Thirty Days Read online

  ‘Let’s buy something for you,’ I said.

  ‘Spending on me is a big waste of money,’ she said calmly. Still, I insisted. We went to a shop on Chapel Street, where she tried on a vest. It was at least one size smaller than her normal fit. She modelled it in front of a mirror and smiled.

  ‘Cancer is one way to lose weight.’

  We bought the vest, but in the months ahead, she invited friends into our bedroom and asked them to choose clothes from her cupboard.

  ‘I’ll never wear this jacket again,’ she said, casting it onto our bed.

  ‘Don’t be silly.’ Her friends all reacted in the same way.

  ‘No. I want you to take it. If not I’ll give it to charity.’

  They accepted the mementos, and after she died, I saw a close friend wearing a piece of clothing from Kerryn’s favourite designer—Marithé et François Girbaud.

  No one told Kerryn how much time she had left, but everything she did in the early days of her diagnosis hinted that she wasn’t fooling herself. At a lunch with friends, she bit into a hard piece of bread and broke a tooth. By the afternoon, she was at a dentist who said he could fit a temporary crown on her that same day, or she could return for a more permanent fitting.

  ‘How long will the temporary one last?’ she asked.

  ‘Up to a year,’ said the dentist.

  Kerryn chose the short-term fix, but cried as she reclined on the dental chair.

  Although we had no prognosis, I began to dig into articles I found on Google Scholar. Why should it even matter, I thought, as I tried to decipher the incomprehensible scientific research—there were so many variables. But the message was clear: not long. How long is not long? Time has no acceptable measure once it is closing in on you.

  Of the three children, Rachel was the most open with me.

  ‘Is Mum going to die soon?’

  I evaded the question. ‘We can’t know for certain. But it’s not looking good.’

  ‘How long?’ she asked directly.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘A year?’

  ‘Possibly. Maybe more, maybe less.’

  ‘This is so fucked. How are we going to cope?’

  ‘We have to be strong for Mum.’

  She didn’t continue with the obvious question: how long will we have to stay strong, once Mum has gone?

  Gabe’s awareness was communicated less directly.

  ‘I want to move back to Melbourne,’ he said.

  ‘What about your work?’ Kerryn asked.

  ‘I’ll quit. Being with you is way more important.’

  ‘What’s important to me is seeing you secure in a job,’ Kerryn replied.

  We came to a compromise. He asked his law firm partners if he could work remotely from Melbourne on Fridays. That would allow him to fly out on Thursday nights and return on Sunday afternoons. Half here, half there.

  We were overwhelmed by the compassion of the firm: Gabe was granted his wish for an unspecified period.

  Kerryn’s younger brother Glenn also arrived the same week from his home in Sydney, suitcase in hand. He stayed with their sister Ann and whisked Kerryn away for breakfasts and evening drinks at wine bars. He took her out, put his arm around her and wept. He kissed her, confusing the waiter. Were they lovers reconciling?

  I acted as a jealous husband. ‘Don’t wake me when you come home,’ I’d say, changing into my pyjamas. I wanted Kerryn on the couch with me and our children, pretending that nothing had changed.

  Most of the time, we sat with plates on our laps, and watched Kerryn’s favourite reality TV shows. Project Runway. MasterChef.

  The oncologist gave us certificates for cancelling work commitments. He scrawled his signature beneath boldly printed words: Certificate of Advanced Cancer. It reminded me of the certificates we received at school for swimming competitions—Beginners, Intermediate, Advanced.

  From the hospital, we went as a family for lunch to a nearby cafe. As we were eating, one of the judges from MasterChef came in and sat at the bar with his partner. Was it a set-up? A coincidence?

  I wanted to tap him on the shoulder and say, ‘Excuse me, I would never normally disturb you, but do you know that my wife has a Certificate of Advanced Cancer and all she wants to do is watch you on MasterChef? Do you mind posing for a photograph with her?’

  And then I remembered my vow. No photos.

