A New Challenge

Losing Shannon

Recollections of Kent Dyer

Please note, I will not have accurate dates or facts. This is because I am dumping my memory out, and honestly, there will be sections out of order or factually wrong, based on my memory, which was overwhelmed with fear, sadness, and the full gamut of emotions that comes with your spouse and love dealing with a terrible prognosis: Stage 4 metastatic cancer.

I guess it all started when my wife passed away in June of 2024. She'd been suffering from cancer since November of 2023. The hit came about a week after I filed for retirement from the state of Texas. We thought we had everything locked in and were just going to cruise from that point on. We were talking about what we were going to do, where we were going to go, and how we were going to live our lives. Then, I guess, life or nature or whatever threw a huge curveball at us.

Shannon had pretty bad back pain for a few weeks. She had gone to the chiropractor a number of times. She went to the ER one night because she just couldn't deal with it and wanted some painkillers, and they did x-rays and decided to keep her overnight to check some stuff out. I had Ben so I had to keep him at home, but when I went up she was in a room and I walked in and she said, "Have a seat. It's not anything anyone wants to hear."

I felt a little bit like one of those guys on To Catch a Predator with Chris Hansen. You're never ready for the words that come out of a person who's just found out that they have cancer.

She led off with, "I have a broken back."

"You do what?!" was my response. "How? How is that even possible?"

"I'm not done," she said. "Let me talk, just listen."

I nodded my assent and sat back.

"I also have lung cancer, and it has spread to my brain, my liver, and my bones."

At this point, I felt like this was a really bad dream. There was absolutely no way any of this was real or true. Honestly, my brain stopped accepting input, as there was no way these facts could be true.

As my brain switched back on, it was in problem solver mode. What can be done to fix this? What are the options? I was in incident response mode and I started asking questions.

"Stop, I know what you're doing, but stop." I just stared. "I have an oncologist already, and she has already been here to talk to me and I really like her."

The world was closing in; it was an absolute nightmare situation, but it was not my situation, and the independent warrior woman I love was informing me that she was making the decisions for care, but I would be in the loop.  I’d know what was happening, but this was her fight.

"I'm here to support you, in whatever way works for you. For anything that you want me to run with, I got it. If it's your call, it's yours. Just tell me what you need." I couldn’t fix the problem. This was a huge issue, and I was completely powerless to do anything other than support Shannon. This made my mind spin. The overwhelming feeling of helplessness was emasculating.

I would say "let's fast-forward here and talk about the highlights," but honestly, from mid-November of 2023 to June 29th of 2024 is not really much time. (Sorry for the spoilers, but she went fast, and didn't win the fight.)

Cue the montage mode now: Shannon gets fitted for a port so she can take the IV chemo treatments and gets signed up for a series of radiation sessions. They burned her pale skin and made her very nauseous.

My step-daughter Frankie, the apple of Shannon's eye, shaved her mom's head for her. She was happy with the look and got some pretty scarves to keep her head warm.  I guess she still had some 80’s-90’s punk rocker in her blood.

Amongst all of the other things, she started chemotherapy. Strong-willed and hard-headed as Shannon was, she insisted she didn't need me to take her to the medical center where they were putting the poison into her bloodstream. I just kept working and doing what I needed to do.

The day came where she called me from the oncology office. "I have to go to the hospital. My blood counts are bad."

"How bad? What does that mean?" I queried.

"I don't know. I think something is a 4 and should be 10,” she replied, knowing that I craved quantification to justify acceptance.

"Ok, I am on my way."

"No, you're working. Finish your day, feed the cat, and get dinner." She ordered. "You can come to the hospital later and bring my stuff."

I arrived at the hospital that afternoon, dragging a bag of gowns and other necessities. She was sitting up in the elevated hospital bed, watching chick TV, an IV infusing her body with blood. She’d already had two or three units. This was the news I’d expect for someone wounded on a battlefield—not for the woman who, that very morning, had been up and about, operating as normally as a person with cancer could, making coffee, eating breakfast, and kvetching about me: 'Are you wearing that shirt on camera with customers today?'

She was ultimately discharged, and went back to the new normal. I think we went through that 3 or 4 times. I guess I could go look back at the payments I sent or the insurance records, but I’d like to think those are something I don’t really ever have to face again—locked away in a warehouse with the Ark of the Covenant. I’m afraid to see that it happened far more often. The bills came in frequently; one visit would end up being six or seven big bills, usually trickling in 6 to 8 weeks later.

It was a bit of rinse, recycle, repeat. She’d feel better, but lose a tiny bit of ground in some area; we’d adapt and work around it, and so on. Finally, she saw her oncologist, on her own of course—she didn’t need some man interfering—and we saw a glimmer of hope. The lesions were not getting bigger; some were stable, others were actually shrinking. Awesome! Best news ever! I think we got Chuy’s that night to celebrate.

