The beginning of the end began 12 months ago today.

It began quietly enough. We got up early and made the drive to Dana-Farber. The traffic was better than usual because of the Veteran’s Day Holiday.  But Jane had had more difficulty getting down the stairs at home. Her legs were often swollen with fluid, but the last couple of days the fluid had begun to build up in her arms again. Her albumin levels, we would learn later that day, were crashing. One of the things albumin does is keep the liquids in the cells where it belongs. Our last appointment of the day was with a nutritionist who was going to help design a diet to boost those levels–and hopefully reduce the swelling.

We had the regular blood draw, then went to see Jen Chan, Jane’s oncologist. We were all concerned about the build up of fluids in Jane’s belly and talked about doing a procedure on Monday to try to draw off some of the fluid. We went to see Javid Moslehi, Jane’s cardio-oncologist. The walk to his office was exhausting and we stopped at a bench about half way there so Jane could catch her breath. I had offered to push her in a wheelchair but she had made very clear she wasn’t going there.  Javid was worried about the fluid build-up as well.

We made the trek back to Dana-Farber to have her monthly injection and meet with the nutritionist. The injection was a simple shot in the buttocks. Then we met the nutritionist. She talked about the need to consume more protien. Jane discovered Greek yogurt was full of the stuff–and she loved Greek yogurt.

When the woman left, we were ready to go home. Then Jane stood up. Her pants were soaked through. She was leaking fluid from the injection site. I wanted to get someone to look at what was going on, but she looked at me with those big brown eyes full of pleading: “I just want to go home,” she said. “Please, just take me home.”

Another man might have done something else. For a time after her death I was angry with myself for not being more insistent, thinking that if we had stayed things might have been different. I have since figured out that it was already too late–that there was really nothing I could have done that would have saved her–and that taking her home meant she got one more weekend in the home that she loved–gave us time to say the private good-byes while she could still talk.

The drive home was awful. The traffic was stop and go from Brockton to Taunton. I had to help her out of the car when we got home and carry her up the stairs.

This morning I had trouble getting out of bed. I cried a bit, railed against the injustice of it all, got angry about all the things that made her death inevitable.

And resolved again to find a way to kill this foul disease.