Life Sucks and Then You Get Cancer

I'm warning you ahead of time, this is not a chipper-cheery posting.

Yesterday, at about 8pm, I called my mom because my step-dad, Pete, was having surgery. Why? Well, at the beginning of May he was starting to have very bad coughing fits. As stated in a previous post, he developed walking pneumonia. No problem, that went away, but he was still doing the coughing fits that were preventing him from doing essential things like sleeping. So they went to the doctor again. They then found out that his right lung had collapsed and was filling with fluid. They took 3 quarts of fluid out and he felt better but the doctor said that there might be something else wrong so they had to go see a specialist on Monday. So they did that and the specialist said that Pete needed surgery to find out what it is, so they did that yesterday. Well, the "something else wrong" turned out to be cancer. As of yesterday, my mom didn't know what kind it was or how much there was because the pathologist still had to analyse it. That and she freaked out after the word cancer left the doctor's mouth. Her and Pete are not taking the news well. I'm not certain, but I think cancer claimed both of his parents. You know, sometimes I wonder why all the good people in this world have all the bad shit happen to them. Pete had polio when he was 3 and has never been able to run since then because his right leg and foot are practically useless. Don't you think that's enough to deal with? He's helped my mom, myself and my brother out so much over the past 6 years, this is the last thing he deserves to get. Even my dad said that he would not wish cancer on his worst enemy. (And Pete is not an enemy, for the record. Quite the contrary. My dad has a lot of respect for him.) My grandparents had just arrived back in AZ but now they're thinking about coming back next week to WI to help out my mom and Pete since Pete cannot go back to work for at least 6 weeks and that's just to recover from the surgery. Then they get to find out about treatment for the cancer. Chad and I will be heading to WI on Friday about 1pm because Chad has training for a possible job until noon otherwise we would be gone already. I'll be staying in WI all next week to help oiut while my mom is at work and hopefully my grandparents will get there sometime before next weekend when Chad will come back and we'll go back to MN (Chad has interviews next week, which is why he can't stay.)

If you would like to send a card to Pete, and I encourage that you do, and you don't know the mailing address, please feel free to e-mail me at jennifer.borley@snc.edu

In other news, I didn't want the job at MT Advertising because they didn't offer benefits, which is not kosher with me. However I had another interview yesterday that seemed to go well and I hope to get this job. I think I have one-up on everyone else because the lady who interviewed me had a niece and nephew that graduated at SNC the same time I did and her nephew now works at GB Packaging (To the person who works at GB Packaging who also reads this blog: I don't know if he's available, but his name is Matt.)

Anyway, that's it for now.

Questions? Comments? E-mail: jennifer.borley@snc.edu