Back in February I talked to my sister Lee about her going to the emergency room for stomach pains. They did a PET scan or MRI and said she had a pancreatitis. I was concerned because Lee is a lung cancer survivor so I want to make sure she is getting proper care so it doesn’t come back. I started to get a nagging feeling and I didn’t like it one bit. My sister told me about her bloating, pain, and feeling like crap. The doctor put her on acid reflux medicine and it helped some as did the changing diet. My sister who drank a pot or two of coffee a day was down to one cup!! WHOA!
I was at work and must have had a look on my face as I was coming out of the Teachers’ Lounge because the secretary asked me what was wrong. I shared with her I had a bad feeling about my sister and felt the cancer was back. One thing I forgot to mention above is that they found lesions on Lee’s liver. She was going to see her cancer doctor but then cover-19 happened and the appointment seemed to take longer. Then I get a text telling Lee had gone to the ER because her left side had gone numb. After doing tests, they found a brain tumor……DAMN! I hate when I am right. Couldn’t I be wrong about this!?!?!
Three weeks later Lee was supposed to get a PET scan done again to see if there was cancer anywhere else. When they were going to do the test they found Lee’s blood sugars too high at 252 so they had to cancel the scan. UGH! So the doctor lowered the steroids and while she was dealing with blood sugars Lee fell and ended up in the hospital again. This time they did do the scan and they found something on her pancreas. Long story short Lee has stage four cancer in the brain and pancreas that is the same as when she had lung cancer.
I found this out on the last day of school. The last day I would see my babies online. Covid-19 has been awful. Now don’t get me wrong I am working for an amazing school district. They had us up and trained to do online teaching within a week of our school closing. Our IT team are phenomenal and it went great. I wondered what it would be like teaching kindergarten online and I have to say I am proud of my students. I went over the expectations when we were online together and they did great. I had my Google Classroom set up for enrichment activities. So many times I got emotional after getting offline with them because I missed them so much! I didn’t have all 20 of my students participating in our WebEx learning and it made me sad. So when I had to say my good-byes on the same day I find all this about Lee I was emotional. Yes, I did start crying a bit as I told my students how proud I am of their accomplishments, growth, and wit. I told their parents I was fortunate to have them because they were amazing help to me. I made cute diplomas and a classroom t-shirt that they drew a portrait of themselves.
I picked a day to have the parents come get the diplomas and shirts so I stood at the school with my mask on getting to see them in person. My heart was full, yet it was breaking. This was my first year as a kindergarten teacher. It was an amazing experience even with the end of the year being crazy. Now that I am out of school I should be flying to Lee but she doesn’t want to chance me getting exposed to the virus. Oh how I hate coven-19! I should be helping my sister! I have a feeling if I was there with her it would make it harder on her. She would be more sad that her time left is limited. I don’t know how to handle this. What do I say to my sister? How do I help her? I don’t want to overwhelm her or get on her nerves but I also am going crazy not being able to help her.
sassypantsdotorg 