I never thought this would happen to me. It happened to my mother twice and to one of my friend’s mother then later on it happened to a few of my married friends. But I never knew the pain it caused them. I’ve lost parents and two siblings to cancer and heart disease but the difference is they didn’t know me as well as a spouse of 46 years.

We experienced childbirth together, financial worries together, children illnesses together, parties together, and vacations together. No one knows us like we knew each other. But now he’s gone. And he went so fast. I didn’t have time to even imagine what this was going to feel like. He found out he had cancer last November and passed away in January. The cancer starved him and the chemo killed him.

I can’t impress enough upon those who are still smoking cigarettes and are addicted. It is impossible to stop even when you get diagnosed with lung cancer. But here’s something we never knew. Lung cancer is not detectable by an x-ray. X-rays show bones not cancer. He needed at CT scan which showed a faint growth on his spine and in his lungs. Then he finally got a PET scan which showed a tennis ball size tumor in his lung with several smaller tumors.

He never coughed once during this whole ordeal nor did he have chest pain or even extreme back pain. But he did have nausea throughout the three months which caused rapid loss of weight about five pounds per week. With the loss of nourishment to his brain, he developed dementia which was his worst symptom. You cannot reason with someone with dementia. He stopped eating and no convincing him to eat worked. He was basically anorexic.

On top of all this he had been Type I Diabetic for twenty years; but with dementia, forgot how to test his blood sugar and even forgot how to administer insulin. I called 911 five times in two months because he was dying from either low blood sugar 31 or high blood sugar 715. The paramedics saved his life right in front of me three times. My sons were devastated from his rapid demise and subsequent death. They always thought of him as a healthy golf and gym rat. When he wasn’t golfing, he loved fishing before he became ill.

His first symptom was tiredness then dizziness. He suddenly stopped golfing and going to the gym. Then he lost interest in watching golf on tv or movies which he normally enjoyed. And next he stopped shopping which was one of his hobbies–shopping for clothes, shoes, and food. His closet must have had $8,000 worth of golf shirts, pants, jackets, and of course shoes. And lastly he stopped grooming himself like he normally did everyday with showers, shaving, trimming, clipping, and moisturizing. All stopped. He had five electric clippers in his bathroom drawer and three water picks for his teeth.

He was hospitalized three times, but they would send him home for me to administer his insulin which became a life and death skill. We wanted him to go into skilled nursing to administer his insulin; but apparently if you go to skilled nursing, you become ineligible for chemo. Unbelievable! So they sent him home to a wife that is not experienced in nursing or giving injections. We tried to hire a home nurse but none of them would touch insulin due to the liability. We also couldn’t find homecare that handles showering. All we got was a physical therapist to help him walk. So he went without showering as he was too heavy for me to handle. At times he looked like an unshaven homeless guy.

After two months he was unable to stand without help and soon couldn’t walk. He ended up in a wheelchair which was very humiliating for him. He asked me one morning if he was dying. I couldn’t tell him the truth. I said, “We hope not. Let’s wait to see what chemo does for you.” His oncologist had given him a one in four chance of prolonging his life. That was a joke. He died five days after his first chemo. Ended up back in the hospital as he was dead weight and incoherent, and we couldn’t get his blood sugar below 400. We called the paramedics again. He died in the hospital in a private room they provided with his sons around him.

The moral of this story is if one is a smoker at any age, please stop now before this happens to you. You will not get any early warning signs like it shows in the movies. And GPs are reluctant to order imaging tests just because you feel tired or dizzy. There’s no coughing up blood or pain in your throat or chest. They always say colon cancer is a silent killer. Well…so is lung cancer. The one thing all cancer patients have in common is that they stop caring about money, politics, sports, or entertainment once they know they have cancer. All they want is to feel better and get back to normal.

But one cannot prepare themselves for the loss of a spouse. Even if we weren’t the happiest of couples, we knew we once were. You will feel a loss that you never prepared for and no ones knows your pain unless they have experienced it. It is an empty abandoned feeling. Everytime the phone rings I hope it is him. Rest in peace, husband. Your family misses you.

DON’T SMOKE!!!

Updated on April 25, 2026.

I recently heard that lung cancer tumors secrete hormones to the brain causing the patient to become neurologically unbalanced. That’s what I was dealing with. It was like caring for a full grown baby. Skilled nursing couldn’t take him in as he was planning to have chemo and chemo disqualifies one from skilled nursing. Our healthcare system for cancer patients suck. Seniors caring for seniors is cruel and the healthcare system doesn’t seem to care. They send you home ill-equipped to care for a cancer patient. All they try to do is get you to sign up for hospice which means we have given up. And forget about Visiting Angels type service. My husband was incontinent, immobile, and incoherent. Visiting Angels don’t deal with that.

And if you come down with cancer over the holidays, forget about it. The doctors, nurses, chemo, imaging all take days off leaving the patient to wait until mid January to be seen. It is cruel and discouraging to have to wait for over a month to get chemo when you have stage 4 cancer. The whole healthcare system sucks. They should be ashamed of themselves. We do appreciate the paramedics that the fire department provides. They always show promptly and do their job.

It’s been three months since his passing, and I still can’t believe he’s gone. I thought we would grow old together since we were the same age. I never thought I’d be a widow. I don’t even know how widows act. He left me his new puppy to raise, and I feel he must have known he was sick long before he told me. His puppy is my new friend but lots of work training him to be house broken and not to bark. Don’t get me started on vet costs. He needed a few shots and some pills—$500 later. To be continued…