I had landed an excellent seat; the story drew me in, as my senses were unimpaired, and I slowly left Rochester, and hospitals behind to immerse myself in the image captured through my eyes. The movie was horrifying; the people in the audience screamed and jumped in unison.

As the actors pursued the vicious shark, and more unsuspecting individuals fell prey to the maniacal monster, one began to feel helplessly self-protective, as if caught unaware, one might be torn limb from limb. Then, in a brutally raging climax, the shark was overthrown, and a tumultuous sigh escaped from the lips of on-lookers; everyone was safe at last.

When I rose from my seat to file out of the building, reality slapped my face. I was not in Moline, I was in Rochester. Tomorrow night I would admit myself into the hospital, and Monday would be inescapable; by Tuesday I would sleep beneath the surgeon's blade and awake to the answers of unfulfilled questions. Yet I was pleased that, for two long hours, I had, without prompting, laid my worries aside; forgetting was a business best left unto itself.

Sunday was spent musing through shops in the local mall. I delighted upon finding several pairs of pants and two knit shirts; it was a ch.o.r.e to fit clothes, since I was tall and, admittedly, too thin. So happy with the new purchases was I that I asked the clerk to remove the tags on two articles and reappeared from the dressing room feeling very much in style.

In another store I spied a purse that looked nice, but cost fairly little. I looked down disgustingly at the worn bag which dangled lifelessly at my hip, and felt the purse would be a worthwhile expenditure. Digging into the old one for my money, I finally extracted a disintegrating leather wallet; it's appearance so shocked my mom that she immediately offered to buy me another.

Generously outfitted, I dismissed the mall with my parents for the more pleasant atmosphere of the city park. The afternoon was disappearing rapidly, and we no longer tried to rid our minds of distressing thoughts, for they were altogether too prevalent to wish away.

Strolling through the gra.s.s, we did not often speak; we merely waited for evening to descend. There is always too much time before an unpleasant event; too much, yet not near enough. The afternoon stalled...it seemed never to end...and our conscious minds sustained heavy blows.

We walked near the lake, where geese stood craning their necks and bickering among themselves. I looked away; the sight offered little solace to my restless mind. I longed, almost, to fling myself upon the hospital steps if I could but in that way escape the awful waiting...waiting...waiting.

Dad glanced at his watch; five o'clock, suppertime. Eating; it was something to do, so we welcomed the thought wholeheartedly. Our therapy consisted of such occupations; as long as one remained busy, the job itself mattered little. Thus, the main objective of the hour encircled the procuring of sustenance.

I knew that the meal that evening would be the last I would share with my parents for several days, yet I no longer remember what I ordered or if I ate well. I recall only that I had been told to finish eating before a certain hour, so that the following morning the test could begin early; under the strict instructions, I lamented that I would not be able to partake of the customary late-night snack.

We did not linger over our dinner plates. The tension had become too great; I wanted the hospital to be our next destination. I carried my few belongings for I needed no suitcase; my underwear I stuffed in my purse.

PAGE 49

Chapter 10 Preparation and Surgery

"If only one did not have to think during the long periods of uncertainty and ignorance, and could somehow benumb the senses until the hours of darkness had pa.s.sed!"

CHAPTER TEN

Preparation and Surgery

At the admissions office, forms were completed; it was much more complicated than registering for a motel room. I sat nearby, watching the wearisome process.

There were no rooms in the pediatrics ward. I was led to a room which was quite old and depressing, and found to my disgust that my roommate smoked. "I hope this doesn't bother you," she said motioning to the hand that held her cigarette. What did it matter, I thought; she would continue smoking regardless of the way I felt about it. From experience I had learned that, although many people who fostered bad habits did not want to be overly offensive, most never possessed enough genuine concern for another individual to refrain from their habit. I waved off her question, and hoped for adequate ventilation. Is this the bittersweet price for societal living?

My few belongings were stowed in a closet, then I went back to my bed and sat on the edge of it, uncertain of what I was supposed to do; during these periods of antic.i.p.ation, had I been a smoker, I might have lit up. I did not wish to spend the night there; anxiety clawed at the walls of my stomach.

Through the window across the room, city lights twinkled like hundreds of stars which had been hurled to the earth, spreading toward the horizon in a grid-work of interesting lines. Soon my parents would return to their hotel; I almost wished that they would leave, so I could adjust to my new surroundings, for I would face tomorrow's test, and the following operation; I had to find comfort within myself.