By this point, this was the new normal. Sure, in retrospect, it sucked, but I was spending time with my wife, who I honestly loved so much, and still do. Yeah, I’ve been married before, and divorced. Never before had I been in a relationship that was more of a partnership. We always had each other’s backs, and no matter what was going on, we were trying to make each other better. Shannon was my biggest cheerleader and coach, and pushed me to be a better man and human.

Over time, weakness set in, and I was actually enlisted to take Shannon to the doctor for her regular visits. Once again, it was time to go to the hospital, and since I drove her to chemo, I was taking her to the hospital. We had to brave the ER at the North Austin Medical Center, and at least it wasn’t on a Friday night, or Halloween.

It was crowded, of course, and I got a wheelchair and brought her in with the help of an orderly, and we were signed in. I put her in front of me, and sat in one of the only free chairs to be had. Next to me was a woman, who was oblivious to the suffering or sanity of others, watching a video on her cell phone at maximum volume, in Russian. In Russian. Maximum volume. It wasn’t news; it was some obnoxiously loud video, with people shouting and carrying on, and I have seldom ever wanted to physically attack anybody (that’s a lie) being a fairly non-confrontational person, but this was one of those times.

I looked at Shannon, who was weak, sick, and obviously annoyed by the uncouth, uncultured moron lady sitting by me… my blood began to boil. I was going to say something, “Hey, can you turn that down, or put in earbuds or something?” Nah, too generic. “Pardon me, but your video is bothering others…” No. Not sufficient.

Somewhere down deep in my mind, a phrase bubbled up. A phrase in Russian no less. “Cyka Blyat!” I muttered, not so much under my breath. I felt the lady shift her head and eyes to me. Within 5 seconds, she stopped her video, gathered her belongings, stood up, and barged off to annoy somebody else.

Shannon looked at me, and followed the woman (I shouldn’t have called her a lady) with her eyes and then back to me, and asked feebly “What did you say?”

“I called her a ‘fucking bitch’ in Russian,” I said, very plainly. (Actually, I found out later that the literal translation is ‘bitch whore’ which I guess still fits the situation.)

Shannon smiled. A very warm smile. “I didn’t know you knew any Russian.”  She seemed very pleased with the result.

“I know a few words, but that wasn’t in my vocabulary—I have no idea where it came from.” I wondered aloud, but in retrospect, it was my eldest kid, who played a lot of video games and I guess I picked it up from them.

“Well, whatever it means, it worked. Thank you.”

We got her settled in, I went and got her bag with gowns and other stuff… and took it up to the hospital.

At one point, I was at the hospital, and Frankie and Oz were also there, and the Oncologist came by. She had some not great news. In a nutshell, start thinking about the end. Plan for this and that. Get connected with a hospice organization. Plan. Prepare, accept.

Shannon had at this point ended her chemo and any thought of future radiation treatments.

Somehow, and this is where my own mind gets very fuzzy, we are told that she needs to have regular nursing care. How had we gotten to this point? What the hell was happening? I have mental glimpses of going to a nursing facility next to the doctor’s office and taking a tour, not unhappy with the place, then contacting the insurance to find out that they were not “on plan” with the coverage which had been great up to that point. Ok, people, give me a list.

We interviewed several hospices, who turned Shannon down for whatever reasons, and ended up with Genteva, as recommended by the oncology practice. They ended up being the best thing to come out of this whole ordeal.

My memory feels like somebody painted a beautiful remembrance of a scene in a movie, all in oil paint, then something wiped across the still wet paint on the canvas, smearing it into a melange of colors and leaving me to puzzle over reality: what was that red bit from? The blue streak? The green smear?

I know some facts:

• Shannon picked Genteva Hospice
• We picked a nursing facility
• The hospital wanted Shannon out
• She was in the hospital for something like 4 to 9 days… I really don’t know.

The nursing facility was, in a word, shit. I started trying to find a new one immediately. I had to threaten them with calling the Texas HHSC, DSHS, and the feds. They put her into a room with the bathroom bolted shut… with a bolt and a screw. Who does that? Oh, it was a room that was never supposed to have a patient in it. MOVE HER. They did after I made not so idle threats. (I worked for the state for 24 years, so I knew a lot about compliance with regulations and threw that in their face.)

Shannon was in the facility less than 2 weeks. She told me in no uncertain terms that she wanted to come home. I said ok. It scared the crap out of me, but I said ok. I didn’t want her there any longer, as they weren’t upholding their part of the deal, so I figured I could do better.

I think it took us 4 days. Four days to clean the house. For those of you who know me, you know I’m a slob. I had been without adult supervision for a while and I needed help. You also know that it’s a rare thing for me to let people into the house, because I’m embarrassed by the clutter, but I did. Frankie, Oz, Kelsey, and Ben all kicked into gear and helped and by gum, we got the house prepared. The bedroom was set up with all of the things needed.

Then it took 2 days to get a signed release and get an ambulance to bring Shannon home. I’m not sure why the hell processing people in and out of a healthcare facility takes so long.

The paramedics brought her home, put her in bed, and she was relaxed. I picked up her prescriptions, and met the hospice nurses, and they brought her morphine. I think this was around the 22nd of June of 2024.

