DR. JACKSON SCHEDULED OUR next appointment for a weeknight five days later, but this time I went with. At this point I felt like Gina and I were teammates lined up against a common foe. If you’ve ever played sports, you know the feeling. It was that kind of bond guys get in the locker room before a game or when they’re walking down the tunnel towards the field. There was a sense of solidarity between us and there was an opponent we were going to face. We didn’t know exactly what that opponent was or how powerful it would be, but we knew we were in for a fight and we were going into it together.
She drove herself to the doctor’s office. I met her there since I was coming straight from work. The drive was strange for me. I tried to keep my mind off of it by paying attention to what they were saying on the radio. I’m a big fan of sports radio, and as any guy who listens to sports radio knows, you can really get lost in what they’re saying if you want to. It’s like sitting at a bar with a thousand other guys talking about what you think the Bears need to do about their quarterback problems, why the Cubs aren’t winning or whatever. That helped with the drive over.
At one point I turned down the radio and said a prayer in hope for good news. When that was done, I called my mom just to talk and hear her voice. There’s something calming in hearing your mom’s voice. As I got closer to the doctor’s office, for whatever reason it all started to become much more real. For the first time, I allowed myself to start thinking about a lot of ‘what if’s.’ What if the news was bad? What would that entail? How would that affect my work schedule? Would I need to take time off? What was that going to do to our financial situation? How does our insurance cover all of this? As I said before, Gina was an incredibly tough woman. I didn’t think anything the doctor could say would collapse her, so I didn’t worry about holding her up. I was more concerned with the overall family well-being.
When I got to the office Gina was already in the waiting room. For whatever reason, I noticed the office had a very soft feel to it, which was odd because I never really pay attention to things like that. Our appointment was late, at 7pm or something like that, and we went right in. We sat next to each other, as teammates do, facing Dr. Jackson as he sat behind his desk.
We had prepared ourselves for bad news, at least I did, but I was still hoping to hear something good. Dr. Jackson looked at me first and our eyes locked in a surreal sort of way that I will never forget. To this day I can still see his eyes bouncing back and forth from Gina, to me, to Gina, to me.
Two words, “…it’s cancer” was all that he initially said. That was all it took and I was immediately overwhelmed with emotion. I did everything I could to hold my composure but that feeling is one I will never forget. In an instant my head got hot, I felt light-headed, and tears came to my eyes. As I looked over at Gina, I could see tears had flooded her eyes as well. We weren’t naive anymore so we were somewhat prepared for this result, but no matter how much you try, you’re never truly prepared to hear those words.
The irony is amazing when you think about it. Here we sat side by side as teammates, yet across the desk sat Dr. Jackson. This man was going to be one of our biggest allies in what would turn out to be the fight of our lives, yet as the words slipped out of his mouth, the visual of that moment burned itself into our minds forever. As he told us the news and confirmed that horrible reality, his was the first face that this ugly disease would take.
He quickly went on to say he wanted to remove the lump for further biopsy and wanted to do it sooner than later. After that, he left the room, giving us a chance to digest the bomb he had just handed us. Out of instinct, the first thing I did was hug her. Gina was a strong woman but this was more than you could ever expect anyone to handle. I told her everything was going to be okay and that we were going to beat this. Things you just say not even knowing if you’re right or not. Strangely though, even in the midst of that moment, I didn’t think a bad outcome was even possible. I was thinking there was just a long road ahead of us.
A fairly positive and upbeat Dr. Jackson returned a few minutes later to inform us that he had scheduled surgery for a week later. He didn’t say it but it was a lesson we would learn; time is never on your side when you’re in this kind of a fight. And even though we were just informed of the news, this fight started long before we knew we were in it.
We only spent about thirty minutes in the doctor’s office and even though we had been sitting the whole time, I was physically and mentally drained when we walked out. I walked Gina to her car wishing we hadn’t driven separately. The car ride home for me was eerie. Neither of us called each other. I imagine it was because both of us were trying to digest the news. As you can imagine, I was down and upset but not in a ‘why me’ kind of way; I just felt completely unprepared for the news. Either way, I was getting myself ready for a fight.
Now it was my turn to start preparing checklists because I was getting ready for a fight. I immediately began to focus on her surgery. I know Gina is strong but sometimes that can be a hurdle. Even in the car, I was already worried about her mental state and what was going through her mind. I really worried about what we were going to tell our son, Jackson. The girls were young at the time; Amber was four and Jackie was only fourteen months, so they wouldn’t understand anything anyhow. But Jackson was eleven years old.
Just as I was thinking about Jackson and what we were going to do with him, I pulled onto the street and the house came into view. We live at the end of a cul-de-sac so you can see the house as you approach. I saw everything differently that night as I pulled into the driveway. The saying goes that you don’t truly appreciate something until it’s taken away from you and that was the moment I knew that saying was right. I hadn’t lost anything yet, but for the first time I truly appreciated how perfect my life had been: I was married to the love of my life, had great kids, and lived in the dream home she and I had designed and built.
Then in that same moment as I put the car in park, I thought about how cruel it all was that we were dealt such a shitty hand.
I must have driven pretty damn slow because by the time I went inside, Gina was already putting the kids to bed. We didn’t discuss anything with them that night because we still hadn’t talked yet ourselves. After the kids were in bed, I washed up and pretty much went right to bed. I was in a state of numbness and fatigue and I could tell Gina was too. We both just crawled into bed and I just kissed her goodnight. Even lying there, I didn’t want to talk about it. Not yet. I just wanted to go close my eyes and go to sleep. Maybe I would wake up tomorrow and it would all just have been a bad dream.