A Mesothelioma Caregiver's Experience

Janette is Kim's best friend. She reminded me of how I would jump in to help my best friend. So we immediately hit it off. I thought she was fabulous and I loved how much she cared about her friend and wanted to take off the burden that Kim was having. We grew up next door to each other, literally. And we've been friends for fifty years. We know each other so well. We always know what's going on in each other's lives. She told me she wasn't feeling well. She'd had a pain in her left side that hadn't gone away My PCP finally said, Kim. Let's just get a a cat scan. Okay? And it was July of twenty nineteen. When I was definitively diagnosed with mesothelioma, I was still numb from hearing the diagnosis few minutes earlier. Janette was sitting by my side, and she said, I'll take care of it. I'm like, okay. Okay. And she ended up calling every single resource. She got me in contact with all of them. And one of the contacts was asbestos dot com, and, patient coordinator Missy, was someone that she spoke directly to. They ended up sort of developing this connection, this relationship, and she said, Hey, look. I I need you to speak to my friend. I need you to offer her some resource some information. As you can imagine, it was a very expensive procedure. The hospital stay and a physiologist, everything that goes into a major surgery like that. By dealing with Jeanette, we were able to actually take a lot of the burden off Kim because she was a full time working nurse. She had two kids at home. She had a husband. She was completely overwhelmed with this whole cancer diagnosis. So me and Jeanette worked very closely together to come up with a proper plan for Kim. We were able to help her with her insurance needs, and then we were able to get her the to assistance that she needed. So she really stepped in to help navigate the whole process medically and financially for her I was trying to be a friend that she could call on, somebody that she could talk to, what she was going through. It didn't really matter what it was. I just tried to really be there for her to support her to listen to her. Jannette came with me. She stayed in the hospital. And there was a lot of times that was just one fit in front of the other, just one treatment just one, you know, walk down the hall, one, you know, wave of nausea to get through. It was just kind of the process. And I always knew that she could make it through. She was so strong that for me, it was easy to say, yes, you know, you can do this. You can get through it. And by being involved with her and being kind of a support person that I was able myself to just comprehend and realize and just lied, really, that I could be strong for her as well. Jannette's been with me every step of the way, as well as Missy in a way. She's been with me every step of the way as well.