Work pushed me out so I could take care of Shannon. I was useless anyway. Tenable was really great to me. We had people in and out. Friends of Shannon who turned on me like I was some awful ogre after she passed… others who came to sit and pray, and we made her days and nights as easy as possible and ensured she didn’t want for anything.

Frankie spent a lot of time with her mom. I made sure that anybody could have 1:1 time—things had to be said, tears had to be shed. Long lost secrets and memories shared.

It came to be the 28th of June. Shannon was not really talking any more and was mostly asleep. I sat next to her, gave her prescriptions as scheduled, made sure she had water or juice or whatever she indicated. When she was awake, her mom called. I put her on speakerphone so Shannon could hear her. She told her “When you get to heaven, find your grandmother and Aunt Clarice, and give them some crap!” Shannon smiled and nodded. She drifted back off.

About 10pm on the 28th, she started talking and was awake. I called Frankie and asked her to come over. Shannon demanded orange juice. I went to the corner store and got OJ and fed it to her with a syringe.

Her words came out with great effort. Frankie and Oz sat by her on the bed, and Shannon issued some orders to both of them. “Take care of my daughter.” She was preparing to leave.

For me, she crooked her finger in a “come here” movement and poked me in the forehead. “You want me to get this bump removed from my forehead?” She nodded. “Ok, I’ll do that.” (My appointment is on December 2nd, sorry—I’m running behind.)

I cycled my boys in to talk with Shannon… called some people on the phone, sent a lot of text messages, and waited.

June 29th came around. Frankie and Oz had left late in the night to go back to their apartment. (I think… I know they had left to get some rest.)

I was on medication watch. I noticed that Shannon’s breathing had changed. It wasn’t rhythmic and smooth... It was ‘lurchy’ and uneven. I called the on-call hospice nurse, Sueann. She said to give a dose of morphine and she was on her way over.

This is the part I don’t even want to write.

Sueann got to the house, took vitals, checked the medication sheet, and looked at me.

She said, “We are close, call anybody you need to.”

I did. While we waited for the inevitable, an odd little visitor came into the room and sat on the bed: Leonard, my big sweet cat. He walked up to Shannon, sniffed her, and sat down, just looking at her face. I scowled with confusion, and mused aloud “What is he doing?”

“He knows,” Sueann said. (Later on, when I was helping him fight for his life at the emergency vet’s office, I shared this story with the vet tech and was told that cats can see across different planes of existence, and they can communicate with the dead.)

I think Lenny came in to say his own goodbye to Shannon before she crossed over. He didn’t stay long, but after looking at her, he looked at me and hopped down and left the room.

Within the hour, Frankie and Oz got to the house, and Shannon left us for the last time.

I was on the bed next to her, holding her hand. I heard a few deep breaths, then quiet.

She was gone, and went out on her own terms. She was in charge, to the end. My beautiful, strong, independent woman. As a Christian, she was about to start her big adventure.

Aftermath

It’s been almost a year and a half since I lost my beautiful Shannon.

We had a ‘celebration of life’ for her at a Mexican restaurant Shannon loved, attended by a lot of family and friends, and I made some life long friends at that event. People I’d heard about but never met: childhood friends who are now part of my life.

I didn’t know how it was going to go, but there were no speeches or a eulogy—rather just people having lunch, talking in small groups.

Bret from work came. My friend Ted came with his wife. Kelly and Patti, my brother and sister in law were there. Aunt Diana and Uncle Danny and their kids were there. Shannon’s brother John, who I’d never met before.  Cousins and other relatives I don’t know were there. Friends like Jeanine and Derek, Shayna and Tom… people who maintain a presence in my life and heart.  Lots of friends from past jobs and lives.

I’ve changed. I’m a better man and father. I’m hurting still to this day, but I also smile at my memories. Losing my beautiful Shannon has not left a scar on my soul, somehow it made me better.

I finally took off my wedding ring about a month ago. It’s still next to my heart on a simple beaded chain, along with a silver cross.

I found a song that makes me think of Shannon:  

https://youtu.be/3Pvi4uKuawk?si=MMChswdjghKDNq-0

I Just Don't Think I'll Ever Get Over You

Colin Hay

I drink good coffee every mornin'

Comes from a place that's far away

And when I'm done, I feel like talkin'

Without you here, there is less to say

I don't want you thinkin' I'm unhappy

What is closer to the truth?

And if I lived 'til I was a hundred and two

I just don't think I'll ever get over you

I'm no longer moved to drink strong whiskey

I shook the hand of time and I knew

If I lived 'til I could no longer climb my stairs

Just don't think I'll ever get over you

Your face, it dances and it haunts me

Your laughter is still ringin' in my ears

I still find pieces of your presence here

Here I am even after all these years

And I don't want you thinkin' that I don't get asked to dinner

'Cause I'm here to say that I sometimes do

And even though I may seem to feel a touch of love

I just don't think I'll ever get over you

If I lived 'til I was a hundred and two

I just don't think I'll ever get over you