My Story is about My dad

 

This event took place from 04/21/2012 to 07/12/2013

 

The Discovery

My dad was bent over in pain on his birthday while fishing, so we had to stop the tournament and go home. On May 3, he went to the doctor and they said 80% chance pancreatic cancer, so then they were gonna do an endoscopy but my dad had a heart attack on the table. July 14 Dr Adams (aka Dr Death) walked in on the phone and said “I’ll be home in five minutes. Bye.” Then turned to my parents, “you have pancreatic cancer. You have 1 year to live.” Countless second opinions, a trip to the Mayo Clinic, 3 bouts of pancreatitis, success at American Cancer Center, but change in treatment due to insurance “networks” led to treatment at INOVA, then finally John’s Hopkins. My dad passed a year later to the day of Dr. Death’s diagnosis.

This is My Story

The last words my dad ever (coherently) said to me were, “I can’t go. I’m not done teaching you yet.” We cried together – only the second time in my whole 17 years of life that my dad had cried in front of me. I will never forget those words. I pray that anyone faced with this situation would ask any of those burning questions or even simple questions. You may not get that chance ever again. But I also pray for the Lord to use our stories and our hurt to help others, that we won’t have to face the horrors in vain.

The Impact of Time

It was so fast. Yet at the time, so painfully slow to watch my dad emaciate and agonize in pain (silently). Early detection was not a thing. By the time my dad felt the pain (April) to when he finally was able to do the endoscopy (July) because of an MI (May) he was at stage 4. Time was not on our side. And after Dr Death, the others in his same practice disagreed with him, saying it was only pancreatitis. It wasn’t until the Jacksonville Mayo Clinic (December) said he “lit up like a Christmas tree” that we had the official confirmed diagnosis. And treatments happened so fast, but they were so painful to watch. I would give anything to have 5 more minutes with my dad to just ask those things I now realize I will never know.