The Other Side of I Do

By Kathi Lengyel

Tom and I were married on a warm sunny day in August amidst family, friends, flowers, and live music. It was a small affair with hors d'oeuvres, champagne, and cake. The ceremony took place at the same riverfront restaurant where we shared our first date. Afterward, we sailed off into the sunset on a friend's boat. Twenty-nine years later, how could this man have died after an eighteen-month "battle" with colon cancer? Prior to his disease, he had always been the healthy one. Tom loved camping, hiking, biking, and racket ball. He even came to aerobics with me, often being the only man in the class. The Other Side of I Do is a journal that documents the emotional highs and lows following Tom's death. Often, writing in my journal was the only thing that made sense during the early days of being a widow. Interspersed throughout are flashbacks to the life we lived, as well as dramatic vignettes documenting his diagnosis and treatment.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: May 2, 2019
• ISBN: 9780359646074

Book preview

The Other Side of I Do

The Other Side of I Do

Kathi Lengyel

2019

Copyright © 2019 by Kathi Lengyel

All rights reserved.

This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review or scholarly journal.

First Printing: 2018

ISBN: 978-0-359-64607-4

Dedication

This book is dedicated to my kids, Jen & Milan, Amy & Michael, Ann & Dieter, and Mat; my grandkids, Nik, Gabe, Logan, Ava, Jack, Charlotte, and Max - you are all the light of my life. Also, to nurses everywhere, care for your patients, as you are their hope.

And of course, to Tom who encouraged me to be the person I am, the greatest gift of all.

Foreword

I hope this book is a help to others when they lose a spouse or significant other. Maybe it will prompt a few to journal their thoughts, as some days that was the only thing that got me through. Putting my feelings down in print made them real, and when I read them now I am surprised at how much emotion they express. I also know if I hadn’t written them down, many of these important memories would be lost. It is my hope that those who still have partners will read these words and remember how important it is to be there for the people we love and never take the future for granted. We really don’t know how long we’ll be here, who we’ll meet along the way, and how our path will change unexpectedly. I never went looking for Tom, but one day, there he was…

May 6, 2010

My parents died in their eighties, and my husband’s parents were even older, his dad passing away after ninety. My husband, Tom, at the age of sixty-one, died yesterday of colon cancer. I went with my two younger children to the funeral home today to sign the contract for cremation, as that was his wish. We will have a private family service for him this weekend at the First Unitarian Society in Milwaukee with a celebration dinner following. It will be a time just for our family; four children, two with spouses, and five grandchildren, to mourn his untimely and quick passing. Tom was up and moving around on Sunday and even watched a movie early Sunday evening, Mamma Mia! It brought a lot of smiles to everyone’s face. Our daughter, Ann, had taken him for ice cream and a ride in the country on Saturday. By Monday he was less alert and spent the day in a lounge chair in our bedroom with music and then the news playing in the background. He deteriorated more on Tuesday, not moving from the bed. And on Wednesday he was less alert with only occasional responses, which at times were hard to decipher. He died on Wednesday, May 5th, at 2:43 p.m. with me and three of our children holding hands and telling him we loved him. He died listening to music from his youth, Bob Dylan and the Grateful Dead. What a Long Strange Trip It's Been. He had just about an hour before he looked intently into my eyes, seeking me out in the room, and said he loved me. I miss him. I can’t believe I won’t ever see him again... That’s the hardest part of all of this.

May 11, 2010

My intent was to journal every day, but it’s been five days since I could bring myself to do so. We have received flowers and many, many cards of sympathy from family members and friends. My co-workers from Lakeshore Technical College sent food for the weekend, casseroles, meats, breads, cookies, a quiche, brownies. At first, I thought, what will I do with all this food, but it was great! The kids were here for the weekend and I didn’t think once about what to feed them. We had a chicken casserole, potatoes, and chili on Friday night. On Saturday before the private service for our family, we had sloppy joes and ham and turkey sandwiches. We also had a meltdown among family members, some felt it was too sad to be in the house without Tom. Everyone cried and there were some raised voices, but we continued to the service and shared many wonderful memories about Tom and then had a lovely, loud dinner after. Ann made a photo board starting when Tom was a baby and ending with a photo taken about four weeks ago. It was beautiful and so thoughtful of her. I also think staying busy with this memorial kept her mind off the reality of the situation. She was intensely close to her dad and called him every day after his diagnosis, following her return from a broken engagement in Spain.

