The Nightmare Begins
I stood before the sink staring into the mirror. My hair was in the steady process of falling out. I was filled with so much sadness, so much terror, it was this moment I realized how much my hair was wrapped into my identity.
Running my hands through my hair I watched clumps of my head fur stick to my fingers. I noticed Ino at the door peering in at me. “What’s the matter?” he asked.
I turned and showed him my hands. He paused for a moment, perhaps spending a second to think before speaking. “Man, you’re going to look stupid once all your hair falls out.” Then he stepped from the door and disappeared into his bedroom.
Later that evening after I finished a bout of vomiting he and I were standing outside. It was a cool slightly breezy night. He pulled out a cigarette and slid it between his lips. Nonchalantly he lit it and took a puff. As he released the cloud of smoke he said. “You know man, you don’t really have it that bad.”
I looked at him and watched him take another drag and exhale. “If you really look at it, my life is much worse than yours…”
The night settled and I ambled to my room to rest my wary mind. I fell asleep and was awakened to the meow and slap of my cat’s soft white paws against my bedroom door. In the living room I heard the scratching click of Ino’s cell phone as he texted. Every minute a terrible ring blasted from his phone throughout the house.
Beside me was a partially filled bucket of vomit. My head ached, and my stomach spun, I felt the food in my belly slowly sneak its way up my throat. I was so tired; the chemo was sucking all the life from me. Ropes of exhaustion tightly twisted around my bones, tearing at my muscles.
On my side I felt a stab, the sensation of a searing hot knife slicing through my flesh. Around that pain was nothing, an absence of feeling, like pins and needles. It felt like my back was wrapped in a blanket of numbness, a void, a nothingness except for the pressure of a rock. The rock was the hardness of a bone, a thing that was my scapula.
My chest felt like my hair was being pulled from the inside out. My skin stung, and my hair ached. There was a roving pain in my flesh, it hurt and throbbed like a chemical fire.
It was hard to breathe, even more than normal. My coughing made my chest muscles scream. I had a weight on my sternum and liquid under it. My lung felt swollen and engorged, fat, and bloated. I would cough then retch.
Strolling into my living room
I rolled out from the covers and placed my feet to the floor. My toes were numb like rubber and my joints hurt as I stood. The muscles of my legs felt like they were filled with glue as they moved. Slowly I ambled into the living room.
Though the air purifiers roared they were overcome by the stench that permeated the house. It was rotten and fetid, soaking everything with the smell of death. The garbage can was filled to the floor with waste and the kitchen sink was a mountain of dishes.
A cloud of flies hovered and flew, and the sour smell of cat feces was thick. It had been weeks since I was able to get my caretaker Ino to clean the cat litter box, to do the dishes, to clean the house. I looked over at him as I passed to enter the kitchen. He sat, staring down, clicking his fingers against the shiny screen of his phone.
I stood within the center of the kitchen and looked around at the insanity. Turning toward him I asked if he would help me do the dishes. His reply was unbelievable, he said he could not help me because doing the dishes gave him flashbacks. Then he went back to texting on his phone.
I had enough, I could not live in this hell. This was the moment my barrel had been filled, pouring over the brim. It was the moment my pain crossed the threshold of my tolerance. With my body in agony I did the dishes, I cleaned the house and he sat and watched as I cleaned around him.
What was it like living with Ino?
It was one of the most emotionally traumatizing experiences of my life. He took a time that was already unbelievably horrific and made it nearly impossible.
In the two months he lived in my house he loaded the dishwasher twice and changed the cat litter box five times. On the occasions that he changed the cat litter box, he looked like he was wearing a bio-hazard suit. His face was covered with a mask, he wore latex gloves, and put on an alternate pair of clothes. As he changed the box he would yell and make throw up sounds that echoed throughout my home. After he changed the box he would run as fast as he could through the house to toss the litter into the garbage can outside.
Sometimes Ino would see that either Acre or Sasha had thrown up a hair ball on the floor. I watched his reaction many times. Ino would first start by opening his mouth up as wide as it could go. His hands would raise above his head, his arms slightly bent so his elbows were pointed outward. Then he would growl and then release a blood curdling scream. “Mother fuck!” was a common thing he would yell. I would look over at him and give him the “what in the hell” kind of look. He would also have these reactions when he found cat hair on his bed sheets or his clothing. When he lived in the house there was a lot of growling and strange yells. I’ve never experienced that kind of weirdness before, but it wasn’t until Ino started abusing me that his other behaviors became a problem.
He never prepared any of my meals, do my laundry, or clean my house. He charged to transport me to the grocery store, doctor’s office, and hangout spots. The arrangement was that he would clean the cat litter boxes every two to three days, do my laundry, keep the house clean, prepare my meals and provide me transportation. In exchange he could eat my food and live in my house for free.
He would often tell me I was weak and frail and discouraged me from exercising or taking walks. When I mentioned my friends he would berate them and tell me I should not spend time with them. He suggested I leave my significant other, scream at my animals, and ask me for money. On many occasions he suggested I give him power of attorney over me, to write him into my will and describe my income as “our” income.
Chemo brain is a very real thing. It leads you to forget things, you can’t think right, and it puts you in a childlike state. This is what clouded my ability to see what he was doing to me.
This all changed one day when I asked him to drive me to the doctor. He asked me for gas money and when I gave him $10 he got angry and demanded more. Ino was furious, yelling it was insulting that I only gave him $10. Stating that 90% of his driving was carting me around.
Instead of reacting in that moment I waited till I got home from my doctor’s visit. I started figuring out exactly how much money I was spending on him. I discovered it was cheaper to buy a new car, pay its taxes and have full coverage insurance than it was to pay him for transportation.
After realizing this I confronted him. I told him that if he wanted to continue living in my home he would have to pay rent. He responded by threatening to kill himself. Then told me that because he was suicidal he could not pay rent.
I told him that he could not live in my house if he was suicidal and said that if he wanted to remain he needed to seek professional help. I paid for him to see a mental health professional and after his first visit with them I informed him the rent was still due.
How did it end? I had not seen him for several days and I was concerned.
I sent him this text:
“I haven’t heard from you in a while, I am concerned for you and hope you are feeling alright.
Times are very hard for both of us right now. I love you and I want you to be healthy, I don’t want our situation to get in the way of our friendship.
I hope you are alright and are having a good day.”
He replied two minutes later with this text:
“Please delete my number and do not contact me again. Thank you.”
Later that day I would find out that he had moved out of my house in the middle of the night. I stayed at Casey’s house that night, so I was not there when he left, which I believe was a good thing.
Pain is the Catalyst of Change
In the end I learned a lot from this experience. Pain is the catalyst of change, but pain alone is not enough. If we sit in the smoldering fires of the forge all we do is burn. We must temper our hardships like a blacksmith with his steel. The hardships of our life must be transformed with wisdom, so we may take the steel from the fire and forge it into a tool, but like an axe we must continually sharpen its edge.
Every hardship we face is an opportunity to learn how to help someone else. Our dark spots are where we bond, so cultivate them, develop a relationship with them and grant them love. When we do this we open the door to greater things, we can fly high into the sky and learn the greatest way to live our life.
As we fly like a dove beside the clouds of above, we can witness the vast landscape of the human experience. With a keen eye we can see we already possess the key to a great life. We learn that it is not about being surrounded with sunshine and smiles. It is the pursuit of peace and harmony, and this can only be achieved by reaching for our purpose and discovering our dreams.
