You Know You’re the Parent of a Kid with Cancer When….

A while back years ago with Tucker’s first round of cancer I received this list called “You Know You’re the Parent of a Kid with Cancer When…1-100”
When I read this list I laughed like I’ve never laughed before- I had tears streaming down my face, the next day my stomach felt like I had done 1000 sit ups! I could relate to every single one of these little statements.
I’m going to share my personal favorites on this list with you, and I also know that a few cancer moms are probably reading this- my hope is that you get that huge uncontrollable belly laugh from this list, not all 100 of them but here are just a few favorite chuckles…

2. Kids with hair look kind of strange to you
3. You can sleep anywhere, and anything that reclines more than 15 degrees looks “comfy”
6. You enjoy the drive at 3:00am to the ER because there aren’t any other cars on the freeway
12. You can maneuver a double iv pole with six boxes/bags and a kid riding, on a tour of the hospital, and make it back to the room before the low-battery alarm sounds and the kid has to pee. (I’m a PRO!)
14. The nurses stop responding to the IV alarm, knowing you’ll fix it anyway
16. Your 2-year-old knows where all of the medical equipment goes, and how to use it.
17. Your child’s first word is a medical term.
18. You keep a bag packed at all times like your 9 ½ months pregnant!
19. You can eat with one hand while you hold the barf bucket with the other.
23. You can read the doctors prescription word for word, and are asked to decipher it by the pharmacist.
25. There are 4 new Mercedes in the doctors’ parking lot due to your child’s payments
30. You have more meds in your cupboard than food
31. You can read your son’s chart better than his nurse
36. Medical students ask to borrow your notes
44. Your child uses Lego’s to build “MRI” machines
47. (love this one) You know you are the friend of a family with a child with cancer when you call to check the chemo schedule and ask, “How will the counts be on the 11th?” before you schedule a birthday party.
49. Your 4year old’s critique of the medical student’s examination skills is the same as the supervising physician’s.
52. You really think this list is funny, when most normal people either don’t get it or start to cry!
57. When the siblings want to know what the child’s counts are to see if they can go inside to eat at McDonald’s
62. You can reset the IV machines overnight, in your sleep, every 30 minutes without waking up once and still call it a good nights sleep!
66. When your kid asks for a Happy Meal you don’t say, “Wait unit we get home to eat.” Rather, “Really?!” (unless of course your kid is on prednisone-steroids-then you say, “A Happy Meal or a Super-Sized Value Meal?”)
71. You make Jell-O with Pedialite
73. Your kid has received enough get-well cards to fuel a small bon-fire.
74. Your child receives soooo many toys while in the hospital that at Christmas time you can now open your own toy store.
75. When you are thankful for steroids because there will not be turkey leftovers after the Thanksgiving meal.
76. Every little thing can make you cry in a heartbeat, but this list, on the other hand, has you rolling on the floor!

Ok, I’ll stop there…. There are so many funny ones. Please go to this site to see them all, the site is called The Never-Ending Squirrel Tale www.squirreltales.com and they have this full list, plus You Know You’re the Babysitter of a Kid with Cancer, and You Know Your’re a Teenager With Cancer.

Tucker has been doing ok.. We are officially on a 4 week break….. my definition of a BREAK and the doctors definition of a BREAK are VERY different. When I think “break” I think, no pills, no doctors, no pills,…. No pills…. (did I say no pills already?) And going somewhere where there is hula music and a sweet tropical drink. The doctors definition of a “break” is for us to not have to physically DRIVE to the hospital for 4 weeks. They said “here I’ll send this chemo home to you in a pill form and we won’t need to see you for 4 weeks, so take a “break”. So your telling me that we are going to double Tucker’s pills just so we don’t have to drive to SLC for 4 weeks?
But in my head I was thinking… Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, not driving in that horrible traffic, not having to battling out my road rage with Mr. Psycho in a huge truck with a nasty look on his face daily……and saving $ on gas!
Ok, DEAL- we’ll take the “break”.
So Tucker takes 2 more pills each day and then 12 more pills on Wednesday’s, that’s his methotraxite (the other 2 are 6MP). *sigh* but a break is a break.

I got a thing to add to the You Know You’re a Parent of a Kid with Cancer when..
*Amber list*
1) The pharmacist at Walgreen’s refuses to fill your prescription because he has to double check with the Doc first because he has “worked as a pharmacist for 20 years and has never filled this high of a dose before”…. (The dose was correct and we got our pills).
2) Thinks it’s a good day when my son can get away with only 1 morphine.
3) Lego’s are being stored in puke-buckets.
4) Didn’t actually have a puke-bucket handy when my child had to puke the other day in my car (but now have 5 buckets in the car just so that never happens again).
5) Got the fright of my life when I turn out all the house lights the other night and turned around and there was my ghost white bald headed kid standing in the shadows waiting for me to tuck him into bed…. (I jumped a mile!).
6) Have a multitude of “back up meds” in my purse “just in case”- ranging from nausea, to pain, to constipation.
7) Me wearing makeup is cause for a celebration.
8) When you’re asked to be used as “training” for the student nurses.
9) Not much can surprise you anymore except that American Idol is still popular.
10) Your child had a blast going to radiation on his birthday.
11) Your child is stumped at the meaning of some school spelling words but can tell you exactly (and spell) what… Methotrexate,ARAC, Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia, Patikia.. ect,
12) Your child can’t seem to ever find his socks or books, but can find the perfect vein for blood draws.

Keep the suggestions coming and I will keep adding them!
*Other cancer Mom’s List's…

Wendy Burr: You know you're a cancer mom when you go into work to talk to your boss, dig around in your purse to find something, and out falls heavy duty surgical mask. =)

Yvonne Davis: You teach your home health nurse how to figure out the ANC

Love to all,
Amber, Justin…. And my lovable cancer-kid Tucker