The biggest surprise at the service was the commentary from our daughter Jennifer. Being stepfather and stepdaughter, they didn’t always see eye-to-eye, but as she said, He was always there for me, no matter what. Amy offered that she was taken aback when Tom said on the day of her graduation from college that he didn’t think she would even go to college. He was well-known for his blunt interjections. She added that it made her more committed to continuing. Ann said she would miss his advice and their daily discussions. Mat said he would miss working with his dad and felt he had learned a lot from him about taking care of day-to-day stuff.

Last evening it hit me that I would never be able to talk on the phone with him again, that he wasn’t just a phone call away! Friends and family I have called since Wednesday have all been shocked at his passing. After his initial diagnosis and during his treatment, he never gave up hope for a cure. He was positive and active until right before the end. It was only after we traveled to the Cancer Treatment Centers of America in northern Illinois that he gave up. The team at CTCA felt there were no options at this point for him, that his liver was too far gone to start anything new and that beginning an aggressive medical protocol would immediately throw him into liver failure. On the ride back, which proved to be a very stormy Friday evening, he turned to me from the passenger seat and said he was done, that he couldn’t deal with any more false hope. That truly was the moment he decided to die, and within less than a week he did.

He remained alert enough to say goodbye to everyone in the family and then his body shut down. I miss him so much it’s hard to even think logically about what has happened. But I know he would want me to move forward. To take care of the house, which was his pride and joy. To take care of the kids, as he really loved having a stable and intact family, something he never had as a child. And to take care of myself, as he always encouraged me to be whoever I wanted to be. But I miss him…

The Call from Denver

I remember the day Tom called from Denver. It was Thursday at 6 p.m. I had just come home from working all day. I sensed the tension in his voice. The nurse practitioner he had seen earlier in the week after a prolonged bout of abdominal pain had called him at work. She had been recommended by a colleague, as Tom had yet to connect with a physician after his move.

The week before, he had gone to dinner with a friend at a Mexican restaurant on Halloween, and the pain had started that evening. Tom had taken antacids and for a time felt better. But over the weekend the pain kept returning and it was getting worse. Did he have food poisoning again?

At first, from his symptoms, the nurse practitioner thought it might be his gallbladder. She sent him for an ultrasound which was inconclusive. She asked him to return for a CAT scan, but at first, he felt he was too busy with work. The pain was still there. I remember being irritated with him and telling him just to go for the test, and he finally relented. Unfortunately, the results were not his gallbladder. The nurse practitioner felt he had stage IV colon cancer with metastasis to his liver. I was stunned! Almost speechless! I reassured him that this was only one opinion, and he needed to come home and see his regular physician. Surely, she had made a mistake. Being a nurse, I realized early in my career that the world was rarely black and white, but many shades of gray. There had to be some give here for other possibilities!

By the end of the phone call, we had made plans for Tom to return home early in the week prior to Thanksgiving. He would contact his local physician and ask for a referral for a colonoscopy. He seemed more at ease by the time we hung up. Throughout our years together we had tackled problems by coming up with a plan of action and meeting controversy head-on. It had provided a sense of reassurance and made us feel we were in control versus outside influences controlling us.

May 14, 2010

I’ve spent the last four days alone in the house. Alone all day and night. With work and school calling, Jennifer returned with Milan and the kids to their home in Michigan on Sunday. Amy and Michael also left with Jack on Sunday. They live about an hour away, but again, work is waiting for them both. Mat returned to Rockford to spend the week finishing what needed to be done to complete his master’s degree in special education. Graduation for him is Sunday, two days away. Tom had hoped to attend. Ann also went back to her apartment on Monday night, she said she had to throw out a lot of food since she’d been at our, I guess it’s now my home for about a week. She also returned to work on Wednesday. I’ve always been uncomfortable being in the house alone at night, but this week is different. After seeing Tom die of cancer in our bedroom, being alone in the house is the least of my concerns. I’ve also spent these days working on organizing a memorial celebration for Tom. Everything has just fallen into place, so I know it’s the right thing to do.

The day after Tom died, Mat and Ann went to the funeral home with me and we arranged for his body to be cremated, per his wishes. We also picked out an urn for a portion of his ashes, decorated with doves in flight. We discussed where to spread the rest of the ashes, deciding on important spots from his life. The west coast from Berkeley to Eugene, maybe even the Palisades where he grew up. In the Sierra’s Kearsarge Pass where he took some of his sister Judy’s ashes. She died from brain cancer five years earlier. And to Hungary, Budapest to be exact. Tom and I had been planning on an extended vacation this next summer to visit his relatives in Hungary, and I finally wanted to go to Italy and visit the Tuscany area. As his condition started to deteriorate in March we put our plans on hold, hoping for a better turn of events and possibly a new course of treatment at CTCA. We also had the private memorial for Tom last