Dear Grandma,
I got called in at 3 am and on the drive into work I was thinking of you. I'm not sure what triggered it this time, but I was so lost in the thought that I never even turned the radio on. At 3 am, the radio and the ac on full blast are usually a requirement. Sometimes I even have to call the Parkston Hospital with the hope that mom is working nights to help wake me. I don't even remember what I was thinking about to be honest, but what I do remember is that when my thought had fizzled I realized how often I think of you still. I'm starting to feel the part of a loss when it gets harder than it was in the beginning. When everyone has forgotten and moved on with their lives and you're still stuck there with something missing..this empty hole that gets deeper everytime you realize you can never ever fill it. Although things may make it seem a little more shallow every now and then...what used to be there is now gone. And this is a brutal reality.

We've got a brand new, beautiful wing on 6th floor in the hospital. There are a couple in construction actually, but 6th east is finally complete. Each time a co-worker would go portable to this floor they would talk of how beautiful and spacious it is. I, like everyone else who hadn't been there, was excited to get a chance to go up there...to scan a patient without having to do serious furniture moving to allow enough room for our machine, to see the updated look of rooms that weren't built and decorated in the 1980s. I had overlooked one fact, a fact that hit me in the face the minute I walked into my patients room. When I walked in to scan my 50 year old patient who was without any hair anywhere on her face or head I quickly remembered where I was - the oncology floor. Of all the places in this medical center, there is nothing I hate more than oncology...nothing that makes me angrier than cancer. And as I had an everyday conversation about the episode of "The View" she was watching, I reminded myself - this woman is 50 years old. Do people with cancer get some huge rush of positivity? I'm thankful your battle with cancer was a short one - shorter than all the others I've seen in my family. I'm thankful you lived a long, happy and hopefully very rewarding life. I'm happy to have learned so much from you. But I'm so bitter - so very bitter that cancer has to exist. And so angry it happens to so many wonderful people. And each person I meet with cancer - young or old, male or female; becomes very personal for me. I'm so thankful for your strength and know of all that goes along with it - this is the part I need to grab hold of and learn something from.

Love you,
Kristen