November is Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month and today is World Pancreatic Cancer Day. In honor of both, my 17 year-old son, Cuyler, wrote this piece about how pancreatic cancer affected his life. I hope you’ll take a moment to read it and help us #WageHope for earlier detection and a cure.
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You never really know what to say until it’s too late. You always remember the question you really wanted to ask only after they’re gone. The things you’ve always wanted to say, are now left unheard and kept to yourself. This was my reality after watching my father pass away from pancreatic cancer, and if I had one more chance to talk to him, I’d tell him I love him.
November is Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month. Each year, an estimated 53,000 men and women are diagnosed with this form of cancer. In the same year, an estimated 41,000 people will die from its effects. Pancreatic Cancer is terminal and has a kill rate of 71 percent within a year of diagnosis. It is the fourth most deadly form of cancer and is deadly because it is often misdiagnosed or missed completely. If the cancer was easier to detect, then perhaps it wouldn’t be as deadly, but most of the time that is just not the case…
I was ten years old when I came home to find my father lying in his bed crying in pain. I was ten years old when my mother sat me and my brother down and told us that our father was diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer. I was ten years old when I became the man of the house. I was ten years old when my I had to grow up.
Over the course of 18 months, I watched the strongest man I knew become a brittle, sick old man. His skin color went from pale white to Simpsons yellow, his hair become shaggy and gray, his arms and face became bony.
My father never showed any fear. He was a stern, strict man who always insisted nothing was wrong, no matter how bad things actually got. I admired that about him. He was strong, and the sicker he got, the harder he focused on not dying. He covered himself in an armor of strength, hope, and denial. But eventually, the chinks in his armor began to show, and the armor was eventually stripped.
One of the last things to go before death is the mind. When everything else in the body becomes dysfunctional and shuts down, the mind is said to be the last thing to work properly, but when the brain begins to dysfunction, the end is near.
I was 12 years old when I came home and my father didn’t know my name. I was 12 years old when I had to remind him who I was. I was 12 years old when I heard the death rattle. I was 12 years old when I saw my father, the strongest man I’ve ever known, panicking because he couldn’t breathe. I was 12 years old when my father looked to me for help; and I was 12 years old when I ran away from his bedside. I was 12 years old and that was the last memory I have of my father being alive. I was 12 years old when my father died of Pancreatic Cancer.
It has been almost six years since my father passed away, and when I reflect on the events that took place, I always ask myself if any of that actually happened. Life has changed so much since then, but I’m always reminded of the past whenever I look into a mirror and see his face.
At times, I miss the thought of a father; however. I believe I am doing fine. I am a firm believer that everything happens for a reason, and the events that have led me to where I am in life have made me strong, happy, and an independent person. I’ll never forget the way he looked, the way he talked, and the memories we created. I just look back on it now and view it as an experience that gave me a different perspective on life. The perspective that this is life sometimes, and life goes on, and we all grow up, sometimes a little faster than expected.