  5

  CYTOTOXIC

  Chemotherapy is a foreign world for those who do not know cancer. But it became our home territory—a map outlined on the contours of Kerryn’s arm. The day-oncology ward resembles many places: an old-fashioned barber shop lined with leather chairs; a refuge for drug addicts receiving desperate doses with clean needles; a women’s gallery in an ultra-Orthodox synagogue, where the women cover their heads with scarves, some of their scalps even shaved after marriage; an inner chamber from the Matrix movie, where food is fed through plastic bags identified by exotic words; or a concentration camp where everyone is given an identity band with a number that is read out countless times by wardens wearing gloves: Patient 1232983.

  Yet it is none of these. It is a place of hope, where angelic nurses administer infusions through the veins of patients, knowing that some may be cured, that others may die—but that most will have their lives extended for an unspecified period.

  Months or years? The nurses do not speak of these things. They smile; they seat you in a comfortable armchair with a footrest; they place a heat pack on your forearm and a warm blanket over your knees. Then they tap your veins, which over time will collapse. The bags hanging from tripod trolleys dispense liquid into your body, the precise contents and quantities communicated via computer from a doctor’s office.

  There is also a chair for a carer. Some of the patients sit alone, visited by a volunteer counsellor. The sicker patients receive their infusion in a bed because it is too painful to sit up. On our first visit, Kerryn was in this latter category. Yet, even in bed, she struggled to find a comfortable position. Her pain was so intense that it pulsated through her back, leg and stomach.

  It was a Friday, two weeks after her diagnosis, and the infusions took about three hours. The regime of treatment is known by its acronym EOX.

  Gabe sat on a chair with his laptop. Kerryn’s patient identity number also gave us access to the hospital WiFi system, which otherwise shuts down mobile phones to an SOS signal.

  SOS, indeed.

  As though he were preparing for a legal client, Gabe documented every recommendation from the nurses and doctors, including the timetabling of tablets and tips for dealing with side effects. It was his way of exercising the role he had assumed since the beginning of Kerryn’s illness: family protector. Surrogate for all our broken idols.

  Throughout the procedure, Kerryn groaned in pain. The needles were finally removed from her veins and she was released, exhausted. We rushed her home. She could barely make it into the house.

  While we’d been in the hospital, our garden had sprouted bouquets of flowers, gifts for Kerryn, along with food left on the doormat. I locked the gate behind me. What was I supposed to do with the flowers? Leave them outside to die, or place them in vases until they withered? Kerryn was already complaining that she was sensitive to smell, so I dumped all the flowers in the laundry sink. Eventually, I threw them out, keeping the cards as a reminder of people’s generosity.

  The doorbell rang. I peeped outside. Someone had thrown flowers over the fence. A plate of food was set on top of the pillar framing the gate.

  Kerryn’s brother Bradley arrived with his wife Tami, bearing an entire Friday night feast for us. Rachel, who was planning to launch a health food business, wanted to make fresh juice. Ann’s gesture of love was at least two supermarket trolleys of food aimed at fattening up Kerryn—tubs of cream, chocolates galore, chemical Sustagens.

  I printed out a sign and taped it to the gate next to the doorbell.

  No visitors please.

  We were fin
ally left alone—just us, our close family, as though we were in a cellar preparing for a nuclear explosion. We studied the list of things to do on the chart Gabe had drawn up.

  The first was the X tablet in EOX—Xaloda, otherwise known as Capecitabine. It took me a while to learn its name; I thought of the city of Cape Town and the side of a bean. Eventually it rolled off my tongue as it was meant to be pronounced. We’d been informed about its toxicity—not to touch it without rubber gloves, and to transmit it to Kerryn in a plastic cup so that she could toss it directly into her mouth. We tried pushing the tablet through the wrapper but it wouldn’t come out, so, in desperation, we resorted to extracting it using scissors. It took us two days before we realised that the wrapper covering each tablet needed to be peeled off.

