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Kemo the Cat

A Different Kind of Therapy

By Dana MaxwellPublished 3 years ago 9 min read
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Kemo

My best friend’s mom, Jan, was diagnosed with stage three colon cancer about three years ago. She was 77 years old. She initially underwent surgery to have her cancer removed, but as with most cancer prognoses, the next phase of necessary treatment was determined to be chemotherapy.

During this time, her husband went out and got her a kitten. She had always been a cat person, and after losing her longtime cat not too long before this news, he wanted her to have a new fur baby to get her through this rough time. The cuddly kitty was brought home and thus began the search for the right name.

My best friend, Veronica, often gets “messages.” It’s hard to explain, but she will often hear a voice in the back of her head about one thing or another. It doesn’t always make sense, but she’s learned to listen to these messages (this “voice”) more times than not. Call it intuition, or some Universal power beyond comprehension, but it often hits her like a ton of bricks and makes itself heard.

When Jan sent Veronica a photo of the nameless kitty, she immediately heard the name “Kemo.” Kemo, as in “chemo,” short for chemotherapy. She didn’t even question it, it made complete sense. Instead of viewing chemo as this awful, dreaded therapy that her mom would have to endure, chemo could now be associated with this beautiful, sweet kitty that was going to bring her comfort. Jan instantly fell in love with the name and the idea of it having a positive connotation to chemotherapy, and thus, Kemo the Cat was born.

I would love to tell you that Jan had a beneficial experience with chemotherapy, and that she kicked cancer’s ass. But as life would have it, things unfolded differently.

When Jan started chemotherapy, she had the unfortunate circumstance of responding poorly to the drugs. Statistically, about two percent of all patients intaking chemo reject it. She was in that two percent pool. While initially administered through the vein, a port had to be put in above her chest, but the flow of chemo into her body was excruciatingly painful and burned. Furthermore, the drugs were too risky to continue administering due to the potential of cardiac arrest.

While it was a tough decision, Jan moved forward without chemotherapy. After all, the surgery had removed the cancer from what the doctors could tell, and everyone was hopeful that it was behind her.

About a year later, she began to experience constant abdominal pain and diarrhea. She was administered to the hospital. Did the cancer return? What did this mean?

After test results came back, her doctor said the cancer was still gone. What she was experiencing was being caused by diverticulitis. Whew! While uncomfortable, diverticulitis was at least treatable, and she would be in the clear. Crisis averted. Thank God. Or so we thought…

Upon further checkups, it turned out that the cancer did, in fact, resurface.

The surgery didn’t get it all, and without chemo working to shrink whatever cells had remained, the cancer had metastasized. Chemotherapy was not an option. Even if it were, it would only extend her life by about two to three months at this stage of the game. There it was. A death sentence. She was given six to nine months to live with a best-case scenario.

Veronica and her siblings were devastated; we all were. You always wonder if you would want to know when someone you love is going to pass, or if it would be easier to not know and have them pass unexpectedly. On the one hand, you have an opportunity to heal old wounds, to talk about things you may never have otherwise talked about, to say a proper goodbye, and so on. On the other hand, what is a proper goodbye? What can be left unsaid? What is the cost and toll of knowing death is looming for the person dying, and for those who love them?

The fear in Jan’s eyes in the last few months of her life was agonizing to watch. She would say things like “I guess I won’t be here next Christmas. They told me I’m not going to make it,” and the words would pierce like daggers. We wanted so badly for this not to be true. For the cancer to magically melt away. For Jan to not be in pain and for there to be some huge mix up.

Jan’s saving grace, strangely enough, was not being able to go through chemotherapy. Chemo would have left her weak, nauseated, and likely too tired to do much of anything, without the true benefit of extending her life in her particular case. Chemo would have robbed her of whatever time she had left to enjoy. Instead, the only "chemo" she faced was this little guy…

This Kemo brought her joy. She would pet him as he ate his food on top of the washing machine. She would watch him play in the living room from her recliner. She would make sure the doggy door was closed and locked at night so he couldn’t get out onto the lanai for fear a cayote might tear though the screens and attack him. (Oh, Mama JJ!) Everyone who loved her called her Mama J. Somewhere along the line I added an extra J and to me, she was and will always be Mama JJ.

