01_F*ck you pancreatic cancer

I wrote this post a couple of weeks ago and have only now had a chance to publish. These are records of and reflections on my experiences as I’ve become my mom’s primary caretaker in her journey with pancreatic cancer.

I write this on my phone in the backseat of a cab. I’m on my way home from the hospital for the night. In the morning I’ll be back in the hospital in time for the doctors’ rounds at 8AM. Why they have to round so goddamn early is beyond me.

I write this as a way to process, record, remember. Maybe there will be some time for reflection and understanding of some grand design some day but for now, I know I won’t be able to write this in the future so I’m just going for it.

Yesterday was the summer solstice, but everyday feels pretty much the same around here. I had planned to be back in California by now, but here I am in Seoul indefinitely, spending every day in the twilight zone that is the hospital.

My mom has metastatic pancreatic cancer. She is 55.

Mom was diagnosed with early stage pancreatic cancer in April of 2018 at the age of 52. Through surgery and chemo, we had maybe 1.5 good years after the diagnosis. The last 1.5 years have been increasingly harrowing, with the last 3 months just being a complete shit storm.

My little brother who’s a doctor told me never to Google things about mom’s disease, but I’ve googled everything.

Pancreatic cancer.

Of the cancers, turns out it’s one of the really bad ones, with a 5-year survival prognosis overall of less than 10%. I’ve grieved every day for the last 3 years but have had hope that she’ll beat this disease. She’d soldiered on through 30+ courses of painfully toxic chemo, if anyone was going to beat this, it was going to be my tough, diamond of a mom.

Josh and I arrived in Seoul in March of 2021, in the midst of a pandemic, to spend time with my family. We planned to travel with my mom to Jeju and do our usual couple of weeks in Seoul and come back home to California. Little did I know what the next few months would hold.

While we were in mandatory quarantine (a thing of COVID times dear readers from the future), my mom went for her usual chemo course of folfirinox when her oncologist told her that the cancer had stopped responding to the chemo.

For mom, the news seemed almost relieving as she had decided to tell her doctor she wanted to stop this toxic chemo due to the painful side effects. Her oncologist switched to a less aggressive gemcitabine-abraxane chemo regiment and encouraged her to continue treatment.

Soon after, mom started having severe, debilitating pain and could no longer eat. We witnessed my mom go from having flashes of pain to screaming-nonstop-throughout-the-night pain, and had her admitted to Seoul National University Hospital.

We’ve spent the last 2 months in and out of SNUH and have come to understand that what doctors originally thought could be symptoms of chemo toxicity, are in actuality signs of her metastasized cancer.

Her digestive tract has completely stopped functioning. Because she cannot eat, she is on constant IV nutrition and fluids. She has a tube down her nose into her stomach to drain fluids for comfort. She is on an unbelievable amount of Fentanyl for pain control, yet her pain seems out of control.

For better or for worse, sickness and death are new to me and I’ve had a hell of a crash course as I’ve unexpectedly become my mom’s primary caretaker.

I’ve unfortunately have become way too familiar with what “cancer pain” looks and sounds like.

I try and pray but many times I do not know what to pray for. I pray that my mom is not in pain. I pray that she doesn’t suffer. I pray that God deliver us from this hell. I pray that she hangs in there — but sometimes these prayers seem mutually exclusive.

What I would do for a day with my mom not in relentless pain. What I would do for the ability to have a conversation with her, to laugh with her, to enjoy each other’s company in the mundaneness of everyday life.

Fuck you pancreatic cancer.