This year's Ride will be taking place over the weekend of June 15-16, and this year our team is comprised of only myself and Rocky's best friend, Paul Gill. I was speaking with Paul earlier this week about Rocky and about the Ride. It is hard for us to believe that June 16 will mark four years since Rocky's diagnosis. Four years. In many ways, time has flown by. In many other ways, time has crawled. Everyone who knew Rocky has been affected in different ways. I can only speak for myself when I describe my struggle to come to terms with and move forward from Rocky's battle and ultimate passing.
For many of you, this will be the first time you are hearing this story. For others, you will have received an annual email in past years. And for some, you will have detailed insider information about just how difficult my own personal struggle has been. Those who know me best will attest to just how badly Rocky's diagnosis terrified me. They will be able to tell you how my precious baby brother became the be all, end all of my life. Every waking moment of my life from June 9, 2009, the day of Rocky's initial hospitalization, through to August 16, 2010, the day of Rocky's passing, revolved solely around Rocky's health and treatments.
These friends will also tell you that every waking moment from August 17, 2010, until very recently revolved around trying to make sense of, and being unable to cope with my indescribable loss.
June 16 will also mark 11 years since the passing of my second brother, Amar. Amar was three years younger than me, and three years older than Rocky. We lost him in 2002, and while I remember struggling with his loss, Rocky's loss can only be described as being the most painful experience I have ever gone through. The best way I can describe it is that Amar's passing left a deep crack in my heart. Rocky's passing shattered it.
With some amazing support, I have lived through some of the darkest moments of my life. I am by no stretch 'over' Rocky's loss. I still struggle each day, but for the first time since I started sending out these emails in 2010, I am able to say that I feel I am getting better. Some days are harder than others, but those hard days are starting to become farther and farther apart. This opens up another painful concern though - am I forgetting my brother? But that is something I will deal with as it comes. For now, it's about this Ride.
For those of you that don't know, I participated in my first Ride in June 2010 after watching Rocky battle for nearly a year. In June 2009, Rocky was hospitalized for severe abdominal pain, which doctors initially thought was pancreatitis. He had been having the abdominal pain for a few weeks, but had tolerated it because he had just recently started a new job with the Major Crimes Section of the RCMP, and missing a day of work to see a doctor as not an option. It wasn't until his first compressed day off that he went to see a doctor, who ordered tests and sent him directly to Emergency. I got a call from my dad as I was getting ready for work that morning, asking if I could meet Rocky there, because he and my mom were worried, but Rocky didn't want them there. Of course I was going to meet him. So I arrived at the hospital and sat with him for hours while he quietly tolerated the pain without being able to lie down. Finally, they started him on morphine and told him that he would need to stay for a couple of days so that the pancreatitis could resolve. They put him on saline and pulled him off food, expecting his very high lipase levels to crash and become normal in the next day or so.
The following day, blood results revealed that rather than decreasing, Rocky's lipase levels had increased again. At this point, they ordered a CT to make sure everything was lining up. It was after this CT that we got our first indication of trouble. An endocrinologist, in speaking with Rocky about a minor thyroid issue, dropped the T-word. Tumor. All of a sudden, things became very serious and very sombre. Rocky was transferred from a stretcher in the hall of Emergency to a ward, and test after test after test was conducted. One morning about a week after Rocky's initial admission to hospital, I took a trip to the temple before going to the hospital. When I walked in, Rocky was wiping sweat from his forehead and looked pale and shaken. I asked him if he was okay, and he said "you better sit down." I did, and this is when Rocky told me that the doctor had just come by, and that he said "you have lumps and bumps everywhere." At this point, all we knew was that it could be one of three things - all of them different forms of cancer: gastrointestinal, thyroid and lymphoma. We were told to hope for lymphoma.
Immediately the concern for both of us became how we were going to tell our parents - particularly our mom. Our mom had lost her 26 year old brother to cancer 33 years prior, and she had never come to terms with that tragedy. How were we going to tell our parents that their youngest child, their favorite child, their baby was about to embark on a terrifying battle against cancer? We strategized and decided to tell our dad first. I had left them at the temple, and dad was going to leave mom there and go open up shop. I called dad and asked him to come to the hospital. He did. Together, Rocky and I broke the news to him. He didn't flinch. He said that it was fine, and we were going to deal with it. And then he asked what Rocky and I had already been thinking - how are we going to tell mom? We decided to let her call when she was ready to leave the temple and we would deal with it then. When she did call, my dad said that he would go pick her up. This proved to be mom's first sign that something was wrong. The original plan was for me to go pick her up. When I didn't show up but dad did, mom immediately knew something was off. But she stayed quiet and prayed all the way to the hospital. Once she got there, the three of us gently broke the news to her. Mom was sitting on a recliner by Rocky's bedside, slightly out of Rocky's line of vision. When I said the words, and Rocky heard nothing, he turned his head to look up at her. She smiled, put her hand on his head and said "that's okay." We'll get through it. And shortly afterwards, very calmly, she told me to stay with Rocky and that she and dad would go home quickly. Rocky didn't know what that meant. I did. Sure enough, I heard after the fact, that they had only gotten out of the hospital doors and into the parkade when they became inconsolable. That afternoon, my dad pushed his youngest child's wheelchair through the halls of Surrey Memorial Hospital, up to the Oncology ward.
After multiple biopsies, we were given "good news." Rocky had Diffuse Large B-Cell Non Hodgkin's Lymphoma. Not as easy as Hodgkin's Lymphoma to treat, but a better prognosis than gastrointestinal or thyroid would offer us. Throughout this entire process, Rocky's abdominal pain had worsened, and he was put on Hydromorphone, which is 8x more potent than morphine. He was receiving subcutaneous doses around the clock to keep him comfortable. On July 2, 2009, Rocky started chemotherapy. He was nervous. We were nervous. No one knew what to expect. The only thing Rocky knew was that it made people vomit, so as nurses prepared to administer the drugs, my poor baby brother pulled a tray near to prepare for the vomiting. I assured him that anything that he would feel would be after the fact and not during the treatment itself. So innocent, so undeserving.
On Rocky's 24th birthday, we spent the day at the hospital and after he sent us home at the end of the day, I received a text message from him telling me that I would need to arrange for "beanies" and shades as soon as possible, because his hair had started to fall out. He had gone into the bathroom to wash up before bed and his entire beard pretty much ended up on his hands. Rocky was finally discharged the following week - 42 day after his initial admission to hospital. He went in weighing nearly 200lbs. He came out weighing 150.
During the chemotherapy process, along with all of the normal side effects, Rocky experienced a painful rash on his head. His entire scalp was red, tender and visibly painful. He cringed everytime someone walked by, afraid that they would touch his head. Along with that came a bout of meningitis which resulted in a horribly painful headache.
After his fourth round of chemo, Rocky went in for a pre-planned CT scan to check progress. The good news was that all of the existing masses had either shrunk or disappeared. The bad news was that two new masses had grown. Oncologists were encouraging, but we would find out much later that Rocky's fate had pretty much been sealed with these results. This was bad news. