We received my wife's Breast Cancer diagnosis in March of 2009. And only seven months later I was diagnosed with Kidney Cancer, also called Renal Cell Carcinoma. Over the next few weeks, I will publish "Our Breast Cancer Story" in six chapters. Please note, that everything you are about to read is written from my perspective and not my wife's.
I received a call from my wife Ann while I was in a hotel room down in North Carolina, attending a business conference. She just had been to her yearly mammography and was called back in for a biopsy. We didn't think much of it, it happened before. Also, her two sisters and her mom had biopsies done, too and they were always benign.
There was this weird two seconds of silence and then she told me, that I had to be very strong now. Her doctor called her and broke her news about her Breast Cancer diagnosis. I wasn't prepared for that. If someone had told me that I had cancer, yes, I would have been in surprised and maybe shocked. But learning about my wife and her cancer, that was too much for me. My throat clogged and my stomach began to hurt.
What really killed me in that very moment was the fact that I wasn't with her to just hold her in my arms. But here I was in this hotel room hundreds of miles away and no chance to get back to her before the next day, if I was lucky enough to catch a plane then. When I received my own cancer diagnosis, I was way more contained and calm. But my wife, no, that was too much for me to take.
Ann told me that she had already informed her brother Gary and he was waiting on the other line, so she had to say good-bye to me for now. As we hung up the phone, I collapsed immediately. Nobody should ever go through something like that.
When you get pushed into a situation like that, everything in life changes immediately. Things like your mortgage, the bills, saving for the kids, etc., are not top priorities any more suddenly. There is only one thing that mattered now, and that was my wife's health. I started to pray and I got under the impression that my prayers were heard. I calmed done and slowly got my senses back together.
But I realized that I had a lot of things to do. I went online and checked the flight schedule. And there it was; a flight going out back to Jersey at 10:00pm. This was my chance. I changed my initial reservation and booked me a seat on that plane. A few minutes later the airline called me to tell me that this flight is about to get cancelled due to an imminent storm on the East Coast. However, if I could make it within 40 minutes to the airport, they would get me on an earlier flight. So I had 40 minutes to get my stuff together, check out, get a cab and make it somehow onto that plane.
The hotel told me that there was no way to get a cab that quickly, so they jumped in and gave me a ride to the airport. That was fantastic. The only problem: my driver had not the slightest clue of the area since he was from Kentucky and just signed up for his new job a few days earlier. As a consequence, he missed the airport exit off of the highway we were on. That was it. Since the next U turn was miles and miles away, I had to say Good Bye to my plane.
I don't know how it was actually possible, but I still made it. I like to believe that the Lord had mercy with me and I know that this might sound corny to some of you. But anyway, I got on the waiting plane and a few hours later I was able to hold my wife in my arms. The first battle in our personal war on cancer was won. - 30427
I received a call from my wife Ann while I was in a hotel room down in North Carolina, attending a business conference. She just had been to her yearly mammography and was called back in for a biopsy. We didn't think much of it, it happened before. Also, her two sisters and her mom had biopsies done, too and they were always benign.
There was this weird two seconds of silence and then she told me, that I had to be very strong now. Her doctor called her and broke her news about her Breast Cancer diagnosis. I wasn't prepared for that. If someone had told me that I had cancer, yes, I would have been in surprised and maybe shocked. But learning about my wife and her cancer, that was too much for me. My throat clogged and my stomach began to hurt.
What really killed me in that very moment was the fact that I wasn't with her to just hold her in my arms. But here I was in this hotel room hundreds of miles away and no chance to get back to her before the next day, if I was lucky enough to catch a plane then. When I received my own cancer diagnosis, I was way more contained and calm. But my wife, no, that was too much for me to take.
Ann told me that she had already informed her brother Gary and he was waiting on the other line, so she had to say good-bye to me for now. As we hung up the phone, I collapsed immediately. Nobody should ever go through something like that.
When you get pushed into a situation like that, everything in life changes immediately. Things like your mortgage, the bills, saving for the kids, etc., are not top priorities any more suddenly. There is only one thing that mattered now, and that was my wife's health. I started to pray and I got under the impression that my prayers were heard. I calmed done and slowly got my senses back together.
But I realized that I had a lot of things to do. I went online and checked the flight schedule. And there it was; a flight going out back to Jersey at 10:00pm. This was my chance. I changed my initial reservation and booked me a seat on that plane. A few minutes later the airline called me to tell me that this flight is about to get cancelled due to an imminent storm on the East Coast. However, if I could make it within 40 minutes to the airport, they would get me on an earlier flight. So I had 40 minutes to get my stuff together, check out, get a cab and make it somehow onto that plane.
The hotel told me that there was no way to get a cab that quickly, so they jumped in and gave me a ride to the airport. That was fantastic. The only problem: my driver had not the slightest clue of the area since he was from Kentucky and just signed up for his new job a few days earlier. As a consequence, he missed the airport exit off of the highway we were on. That was it. Since the next U turn was miles and miles away, I had to say Good Bye to my plane.
I don't know how it was actually possible, but I still made it. I like to believe that the Lord had mercy with me and I know that this might sound corny to some of you. But anyway, I got on the waiting plane and a few hours later I was able to hold my wife in my arms. The first battle in our personal war on cancer was won. - 30427
About the Author:
A few months after his wife Ann got diagnosed with Breast Cancer, the author of this article Tony Ulrich started his website called Our Breast Cancer Site. You just read The First Part of our Breast Cancer Story from his mini essay 'Ann's an Tony's Breast Cancer Story'.
