Fog

So, I should probably expand a bit on last week’s ultrasound posting. It is indeed slightly premature for me to declare that Austin is three years cancer-free when we have yet to see his new oncologist (who we met for the first time in February) or to receive an all-clear regarding his lungs. All of that will happen at the end of next week, when we visit the Clinic for labs and a chest x-ray. But, since his lungs have always been far down on the list of things we worry about and since the abdominal ultrasound is what has revealed anything and everything suspicious or dangerous over the past four years, we nonetheless feel pretty darn good with last week’s news.

It’s funny how this one crept up on us. This three-year mark. So unlike last year’s anniversary, for which there was so much anticipation and excitement, all of it dashed with that horrible May 7 appointment. And then we plunged into a surreal in-between world, filled with only fear and dread but no answers or action. I do much better when there’s action. When I can see the mountain in front of me, even if it’s absurdly steep, I’m able to gear up, draw upon my strength, and plan out how to scale it. But when it’s only fog I see, only vague warnings about a pending cliff or a jagged slope with nothing concrete or real, then I’m paralyzed. Last May, I felt paralyzed. Terrified beyond anything in memory (and there’s been much terror to remember). I had no idea what we were facing, couldn’t even begin to plan our attack — but I felt certain something was out there. Something deadly was lurking there in the fog, waiting for us to pass, waiting for him. And I was paralyzed.

Of course, it all passed as nothing. Those sixteen days a mere post-script to our crazy story. And I find myself back again, in the very same place I was when I wrote this on May 6 of last year, the night before his faulty “something” scan.

And I’ll say it again, with a slight edit to the number: Come what may, it’s been a damn good three years.