Agony

[Pam]

I'm hoping I don't offend anyone or bring anyone down by this post, but I feel like I am going out of my mind and I need to get this out - -

Today was awful - a coworker returned to work after being out for six months due to breast cancer, she wanted to talk with me about all that has happened with my dad, and about cancer and mets and all that, we talked about the oncs and the waiting rooms and the chemo and steroids and radiation and you name it....funny how this horrible disease brings people closer together.

I call to check on my mom, she is crying, she received a plaque and a power point presentation from the place my dad worked, in memory of him. Of course I dashed home to see the slide show for myself. I have practically every picture of my dad memorized, so when a new one taken of him at work that I'd never seen before flashed onto the screen....I literally stopped breathing - and for a split second I was filled with

JOY and HOPE because

THERE IS MY DAD - THERE HE IS AND HE'S OK - HE'S BEEN AT WORK -THAT HAS BEEN WHERE HE HAS BEEN AT AND THAT'S WHY HE'S BEEN GONE HE'S REALLY GOING TO BE OK!!!!

He was looking straight into the camera and he had a nice relaxed smile on his face and I HAD MY DADDY BACK!!!!

And then the world crashed in again and I've been sobbing ever since...

WHY WHY WHY!!!!

We still need him - he still wanted to live - why didn't we see the end coming - it's not fair - he tried so hard - he fought so hard - he never gave up and we all thought we could win - he's such a good kind man and he loved us so much and we miss him so much.....

Where is my dad? Is there really a heaven? I've been doubting my faith since this happened and I've been afraid to say it out loud and I hope I don't make any of you mad but HOW CAN I BE SURE THERE IS A HEAVEN!

Who really knows for sure how can I be sure?

Or is it just over - when your brain stops functioning do you just cease to exist???

If I could just talk to my dad again....If I could just hold his hand again, that's all he wanted in the end, was for mom and me to sit by his side and hold his hand....and we did, and it hurts so bad and I can't stop crying..

And I feel like my heart has been ripped open again, I feel like it just happened yesterday......

[Don Wood]

Faith is not being sure but believing anyway. I believe it because God promises it in his Word, and I have seen many signs to encourage my belief. It is natural for you, with your love for your dad, that you want your dad to still be in this world, and it will take time to get through grieving over him. I believe that things that don't seem fair in our short time in this world will be made clear in the eternal world. Your hurt will not disappear, but it will diminish. Your dad can continue to live in this world in your memory and how you live your own life. It is good that you can express your anger and disappointment and frustration. You need to do that to be able to move on. God can take our anger, our hurts, our disappointments -- he's a big Guy! He can take them and turn them into positives, but only if we are willing. Hang on to your faith. It will serve you well. God may not seem to be present now, but he is there, and he also grieves with you. I pray God's grace for you and your family. Don

[berisa]

Something you cannot touch, something you cannot see, but it does exist. Like AIR, WIND...etc. Something out of your knowledge and understanding, but it does exist. Like the universe, human is not wise enough to know everything. I have doubted about God, but while I think, how the universe formed at the beginning? Why human can make a human? All things seems sooooo organized. When I see the power of nature, I have no words.....I don't believe all these exist by themselves or by co-incident. How about the food chain? In China, snakes in fields are caught for making snake soup, for there is a great demand, now too many snakes are over-caught that many rats are everywhere in fields that affects the foodchain. So, MAYBE, that's why human could not live forever for some reasons.

This is what I think and want to share with you. This may be a bit off the subject.

I will pray for you.

[DeanCarl]

Pam,

I've been thinking all night about your post and trying to come up with the words that would help to ease your pain. And I finaly realized I have no words that will accomplish that purpose.

Oh, I know your pain will lessen. And so, I think, do you. But that doesn't realy help right now does it? So, if it helps, just imagine that I'm sitting there, quietly, with you this evening. In my heart I am.

Dean

[shirleyb]

Oh Pam,

I am so sorry you are having such a rough day. I understand what you mean about seeing the pictures and thinking he is still here. The pictures are proof positive. I have cried those same tears after finding pictures of Randy that I did not expect to see.

I believe there is a Heaven and a God. My father had an acute heart attack when he was 49. He died that day but only for a moment. In that moment he got to see God. God wrapped his arms around him and my father could feel His love. Dad was then sent back to us for another 15 years. That is why I believe in God and Heaven. The things my father told me about that day will live in my memory until I too one day will join him and Randy and all the rest that have passed that I have loved in my life.

Pam, you are in my thoughts and prayers still.

