Sara Haghipour
The Signal
Cancer…that one little word can stop you in your tracks and change your life forever.
It doesn’t feel that way just for the people who have cancer but for their family, too. When someone in your family has cancer, it’s like your entire family has cancer.
My mother is a two-time, triple negative breast cancer survivor and the strongest woman I know.
Her second bout with breast cancer began in January 2011 when she was diagnosed, not with a reoccurrence, but a brand new cancer.
There’s never a good time for cancer, but during my mother’s illness, life was just about as hectic as it could be. I was working full-time and going to school full-time. My father was working out of state, and as much as he wanted to be home to help care for my mother, he had to work to pay for her cancer treatment.
It is a strange feeling, the role reversal, when your parents start to get older. Suddenly you, the child, have become the caretaker, and one of the people who has taken care of you your whole life needs you in a way she never has.
I went with my mother to what felt like an endless number of doctors appointments between her two surgeries, radiation treatments and chemotherapy.
Taking care of the house, grocery shopping and cooking fell to me. Many days my mother could barely make it out of bed and onto the couch. Chemotherapy had taken away her sense of taste for mostly everything. The only thing she ever wanted to eat were cinnamon muffins from HEB, which even made preparing a well-balanced dinner a tough task.
Sometimes I felt guilty for feeling tired, stressed or depressed; after all, I was taking care of my mother, not living with cancer. I eventually learned that these feelings were okay, but at the time, I never allowed my mother to see them. The last thing I wanted was for her to feel like a burden.
It was a difficult time in my life, but I got through it because I knew that my mother needed me and that was all that mattered. When you go through something like that, there’s not always a lot you can do; you just have to get through it. Sometimes I would just go for a drive and cry because that’s all I really could do.
I could tell my mother became depressed and some days didn’t even want to talk. I wish I could tell you that there was a way to cure this and lift her spirits, but that wasn’t the case. I felt helpless seeing her this way. I learned to listen and to let her know I was there and that I loved her.
After my mother’s first chemo treatment, she told me that she felt like giving up because it wasn’t worth it to live feeling as bad as she did. That was the first time I realized my mother needed tough love to help her through the draining treatments, and I had to provide it.
I had to be strong for her when she was weak, and I had to make tough decisions for her when she wasn’t thinking clearly. There were times when I felt like I had to drag her out of the house for her treatment. Now she tells me she is thankful I did. I’m just thankful to still have a mother.
For anyone who has been through this or will go through this, know that treating cancer is long, exhausting and painful. I am grateful and blessed that my mother is a survivor. Through all of the stress and sadness, I tried to stay optimistic. Maybe it was for my mother’s sake or maybe it was for my sanity – I’m still not sure.
All I know is my entire life my mother has been there for me through everything, good and bad. I didn’t believe it was possible for our relationship to get any stronger, but going through a hardship like cancer brought us even closer. The bond I have with my mother goes beyond that of a mother and daughter; she’s my best friend.
