I love you all the time and I’ll love you forever La version française de ce court texte suit immédiatement la version anglaise. Just before she underwent emergency brain surgery to remove the accessible part of the cancer that had metastasized throughout her brain, Anne said these words to me and to our sons…
A Little Help from our Friends In the fall of 1979, as the new school year was about to begin, I found myself in exile, shunted to a crowded, windowless office space in a remote corner of our tiny college, Champlain St. Lawrence CEGEP in Quebec City. As a young, part-time English instructor, I didn’t..
Unhappy Campers It was the summer of 1980. Anne and I were spending our holidays in Vancouver with her family. We were child free. When fall approached, we settled on a novel way to return to our home in Quebec City, opting for Canada DriveAway . Ever heard of that blue-ribbon organization?..
Animal Dreams: Animal Therapy and Terminal Cancer When I was a small child, I had the gooiest of soft spots for all animal creatures, fictional or otherwise. Every night before bed, my dad would read me a story featuring the little forest and meadow people of Thornton W. Burgess, including Grandfather Frog, Jimmy Skunk,..
Support workers in end-of-life homecare play a vital role in enhancing the quality of life (QOL) for individuals and their families by providing practical, emotional, and social support. They offer assistance with personal care, mobility, medication management, and symptom management, while also providing companionship and emotional support to both the individual and their family. This is our..
Adapting our apartment to Anne’s disability: The Great Escape revisited Have you ever seen the film The Great Escape? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Escape_(film) The 1963 epic film depicts a heavily fictionalized version of the mass escape by British Commonwealth prisoners of war from German POW camp Stalag Luft III in World War II. Our apartment is currently being adapted for an ongoing “Great Escape”,..
Relapses and Awakenings: Anne returns to the hospital unable to walk, talk, or eat Yesterday morning, Anne was unable to get out of bed. She could not walk, talk, or eat. She was also radically incontinent. After about 30 minutes of my lugging and cajoling, we finally reached the bathroom of our tiny..
Bashful hellos and goodbyes during Anne’s struggle with brain cancer: Snatching victory from the jaws of defeat In Anne Tyler’s iconic novel The Accidental Tourist, the character Muriel Pritchett describes herself as “bashful” when she first makes love with the lead character, Macon Leary. Bashful. A quaint, moving, and beautiful word. My Anne,..
Anne is a moulting kitten: Chemotherapy is the culprit My darling wife Anne is moulting. Her hair is falling out in clumps, the ravages of three weeks of intensive chemotherapy and radiation treatments. Our home is sprinkled with a thick layer of her hair, just as it is after we visit our son..
Weetabix Revisited in the Wake of Brain Cancer Until my wife Anne was suddenly stricken by glioblastoma, the very aggressive, incurable form of brain cancer that befell her a mere six weeks ago, she could not live without her daily hit of Weetabix. Even on Christmas morning, she devoured a delicious bowl of this..