Take care,

Love

Shirley

[Pam]

THANK YOU all so much for your replies....I am feeling so selfish this morning for laying all my fears and doubts out last night, when so many of you are going through so much worse.....

I have always believed in God and I still do, there would be no point to life without Him.....I want to believe so much that we will all be together

again some day.

Thanks again to all of you.....

[lilyjohn]

Pam

Reading your post took me back to so many of the days I have lived through. I too have felt the anger and asked the questions. I have lost my faith and regained it more than one time. Pain often makes us question not only our beliefs but ourselves. No one knows why we have to endure so much pain. Who choses who will beat this disease and who will not? I don't think there are any real answers to those questions.. As for believing in God, I have never doubted His existance, just his place in my life. I believed that my faith betrayed me. On the bad days I still do but that is only momentary now. I don't believe in God I KNOW he exists.

Our image of God is just that an image! We see Him one way and expect Him to always be there and give us what we ask for. There are times that what we ask for just doesn't go with our lifes plan. When that happens it is easy to blame God. We ask why didn't He answer our prayers when we have so much faith. The answer to that question I have come to believe is that he did answer my prayers. Instead of yes his answer was no! Why? I don't know the answer to that any more than you or any of the others here do. I just know that was the answer.

Life can seem so unfair. I have felt that everything has been taken from me. It has taken me over a year to realize that tho much was taken from me I have gained so much too. Cancer teaches you to fight. It makes you aware of a strength that you never knew that you had. In time it also teaches you to Know God. I know that death is NOT the end. I have had too many things happen to assure me that life goes on just on a different plane. Think about seeing that picture of your dad. When you saw it you felt so close to him. He was once more alive. That was not a coinsidence. It was your dad letting you know that he is still with you. It was his gift to you a gift that he knew you needed at that time.

The fear, hope and pain come in cycles. Sometimes those cycles last for days, sometimes only minutes. Each cycle is a new period of grief. It is those cycles that take us through the hardest times. If we did not feel the pain, fear and anger how would we appreciate the love and the hope when we feel it?

Don't ever be ashamed or beat yourself up for those feelings. They are normal feelings that go with love and loss. Without them we would not be human and there would be no need for God. He finds a way to make us know and He brings us through those bad times. We are all here now among friends. It is hard to have gone through what we have that brought us here but it would be so much harder had we never found the support and loving people here. Cancer robs us but the battle rewards us in ways not to make up for our loss but make us appreciate the love that we were fortunate enough to have.

Lillian

[Snowflake]

Pam,

There is no need to feel selfish when you post your doubts and grief - I believe that it truly helps the rest of us on the board to help someone else, to give words of support and sympathy and to know that even when our worlds may be falling apart, we can do something to help someone else. Many of us experience the same things, just differently and all of us have at some point needed a hand up from someone, ANYONE else who has walked the road before....can you see all the hands reaching out to you? Just grab ahold and hang on.

Perhaps your bad day is the beginning of your healing. The tears will taper off, the pain will lessen...and you will always carry a piece of him in your heart. You have experienced other losses in your life and gone on, you will with this, too. Some things hurt deeper, but this pain, too, shall pass.

I wish you peace,

Becky

[kimd]

Pam:

Just read your post. I know how difficult things must be for you, but may you have comfort in knowing that you were there for your dad and nobody can take away the wonderful memories and pictures you have of him. My dad too has lung cancer and we are now on the roller coaster ride -- ups and downs. Since he's still here, I'm trying to build special times and memories with him (and my children are too). We talked a few weeks before Christmas about how my dad had tought all his grandchildren how to play checkers except my little one (he's 7). I stayed overnight with my parents Christmas Eve and spent Christmas Day with them (I live 1 1/2 hrs from them) and woke to the sounds of my dad playing Christmas tunes on his guitar and mandolin. Just like it was a normal day, guess what he did later? He taught my son how to play checkers. So -- our dad's also build memories. I feel certain your dad is in heaven and looking over you. There will be special times you will think about him and that's when I think they are letting us know that they are okay (even if we aren't). I have two coworkers who both lost parents to cancer over the holidays and when they returned to work, I had a very difficult day. I had to try to comfort them and rec'd a call from my mom the same day and told me my dad's chemo stopped working. May we all have the strength to get through each day. God Bless!

[J.C.]

Pam,

Sorry I did not see your post before, I just learning how to navigate

in a Forum.

A friend sent me this when my husband died and I was like you

asking WHY ! WHY HIM ?????????????????? WHY SO FAST???

My prayer for you

Sometimes we walk along a path

Beneath a cloudy sky -

There's nothing to the right or left

To lift our spirits high..

