I think the hardest part of all of this is that between the likely dementia of some kind, age, trauma/denial, the anemia, the cancer, and the chemo - mom keeps forgetting or simply not processing in the first place that this is chronic; forever.
She will never get to ring that bell signaling the end of treatment this time, never get to be announced as cancer free or in remission.
Best case scenario is that chemo can become briefer and/ less frequent. But even that's not likely.
Feb 4, 2026 10:29Due to many factors, she's likely to be in this five days of chemo every 28 days schedule for the duration. Until this chronic version turns into the acute version, which will be even worse.
Meanwhile, the blood transfusions will keep being needed regularly, as well.
She's had all of this explained in different ways by different people multiple times. But she keeps forgetting.
I'm walking a thin line between being honest with her and not constantly crushing her hope.
Meanwhile continually have to reprocess the reality of it for myself.
She just had 2 units of red blood cells and 2 units of platelets transfused, which means she's probably gonna wake up feeling much better and say something like maybe this is working and she's recovering.
2 days later...
😭😭😭
