The road is long, and keeps on getting longer...

So today was supposed to be mom's last day for chemo.
She was only supposed to have chemo for 4 weeks and that was it.

it all changed today.

Her white blood cell count was too low to get her treatment.
She has to go in Monday and take another blood test, and then the doctor will decide what to do next.

He also said: if I were you, or you were my relative, I'd say go on the chemo for a year - as supplemental therapy.

She flatly refused.
She says that she has to work - to pay her mortgage, her car bills, to live.
She says that she can't afford to take the chance that she will be too sick to work. Her job has lots of responsibilities, and she would only go to 1/2 salary after 6 months. Not enough to pay the bills.
When she told me that, I flipped.

She has pretty much signed her death certificate and is taking a big chance with her future and health.

I think she is just being stubborn (and talks about losing her hair) and is thinking too much about work when she should really be thinking about herself.

but it all comes down to money

what she needs, what she doesn't have, what she won't have...

I was stunned today.
I had made her a nice card that said : "welcome home from your long journey".
But the journey has just begun again, and it's a long road. Perhaps too fucken long for her, and I am so upset that she has decided not to go on the chemo for a year.

It's not like it's gonna be every day, 3 times a week, 1/2 the dose that she is getting now.

1/2 the exhaustion, 1/2 the dose, and as I told her - you take on 1/2 of the stress at work.

but she is stubborn, and I fear that vanity and fear of poverty are going to drive her to make a decision.

And I thought that it would be smooth sailing, but this mother's day will definitely be a special one, and hopefully , not the last...