106. The Last Corner
September 15, 2022
Last week’s blog, What the Hell is an Orb, was written three weeks ago. During the three weeks that separated that and this blog, my physical and emotional state has hit rock bottom. Where we are: we are no longer managing the pain, the pain is kicking my ass. We are in a cycle of: increase the pain meds then wait a couple days, suffer through moderate or unbearable breakthrough pain, increase the pain meds then repeat, repeat, repeat. I think I have been very clear about this: I don’t want to take morphine at home.
But I am going to have to take it.
Why?
Because ‘Excruciating Pain’ doesn’t come close to describing what I’m going through.
The other night I was woken by breakthrough pain that morphed into an all-out-assault on my skeleton. Within minutes my heart started squeezing an off-beat thumpy thing that caused my entire body to shake uncontrollably. I struggled to reach for my cell phone on the end table but could not stretch my limbs or calm the shakes enough to grab hold of it.
I asked God to take me.
After several minutes I heard Tim in the hallway upstairs and called out to him. He found me on the winding down edge of whatever the hell happened to me. He called Jessica down and she snapped into action.
“Mom, I’m going to change your patch now, it’s several hours early but…”
The morphine part of the crisis was over so we talked about the sequence of events. One thing that jumped out at me was the intense push of anxiety. I don’t know if my heart became crazy because of my anxiety or vice versa, but I knew I was going to ask that my Xanax dosage be increased. Several meds were upped when Nurse M came for an emergency visit later that day.
I got the whole morphine lecture, and from her perspective it is the logical and medically best thing for me to do. I know for certain that had Tim been on scene earlier, he would have given morphine because I would have begged him to.
And. Then. This. Would. Happen.
I would have begun the process to go to Rose Monahan. I know there have been many changes on the final journey of SOB, but there has been one thing that has remained constant. I want to be in a facility where paid medical professions administer end of life medications.
So this is what’s going to happen.
The next time I am tortured by the hideous pain of metastatic breast cancer of the bones I will allow Tim to medicate me. And then I will ask him to begin the process of admitting me to the end of life residence home. After this last event, I was asked if I was okay being at Rose Monahan for an extended period of time should things stabilize. Living — dying — in this body, I know there will not be a whole lot of time. Then I was reminded that I would be away from home and missing time with my family. That is the deepest cut of this, but let’s face it, I’m sleeping nearly 20 hours a day. In rapid succession, the quality of my life has all but ended. I don’t know how long I have, but I know I’ll be spending it on morphine, and it will be administered at Rose Monahan.
I followed my own advice way back when.
And I am going to do it now.
I do not intend to torture myself. I do not want to hear myself cry out to God for the mercy of death. I want to be tucked into a bed with 24 hour care. So, my dear friends, you know my plan. I want you to know I am at peace with my plan.
I hope I’ll be blogging as I go through the next phase of The Life and Times of SOB. I suspect the blogs will be on the short side of things. And for me they will express the important side of things.