Ask Lemmy

Well. A year ago I was living with my dad, because he's a broken down old man, and needs help. But he refused help on so many occasions. I'd have to work all the time, to the point where I was never home. But dad wouldn't clean his house. He wouldn't do anything for himself. Eventually it went from "wouldn't" to "couldn't". I'd be gone from 16-18 hours a day, get home, go to sleep, wake up, do it again, 6 days a week. He's completely retired, and could have cleaned after himself at any time. He didn't. Then he suffered health issues. Now he couldn't even stand.

I'd come home sometimes and find him on the bathroom floor.

He wouldn't let me hire a maid. He wouldn't let me hire an assistant. He wouldn't accept any help. And the house suffered. It got bad. Real bad. One year I started noticing mice. And then one day I saw a rat. The house was literally rotting, and I could only do so much on 1 day off a week.

What nobody knew was that I had been suffering physically. I thought it was just me getting older. I'm overweight, but I've always been a very mobile big man. But now I was getting winded going up stairs. I figured "I'm getting older. It's normal."

With me never being home I was eating a lot of fast food. I ballooned up real big real fast. I figured "I have a shitty diet. Of coarse I'm getting fatter. It's normal."

Then I'd get tired doing simple things. I figured "Well, I'm fat now. Fat people get winded. It's normal."

Then one Christmas I'm at my sisters house, and I'm getting real tired doing nothing.

I figured "I've been pushing myself to the limit to pay for dad, and pay for me. My body wants rest. It's normal."

Then my other sister said "You don't look good. You need to go to a doctor."

And the thing is, my sister can be a bit of a drama queen. I figured "it's fine".

Then 3 months later, I pulled my back. My body finally broke down. So I go to the hospital, and the woman says the same thing my sister did. That I looked pale. Which I figured was normal since I'm never in the sun. I wear hoodies in the summer to avoid sun exposure. Being pale was normal, I thought.

The nurse says "Well, I'd like to take a blood sample". In my own mind I'm rolling my eyes, like "yeah, sure, knock yourself out. Waste your own time". Although outwardly I just said "ok", and wasn't sarcastic. Just internally was I dismissive.

She comes back an hour later, and asks how I got into the hospital that day. I said "I took 2 buses, and walked across the street."

She said "No you didn't." And NOW I'm getting maybe a bit more frustrated outwardly, because how are you going to tell ME how I got here???

I said "Yeah. I did. Do you want to see my bus pass?"

And she says "Well, based on your blood sample, you have a blood count of 4.7. To put that in perspective, a male of your age has between 15-18. Essentially, you're so low on blood, that you should have passed out and died at any time long before you hot here. Doing ANY physically active activity."

Then she asked me what I do for a living, and I said "I push wheelchairs. Usually two at a time."

And she said there's no way my blood just dropped that low recently without a major incident. That I must have been losing blood slowly, over weeks, months, or maybe years. She said that at any point with the way I was working myself, I could have passed out and died at any time doing that.

She hooked me up to a bag of blood. Then took a blood test. She said "we're going to hook you into a second bag." Then after that, another blood test. THIRD bag of blood. Another blood test. She said I was still very very low on blood, but they weren't allowed to put any more in me. So I was going to have to stay the night.

Stay the night, in the morning, different nurse, 2 more bags of blood. STILL very low. So now we're doing every test they have to figure out why I'm so low on blood.

I end up staying for 4 days in the hospital. I don't have news. They don't have news. They're running every test they got.

Then finally, on the 5th day, a doctor comes in and tells me I have cancer. I walked in for what I assumed would be a back patch, and a doctors note to miss work, and come to find out a strained back was the least of my worries. Now I'm getting hooked up to chemo, being told I'd be out of work for 6-12 months.

I'm living in a house filled with rats, with a leaking roof, a father who I sometimes find on the floor at home but I can't pick him up, stretching myself beyond my limits, being superman for everyone, and all of this has lead to me getting cancer.

And now I have no job, because you can't be going through cancer, AND still pushing heavy people.

I remember being doped up on surgury drugs and thinking "I have no idea what I'm going to do...."

And I'm not the type to ask for help. I'm the type to help others. Others don't help me, I help others!

And as I sat there in the hospital bed, doped out of my mind, I thought "How?"

And I couldn't answer the question of "how do I provide help for my dad?" I don't know if it was the drugs, or reality crashing down, but I had this scary moment where for the first time in my life things weren't just bad......they were a disaster.

And thats when I realized I can't help dad with or without financial help. You can't help those who want no help. Just as I had scoffed at needing a doctor, he was scoffing at me trying to pay for a roof replacement, and foundational repairs, and extermination services. He won't let me help.

He won't let me help. I can't help him. I can't put into words how that hit me like a brick wall. The feeling of trying to be the hero, and being powerless to help.

I just laid there, watching the office on TBS, and not absorbing any of it.

The next day, I called my sister to tell her the bad news. By this point the drugs had worn off, and I was more alert. When I told her, she said without a moments notice, and without hesitation, she said "We're going to pay for you to move out. We're going to pay your rent. We're going to pay everything.

It was in that moment I realized, I could do the unhealthy thing, and be stubborn. Or I could go with it, start a new chapter of my life, and accept the help.

I did that. Took a year off work. My 2 sisters and mom split paying my rent for a year. Had major surgery to cut the cancer out. Sat at home for a year.

And now, I'm back to work.

So nice things from the state for covering insurance for me.

Nice things from the state to let me get on food stamps while I had no job.

Nice things from the medical staff from many different nurses and doctors, and everybody else.

Nice things from my family to remove me from a situation that gave me cancer.

Nice things from my boss to hold my position (unpaid) for a year so I didn't need to find a new job.

Nice things from pretty much all around.

And this is why I keep the attitude of "if you help everyone, that aura will rub off, and the world will be a better place". I don't believe in karma per se, but I do believe in people noticing you doing good for those around you.