Kemo was Jan’s guardian angel. He would keep her company when we couldn’t. He would jump up on her chair while she watched tv and paw at her arm, digging his nose into the crevice of her elbow. He brought her comfort at a time where she was terrified of her future, and sad.

She lived the remaining months of her life with enough energy to get dressed occasionally and go out and about. She’d spruce up her short, gray-turned hair, and pull on a fashionable jacket and cute flat shoes, and we’d all go sit at a Starbucks and enjoy the outside breeze.

She would take walks around the neighborhood until she couldn’t anymore, and Veronica would push her in her wheelchair instead. Or they would drive to the tiny lake up the street next to the public library, and sit at a picnic table, looking out at the ducks and sipping hot coffee.

When Covid hit, I lost my job and had to get out of Dodge (aka Los Angeles). I was able to move in with Veronica and her parents, and be of support during her decline. It was a blessing in disguise because I otherwise wouldn’t have had the quality time with her that I had, nor would I have been able to be around during the most difficult time of Veronica's life.

Without a job, and with nowhere to go due to Covid, I made myself useful in the kitchen. I baked lemon bars, all kinds of cookies, even Hamantaschen (which Jan had never heard of but really liked)!

I also perfected the gooey, triple topping banana split that she would devour every night. I couldn’t get over the amount of sweets she could intake. It was bittersweet because her whole life she limited herself from sugar so as not to gain weight, and towards the end all she wanted to do was put on a few pounds so she could live longer.

The beautiful Mama JJ/ Jan and her banana split

As her cancer progressed, Jan’s daily routine consisted mainly of sitting at home and passing the time by watching films, coloring in a kids' coloring book, or talking, though she didn’t want to talk much. I can’t imagine the pain that came up for her every time she thought of a memory, or of her kids, or of her future. She easily broke down in tears.

She spent a lot of time coloring these for me and Veronica. We had them framed.

During her last couple of months, I remember her best with her large wireless headphones, sitting on her recliner, watching movies, and petting Kemo. We got her a subscription to Disney+ and she watched all of the Star Wars movies in succession. She loved Sci-fi films or dramatic time pieces, like Outlander. Every night we’d look for a movie to all watch together, or a mini series like Little Fires Everywhere. Pretty soon, Rotten Tomatoes became our most used website to see if something was truly worth spending our time on.

No matter how much time we were given in a day, it felt like it was never enough. Time was truly our greatest commodity, and it seemed to easily slip away.

Cancer is an awful disease that takes far too many people from this planet, in far too painful of ways.

It has never made sense to any of my friends who have lost someone to cancer (nor me) how we can have the science, knowledge and tools to land on Mars, but we can’t cure this disease.

I won’t get into the nitty gritty details of Jan’s last few days. The unknown mini-stroke she had that caused her to be unable to speak, eat, or drink, and how her hospice team didn’t acknowledge the vast decline and left us wondering what was happening. The complete abandonment of her appointed hospice nurse, who had been wonderful up to the time where it really mattered, up to the time when she was needed more than ever and was suddenly nowhere to be found. I won’t go into the pain Veronica had to endure, watching her mom unable to communicate or physically move, even though she could see and hear everything. The end of the line was approaching, and she wasn’t ready to go. It was devastating.

The day after Jan passed and was wheeled away from her home, Kemo walked around the house, missing his human.

Like all of us, he had to adjust. One day, a few days after her death, I was sitting in her recliner chair, and out of nowhere, Kemo jumped onto the chair and into my lap, and nuzzled himself into my elbow. He had never done that to anyone before and we knew Jan must have come to visit.

It’s been a year since she passed. She is missed. She is loved. She is never forgotten. As for Kemo, I hope that anyone who truly has to go through chemo can think of him in the process and envision a cuddly, soft and happy ball of energy in lieu of the alternative.

Yoga pose

Doing a great impression of the Wicked Witch of the East.

He brought her much joy and he continues to make us smile and think of chemo differently.

Thank you for reading. If you liked this story, please give it a heart. It would also be great if you could share it on your socials. You never know who Kemo might help cheer up.

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About the Creator

Dana Maxwell

She/Her. Coffee and cat lover. Film and television enthusiast. Random thought thinker. If only every decade could be as cool as the 90s.

T: @danamaxwell30

IG: @danamaxwellsmart

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