“Morning, baby,” Shelby smiled at Lanie as we walked into the hospital room, hand in hand. “How ya feeling?” She whispered as she dropped my hand to my side and sat down on the edge of Lanie’s bed.
“I feel icky, mommy,” Lanie whimpered and tried to sit up to crawl into Shelby’s lap. Shelby kissed the top of her head and began to run her fingers through her hair.
“I’m sorry, baby,” Shelby whispered. “It’ll all get…” she stopped and I looked up from my chair to see what the problem was. Shelby looked terrified; she was holding clumps of Lanie’s hair in her hands. “O-Oh…” she started to get upset. I quickly jumped up and sat down next to her.
“It’s okay,” I whispered and kissed the side of her head. “Don’t scare her.” I reminded her. I swallowed the lump in my throat at the gory image in front of me. My daughter was losing her hair.
“Mommy?” Lanie looked up to see her clumps of blonde beautiful hair in Shelby’s hands. “Mommy! Why is my hair in your hands?” She cried and tears began to roll down her cheeks. She felt her own hair as it began to fall into her hands, as well.
“Shh,” Shelby tried to hush her, while crying at the same time. “Baby, your cancer medicine makes your hair fall out. It’s okay, honey.” She rocked her in her lap back and forth. “There’s a bunch of special stores where we can go and find fake hair for you. Your hair will grow back when you get better.” I couldn’t believe we hadn’t explained this to her yet. I felt bad for not telling her everything that was going to happen to her body, but at the same time, I didn’t want to scare her.
“Mommy, I want my hair, not fake hair,” Lanie sobbed. I had a bad feeling that every day something else was going to happen and it definitely wasn’t going to always be positive. I watched as Shelby closed her eyes and rocked back in forth with Lanie in her lap. She didn’t know what to say or do.
“It’s okay, baby. We’re right here,” I whispered and hugged both of them so Lanie was against my chest but my arms reached around to Shelby’s back. “I’m right here.” I muttered again, this time so Shelby could hear me.
~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~
It seemed like days before Lanie fell asleep, but finally she did. Shelby and I made our way out into the hallway outside the room. “I-I never t-thought h-her hair w-would fall out, N-Nick,” Shelby hiccupped through sobs as I pulled her close to my body.
“Shh,” I hushed her. “I know, baby. I know.” I kissed the top of her head. “I know how hard this is, okay? I get it. But we have to stay strong for her. We have to. We can’t freak out when her hair starts falling out or when she’s puking from the medicine. If we freak out, we scare the shit out of her.” I tried to explain. Shelby nodded through her sobs.
“Mr. and Mrs. Carter?” Someone said from behind us. I turned around, wanting to bitch at whoever was there interrupting. It wasn’t exactly the best moment. That was until I saw it was the doctor. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”
Jesus Christ. Could this situation get any worse? “You have got to be kidding me,” Shelby tried to calm down as she slid down into a chair in the hallway. I sat next to her and draped my arm around her, pulling her in closer. I felt the same way she did.
“Oh, no! No,” the doctor quickly corrected himself. “It’s nothing bad. I just wanted to talk about different living arrangements we could come up with for Lanie during her treatment. There are a couple different options.” He started. I couldn’t get over how nonchalant he seemed about everything. It was really starting to piss me off. “Let’s see, we can definitely keep her here if you need us to. We just know many patients, especially children, get tired of staying in the hospital. And we know for the parents it’s hard because they’re living between the hospital and the home. It’s good that you two don’t have other children – that always makes everything more difficult.”
“Can she really go home with us?” Shelby asked, almost begged. I knew that’s exactly what she wanted, but I had to throw in the rational thoughts.
“Can she really be taken care of from home?” I asked and placed my hand on Shelby’s. I wanted her to know I wanted Lanie at home with us as much as she did, but I didn’t want her to get even worse.
“She can,” the doctor nodded. “We’d probably have a nurse that would come over every day to take care of her and be on call if you need her during the night or whenever. We’d have the IV and chemo set up in a room in the house, and she’d probably come in once every other day for a checkup from me.” He explained.
“Oh my God,” Shelby smiled for the first time since we had gotten to the hospital, her tears finally stopping. “That would be amazing. And I know Lanie would love to be in her own bed again!” I had to smile. Even though Lanie was sick and in pain, this would help her immensely.
“We’ll work it out so that maybe after her chemo treatment today we can transport her,” he smiled warmly. “Just remember how big of a commitment it is. Granted, there will be a nurse you can call at all hours of the day, but still. If it’s too soon right now, we can try transporting her in a few weeks.”
“No,” Shelby shook her head with a smile. “I want my baby to come home with us…” she looked over at me and smiled. I squeezed her hand and smiled at the doctor.
“I agree,” I smirked.
“Great,” the doctor stood up from his position kneeling on the floor and we stood up as well. “I understand you were both a little upset from her hair falling out…” he touched on the subject lightly. “If you’d like, I could schedule a visit with one of the wig dressers in the city and she could design a few wigs for her. And they also design really adorable bandanas for little girls.” He expressed.
Shelby swallowed hard and nodded, the sad expression returning to her face. “That would be nice of you.” She didn’t know what else to say.
“I promise it’ll start getting easier, Mrs. Carter,” the doctor tried to sympathize. “Getting used to the cancer and the treatment the first few weeks is the hardest part. It’ll get better.”
“I hope so,” she sighed and I squeezed her hand again for support.
“How about we go in and tell Lanie the good news, huh?” I smiled. “You know she’s gonna be really excited to hear that she can leave today.” Shelby smiled at the thought of that. So we held hands and went in together to share the amazing news.
Author's Chapter Notes:
Sorry for the delay! College = chaos. Please, please keep the reviews coming!! The more reviews I get, the more I write! Thanks a bunch!
