Authors: Meghan Redenbach
Meghan’s Journey: The Story of Meghan Redenbach: The Teenage Girl Who Showed a Community How to “Man Up” in the Face of Cancer (5 page)
She came in. She smiled slightly. My stomach just dropped. I was shaky and nervous.
When I get nervous I get the chills and shake really bad. “Hello Mr. and Mrs. Redenbach.” She shook their hands then made her way over to me. “Hello Meghan.”
“Hello, how are you?” I asked.
“I’m well, thank you.” She smiled. “I have the test results back from the surgery. I’m very sorry, but the tumor was cancerous. You have a very rare form of ovarian cancer. It is called fibrosarcoma, and it is usually only found in menopausal women. There have only been thirty cases reported, and only one being a child. She was eight years old.”
She continued, “Now, most of this tumor is fibrosarcoma, but there is another type as well. It’s called a germ cell, which is very common, unlike the fibrosarcoma. I’m sorry to say this but the only treatment for this is to have chemotherapy.”
Silence. Nothing but silence. It didn’t hit me at all. I didn’t even cry or ask questions. I just looked out the window in silence. I didn’t want to look at anybody; I didn’t want to face the truth of it. I figured if I just looked out the window it wouldn’t be true. None of it would be true. Just keep looking out the window, I thought.
“I will come back a little later and talk to you some more about this so you can have some time together.” She left the room and my dad followed her. I think he was going to ask questions. Then mom got up and followed as well.
It was just me and my grandma. I looked away from the window to look at her. I shouldn’t have, because the look on her face broke my heart. I should have just kept looking out the window.
“What now?” I asked slowly. I shouldn’t have spoken either. She started to cry, and my eyes watered up. I needed to talk to someone. I had to call someone. I grabbed my cell phone and called my best friend Olivia.
Olivia is the one I always called when something went wrong, even if we were mad at each other. It was just a habit to call her. She always turned bad things into something funny to break the tension. She had been my partner in crime since second grade. We are both major competitors. We both play basketball, volleyball, and softball. We are always laughing non-stop, and always drawing attention to ourselves by doing stupid things. We always look back and laugh at the stupid things we used to fight about. This one time she came over, and we were eating cookies. There were crumbs all over the floor, and my mom yelled at me for it and told me to pick it up. Well, I wasn’t happy with that. I said they were Olivia’s crumbs, and we argued and yelled over whose crumbs they were. We ended up having to take her home because it was so bad. Neither of us would accept that they were both our cookie crumbs. We laugh so hard about that day.
“Hello?” Olivia answered. Thank God she answered.
“Liv?”
“Yeah, what’s up? I missed you at school again today. Are you feeling better?” She had no idea about my surgery or anything. It took me a second to answer.
“Uh…well, I had to have emergency surgery and I…” I couldn’t get the words out. “I have cancer.” A tear ran down my cheek. I never thought that sentence would ever come out of my mouth.
Silence again. I didn’t like the silence. For some reason it made everything seem so much more real.
“Oh my God. I’m, I’m so sorry.” She hesitated. I could tell she wasn’t really sure what to say. “This sucks,” she said.
I couldn’t help but laugh a little, because it’s so her. That’s exactly how she handles things. It was a relief just to hear her say that. It didn’t sound so serious.
“I’m really sorry,” I said, “but I have to go. There is a lot going on right now. I will call you as soon as I can.”
“Okay. I hope you feel better.” I could hear her voice starting to crack.
“Thank you. Bye.”
“Bye.” She hung up the phone. After that, more silence.
The Ride to Roswell
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his ride seems so long. It’s only forty-five minutes, maybe fifty to the hospital, but on this specific day, it seems like a lifetime. Everything seems to be moving in slow motion. At least it’s a nice day out. I would say it’s about seventy degrees. We have the windows down with the wind blowing around all our thoughts. It’s kind of tense; I can feel the uneasiness my parents are feeling right now. It’s like there is an empty pit in my stomach. I forgot about that when I saw the birds flying freely in the sky, and the squirrels scurrying around climbing up the trees. They distract me from these feelings, at least for a couple minutes at a time; then I have to look for something else to catch my eye.