  Kerryn was also given other instructions: after using the bathroom she should flush the toilet twice. She mustn’t use dental floss because her teeth would be too sensitive. She should paint her nails with polish to harden them. She was also warned that one of the drugs would make her throat sensitive to cold water and potentially choke her. I scribbled no cold water on yellow Post-it notes and stuck them above the kitchen sink, on the fridge, in our bathroom next to her toothbrush.

  Our house has always followed the rules of purification according to Jewish dietary laws. There are two sinks—one for meat and one for milk.

  I should have changed the sign outside the gate: CYTOTOXIC.

  Before dusk, I led Kerryn to the piano where we place our candlesticks. Even in this time, I wanted Kerryn to continue fulfilling the rituals she had taken on since marriage. I needed to see her still in control as the matriarch of our family. Our candles were bought from an artist in Jerusalem. Kerryn loved to tell guests about the symbolism of their unusual shape. One candlestick is straight, the other bowed, signifying the imperfections of human nature. She lit the candles and pressed her hands to her eyes for longer than usual. What was she thinking? Panicked, I imagined the bent candle might collapse and burn the entire house.

  Once I’d manoeuvred Kerryn back on the couch, we fed her chicken soup, the one medicine that was not given to her by infusion. We gathered around her and watched TV together. I kept glancing back at her to check what was happening: had the cancer vanished yet? How was her pain?

  An hour later it began. Without warning, her stomach rumbled and she spewed out the food. We caught the vomit in a plastic bowl. Her body convulsed with each effusion and vomit dripped onto her clothes and blanket.

  Sarah rushed to the rescue. She held up Kerryn’s head and soothed her until the vomiting subsided. She put the blanket into the washing machine. As I watched helplessly, I recalled Kerryn as a medical student, injecting her mother with morphine. I made another silent vow to myself: I won’t let history repeat itself by allowing Sarah to be Kerryn’s doctor.

  We helped Kerryn change into a fresh nightie. It was the first time I’d seen Kerryn like this—exposed and weak. It had always been her caring for us.

  She sipped water.

  Five minutes later, she was vomiting again. We placed bowls around her feet, like containers in a storm.

  Eventually, we helped her up the staircase. I spread a towel on the floor beside our bed, and more plastic bowls.

  The vomiting eventually stopped. Kerryn fell asleep, assisted by prescription medication—an Atavan supplemented by Temazepam. I had been taking two Temazepams nightly for the past year to deal with my own insomnia. What if I needed to wake up in the middle of the night to help her? As a precaution, I only took one.

  Some hours later, I woke to hear Kerryn saying, ‘Marky, I’m hungry.’

  I looked at the clock. It was 3 a.m.

  I sat up. ‘What can I get you, darling?’

  ‘A Teddy-Bear biscuit.’

  In among all the baskets of food we had received, there was not a single Teddy-Bear biscuit. In fact, I don’t recall a time in our lives when she had ever wanted one.

  I got dressed and drove to the all-night supermarket. Along the shelves of biscuits, I found an assortment of teddy bears of all sizes. I purchased them all, so that I could be sure I had the perfect specimen for her.

  When I returned, I brought her the biscuits on a plate and laid out a serviette as though she was at a fine-dining restaurant. She nibbled at the teddy bear.

  A minute later she was vomiting again.

  The teddy remained on the plate by her bed, intact but for one ear.

  •

  Is this how chemotherapy is meant to be? I wondered the next day. Kerryn was vomiting continuously. She was sitting up to cope with the nausea. She couldn’t hold down any liquid and refused to take the Capecitabine. Her back was aching.

  I called the oncology ward.

  ‘If it doesn’t improve in the next two hours, bring her into Emergency.’

  An hour seemed too long.

  We drove her to the hospital, a plastic container held under her mouth, and checked her into the Emergency Department. She could barely sit on a chair, but there were forms to fill out. Once she was given a bed, the nurses inserted an intravenous needle. They struggled to find a vein. After the third attempt, her arms were bruised. I wanted to shout for help.

  On the fourth attempt, the blood flowed through the needle. Another bag dripped fluid into her. By evening she was in a room in the oncology ward with three other patients.

