I am able to distract myself. I am even able to be guardedly hopeful. But consistently upbeat is beyond me. I don't think I should be chastised for getting upset. And Curtiss isn't doing that. I think he gets it about me. I want to help him, but I am a lousy caregiver. The best I can do is take care of my own health so at least I am able to give him the support he needs.