His biggest regret

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

“I’m sorry?” The words are still echoing in my head. I just can’t seem to understand the words. “That can’t be right, it was only a cough”.

“You also started that you’ve been having a lot of colds, long once”, the doctor says. “I’m truly so sorry, but you have leukemia”.

“I can’t have cancer!” I scream and stand up from the chair. “I don’t feel sick! I just feel a little tired, and yeah I have been having colds but doesn’t everyone?” 

“Not as often as you do”, the doctor says. I can see in his eyes that he is truly sorry for my sake. “We have to start your treatment as soon as possible”.

“The tests are wrong”, I insist. 

“I'm afraid not”, he says. “Is there someone we can call for you?” 

I shake my head. I have no family and I don’t want to upset Stella right now. I have to keep this to myself. 

“My parents are dead”, I say and sit back down in the chair. There is no one but my best friend, and I don’t want to trouble her right now”.

“Ms. Barkley, you shouldn’t go through this alone”, the doctor says. I know that he only wants to help me, but he is stepping on my last nerve.

“You’d be surprised at what I can handle by myself”, I say. “I have gone through most of my life alone, I can go through this as well. And besides, I’m not planning on dying right now, I’m not going to give up until you say that the treatment isn’t working and I haven’t even started yet. So when do we start?”

“We’ll start the chemotherapy very soon, but there are side effects to this, but it’s the most effective way to kill cancer”, he says. 

“I’m going to be bold am I?” 

“One side effect is hair loss, yes”, the doctor says. “But there’s also nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite, easy bruising and…”

“Pain? Am I going to be in pain?” I ask, I suddenly feel afraid for the first time since I got the news.

“Yes, pain is also a side effect”, he says. 

I take a deep breath. “Okay”, I say. “So when do I get the pills?”

I just want this over with. I want to start the treatment and move on with my life. Even if I die I will know that I have done everything in my power to fight this. Even if I lose the fight, I will be a winner for trying to beat this s**t. I do wonder what the people did to piss off God so much he gave us cancer on earth. I have always been a believer, but I am starting to doubt. I always heard as a child “God doesn’t give you more than you can handle”. But that is bullshit. If there’s something I don’t believe, it's that. Even if there is a God I don’t believe he is fair if he is the cause for all of the misery on this earth. 

I’m going to talk to Stella eventually, of course, just not right now, I need to have time to take all of this in. I know that Stella is a believer but this would make even her question her beliefs. I don’t want to put this on her, I don’t want to weigh her shoulders with this. I love her too much, but I also know that she will be very angry with me if I don’t tell her. This is a big thing to tell someone, it’s a big thing to find out. It’s going to be horrible and it’s going to be a horrible time. I don’t want to sound negative or like a pessimist but I don’t think I have a lot of chance to beat this. I want to beat leukemia but I don’t know if I am strong enough to do it. I’m going to try, mostly for Stella, but a small part for myself as well. If I’m strong enough to beat leukemia I am strong enough to do pretty much anything that comes to mind.

“You will start the medication now, I will prescribe for you to take out and you will start immediately and you will come regularly on check-ups”, the doctor answers. Everything sounds so surreal. Medication, check-ups, being sick. Is this me?

“Okay so how do we do it?”

“Well you’ve got the type of leukemia that is called acute lymphoblastic leukemia, ALL for short”, the doctor says and suddenly looks very troubled. “It’s a very rare form of leukemia and is more common for children. Statistically only 4 out of 10 people who get ALL are adults and 4 out of 5 adults who get ALL sadly passes away”.

Ah. Of course. Why make it easy with a normal type of leukemia? Of course, I had to be one of those five adults who gets acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Of course. 

“I like odds”, I mutter. 

“I know, but you could very well be that one who makes it”, I know he is a doctor and has to be positive but that’s just bullshit. I look at him and just shake my head. No. I have no chance to beat this and make it through. But, I’d rather die trying than die not trying at all. I’m that type of person even if I’m a little pessimistic. 

I just have a general negative sight of things since Leo, I don’t want to be negative all the time. I want to believe that I can be that 1 out of 5 adults who make it through this disease, I do. It just seems very unlikely that I would be that one who would. I don’t even know if I deserve to be that one. I’m sure that there is someone more deserving to be that one. 

“I doubt it but okay”, I say. I just feel like all the air is now out of my lungs, and I feel speechless. I don’t know what to say, to be honest.