Mom and Dad kissed me goodnight, amid their internal struggle toward leaving their little girl in the hands of strangers. Once they had gone, my nervousness began to subside; anxiety breeds anxiety, and lacking two generators, I now bore only my own.

Seeing that I was quite alone, a nurse entered the room bearing the essentials of hospital life, issuing to me a gown, and placing kleenex tissues and a thermometer and styrofoam water pitcher on my nightstand.

She routinely popped the thermometer into my mouth and took my blood pressure and pulse rate; removing the thermometer from my mouth, she glanced at the reading and made notations for her file. Before bidding me goodnight, the nurse reminded me that I should eat nothing, nor should I drink water after 6 a.m. the next morning; I nodded in comprehensive agreement, and climbed beneath the sheets to stare at the ceiling.

At first it was difficult to dispel my restless thoughts, and I fought to find a comfortable position amongst the stiff sheets and unfamiliar pillow. Yet at some unknown point in time, disquietude was overruled by fatigue, and I was claimed by the obscure world where conscious and unconscious thought are united as one. I drifted into a pleasant, untormented sleep.

In the morning, quite soon after I had been awakened a nurse administered a relaxant which quickly chased away negative emotions that would have otherwise clogged my mind. I felt blissfully content and agreeable as my senses numbed and were encircled by an unearthly calm. I smiled dreamily as my parents descended upon my heavenly state of awareness, speaking and receiving words which sounded distant and muted, as those heard by one while swimming underwater, or standing behind a heavy door.

Two interns arrived, wheeling a cart intended for my transport to places unknown. They skillfully guided it past my parents with minimal conversation, and easily hoisted me from the bed onto the unquestionably hard surface. I waved goodby to Mom and Dad, who stood dubiously watching as the men wordlessly rolled the stretcher down the hall, and finally, after a fair amount of travel, found myself in an expansive room, surrounded by gauges and meters by which a staff of doctors and nurses stood awaiting my arrival.

The room itself was rather dark, which blended fittingly with my semi-consciousness. While the staff worked about me, I remained awake although my body was as limp and motionless as one in a coma. The doctor injected a liquid dye into my vein, watching a monitor as it slowly spread from the point of entry at the union of my leg and trunk, and I began to feel weaker still. With markers, the doctor charted a map on my stomach under the beam of a spotlight; I looked on maintaining awareness through a power that no longer seemed to be my own. It was crazy that people concerned themselves about death; I felt more than half-way there; whether I drifted closer to life or to death made no difference to me, then, for in all things existed only tranquility...and that blissful unearthly calm.

Gravity tied me to the bed, and I laid like a dead thing, bound by an invisible, unyielding weight. All afternoon I slept, and into the deepest night; morning came, Tuesday morning, but I knew it not.

Though numbered words to my parents I spoke, I can recall nothing. In my mind's h.o.a.rd of memories, that morning never dawned before these eyes.

For my parents, Monday, the day of the arteriogram, was spent primarily in my room. They did little but watch in silence as I slept, breathing quietly as dream after dream filtered through my subconscious mind.

Aside from mealtimes and occasional strolls to exercise their legs, my parents remained near my bed until the ripe hours of the evening. Near 8 p.m. Mom was paged on the hospital intercom. Receiving the phone at the Nurses Station, she found herself conversing with Dr. T., the surgeon who would lead a team scheduled for my case the following day.

The operation would be of great consequence, and he wished Mom to fully acknowledge that fact before it commenced; to all operations, a risk was involved, and regarding the seriousness of the situation was of utmost importance. Since the ma.s.s had so thoroughly encroached upon the stomach, they would have to remove most of the stomach itself, thereby reducing its overall size considerably; though the stomach would stretch with time, it would never return to its original size.

The conversation came to a close. It seemed awful that a young girl, Mom's little girl, should have to endure so much, so ma.s.sive an operation. She returned to the hospital room where I still breathed steadily in a tranquil repose; while Dad received the portents of the previous conversation, I was adrift on a sea bereft of anxiety or pain, and ignorant of their antic.i.p.ation, I did not stir when they stood to return to their hotel.

