Kid Sister…
She looked at me and said, ‘When I think about my upcoming surgery, I’m scared. But then I think about how you went through three surgeries with your c-sections. If you did it, I can do it. It gives me a lot of comfort knowing that you went through surgeries before me.’ I was a bit stunned to hear Lynette, my big sister, share this me. First, that ‘little sister complex’ keeps telling me that I don’t have much to offer my big sister. But here she is telling me that I’ve been through something she’s never been through and that’s giving her courage and comfort! Secondly, she was referring to my c-sections, of which I always felt that she was a staunch opponent of unless really medically necessary. I had my first child by c-section out of medical necessity and my other two were arguably necessary. I guess it just depends on who’s standards you’re using.
I always felt a little bit like I let my sister down when I had my babies by c-section. She was the ‘au naturalel’ childbirth woman and I assumed I’d follow in her footsteps (or rather, six labors before even my first one). But due to uncontrollable circumstances, I definitely went to the opposite end of the spectrum. She never came down on me for this, but I didn’t feel much like a champion childbirther around her either. So, I just didn’t talk much about my birthing choices with her. Now, here she was redeeming my choices of agreeing to c-sections for my babies and re-writing what I assumed she thought about me and my childbirth outcomes. The area where our life stories took two distinct paths now had a bridge. My three surgeries now held something that Lynette needed – courage. She needed to know that she could make it through her surgeries. It gave her encouragement that her kid sister had done it and so she could do it too. What a gift she gave me in telling me how that was meaningful to her. As strange as it may seem, it made me feel closer to her and like I was helping her in some small way. I felt connected to her in a new way and thankful for my past experience with surgeries. Here I was feeling helpless, but unknown to me, something about my lived experience was aiding my sister through the big surgery ahead.
Time to Say Goodbye (for now)…
My time to say goodbye had come. After a few days of visiting, seeing my sister, her family, and my mom and brother who had come to visit, it was time for me to head back home. Saying goodbye was difficult. The next day she was having her first brain surgery to remove as much of the tumor as possible. I questioned, ‘Would she make it through? Would she live? Can they, the medical community, fix this?’ There was no assurance that she would be back to normal, doing better, or doing worse than at this very moment. All I had to hold onto was the last few days from our visit together. I felt unsure, but somewhat hopeful. I hoped that the doctors could remove all of her tumor. I hoped that this would stop her seizures. I hoped that this would give her movement back on her left side. I hoped it would be the end of her cancer.
As I woke up the next morning to catch my flight, my sister was ‘catching’ her ride to the hospital. She’d be having brain surgery while I was flying home. (What a strange sentence. I never expected that to be a sentence I’d ever write.) I made it home without any trouble and anxiously awaited the news of her surgery. Surgery was finished! The good news is that the doctor thought he had gotten 90% of the tumor. A later MRI revealed he had gotten about 95% of it! Praise the Lord. That was wonderful news and put me into a good place as my family headed south to visit my mom and brother’s family in central Illinois.
We already had travel plans to head south before I made my big leap to the east coast of the United States. So, when we arrived to visit with my brother and sister-in-law, we joked about how long it had been since we saw each other. Yes, this was the brother who I just saw at my sister’s house. We updated our spouses by sharing about our experience and shared our sadness over our sister’s cancer diagnosis. It was just as hard on my brother to see his big sister in such an immobile state. Jesse, my brother, has SUCH a big heart. His love is big and that love goes out to his big sister too. I’m sure he could fill pages with memories too. They argued and wrestled with each other, but they also were each other’s playmate all throughout their childhood. A favorite picture is one where they shared a pair of Dad’s coveralls! Their two small frames could fit inside of one pair of Dad’s large coveralls. The smiles from the photo show such joy and love on their faces.
While we were all finally relaxing together, we got a text from Shaun, her husband. He was asking us to pray again for Lynette. She wasn’t feeling the greatest and needed some prayer. Immediately we four stopped what we were doing and right then and there, we prayed. We prayed with much hope and belief that whatever was afflicting her would stop because we were praying for her. We sent a photo of the four of us because we just so happened to be together. Shaun responded that Lynette liked the picture and could really sense those prayers. Her pain was even subsiding a bit! We happily praised the Lord and continued our time together.
On the day we were getting ready to head back home, Jesse and I shared breakfast together. It was a relaxed breakfast as we had our last bits of time to talk. As we ate, we once again reflected on Lynette and how this affected us and how it affected our family. With our emotions heightened, we started to cry. Just a little bit of tears and some nervous laughter to follow. It was just really hard. Our big sister was very ill and we were so far from her. We didn’t know what to expect. We didn’t know if we’d continue to have all our siblings or if one day, we’d be taking pictures with one less. As we wrestled with our feelings, we also joked in an effort to keep things light. In the last minutes before we headed out, it was time to take a quick picture together. With tears in our eyes, but smiles on our lips, we captured a moment of real connection between us, the two youngest siblings – Jesse and Brittany.
