Anywho, someone told me that yesterday was sibling day, and I was like, wtf, how perfect for this week's post...too bad it has to be a late post, but then yahoo answers told me that that information was incorrect and that sibling day is actually in April. Wow, bad grammar.
Regardless. I am going to write a little bit about my sister...or rather...first I am going to share something she wrote. She sent this to me a couple weeks ago; it's something she wrote for english. And you know, call me a big ole puss but I really got all choked up. Jackie gave me permission to share it here:
Jackie Pardee <--------------------I even included the heading. P. 4 English
9/17/12 Hughes Assignment
Some say that sixteen
years of age is not enough time to really experience something life changing.
That may be true for many sixteen year olds, but not for me. Granted, that can
be considered a good thing, because I wouldn't wish my families experience on
anyone. To witness what I witnessed at age thirteen, is probably more intense,
emotional, and "life changing" than many people witness in a
lifetime.
It all started during
the winter of my seventh grade year. I was sitting in my eighth period reading
class, and I remember it like it was yesterday. The phone rang and they told me
to go the main office. I figured my mom was calling to pick me up for some
appointment I have forgotton about, or bring me my lunch, or to bring me my
basketball shoes that I left at home, seeing as though I am probably one of the
most forgetful people you'll ever meet. Instead my dad was on the phone,
telling me that he, my mother, and sister were in the hospital and my sister
had been brought to the emergency room. I figured she'd be fine and I better
get focused for practice, cause nothing bad could happen to us, right?
It wasn't until I got
another call that night at the varsity hockey game , in the bathroom stall all
alone, that my life changed forever. My mom called to tell me that my sister
had bone cancer on her pelvis and that she would probably start chemotherapy the
next night, on Christmas eve. I couldn't think of anything but Christmas, and I
will never forgive myself for being so ignorant and selfish given the
circumstances. But I soon understood the seriousness of the situation and knew
I had to be there for my sister.
My sister! She
certainly wasn't thinking of Christmas. How could you when you knew you were
about to have extreme amounts of seemingly endless poison dripped into your
system that was going to do nothing but make you vomit, bald, and basically
give up your senior year of highschool. Throughout the next year she gave up so
much, and put forth all of the fight she had in her. She battled day in and day
out with her cancer until one year later, she came out on top and victorious.
I watched my sister fight
and feel weak for so long that I just wanted nothing more than to switch places
with her. However, deep down, I knew that my sister wouldn't want that. If it
had to happen to someone in our family, I know she would nominate herself
because she wouldn't want to watch any of us go through it, as much as we
didn't want to watch her. I met many genuinely good people that year, from the
nurses to other patients, and to a little girl named Peyton that stands next to
my sister in my list of heros. Nothing can describe the wave of sadness and
emotional damage that followed us around everywhere that year, but I can't help
but thinking that meeting these people was a blessing.
Clearly, I wouldn't
wish that awful diagnoses on anyone. But what I do wish for, is that everyone
have some sort of experience that makes them feel as blessed as I do. That
terrible year is my life changing experience, but having the honor and pleasure
of knowing a person and warrior like my sister is a life changing
experience everyday I spend with her.
----Now let me tell you: my sister and I love eachother very much, but there's sort of like...this unspoken agreement that it never be said aloud...simply understood. We're not the type of sisters to hug it out or say 'I love you' all the time, but we don't need to. We just know.
Now let me say that I want to totally and completely reverse Jackie's entire essay. It's gonna be all emotional and shit, but it's important that everyone know the massive amount of respect I have for Jackie.
During that entire disgusting year, Jackie carried the burden of being the girl with the sick sister. All of her teachers had had me before, so she got questioned constantly about me from them, and really...any family friend, acquaintance, or person Jackie encountered asked about how Jesse was doing.
It was all about me. Is Jesse comfortable? Is Jesse getting better? Does Jesse have all her prescriptions? Does she have a fever? Should she go to the hospital? Does she need food? A blood transfusion? Platelets? What are her blood counts????
Jesus, even I was sick of it. Our neighbors who are good friends of the family would sit in the bleachers at all her games because Mom and Dad had to be with Jesse. Jackie probably felt like she faded into the background completely...
But Jackie never let on how angry or sad or confused she was about everything going on. She would bring her backpack stuffed with books and binders to the hospital, and sit in the cramped room to visit me. If I was in a shitty mood, which I often was, she would talk to the nurses or sit in the day room and play cards with my 3 year-old roommate, who cheated like it was nobody's business.
Jackie is a true hero to me, just as I am to her. It's wonderful to know that I have a sister who will stand by my side through thick and thin, no matter what. And I know...I know how badly she wanted to switch places with me...just as she knows how much I wouldn't want her to.
She put up with a lot of shit. I remember screaming at her one time because I needed complete silence while my dad gave me one of my injections, and she was trying to tell my mom something about her day. Yeah, I was a peach like that. I know she felt enormous guilt...like 'why Jesse and not me?' I know she heard me tell my mom and dad that I wish I could just be Jackie. That I didn't want to exist anymore...that I just wanted to be Jackie. Because Jackie had long pretty hair, and Jackie got to go to school, and Jackie went to parties...but I know now that Jackie didn't have it so easy either. Jackie felt genuine pain for what her family was going through, and for what the families around us were going through.
I find it so interesting that she talked about how angry she was about Christmas...and how guilty she felt that it was her top concern...because I remember feeling the same way. Never mind the cancer...I was ruining Christmas. It's a guilt I feel to this day...it was my grandmother's last Christmas before she passed...and I often feel like I robbed my entire family and extended family of having that last perfect holiday season with her. I remember how Jackie kept asking when we would have our "Christmas re-do", as my family put it...
I don't think we ever really got to it. I know my whole family feels a little blue when the holiday season starts to gear up...but for me at least...once Christmas morning 2010 arrived and I was cancer free, sitting around the Christmas tree and not the hospital bed...it made the holiday all the more sweet. I actually love Christmas now, for that reason. It gets a little emotional for me on the 23rd and the few days leading up to it. But when my family is all together on Christmas eve and Christmas morning...we are all so f**king grateful.
It's a bond Jackie and I will have for the rest of our lives...how wonderful moments like that are when you know how perfectly awful they could be.
Jackie never freaking ceases to amaze me either. She seems almost excited to give me a kidney one day, as it's predicted I'll need one. She has made it known that she is first in line to give me one. I hope she knows that if my body wasn't a deserted cancer-fest, I would give her a freaking kidney too, or anything else she needed. I love my sister very much. I think it's important for cancer survivors and their companions not to relish in the pain of the experience, but find joy in the lessons and bonding it brought with it.
Thanks for being a kick-ass bitch, Jackie.
Jackie and Jesse 2009...The year from hell that taught us well.
Be grateful for the loved ones in your life.
Love,
Jesse
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