It’s Suzette Standring, your blogger. Easter 2025 is here, and what a difference a year makes. Last year, I was hospitalized for pleural effusion, a severe fluid buildup in my chest, a complication from lung cancer radiation. Back then I could barely breathe just walking from my bedroom into the living room. What’s up with that? Alarmed, my doctor directed me to an ER in Boston (STAT!) where “a pulmonary team will be ready.” Wait. What?
X-rays showed fluid filled my chest, which had to be drained through chest tubes. Two days later, I had an emergency pleurodisis, a procedure to collapse the pleural space between my lungs and chest wall where fluid/air can collect. It was successful.
But during my week in the hospital, my goal was to get home by Easter Sunday.
I had a hospital roomie, Joan, a devout Christian, whose every word was about praise and prayer. Some might have found her offensive, as in, how dare she impose her beliefs on me. One friend later said, “Oh, poor you, stuck in the same room with a Bible thumper.”
But if you were in my nubby hospital socks, you might feel differently. I had two chest tubes connected to two plastic canisters to catch fluid, and post surgery, I had to drag all of it around. At one point, they got caught on the furniture, it was painful to bend down, and I just wanted to cry.
But Joan was relentlessly upbeat. There she was, bundled up in white cotton blankets, one eye gone from metastatic cancer, suffering with a perforated bowel. She yearns for a chicken pot pie, but she can only have jello and liquid food. Whenever her doctor visits, there’s a lively discussion on the variations of diarrhea.
I was so depressed and scared. My mind went dark with the pain of the drainage tubes and the future direction of my lung cancer.
One time I was inching past her bed with all my coils, a slow-motion Jacob Marley in chains, and Joan was cheery.
“Look at you, speed racer! Just keep doing what you’re doing. Oh, I can tell you’re getting better every day.”
“Am I, Joan?”
“Oh, yes. You’ll be outta here in no time. I’m praying for you! You know, you and I are the same.”
(Well, there’s a scary thought.)
I said, “Are we, Joan?”
“Yes, we both have cancer, and you got excess fluid in your lungs, and I have excess fluid in my stomach. I come in every two weeks to get drained.”
She added, “God is good because I was 85 before my health turned, Now I’m almost 90, and I just have to be patient. It takes longer to heal when you’re older.”
I climbed back into bed, comforted by her kindness. Doctors are vital for physical health, but they can’t be responsible for a cancer patient’s emotional, psychological, and spiritual wellbeing. We’re on my own, and Joan seemed to really care.
Every day she cheerleaded me along, God-blessing-me all the time, and affirming her constant prayers for me. Reach out to the divine and you will be heard was her mantra.
Finally, I was given the green light to go home, just in time for Easter! By then my husband David knew Joan, and he went to say goodbye, “Joan, we’re leaving soon, and I know how important Jesus is to you, and I wanted to wish you a Happy Easter.”
Typically, Joan has a faint, tremulous voice, but she warmed to the subject, and her volume grew loud and strong, like she was preaching to the multitudes.
Suddenly a nurse appeared, “Joan, did you need help getting to the toilet?”
Joan said, “Yes.”
David said, “That’s OK, I’ll leave you to it.”
Back with me, he whispered, “I think she was going to order a tub of water.”
“What for?” I asked.
“I think she wanted to baptize me.”
Unfortunately, Joan was still in the bathroom when the nurse said it was go time, so I skeedaddled outta there, without a chance to say goodbye.
But on Sunday, I called to wish her a Happy Easter, and that I, too, would not stop praying for her.
Joan said, “Oh, I could tell it was safe to talk to you. Lots of people get mad, and there are so many things happening in the world that make Christians look bad. But you just have to let people know about Christ through kindness, good words, and sending out love.”
Now that’s walking the talk of faith.
Now it’s year later at Easter time. I’m in remission and I pray Joan did improve and I like to imagine her tucking into a chicken pot pie. Peace and healing to all.
DO YOU HAVE A FIREFIGHTER RELATED CANCER STORY?
Please contact Suzette Standring (suzette@firefightersvscancer.org) if you, as a firefighter or family member, have a story to share.
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