Updates on the Journey…
Over the next week, I waited anxiously for updates. Lynette’s husband posted regular updates for all to see and I am ever so thankful for those. Each day we got to hear about the progress she was making. Each day, he posted prayer requests so we could pray along with the family. Each day brought more hope as we saw small, but steady improvement. I was so relieved. Her speech was improving. She could wiggle her left leg a bit. Her appetite had returned. All signs pointed towards continued improvement until a week out from her surgery. Suddenly she had a massive headache. Her pain was at a 10 out of 10 and the doctors had to keep increasing the medicine to get her pain level to decrease. Unsure of what was going on, they took her for a CT scan. This scan revealed that she had an infection in her incision sight. So, they had to get her back into surgery to clean out the site (Sept. 8.). What an anxious day that was! Later, cultures would reveal that she had a staff infection and would need 6 weeks of IV antibiotics and a longer hospital stay.
After feeling hope lift and lift for 6 days, it was really hard to comprehend what could be happening with this sudden headache. And when it didn’t resolve overnight, that was even more confusing. What’s happening? Her tumor is mostly gone, it’s practically not there anymore. How could she possibly be having what felt like a relapse? Why is this happening to her? She’s supposed to be getting better. She’s supposed to just keep on improving. This is not the trajectory I had imagined. I wrestled with the feelings of disappointment, discouragement, and confusion. The question, ‘Why’? came to mind over and over again. It didn’t make sense. I didn’t understand it. AND… I didn’t want to accept it. Setbacks were not allowed in my book.
Yet, the next five and a half weeks was only setbacks it seemed. One after another. This infection was a very tricky one and pesky too. It wouldn’t resolve and sent her back to surgery two more times (Sept. 23 & Oct. 7). From headaches, to swelling, to a breakthrough seizure (Sept. 28) and a bit of tumor growth, things weren’t looking the greatest. After five brain surgeries (Biopsy, original surgery, 3 clean ups), they’d be reluctant to do anymore surgeries if something further happened to her. I started to worry that maybe things wouldn’t resolve this time. It was getting pretty serious and I felt the fear and grief course through me. As I cried to my husband about these hard developments, he told me in no uncertain terms, that I needed to go out there again. All I could see were the obstacles: There’s no time! There’s no money! We are traveling to a retreat soon! I have my teaching schedule!
Building Resilience…
All these were really just excuses though. Yet again I was afraid to travel out to see my sister on my own. What was I going to do? I didn’t want my sister to die. I didn’t want to say goodbye. I didn’t think I had the inner strength to go through with a visit to seeing her in a hospital! … And personally, hospitals are not my favorite place to be … and on and on I went. One excuse after another because it was just so hard to face the inevitable. It’s hard to do BIG things, at least for me. It’s hard to put myself into uncomfortable situations. Yet, that’s a big part of life. It’s a big part of what we want our children to learn. You can do HARD things! You CAN! How many times have I said that to my kids? Each of them face their own giants and each of them must learn to overcome them. Resiliency isn’t something we get to choose to have or not have. It is essential to the human experience. We must grow in resiliency and each small step, or big step, grows us in that. This was yet another step in my growth towards more resiliency.
Could I handle this step? Would it overtake me? Or would I somehow make it through? Would God be with me and carry me in this most hard time? What was I going towards and how would I get through it?
…I’ll write about the trip in my next post. But, I wanted to take a moment and just sit with this a bit. Things get hard, really hard. We have choices to make left and right. Sometimes we have people beside us who can coach us and encourage us, like I had my husband. And other times we just have to move forward and take the next step regardless of whether or not we have a team cheering us on. Either way, I’m thankful for my faith because it means I’ll never go alone. Even when I’m literally alone on this physical earth, I still have the presence of Jesus and his Holy Spirit with me. I have relied more times than I know on the strength and hope that resides in Jesus. It’s not a ‘given’ that I’ll feel him with me, but it is a PROMISE that he’ll never leave me. That is the confidence I take with me into hard things. And with him, and through facing hard things repeatedly, I have grown in resilience and can face the next hard, big, and ‘right thing’.
I’ll leave you with this song from the movie Frozen 2 called ‘The Next Right Thing’. This song comes after Anna has apparently lost everything – her sister, her traveling buddy, and even her way. Yet, she rises up and puts one foot in front of the other because there’s still life and people out there. She still has an assignment or mission to the people she leads and those she cherishes. She will rise and move forward and with that, gain confidence in each step. May the Lord bless each of us to take the next steps with Him daily.
Brittany M Putman 