  In the bed opposite, an older woman was surrounded by her family. She was lecturing them in a stentorian tone. ‘I want you boys to make up. It’s been too many years since you haven’t spoken. Shake hands now, before I die, and say sorry.’

  It felt like a scene from a soap opera. Had Kerryn been well enough, I am sure she would have offered her services as a family therapist.

  I went to the nurses’ station and pleaded for a private room.

  ‘We’ll do our best,’ they said.

  I knew there was no reason why Kerryn should be more entitled to a private room than anyone else, but I didn’t want to leave her side and there was nowhere for me to spend the night in the ward.

  The nurses assured me she would be well taken care of. Guiltily, I left, and returned early the following morning.

  The next day was one experiment after another in controlling her symptoms. I learned the word contraindication. Every medication she took produced a negative side effect. The painkillers gave her constipation, which in turn unleashed new symptoms. The chicken soup containers were replaced by clinical vomit bags—white plastic tubes that resembled gigantic condoms with a red rim at the top. She appeared to go through a week’s supply of these bags within hours.

  Is this routine? I wondered. What about all the other chemotherapy patients who had reclined in chairs the other day? Are they also back in hospital in this uncontrollable situation?

  A private room became available and the nurses wheeled her across the corridor. I bumped into relative, who was visiting an aunt. She looked at Kerryn’s head popping out from the sheets.

  ‘We’ve all been reciting psalms,’ she said.

  Standing outside the door later that night, I collided with another Orthodox Jew.

  ‘Are you here visiting your mother?’ he asked.

  ‘I wish.’

  How could I have made such a huge Freudian slip? I quickly corrected myself. ‘I mean, it’s my wife, Kerryn.’

  He was shocked, and wished her the traditional blessing for a speedy recovery.

  Moments later, he returned and handed me a slip of paper.

  ‘This is a special telephone number of the wife of a holy rabbi in Jerusalem. Ring her and she will ask her husband to give you a special blessing.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said politely.

  Later, I checked out the rabbi on YouTube. I saw an old man crowned in a shtreimel, the fur hat worn by Jewish mystics. He was surrounded by his devotees, who were dancing in a circle, singing a wordless melody.

  I tore up the piece of paper and threw it in the bin.

  The advice to consult a
faith healer was not the only counsel we were given. One of the challenges of navigating the world of medicine is knowing who to trust. From the moment Kerryn was diagnosed, we were inundated with advice from wellwishers.

  Friends kept feeding me the names of leading cancer doctors in institutions around the world. I quickly assembled a website that included the X-rays and medical reports of Kerryn’s scans to send to overseas doctors. We made some phone calls and were assured repeatedly that there was nothing they knew that qualified doctors in Australia didn’t. So, I gathered an informal group of advisors—three medical friends to help filter the flood of information.

  The advice continued to arrive from left-field. A friend involved in biotechnology start-ups in the US called, rattling warnings in an urgent tone. We had to act quickly and pay a fee to outsource Kerryn’s care. The key to her survival was staying one step ahead of the doctors. He listed the companies like he was offering me shares in a float: once registered, we would be informed of the best doctors in the field. We would receive emails listing trials, and live-streams of research results. The medical system on its own couldn’t be trusted to prioritise Kerryn. She was an anonymous cog in a large machine. I’m telling you Mark, if you want her to survive you need to do this now. I could tell from all the honking cars that he was speeding along a Los Angeles freeway.

  Another friend sent emails detailing success stories of cancer patients who were written off by doctors. We had to get Kerryn out of Australia and put her in a hospital in China. I sent the information to my three trusted advisors.

  ‘Charlatan,’ was the response.

  Another friend sent me the private medical reports of a start-up company based in India that was using new techniques. It sounded intriguing.

  ‘Charlatan,’ I was told again.

  Then I got a phone call from someone who began by declaring her love for Kerryn. With an introduction like that, how could I possibly refuse whatever she was about to say?

  ‘I want you to speak to a friend of a friend in the south of France, whose wife is using the Gerson Therapy.’