Then at last, we turn a corner

And there burst, into our view

A scene of light and beauty

And the world seems fresh and new,

So always hold this little thought

That cares are bound to end,

And there's a brighter day ahead -

Just waiting round the bend.

May His love sustain you,

His presence bless you,

and may He keep you very close - always.

Get well soon, better days will come.

J.C.

[Debaroo]

Pam, I also feel that much of your post could have been written by me. Although, the only weird thing for me is that I never ask why. I guess I have always believed that our whole purpose here on earth is to get though it together. I used to work with people with severe developmental disabilites, and one day my mom asked why God would allow people to be born with such handicaps, I had never thought of that, really, before. Because, to me, it is to be sure that those who do not suffer with such disabilites-take care of those that have them.

Now, I always thought I was a negative person, I guess because I used to shave my head, listen to punk music and wear black ALL THE TIME, but actually, that was all external. Internally, I never realized that I do have alot of faith.

But, this has been the tricky part for me. Because I keep wondering if I have faith merely because it makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside. Because it makes life somewhat more bearable. So, I then think too much and then tourture myself with the whole "proof" thing...I'm sure MANY of you have done the same thing, the whole "give me a sign" thing. I feel that I've been making this request of my Dad or God or ANYONE to 'show me the money', I believe that if I had a penny for every time since Dads death that I have asked for a "sign" that the whole 'spirit' thing and the whole heaven thing is true, I'd be able to pay off the national debt and have enough money to buy my own private island where we can build a vacation getaway for the whole LCMB family.

There are times that Daddys death just hits me like it just happened and I cry until I can't cry anymore...but most of the time I kind of feel like hes not gone, like I can, somehow, feel his presance. Then my logical side screws up that good feeling with the whole "so, maybe this is what denial is" thing. THEN I GET UPSET, Its like I have to force myself to realize that I won't be able to see or hug my dad again. Its so weird. I miss my dad, and yet I don't feel like he's gone, so I don't always miss him the way that I think I should. I always hated and never believed in the 'denial' card and now here I am, filling myself with self-doubt over my own feelings-I have never been more confused in my life.

Gee, this post must be really helping you. I guess my point, and I do have one, is, follow your gut. If you're upset or angry, let it out-if your having a good day, allow it. Give yourself permission to feel whatever you feel, and give yourself time to get used to all of this. I think that Dean put it best-and a LOT less wordy than me -there are no words that will help to ease the pain, so, lets just all sit quietly together-and take a breath.

Take care, Pam. Deb

[Guest DaveG]

As I read over the original post and all the replies, I suddenly came to the conclusion that all of you, but two, could be my children talking about me. (Lilly and I are about the same age, and Dean and I both served during the Vietnam War.)

When I had my second surgery, at the Marshfield Clinic, 125 miles from my home, a friend from the LC Support Group at the U of Wis Comprehensive Cancer Center, came to visit me. He drove over 130 miles to do so, as he was from a town other than mine. Two months later, to the day that he visited me, we buried him.

The night before he died, he called for me to come and visit him. When I went into the room, it was just he and I, he asked me to take his hand. He then told me that he wanted me to come because he wanted to share what he was experiencing. The first thing he said to me, was don't be scared because death is a wonderful experience. He said that he never felt so much at peace as he did then. He told me that he had already seen Heaven and it is beautiful. (I didn't doubt what he was saying.) There were no tears on his part because of the peace that he felt. He said there was nothing more to cry about, as he believed that where was going he was going to be happy.

I know that the day he came to visit me, while I was recovering from surgery, he was in great pain. That was his style = always the other person first then worry about himself.

Less than 12 hours after I visited him, he breathed his last, with his whole family by his side. His wife told me, that 5 minutes before he died, he said good by to everyone there.

I have always felt that he is in Heaven and he is looking down at us in the LC Support Group at UWCCC, and is proud of what he sees. He was one of the founders of the group and when he died, at his request, all memorials were made to the support group. To his memory, we have created a 4 page brouchere about Lung Cancer and about the Support Group. This brouchere will be distributed to all the hospitals and medical clinics within a 75 mile radius of Madison, WI. He made it possible.

[Karma1976]

Pam, all I can say is I understand 100000000%. It is the HARDEST thing ever. I HONESTLY sometimes have to stop myself from thinking about him, not in good ways but I for some reason tend to go back to the final days and it drives me nuts. I try to focus on all the good and "time" I had with him and it seems like is should have been more. So I feel for you and hear you. I am trying everyday to make this whole tramatic ordeal something that would have made him proud. that is about the only thing I can do is honor him in every way i can.