I’m listening to my iPod, taking in the sights. I am so focused that my blaring music is just barely heard in the background. I like to do this on the rides, and I try to remember how I look at things around me. I’m starting to find that whenever I’m coming home from the hospital, I view things differently than I do on the way there.
I noticed my mom in the passenger seat looking out the window. I noticed the sun on her face, and the wind blowing her hair. The sun was bouncing off her sunglasses and her skin seemed to sparkle. She had this way of looking so calm and not letting anyone know when she was worried. But today, I could just feel it; she was a little more tense than normal.
My mom is the most patient in the family. She’s pretty, too. She has short brunette hair, with these green eyes that look like the new green leaves on the trees. She is so loving and nurturing; it’s hard to imagine someone not loving my mom. In fact, I don’t think it is possible. She would do anything for anybody. I think that is what makes her so special. Like most other moms, she would do anything for me and my older brother, Nick. In this past year, she really proved it. She was right by my side through everything, along with my dad, too. I couldn’t have gotten any luckier with my family. We are almost like a gang; we never leave each other unprotected. We stay together, through everything. Sometimes I actually wonder that if my disease never happened, would we be this close. Would my parents end up getting divorced like a lot of families these days? Would my brother and I cut our parents completely out of our lives? I trembled at the thought of it. I just couldn’t imagine a life like that. I know for a fact, that if I didn’t have my family, I wouldn’t be alive.
I suddenly snapped out of my daydream, realizing we were already parked on the top of the parking ramp at the hospital. Then a new train of thought came to mind, the last three month check-up. I quickly shook my head, as if to shake away the thought. We started walking towards the door. It felt like slow motion walking towards the entrance. My eyes were focused in on the door. Walking down the hallways, past the blood-work room and main check-in desk, we entered the waiting room. I sat down next to my mom and dad by the window. I looked around. My heart broke as I saw a little old woman and her husband sitting across from us holding hands as the nurse called their names. I couldn’t help but wonder if they were about to receive good news or bad news. I quickly closed my eyes and just hoped for the best, for their sake. The couple disappeared into one of the rooms followed by a nurse and a doctor. I was so focused on what might be happening in that room. I thought about the worst. I do that a lot lately.
I had to find something else to think about. So, I looked out the window in hopes of finding a bird or two to watch. Instead I saw a woman with her mother’s arm linked with hers. She was pulling her IV pole with the other hand. They were walking down this concrete path outside where it is like an outside visiting area. On each side of the path are these small trees with birds and butterflies circling around them. It really is beautiful out there. There are benches out there with names of past patients which their families dedicated to them, and these beautiful tulips everywhere you look. There were all sorts of colors. There was a very light breeze that was blowing them around ever so slightly. I kept looking, and in the very middle is a water fountain that just seems to top everything off. The two women sat on a bench closer to the fountain. They sat silently and just admired everything around them. They seemed to be taking everything in. The older woman looked up at the sky; she closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath as if it were her last. The breeze was blowing the scarf that was around on her head. The sight looked as if it were taken straight from a movie.
“Are you okay?” my mom said. She looked at me with this blank look on her face.
“Oh, yeah. I’m okay. Just looking outside.” I lied, but I put on a believable smile. I learned how to do that after a while. I do that so she doesn’t worry. Same with dad, but I think Nick can read me better than they can.
My mom went back to reading her magazine. I looked at my cell phone to see what time it was. It didn’t seem like it, but we had been waiting for almost a half an hour since we got there, and not that long since that older couple had left with the nurse. My heart fluttered a little bit. I figured if I flipped through a magazine I would forget about that couple. I reached for a magazine, and as I did I saw them. They were heading back towards us. I froze.
“Thank you. Thank you very much!” the old women said with a shaky voice.
I couldn’t see her face until she turned back around. She and her husband had smiles from ear to ear. Once again they were hand in hand. The man kissed her hand and they walked past me, past the check-in counter, and out the door. A sigh of relief came over me. I couldn’t help but smile, because it was so cute. My mom nudged my arm and smiled. She was thinking the same thing. I noticed her eyes. They were gentle and seemed to go on forever with no end. Then I heard the door open that leads to the hallway of examining rooms.
“Meghan,” the nurse called.