The day of the operation had dawned amid countless hours of waiting, yet the waiting for my parents had not ended; the minutes would drag while I laid beyond their sight, and a doctor kindly advised that they leave the building, for the operation would most surely prove quite lengthy, and the hospital atmosphere had less to offer than did the beauty of the nearby sanctuary on the hospital grounds. They nodded, numbly deciding to try his remedy for over-wrought parents.

Mom and Dad found their way to the garden, their legs propelling leaden bodies through some distant, unknown source of power. Ambling through the sunlit pa.s.sages like automatons, their eyes would focus, yet they did not see. Finally disposing of the useless suggestion, they checked their course and wheeled around to return to the hospital once more.

They felt compelled to be nearby, even though there was nothing with which to occupy their senses; the operation so filled the capacity of their thoughts that no other form of diversion was required.

I was in surgery for six hours. My parents were anxious, at times pacing the hallways, and then sitting once again; despite the voluminous weight which seemed to claim their energy and tax their very soul, they were always watchful, ready to receive any news of the progress from the operating room. Staring dismally at the various activities that were going on about them, Mom suddenly noticed two nurses wheeling a cart past the lounge where my parents were seated.

"Those are Laurie's things!" she exclaimed; suddenly overwhelmed by the thought that I had died, and they were removing my personal effects from the room. On rubber-like legs, she raced down the hall, adrenalin giving her energy which seconds ago she had not possessed. Rushing up to the nurses, she again cried out, "Those are Laurie's things!"

displaying fully the horror of her panic-stricken a.s.sumptions.

"Oh. . ." they replied "we're so sorry! We never would have moved her things without telling you first if we knew you were sitting there.

You see, a room is vacant in the pediatrics ward, and we're taking her things down there." The explanation heralded unspeakable relief, and Mom returned to her seat, an older but less fearful woman.

Resuming their stationary poses, my parents waited, each fostering thoughts of dread and flickers of hope. If only one did not have to think during the long periods of uncertainty and ignorance, and could somehow benumb the senses until the hours of darkness had pa.s.sed! The truth can burn the heart like a smouldering ember touched lightly to the flesh, but waiting. . .waiting is the relentless torture of unseen phantoms, made more hideous through one's blindness as the seconds slink by, without an end.

A door opened, and Dr. T. strode toward my parents, who immediately rose, br.i.m.m.i.n.g with questions. The doctor ushered them into a conference room, and closed the door behind him. Already present were Dr. M. and W. who had a.s.sisted him with the operation. The doctors said that I was in the Intensive Care Unit, and would remain there for several days until my condition had stabilized and I had regained some strength. It had been a long and grueling operation; Dr. T. confessed that when he first looked at the incredible ma.s.s in my stomach, he did not believe that they would be able to remove it. The growth was cancerous and severely advanced; having one baseball sized tumor and several smaller ones in the stomach, it had begun fingering into the pancreas as well. Nevertheless, they decided to work, the minutes fading into hours, until their degree of progress flooded them with hope. By the time they finished the operation the doctors felt quite confident that they had removed the growth entirely.

Understandably pleased with their efforts and apparent success, the doctors continued to further explain the cancer which had invaded my stomach. The type that I had developed was called a "leiomyosarcoma,"

which was considered a low-grade cancer and one quite slow to spread.

Ninety-eight percent of those having that type of cancer were cured simply through an operation alone. A factor which mystified them about my case was that most leiomyosarcomas occurred in older women; why a young girl of 13 would produce such a cancer seemed baffling.

Visitation time in the ICU was strictly monitored, and limited to several minutes out of each hour. My parents were anxious to see me, however, even if they could not long remain at my side. After the conference had ended, they were guided into the dimly lit room which I shared with others demanding close attention. Their eyes were greeted by an alien spectacle, quite changed from their little girl who tromped through the woods and gleefully rode her bicycle. A tube exiting my nose was attached to a machine which suctioned out the contents (acids, fluids, etc.) of my stomach while it healed. An intravenous bottle dripped some unknown fluid through a long tube which trailed down several feet and then disappeared under an ample wrapping of cloth. The incision itself was hidden beneath my hospital gown, a full six inches in length. Also concealed beneath my gown was a tube connected to a small bag taped to my skin in which the seepage near the wound would acc.u.mulate; called a "drain." It operated through gravity alone.