So, dear friends, it has been a while and there has been a lot going on which has stretched me thin. This will be a two-part blog, the second being under a new category, or rather an old one; please be patient.

Today’s theme came to me after I took Robert’s little, old, flip phone and turned it on. It’s a small device that he had for many years, not wanting to give it up for anything more complicated. It booted up, still worked fine as it sat in my hand. A cell phone. A device used for linking people, for communication. Robert used it many many hours over the years, holding it to his ear and I often wondered if by any chance, could it be contributing to his neurological issues. It would be nice to blame something. To say, “you see, that is the cause! We solved the mystery!

We haven’t.

I took the phone and called my cell phone. My phone rang and on its screen, displayed, “Bob’s cell.” I freaked out. I hadn’t seen that in the longest time. For a minute I believed he was calling, cured, in whatever place, he had opened his drawer in the nursing home, he had picked up his phone and called mine. I would say hello and hear his voice. But it was me, talking to myself, believing in the magic that could never happen: Robert called me for the last time in December. He left messages when he was stuck in the ER for three days. He called when he got to the nursing home. He sounded cogent until, at some point, he fell out of the bed several times, hit his head, cut his eye and was harboring Covid. I still have a couple of messages on the home voicemail.

I still can’t believe it.

When I arrived for a visit yesterday, for the first time, I observed him sleeping. I said hello, asked how he was. He said fine, or OK from whatever dream he was inhabiting. I touched his arm, now made of paper, and asked if he wanted to sleep.

Yes.

I love you, I said, and left the room, now shared with a roommate. They come and go. Robert stays.

If you recall, I had taken a buccal swab of Robert’s mouth for testing purposes. I did this on Father’s Day and heard nothing back for weeks and just recently learned that the test failed and they needed another sample. A new kit arrived in the mail.

This is a huge source of stress: not only because of the still unknown test results but my having to administer it. A friend drove me to see Robert yesterday. The kit was in a tote bag. I tried to recall the steps: the careful unwrapping, the swabbing of the lower gums ten times, the careful unscrewing of the swab-cab, the placing of the swab in the waiting blue solution, the shaking ten times and then repeated with another swab. If the swab touches anything but its planned destination, it is defiled. Then there is the labelling, the packing, the shipping.

The waiting.

The kit was in my bag, I was psyched up to administer it again, but could not. There was insufficient access to a sleeping man.

I could not collect his cells.

Robert’s body has become his own prison, a cell that holds him in place and structures his every thought and attempt to move, to speak. Things have changed totally on a molecular level. Cells have changed, shifted, faded away leaving gaps, destroying free-will, movement, speech. I have no idea what Robert was thinking as he slept. The man who used to sleep on the left side of a shared bed. He’d plow through book after book, article after article before sleep took him. Before many falls took him.

So, now I will admit that he hasn’t been the center of my attention. Lately I have been struggling; with ocular migraine, well, I always have, about five episodes a month and today, after a wonderful lunch with a friend, migraine vertigo visited me again. Thankfully not as forcefully as it usually does, leaving me screaming in panic and fear, sending me hurtling through space at infinite speeds. It was a milder version, the Titanic version where I am walking on decks that list to one side and then the other. Waves washing over me, lifting me and dropping me, turning me. I have been on this sinking ship for almost a week, feeling I can’t walk a straight line. My ocular migraines and migraine vertigo episodes reflect how I feel: tired, confused, bereft, sad.

I have heart palpitations having had results from recent testing. This is why.

Cells have reared their heads, their nuclei taunting me after many series of tests. I haven’t dealt with this since 2004.

And so I am going to add to my breast cancer series, the Nipplemania Newsletter, a 2021 edition.

📌The series starts here:
Part 1: And The Band Played On … a mother’s life, a daughter’s journey

The previous post is here

The next post is here, part 22

Index to breast cancer series, Blogging for Breast Cancer is here