When I think back to a year ago at this time last year, it was on the evening of Friday the 11th of June that Sarah and I had a wonderfully long phone conversation …. if I remember correctly, we talked until close to 11pm … .a late night for us moms with young kids! We were lucky that we more frequently connected on email … as our time to communicate often fell during hours when phones just shouldn’t ring!
As usual, we talked all about our kids, day to day things, and then talked about how Sarah was researching a new treatment option for Mike – the strain & stress it could put on him, insurance company run arounds, the logistics of getting Mike to the new treatment centre location while caring for the kids. We talked about how although Sarah had just finished her maternity leave with Emily, that she had just organized another leave from work; how she really just wanted to spend time with Mike – have time to get out in the car and go for lunch (Pan Chancho’s no doubt). They would leave the kids in daycare for a bit.
When I had talked with Sarah or emailed with her in the fall of 2009 and into 2010, I didn’t realize that Mike had been given a terminal diagnosis (we had last seen each other in July/August of 2009 the family’s cottage near Forest). I remember one very emotional conversation we had after Emily was born – but I didn’t interpret the information as Mike having received a prognosis ….. I only heard that tough times were ahead …. and I guess I thought distantly ahead. I don’t think I listened with ears that wanted to hear the message. I held on to an original conversation that Sarah & I had had in City Park in the summer of 2004? when through tears, Sarah told me that Mike had been diagnosed with a tumour, not cancer, and that it could lay dormant for 40 years. That was the truth I held onto – wanted to very much hold onto. I framed my listening over the next many years around that conversation.
When I look back, I heard our conversations that year differently than I could have. When Sarah would tell me that Mike had some mobility issues or that his one side wasn’t working well, or that he had some swelling from the surgeries, or that he wasn’t reading much, it never translated to me that he was using a wheelchair, or struggling to communicate or that he was facing his last year. When he didn’t seem to answer the phone anymore – I still left it as him being busy at work or tired. When we talked about all of the help & support both families were giving, I still didn’t hear the message that Mike wasn’t getting better. I looked at all of his surgeries as hopeful and didn’t listen closely enough to know that the surgeries were a fight for time. I knew something on some level – when too much time would go by without a response from Sarah to an email I would email Catherine …. I knew something on some level.
Sarah always, always, always spoke so plainly, so lovingly, so affectionately about Mike all of the time – all of the time. I never pictured Mike to be struggling anymore or any less than he had been struggling in the summer of 2009 when he was so tired. Sarah’s love for Mike didn’t paint a picture of sickness or despair or defeat. Her words painted a picture of Mike no differently than the Mike I had waved good bye to on the lawn of the cottage in 2009.
Two days later, on Sunday morning the 13th of June, I remember the phone ringing and not prioritizing getting to the phone. My husband Mike later listened to the messages from an upstairs phone – and I remember so clearly him coming to the top of our stairs and telling me that Sarah had called and that Mike had passed away. I remember sitting upstairs on my bedroom floor, and listening to the message - I just couldn’t register all of it in my brain. Calling Sarah was a gush of sadness – disbelief – heartbreak for the loss of so much. Remembering now is full of hurt.
When I think of the last time I saw Mike it was at Sarah’s family cottage on the front lawn in July/August 2009. We had spent a wonderful day with the kids in the water – Mike relaxed in a shaded chair on the beach to stay out of the sun. I remember Mike walking back from the beach with the boys (Adam and Lucas) and thinking how cute the 3 of them looked. I remember Mike holding a plate of watermelon over his head on the back porch, as the kids jumped up at him to get the first piece – Mike lovingly trying to reinforce that manners were not being used! And I remember Mike heading in to take a nap as our visit was ending -- his head was bothering him, he was tired. I don’t remember if I even gave him a hug good bye, and I sadly don’t think that I did.
Mike we miss you. Not having you in Kingston, physically present to love Sarah, Lucas and Emily is something to which I will never adjust.
Pictures from August 2009
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