I’m Here! By Myself for Now
Things Got Weird
TL;DR: I haven’t written an update since our visas were approved on October 6th because things turned from fun and exciting to sad and scary. Shane got diagnosed with kidney cancer and I’m in Portugal by myself.
I just read over my last blog post on October 8th about our visas being approved and figuring out last details! That was a little over a month ago but holy shit what a month.
I’m going to break this up into a few installments, because there is a lot of information and I want to do it justice!
First, Shane! There is STILL a lot we don’t know, but it all started because he has been having a lot of back pain since April, and after physical therapy didn’t help he got an MRI to see what was going on with his spine. The MRI results revealed more than just a couple slipped disks.
Continuing from my newsletter? Start reading here!
I was teaching at Camp Workroom Social the weekend of Oct 16-20 and got back very late Monday night. Poor Shane got a call from his doctor on Saturday the 18th that yes, he had some serious damage to his back that needed to be dealt with, but he also had a 5.2cm growth in his kidney that was more than likely renal cell carcinoma, or kidney cancer. And he sat on that information and just flipped out all weekend until I got home from working!
After a ton of talking and flipping out, a few sleepless nights (for me!), and a lot of playing out EVERY logistic, we made a tentative plan: I’d go! We’d send the pets. Shane would stay to figure things out and join us when he could.
This was all the week of Oct 20th - 10 days before we were supposed to be out of our Chicago apartment, and 9 days before I was due to host a retreat, visit my mom in Michigan, and then host ANOTHER retreat before flying out on Nov 10th.
Amazingly, and thankfully, our friend Hannah who is taking over our apartment, got a work trip that delayed her move in until Nov 10th, giving us some more time to pack. Honestly I don’t know what we would have done if we didn’t have that extra time because we were pretty shell shocked with Shane’s news and things got pretty delayed. I cancelled my visit with my mom so I could be home with him between retreats, and we finished packing and getting rid of stuff!
WHY YES THAT IS SNOW WE’LL SAVE THAT STORY FOR ANOTHER DAY
This is most of our boxes! We packed 22 to ship + my desktop computer, and they’re in transit now!
Partnering means different things to different people. Shane said that he would feel so much less stressed if we, the pets and I, were settled in our new home, instead of being passed around to friends, or getting a short term rental in the US, waiting on his surgery. I have to believe him. This could be a long process! So for now I’m holding the fort in Porto, awaiting the pet arrival, and he’s navigating our fucking bullshit healthcare system, keeping his job so he can stay on his good insurance, and getting passed around between our friends until we have answers.
Oh and he has a slipped disk he is still dealing with!
WHEW! The prognosis is relatively good - kidney cancer is slow growing, his health is otherwise good, he’s only (and freshly!) 45 years old, but it does look like he’ll lose the kidney based on it’s placement. There is no other cancer anywhere else and, if it is removed cleanly and there are no other unexpected complications, there is only a 5% chance it will come back. People keep telling us that if you’re going to get cancer, this is a good cancer to get! Ok!
I keep saying that we’ll hopefully be toasting to his life saving slipped disk soon enough! Imagine if we had no idea that tumor was in there, with little insurance in Porto and no doctors, that thing could have kept growing for ages until we moved forward with figuring out what was going on. So while this FEELS like horrible timing, it could be so much worse!
Meanwhile, I’m here! Waiting on the rest of my life to show up! Consider this a before pic - post cleaning but pre everything getting here later today? Maybe?! But more on that tomorrow!