“We are going to start with the induction, it’s the first part of the treatment plan”, I’m just listening to his words, trying to take it all in. “It’s the most intensive part of the treatment and lasts about a month, after that we will go into the next part, which is the consolidation and that lasts for about a few months and can also be intensive, during these two parts you will most likely feel most of the side effects like I told you before the effects can be nausea and vomiting, hair loss, loss of appetite and some gets mouth sores and diarrhea or constipation”.

Hair loss. I'm going to be bold, I already knew this, but hearing it a second time really stings. I’m going to have to get a very good and realistic wig. I do not want to go around without hair around people. I wouldn’t feel comfortable at all.

I realize now that a lot in my life is going to change. 

“And what is step three?” I ask. 

“Maintenance, also post-consolidation is step three”, he answers. “This step usually continues for about two years”.

“And if this doesn’t work?”

“Well if the treatment stops working we will look at other treatments, sometimes you have to do more than chemo, but we can talk more about that if we get there”.

“You mean if I don’t die before?” I ask.

“Hey now, we caught cancer at an early stage, and that’s great, that means you have a higher chance to beat cancer”.

Maybe. Maybe not. I don’t want to get my hopes up because I know that my odds suck. It completely sucks. I don’t want to get my hopes up but I also don’t want to believe that this is it for me. I want to do more things, see more. I have a lot more left to give. I don’t want it to be game over for me just yet. I’m too young, I’m only twenty-one for god's sake, this isn’t how it was supposed to go. 

“Maybe”, I say.

“I’m going to write the prescription and I would like you to see a therapist”, the doctor says.

“I don’t want that”, I say quickly. “I can handle this by myself”.

“You don’t have to, there is nothing wrong with getting help or admitting that things are hard to go through”.

“I will either live or die”, I say. “And I am most likely going to die, what’s hard about that? I know my odds, I’m going to try to get healthy but if I don’t… I have no family, I have one friend, that’s it, and if I’d die she would be the only one to miss me, that’s the hard thing to realize, not the facts about my illness”.

“You really should go see a therapist, I know several great ones once I could give you numbers, and”, I cut him off.

“No, thank you”.

“Okay, but if you change your mind you can always tell me and I will help you see a great one”.

“I won’t”.

He looks doubtful. He may have met a lot of people who've said that they don’t want to see a therapist but end up wanting to, but I won’t. I’ve never really liked therapists. I can handle it and talk to Stella whenever I want to. That’s all I really need. I don’t need someone who doesn’t know me to like around inside my brain. No thank you. 

How do I even tell Stella about this? I have to think of a way to do so. Maybe not right now but soon.

A few months ago I was happy. I was in love with a man I thought I was going to spend my life with. I thought that life was good, and all was well. Now, nothing seems right, nothing seems good, nothing is well. Everything has come crashing down and I feel like s**t. This wasn’t supposed to happen to me, I was supposed to change my life around, that’s why I even moved to New York in the first place, to start over. And this is what I get as a start over. It doesn’t feel right, it doesn’t feel like I deserve this. Why did this happen? Did I do anything wrong? Did I cause this? Coul I have Caused this? 

Shit. I feel like I’m starting to panic. I don’t want to panic in front of the doctor. That would be too embarrassing, I have to seriously keep my s**t together right now. I can fall apart at home in my apartment, not here and not outside. At home in my bed, which I will never leave again. Okay, I probably will, but I know that I won’t want to. Are there beds on the other end of this life? Hm.

“Okay well like I said, we are going to start the induction part of the treatment right away and you will have to come back regularly for checkups and such”, the doctor says. “Granted that you are not getting worse or too ill to stay at your home, in such case you will probably have to”, I cut him off again.

“Check into the hospital to stay”, I say.

“Yeah until your better or, um…” He cuts himself off this time, unsure of what to say next.

“Until I check out, like permanently”, I say. “From life”.

He sadly nods. I feel for him, I really do. Being a doctor and helping people has to be a kind of amazing and fulfilling job most of the time. But being a doctor and having to deliver news like this has to really suck. To give someone a death sentence. He knows it and I know it. It’s not very likely that I am that one person to survive this. One could hope and I do and I believe that the doctor hopes, but hoping is not the same as the facts lined up. Hope is good, hope is great even, but not if you blindly cling onto the hope like a lifeline. That’s not good. You have to be able to face reality as well. And right now, my reality is that I may or may not but most likely will die of acute lymphoblastic leukemia.