My mother was introduced to Cancer in 1965. She was a newly married mother with two small babies when my father was diagnosed with a terminal cancer at the base of his brain. The tumor was inoperable. It caused migraine headaches and blurred vision. My father was 24 years old with a wife and two daughters, both under the age of two, The tumor caused extreme pain and it made his tolerance low. I remember my mother always working around the house. My mom was the one who was always there to provide discipline, love, and support. A presence in every memory. The rock that held our shaky foundation together.
My father outlived his year prognosis and battled the cancer that grew at the base of his skull for five years. He died on Thanksgiving evening; November, 1970, one month before his 30th birthday. My mother was 28, I was 6 and my sister was 5. The few memories I have of my father are vivid involving both extreme happiness and sadness; not the day to day living that we must have done.
My mother worked at a factory throughout my life. Five days and forty hours+ every week. She never had a day off, she never missed for sickness; either hers or ours. She made the money that supported us. I can never remember wanting for anything.
Within a year of my father's death, my mother bought a trailer and moved us to my grandparents farm and that is where we grew up. The farm is where our memories were made, under the watchful, loving eyes of my Grandpa and Grandma we survived our first encounter with Cancer.
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