Discussing Breast Cancer

A few days after my surgery (I believe it was day five) I was ready for my children to come and visit. No, that’s not true. I wasn’t ready for that at all. My children were ready to visit me.

My youngest, two at the time, was not part of the equation. There was no way I wanted her to see me briefly then have to leave me. Her separation anxiety was peaking and that felt like a cruel thing to do — it would be a tease. She was missing me, for sure, but as long as my parents kept her busy, she was distracted. I was missing her but had to think of what was best for her and not for me. That’s what mommies do, isn’t it?

My middle, four at the time, was eager to see me but had to be coached on what to expect and how to behave.

My oldest, six at the time, was also eager to see me. But he’d seen me in the hospital once before — when I gave birth to his younger brother, so he was quite an expert on the situation.

I knew before they arrived I’d have to get myself to the bathroom and wash up; I wasn’t allowed to shower yet but a good hair brush, teeth brush and body wash were in order. Remember, I’d had the TRAM flap, so the biggest trouble for me was the pain and discomfort in my abdomen.

With the nurses help, I accomplished what I’d set out to accomplish. I sat back down in the chair, making sure to cover my four Jackson-Pratt’s and my catheter and my bandages. The nurses tidied up my bed so the kids had a place to climb onto when they arrived.

When the door opened, I was overjoyed to see my kids and overwhelmed at how awful I felt at the same time. I was still running a low grade fever and all I wanted to do was sleep it off. My pain, on a scale of 1-10, was a six; not horrific anymore, managed with Tylenol, but not gone, either, to say the least.

(About that pain scale … when I woke from surgery, that first day, the nurse asked me to rate my pain on a scale of 1-10 and I swore 10 wasn’t even close. Then she asked me what my pain goal was … does anyone NOT say 0? Just a question … )

The kids kissed me gently on the cheek, then happily climbed on my bed. First they shared some of their shenanigans but quickly turned their energy into clamoring for a show; there was that tempting television set suspended from the wall in the corner of the room. We flicked to the usual channels (e.g., Disney, Nickelodeon) and found an episode of something they liked and that was that.

We kept the visit short; we needed to eliminate the possibility that they’d start to misbehave and I’d start to deteriorate.

When they left I felt such relief. Their well-being mattered to me greatly, that was why I wanted them to come. They saw me, felt reassured that I was alright, and were able to check off ‘visit mom’ from their mental list.

It’s an important thing to do, let them visit. It takes the mystery out of where you are and what you are experiencing. Even if they don’t understand the nuances, they have a visual picture of you that they can hold onto to get them through the days without you.

What they didn’t realize was that I was pretending quite a bit … pretending to be up for the visit and pretending to be physically better off than I was and pretending to be emotionally in tact when really, I was a wreck.

But I made magic for my kids that day, a magic only moms can make.