My Manifesto: The Incoherent Ramblings of a Madman

Why is it when family members are dying - the only thing on peoples minds is how much their cut is in the estate? "Loved ones" "Family" "Friends" all circle around the carcus while it is still whole, each trying to get their pound of flesh. It is sickening!

My Uncle is dying of cancer. I'm not sure what is going through his mind. I'm not sure if he is stupid enough that he thinks he can beat cancer like you shake off a cold. I'm not sure if he is being overly optimistic. I'm not sure if he is trying to ignore it hoping it will go away. I'm not sure if going to work each day, and continually checking himself out of hospital from his death bed is the only way he can deal with it by trying to keep a normal routine. I'm not sure if he understands how bad his cancer is.

I think it is good that he is so optimistic and is talking about "next week" "next year" "the year after next" - but optimism can only take you so far! Sooner or later the cancer will still win, and with him not doing anything to stop it, I fear it will win sooner rather than later.

He is a trooper - I'll give him that. He is still going to work - a physically demanding job at that. He continually checks himself out of hospital, and refuses pain medication. He can't sleep from the pain, or it gets to the point where he passes out from it.

I've not seen him for a long time. I'm not sure if i want to see him. I guess I'm being selfish. One of the biggest regrets I have in my life was not telling Mr Wade that I loved him before he died of cancer - I couldn't bring myself to see him in the hollow faced, chest caved state he was in. I wanted to remember him the way I remember him now - full of life. He was like a grandfather to me - and like I said, it was the biggest regret of my life, but at the same time, I have always told myself, that if I ever had my time over, I guess I would do the same thing - I just don't want to remember people as they are in their dying days.

Here I sit with the same problem with my Uncle. I want to see him, but I know all I will do is cry, and crying infront of someone who is trying to "shake off" cancer is not exactly a great way of filling them with hope. I want to see him, but I want to remember him as I remember him now, I don't want the image in my mind of my Uncle to be of a sickly dying man who is incoherent from pain and riddled with cancer. I want to see him so I can tell him I love him. However, I want to remember him full of life.

I didn't want to be faced with a problem like this again in my lifetime. I didn't want to be forced between making the right decision for my them, and the right decision for my own selfish reasons. How do you comfort someone who is going to die that isn't willing to admit or accept it?

I just don't know what to do, but alas, I do know that whatever decision I make I will regret for the rest of my life again.

p.s I ended up re-installing windows over the top of windows, Ok - so it's the stupidest thing ever to do, and it never works because the screwed up file never gets replaced because windows only replaces the missing files, and usually ruins the computer to the point of having to reformat - but the 3rd time of reinstalling it in a row - it worked - I used an old registry backup file from february - I had to reinstall the sound card drivers, and I had to reinstall anti-virus and firewall programs...everything else works honky dory...it's not as stable as it used to be...but hell...it's more stable than any windows XP desktop I've ever had the misfortune of using, and has not crashed all day!