Today I want to focus a bit more on gratitude. I had mentioned that it was a rough week yesterday and it seems that this week has been so long. At the end of each day as I went to bed it felt like it was the end of the week, even though it was nowhere near it. What I appreciate is that we had a lot of people reaching out when I said that this week has been rough. Regardless of what happened, I know that we had a lot of support. When I was talking to the nurses yesterday she had mentioned that there were so many people that went into the palliative care who were by themselves or did not have a very good support system. She was still learning things and what she said was that she was not aware of the PIPAC procedure so that is what she was going to learn more about. Doing all of this without a support system could make this more difficult. The support system helps you offload some things for others and allows for sharing problems with others. We have been allowing more people to help out with small things to help make things easier for us.
Cancer is not easy. It can bring a lot of strain for both the patient and for the family. A lot of times things are not easy, but I also do not think that they are too difficult either. Most people do not work through this and will take time off, where I try and work through it all. I am not sure what our kids think about this as they see me struggle on occasion, but for the most part they see me living normally with conditions. How we deal when bad things do not go our way is what helps shape us. Early resilience helps later on in life. I have made a lot of mistakes growing up but it has helped shape who i am today. When you think of all of the small things that need to happen to get to where we are now i would not change a thing. Mel and I were both quite lucky where we grew up with our best friends next door. We spent most of our childhood with them and they are family to us. Both of are friends with their cousins and with whole extended family. I was born across the globe, and moved here when I was super young. My parents decided to stay here while my aunt and her kids moved out west to Vancouver. When we moved from our apartment on Barrydowne they had to decide whether they were going to move to the South End or stay in New Sudbury. I remember telling them that I did not want to move to the South End and liked where we were. My life would have turned out quite differently if that happened. A big difference it seems with kids these days and when we grew up was that it was rare that people were bussed to school, so all of your friends lived close by. It is a bit different from the kids today where their friends do not necessarily live within walking distance. This is the foundation of our network, of people that I have known for most of my life. they have been there to help support me and these people have seen both Mel and my growth. This is one layer of our support system. It was built from childhood friendships from our neighbourhood that expanded to include their family.
Our work has also been impressive in their support allowing great flexibility allowing us to attend our medical appointments and to help me out with things. Everyone offers to help however they can. I have several circles of work friends and Mel was sharing a story with her sister where i made a comment in the group chat one day that I could go for an iced cappuccino and within the chat people were offering to come bring me one where ever I was. This is the strength of my support system, that any request done at any time will lead to someone offering to help me out. I am not sure how common it is, but the friends that I made at every place I am still i contact with. We may not speak all of the time, perhaps not even monthly, but we do touch base every now and then and chat. I have made strong connections throughout my work career. I am grateful for all of the friends I have made. I have connected with people that transcend just work and we are friends outside of work.
When I hear of stories that other people have about lack of support I have greater gratitude of whom I have surrounded myself with. There are parents on hockey teams that I have played on in the past that have provided support. People have offered to drive Xavier to games or practices and their kids do not even play on the same team. We have had a positive impact on these friend groups that they are willing to inconvenience themselves to help us out. What it shows is that there are a lot of good people out there. I also have a lot of friends that send me alternative treatment options and drugs and anything that they find. I appreciate that they spend the time looking these things up and giving it to me. I actually spend time looking up the mechanism on how it works and whether it could be potentially effective or not. Mel and myself had done research to better understand why treatments fail and the difficulty in treating this type of cancer so we can understand if something would be effective or not. I have gratitude for all of the extra work that Mel has done to better understand our circumstances.
We have such a strong network of support that logistics such as Spain is essier. Anything that we ask of people to help out will be accomplished quite essily. If we were to abandon the kids at home we could accommodate their schedules. We will bring them as this will be our family vacation before I potentially get worse. Tomorrow we will be planning the trip to Spain and better understand what the costs associated with this trip will be. I think that I will not get progressively worse as the treatment goes on, but we will not know the impact that 3 rounds of chemotherapy will have on me. Hopefully it is not too bad and I can enjoy myself a bit prior to treatment. Cancer is difficult. But when you have a great support system it makes it easier. People are willing to inconvenience themselves for us because they understand it is mutual. Support systems are not random but take time and effort to build over time. A lesson that I want our boys to understand is that the people around us are a reflection of how we have treated others throughout our lives. If you can help someone out, do so even if it is an inconvenience. Not because you may get something in return, but do it because it is the right thing to do and you should do it without expectations. Truly great people help quietly, without needing recognition. Sometimes you need to show some vulnerability and open up so others know what they can do to help you out. You need to understand that even though at times you may seem like you are an island going through this, if you allow others into your life it makes the impossible less difficult, and the difficult easy. I have been blessed to be surrounded by so many great people in my life.
Quoc Hao