My Husband, My Georgie

Cancer scares the hell out of me.
It doesn't matter how much I try to inform myself, or the number of times I repeat the encouragements that are supposed to make me feel in command.  (In command of what? I ask.)

In 2007 the ground gave way beneath our feet; George learned that he had Multiple Myeloma, and that his life expectancy was somewhere between three and five years.  I didn't even know what the disease was, but in that moment of bad news delivery I instantly found it difficult to breathe, as if water were threatening to fill my lungs if I inhaled too deeply.  The ride home from Lahey Clinic in Burlington was suffocatingly silent.  We were both filled with grief, and clung to each other's hand.  Three to five years?  That's but a blink of the eye.  

We had just begun that phase of our marriage when we thought it was okay to be selfish again; we could focus on us.  Lord knows we needed to work on us; we had become too practiced at blaming each other for everything that wasn't working, all aspects of married-with-children that didn't measure up to the stiffest standard.  We had at some earlier indefinite point in time become entrenched in adversarial roles; for whatever reason, we had strayed so far from the close bond that we had forged in the first years of our relationship.  But that was just beginning to change.  We were friends again; we could laugh easily. . . especially at jokes that only we got.  (I'm no doubt the major reason why we struggled with each other, even when life was being kind to us.  I had become too anxious, anxious about parenthood, about my career in teaching, and just about anything that falls within the category of "life".)

George approached his diagnosis with stoicism and a sense of resolve.  He would endure the treatment plan, and he would continue his life.  He had rare moments of emotion, and always quickly regained his composure.  Although his cancer steadily eroded his body (sometimes making frontal attacks and at other times ambushing him), it never altered the man that had earnestly promised in 1978 that he would provide for me and love me unequivocally.  A softer version did emerge, though; for example, George - always generous - became more so.  We once attended a fundraiser dance event for a perfect stranger who was going through his own medical crisis; in addition to the admission fee, George left a sizable donation; our stay was brief, but even if the other attendees gave not a moment's thought to our presence, I understood George's gesture.  Little acts like this were possible, and they brought George great peace of mind.  On the other hand, every kind act that he performed resulted in a helpless feeling on my part.  NOTHING WE COULD DO COULD ALTER HIS OWN FATE.  No matter how many times he planted money in a supplicant's hand, it didn't arrest the insidious march of his disease.

All my life I've had a paralyzing dread of cancer.  When my mother was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 1995 I couldn't imagine my way forward, I couldn't conceive of life without her.  I remarked to her at the time, "But I'm not done learning from you."  In customary fashion, she responded, "Not to worry; I think you've learned all you need to know from me."  I've observed that same fear in Megan.  At her friend Jen's wedding, she sensed that something wasn't right with us.  (It was one day after we had received the dreaded news.)  She asked with no preamble:  "Does Dad have cancer?"  I couldn't answer, I could only look at her with sadness.  She collapsed on the ground, wailing, "NO!  NO!"  For the first time in all the years that I had known George, he gathered her in his arms and cried.  Sharing the news a day later with Lindsey was no easier.  We were now all "in it together".   The world shrunk away that day; it was just us four. . . with our helpless pain, and the knowledge that life was about to steer us in a new direction.  And there was no going back.

Nine years.  Nine years.  That's what it took to bring my strong, proud, devoted husband down.  He kept his gloves up till the very end.  His last couple of years were a testament to his fighting spirit.  February will forever more conjure my most exquisite pain.  One year it was his stem cell transplant; the following February it was the removal of a tumor on his spine and a laminectomy.  And February 2016 was the final knock-down.  His oncologist, Dr. Rabinowitz, was in awe of his tenacity.  His final words to me were, "Your husband was a very courageous man."

So what do I walk away from all of this with?  How do I properly honor my Georgie?  How do I reshape my life?  My constant musings that it should have been me, not him don't serve any useful purpose.  God chose to take him.  Brought to my knees, I nevertheless am not completely broken.  I laugh harder, cry harder, make my feelings more transparent, and stroke my forty-year love for George with pure tenderness.  (And, Georgie, when I dance alone in front of your photograph, I imagine you right here with me.  I even raise my arms to wrap around your body and hold you close.  Your arms hold me and guide me, too.  You taught me to love to dance, you do know that, right?)