I didn’t even look at the nurse, because I was so intrigued with my mom’s eyes. Then suddenly, they were darker, and they seemed to have no emotion behind them. We slowly got up, and followed the nurse with the clipboard back to the same room where the older couple had been.
Saturday, December 6, 2008
Meghan woke up in the morning and complained of a stomach ache but still wanted to go and get her hair done for the Snowflake Dance that night. She had a great time.
Sunday, December 7
Meghan woke up and said her stomach really hurt. She had her second day of club volleyball tryouts and insisted on going. She complained about her stomach all day. We didn’t think anything of it because her basketball team had the flu, and strep throat was going around school. We came home from volleyball and Meg slept most of the day.
Monday, December 8
Meghan still didn’t feel well and stayed home from school. She said it felt like knives in her stomach. I was giving her one more day to see if she felt better. I went to work and Meg still didn’t feel well when I got home.
Tuesday, December 9
Meg tried to go to school. She was out waiting for the bus and then came running back in the house, sat down on the couch and said, “I can’t do this.” About thirty seconds later she ran for the bathroom and had to throw up. After throwing up she was screaming in pain curled up on the bathroom floor. I knew that something was really wrong and called the doctor’s office at 7:05 a.m. The answering service had the doctor call me within fifteen minutes. I spoke with Dr. Bill and he said it was not the flu and to take her to Children’s Hospital and have tests and blood work done, and we would take it from there. We were all thinking maybe it was her appendix.
I called Mike home from work right away. We went to Children’s at 9:15 a.m., got registered, and then we were put right in an exam room. The first thing they did was ask a million questions. They took her down for an x-ray of her tummy. When she came back she said they had her sign something. We told her that she should never sign anything without knowing what it is. I told her she signed a paper saying they could take her right leg off. Mike told her she signed something saying they could take her bank account. What she actually signed was a paper confirming that she was not pregnant.
When the results of the x-ray came back they said that there was poop in her colon and rectum, and maybe she was constipated. The doctor said that we could go home and give her an enema, and if the pain didn’t go away with that we could bring her back, or we could let them give her an enema and see what happened. Well, we chose to have the doctors do it. Mike explained to Meghan in a funny way what an enema was and she didn’t believe him. When the nurse came in with that well recognized box, Mike and I were out of there. When we came back in the room Meghan was lying on her side and said, “I think I really hate you guys.” We all laughed, including Meghan.
After waiting forty minutes for the enema to work, the intense pain was still there. The next step was a CAT scan, where Meg had to drink three cups of an apple juice flavored liquid. After Meg drank the liquid she had to wait two hours before the test. At 4:30 Meghan went up for the CAT scan. This test took about fifteen minutes. We went back up to the ER to wait for the results.
Around 6:00 p.m. the results were back, and they needed to do further tests. We found ourselves on the way to an ultrasound. They had lots of people in this room while doing the test. It was me, Mike, Meghan, the head radiologist, a technician, and two surgeons. They were having a hard time finding her right ovary. When they found it, it was very large and mixed with some type of cyst. All the professionals chatted in front of us and alone, and we knew something was wrong. They took us back to the ER to wait and see what was going to be done.
Around 7:00 p.m. a team of surgeons came in. The chief surgeon of Children’s Hospital talked to us and informed us that emergency surgery needed to be done. By 7:30 Meghan was on her way up to surgery. Meghan was in surgery for one and a half hours. After surgery Dr. C came and spoke with us. He told us that they had to remove Meghan’s right ovary because there was some type of tumor or cyst entwined with her ovary. He also told us that there was some type of fluid in her stomach, because the tumor had ruptured. He told us that Meghan had been in a lot of pain, and she would be in the hospital for three to five days. We would receive test results back in three to seven business days as to what type of cyst it was. Meghan went to recovery until 10:00 p.m. and then up to her room. Her favorite doctor came to check on her; he was a resident from the University of Buffalo, but Meg called him Dr. Michigan because he had the state insignia on his skull cap. Meghan was able to give herself doses of morphine. She had a rough night of sleep, along with her mom.
Wednesday, December 10
Meghan woke up and was very sore in her incision area, but said she would take that pain over her other pain any day of the week. Meg had so many visitors—family, friends, and teachers. She received flowers, cards and gifts. We both stayed over again (Meg and me).
