Amy's 'momentary trouble'

One year ago tomorrow, late in the afternoon, I sat in a small recovery room waiting for Amy to come out of the anesthetic. Two weeks earlier, we had made the decision and switched doctors/hospitals. We were unhappy with the path the other surgeon wanted to take and ultimately lost confidence in him. So, after meeting earlier in the week with the new doctor/surgeon, he wanted Amy to have yet another ERCP (where they put a tube with a camera down her throat to look in her stomach and beyond). She had one previously at the other hospital, but I’m sure the new doctor wanted updated pictures and to have their specialist take a look for himself. So, here I was, sitting quietly in this rather small room with three walls and a curtain. To keep the noise down and let Amy sleep, I kept the T.V. off and alternated from reading the paper to playing an electronic version of Yahtzee. The doctor poked his head in several times to check on Amy, but as she was still sleeping, he left. Eventually Amy started coming around and she drifted in and out for about the next 30 minutes or so. Once she was more fully awake, she asked for some water, but the nurse only gave her ice chips until the doctor could ok anything more. We may have waited for another 30 to 45 minutes until the doctor came back around. He proceeded to tell us about the procedure, and that he did see some obstruction of the bile duct, rather that it looked like the opening was being pulled or stretched to the side. He proceeded to tell us that he was able to extract a cell sample from the tumor and that preliminary results looks to him that the tumor was cancerous. And so on February 28th 2006, began Amy’s 8 month and 16 day journey with Pancreatic Cancer.
Please, if you can remember, take a moment today and think of a time when Amy made you laugh! I guarantee you won’t be able to do it without smiling!
And Amy will be smiling down as well.

For the love of Amy - V