My Aunt Barbara died today. She was only 61 years old. We found out 6 weeks ago that she had stage 4 pancreatic cancer, which had spread to her liver, spine and bones. She did a week of radiation and a round of chemotherapy. The radiation helped shrink the tumor in her knee to allow her to walk for a few more weeks. The chemo made her weak and only prolonged the inevitable. We were able to celebrate her 61st birthday with her on May 8th. It was great to be able to have one more gathering with her. She was in good spirits at that time. At the beginning of last week (the week of May 23), she went down hill and we thought we were going to loose her then. She had been in a rehabilitation place, but had to be transferred back to the hospital. We found out she had an infection and so she was put on antibiotics and given a blood transfusion and everything turned around! I got to see her on Thursday (May 27th) and she seemed pretty coherent (or at least while we were there she was). We got to visit with her for a good 2 hours. We helped to decorate her new room (she had been moved to a hospice center) and just get to visit with her (unbeknown to us kids, for the last time). On Friday, she started to go down hill. She was getting another infection. From Friday on, she only continued to go downhill. She was in and out of consciousness and she didn't remember things. Last night was not good for her. She had a fever of 104 and her oxygen level had dropped from 86 to 64. Her pupils were fixed and dilated; she was unresponsive. We were surprised to wake up this morning and find she had made it through the night, but we knew it would only be a matter of a few hours now. I went to nanny, and I got the call that she had passed away. She left this mortal life to continue on her journey around 12:30 PM on Tuesday, June 1st. What is interesting is that she died right around the same time that my Auntie Janice did, almost 7 years ago.
We are hoping to have her funeral this Friday, June 4th, but we will know for sure tomorrow if that is going to be possible.
