There is nothing special or unique about death or, even more specifically, death by breast cancer. Every 13 minutes another woman is lost to this disease and this year more than 40,000 women have died from breast cancer in the United States alone. During the month of October we are all inundated with breast cancer facts, products, and statistics, but for me the only number that matters is 33: that's how many weeks have gone by since my mother passed away from this disease.
The author and her father
Given the general pace of my 25-year-old life, it might seem like 33 weeks --or eight months --should feel like an eternity ago, but that just is not the case. There are days when it feels like it happened yesterday and even instances when I forget that it happened at all.
As I continue to mourn the loss of the person I loved most in the world, I find myself contemplating the one breast cancer statistic that I have not yet been able to uncover. How many people do these women leave behind? How many husbands are without wives and how many children are without mothers? How many people lose their best friends?
In considering this "statistic" or lack thereof, I have been forced to reconsider my relationship with the person my mother loved most in the world (hard to believe, but it wasn't me) and who, like me, has now been "left behind"--my father. If you had asked about our relationship a year ago, I would have told you that my father and I were incredibly close. I would have said, "I'm daddy's little girl, and I can get away with just about anything." And I really would have believed it. It is only in my mother's absence that I've come to realize just how much of my relationship with my father was built around--and filtered through--my mother.
I never had to tell my father directly if I was dating someone; he rarely asked how my job was going or what was new in New York City--not because he didn't care, but because my mother had already told him at least 10 times and he just didn't need to ask. The official family gossip chain began and ended with Lisa Mae Lee, and when she left us on February 28, 2008, those she touched were immediately able to downgrade their cell phone plans by at least a few hundred minutes.
Since I firmly believe that I can fix anything and everything (impeccably) and usually multiple things at any given time simultaneously, it took me a while to realize that I just wasn't going to be able "fix" this man who had just lost the love of his life--the woman he had loved, or at least liked a whole lot, since he was 13 years old. Once I realized just how mentally and emotionally unavailable I was and how empty and awkward time spent with him and without her felt, I realized (thanks to my friends, therapist, family pastor and even a fortune teller in Southampton... no, I'm not kidding) that I no longer needed to run home every weekend just because that's what I had been doing for the last three years.
Instead, I've decided that my job right now is to learn how to take care of myself and build a life in New York that my mother would be proud of and excited about. I'm also working to find some means of connecting with my father as we both struggle to create lives without the woman whom we both loved and to whom we were so devoted -the all important source of cohesion in our family.
It's been a tough 12-year period for my father and me. We waged war against my mother's multiple sclerosis. We managed numerous doctors and medications, and we eventually watched her die from breast cancer. We spent his 50th birthday with her in the hospital and my 25th was spent in similar fashion - the only addition being an end of life attorney, funfetti cake and my best friends in lieu of his own. Less than six weeks after I turned the big 2-5, my father and I worked as a team on what turned out to be her last day. When she fainted, he held her while I called 911. I took over to allow him to move our family cars from the driveway to the street in order to make more room for the ambulances when they arrived; and when they did arrive, I shouted information about my mother's health situation from my parent's closet (I was told to exit the room, but I do not follow directions very well) while my father provided them with key legal documents.
Together, we watched as the number of breaths she took in declined to 3-5 per minute and together we insisted that paramedics who wanted to take her to the local hospital, respect her 'do not resuscitate' order and allow her to die comfortably in her bed.
These are just some of the many things my father and I have done together over the past 12 years. Unfortunately, the majority of them were for--or based on--someone who is no longer with us. We both loved my mother dearly in very different ways. Now that she is gone, we have an option: we can create separate and new lives together or create them apart.
We've chosen the former. I love my father, and as I navigate our uncertain future, I do so with the support of some incredibly generous and well-connected friends who have provided a much needed distraction: tickets.
We've gotten offers from the Bengals. He sat in a box with his brothers at Shea stadium when the Mets took on the Pirates. He will watch the Giants play the Cowboys on the weekend of his wedding anniversary. And for the first time ever, my father and I will take a trip without my mom when we travel to New Orleans to watch the Packers battle the Saints. In addition to the tickets, we will bond over our mutual love of wine, Italian food, and a few fairly violent movies and hopefully all of these things will help ease the pain and confusion that are bound to be a part of this transitional period. I expect us to inevitably experience difficult and awkward moments, but I am confident we will find a way to work through them. (See prior mention of wine and food.)
I don't know how one would begin to account for the number of people left behind by this disease; I can't even begin to account for the number of people left behind by my own mother Lisa. In the 231 days since she left us, I am astounded by the new and unexpected ways this loss affects me and how many previously unknown 'friends of Lisa' have reached out to share their love of her and the void her passing has left. When I meet my future husband (please cross your fingers on this one), he too will experience the loss of my mother - years after her death. He is just one of the people I will meet in the course of my life who will never meet the woman who impacted my life the most. Because she became one of the women we lose every 13 minutes on February 28th 2008, my children will also be a part of that future group of important people deeply affected by a woman they will never meet.
Ultimately, it will be difficult to quantify the number of people affected - whether directly or indirectly - by the death of my mother. This is indeed a statistic that cannot actually be accounted for until we stop losing nearly 5 wives, mothers, and friends every hour.