Thursday, December 11
Meghan felt a little better today; she got up and walked around the floor. She met the girl next door who lives in Medina. She had her appendix rupture. Meg had lots of visitors again today. We played “Fact or Crap” and Mike won. Meghan slept on and off today. We couldn’t wait to go to sleep. Dad went home to fill Nick in on everything. It was the week of exams for Nick, so we tried to leave him alone. It worked—he made the Dean’s List.
Friday, December 12
Meg is doing awesome. She can get up by herself and roll over. She isn’t on the morphine button anymore. She is only taking Loratab and Colace. We were awaiting test results to come back today on the tumor that was removed. Dr. B came up around noon and told us that Meg had a very rare type of cancer. It is called fibrosarcoma and is usually found in women who are menopausal. Thirty cases have been reported, and only one girl who was eight years old had it. Most of the tumor was this type of cancer, and a little part was also what is called a yoke cell or germ cell type, which is the most common. Treatment for this would have to be chemotherapy. We were all devastated but remained very positive.
Meg’s teachers were all notified by Miss Maclam. Her friends were getting word of all of it. Everyone from my work to Mike’s work, Meghan’s school, friends, family, and volleyball were asking what they could do. Meg had one question: “Am I going to lose my hair?” The answer was yes. This was a big deal to her since her hair is everything to her.
We made it through the news, and the doctor wanted Meghan to have a CAT scan of her chest and lungs to make sure there wasn’t anything bad going on. The test came back okay. Nick came up in the evening with the DeChellis family. He was quite upset.
We went to bed early, because we knew that we would be leaving tomorrow. We will have to come back next week to have Meghan’s port put in her chest. This is where her chemo will be put. She will need to be put out like she was for her surgery.
Back on December 9
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, when I told you about Meghan signing things without asking what it was, well it came back to us as a funny joke. We were sitting on Meg’s bed waiting for her to be discharged, and around the corner came a girl in a wheelchair with one leg. Meg’s response was, “She must have signed the same paper I did!” The two of us laughed hysterically. Mike came in and said, “You two are bad.”
Saturday, December 13
Meghan finally was able to come home. We left the hospital around 1:30 p.m. When we got home Meghan wanted all her friends to come over. There were so many visitors.
Sunday, December 14
Meghan was still recovering from surgery “giving birth to a cantaloupe.” Lots of friends came over. Meg received gifts and flowers continually. Very busy day—people dropped off so much food.
Monday December 15
Same as the past few days. Prizes, flowers, food, and visitors. Talked to Dr. C’s office and Meghan will be getting her mediport put in on Wednesday the 17
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.
Tuesday, December 16
Rested up for her surgery on Wednesday. Lots of people called and came over.
Wednesday, December 17
Meghan had her mediport put in and we had to be at Children’s Hospital at 9:00 a.m. Meghan was an add-on for surgery. We arrived at nine and registered. After we registered we went to the Outpatient Surgery floor (9
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floor). Meghan finally went into surgery at 1:30 p.m. Surgery was one and a half hours. Dr. C came out and said everything went great. They just had to put the line under her collarbone instead of going in through her jugular. Meghan went to recovery for about an hour. When Meghan finally came around she was very sore and groggy. We stayed an extra hour to let her recover a little. When we got home around 6:30 Meghan was exhausted. She had to go to bed early because we had to be at Roswell at 8:45 a.m.
Thursday, December 18
We got up very early and went to Roswell to get the rest of Meghan’s test results and her bone scan and to speak with Dr. B about Meghan’s treatment. First we went to Nuclear Medicine to get Meghan’s injection for her bone scan. Next we went up to talk to Dr. B about results and her therapy. We discussed that Meghan was diagnosed with fibrosarcoma and would have to have chemo every three weeks, then stay there for three days and be hydrated. We then went down at 11:00 a.m. to have Meg’s bone scan. Mike went in the back with her for the scan. They were back there for one hour. During this time there was a “Code Blue” called for the Inpatient Department, which is connected to the Nuclear Medicine Department (I was unaware there was anything else back there). I saw all these doctors, nurses, and crash carts rushing through the door. The only person in the waiting room was me; therefore I panicked and asked the lady at the window if it was my daughter. She just looked at me and didn’t answer. I then said it again and she said, “No ma’am, your daughter is fine.” Ten minutes later Meghan and Mike came out of the back laughing at the x-rays of Meghan’s body. He was making the skeleton’s dance. I explained to them what happened with the “Code Blue,” and they were laughing at me when I told them what I did.
