Hem/Onc here we come!

Original post Mar. 31st, 2010 at 9:51 PM Livejournal


A day like this I would wish on most anyone. The older of my children is in treatment for Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL). Every month we have to make a visit to the Hematology/Oncology clinic at our Children’s Hospital. It is no fun. It is so not fun that I never really talk about it, which could be half the problem. I don’t like it, any of it and I really don’t think I have to.

On the way to the clinic, which is quite a haul from our house out in the burbs, my kiddos drive me crazy by pointing out every place we have ever seen before and asking twenty four thousand questions about the ones we haven’t. I deep breathe the entire time and try not to crash the car. Finally, I pull off the highway and actually get the right exit this time. Then my children are silent. Really?!?! While hurling through traffic exactly seven miles over the speed limit trying to avoid certain death there is not one iota of quiet. Now that my car is still there is silence. So I say a quick “thank heaven” for the breather and realize my kids are silent for a reason. After seeing what they had their little eyes trained on I am not sure if that reason was fear or simple curiosity. There is a homeless man with a used paper coffee cup going from car to car asking for change. This man was definitely a sight. Usually I am very skeptical of pan-handlers. I saw a Dateline a few years back about how the stats on the seemingly “homeless” are equally split between drug abusers looking for their next fix and scammers who, on average, make six figures by pulling on our heart strings. Since then I am reluctant to hand over my money. I will however offer to help in other ways. You say you are starving? I will bring you a sandwich. Wanna get shit-faced? I’m sure I have some whiskey in my purse somewhere, sir. But is very seldom I hand over money.

This man was a different story, I think. If he is bluffing he should be up for an Academy Award. It was obvious this man has had it rough. My children were staring because this elderly black man was all of maybe 90lbs, had probably been wearing the same shoes for the better part of a century, his right eye was completely clouded over by cataract, and he had one arm instead of two. He walked near my open window; I signaled and dumped the entire contents of my ashtray into his cup. Slow down now, it holds change and usually close to eight bucks. My children barrage me with questions for the next half mile and we reach our destination. Whew! Please add whatever interest eight dollars would collect and thirty eight heartfelt tears to my Karma Credit account. Thank you.

I am going to catch up on the last few days in one evening so I am going to break it up into several posts. The clinic day I was speaking of was started yesterday, Tuesday. There is more, we just got there.