We went home and waited for the results of the bone scan. We were all exhausted from the last two days of running around. When we arrived home Dr. B called with the results of Meghan’s bone scan. Everything was A-Okay. Meghan doesn’t have to start her chemo until the day after Christmas, Friday the 26
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, and then she can come home on Monday.
Friday, December 19–Thursday, December 25
We all enjoyed the week of Meghan feeling well before her first treatment of chemo.
Friday, December 26
This was Meghan’s first day of chemo. We had to have an EKG and a MUGA scan done before we went up to the inpatient floor (the MUGA scan evaluates the right and left ventricles of the heart). The nurses all introduced themselves and made us feel at home. Lots of different people came in to speak with us. As they got a lot more information from us they continued to get Meghan ready for her treatment. They started by accessing Meghan’s mediport and hydrating her. Meg’s urine needed to be at a certain pH. After lying around all day and acting silly, they finally began giving her the treatments. She remained in her room for this. The chemo was in two different bags. The first bag took fifteen minutes and was red in color. The second bag was clear and took three hours. They continued to flush her system well. Around 11:00 p.m. Meghan started feeling very nauseous and throwing up. They gave different types of nausea medicine for this. She slept most of the night, but was very nauseated. I slept over with her, and Mike went home to get some rest.
Saturday, December 27
Meghan slept most of the day, ate nothing but woke up long enough to visit with Bethany, Grandma, and Aunt Janet. She began her treatments again at 7:00 p.m. At about 11:15 the same thing began to happen as the night before. Meg felt horrible. She said it’s like having a bad flu. The doctors came in the morning and let us know that they need to get to know Meghan’s body and figure out what works best in medicine for her nausea. She finally went to sleep. I went to sleep and Mike went home to be with Nick.
Sunday, December 28
Meghan woke up to the doctors talking with her. She still had a very upset stomach. Mike stayed home until around 4:30 p.m. because there was a storm, and the power went out and some water filled the basement. There were 60 to 70 mile an hour winds. Today Meghan only gets the one bag of chemo. After receiving this she began to throw up again. Meghan slept pretty well. Mike left around 9:30. Around 4:15 a.m. Meghan decided she was bored and said, “I’m bored—wake up, you slept enough”. I told her to turn on the TV. She then said, “There is only paid programming on.” She finally fell asleep.
Monday, December 29
I woke up around 8:00 a.m. and figured I would give Meghan a little taste of her own medicine. I said, “I’m bored—wake up, you slept long enough.” Meg replied, “Shhh” and laughed.
The doctors came in around 9:00 a.m. and said that Meg could go home around 11:00 a.m. They did a test before discharging her. They checked her blood pressure and heart rate while she was lying down, sitting up and standing up. She did fine with the first two things, but when it came to the standing up part, her heart rate went up to 200 and her blood pressure crashed. They immediately put her back in bed and bolised her (gave her lots of fluids quickly). It took about fifteen minutes for her to start coming around. The doctors came back in and wanted her to stay a couple more hours. Around 3:00 we could leave, but she needed to eat and drink a little, which she did. She wanted visitors when she got home, so Aunt Debbie, Uncle Dan and Lindsay, Sam, Karen and Michael came to visit and brought her gifts. As soon as they left at 9:00 p.m. she began throwing up again, and none of her medicine stayed down. She couldn’t eat or drink.
Tuesday, December 30
After suffering into the night with nausea and throwing up, I called the nurse’s station at midnight. Meg had a terrible headache. They had the doctor call me and said to have her try to eat crackers and drink. If this didn’t work and she got worse, we were to call back. It got worse. By 5:00 a.m. I called back and they said to bring her back in. We arrived at Roswell around 6:45 a.m. The car ride was the longest ride ever for Meg. Mike parked the car and I went in to register her. At the registration desk Meg began to throw up. Mike then came and wheeled her upstairs. She rode the elevator throwing up with other people. They didn’t seem to mind, they just said “I hope you feel better.”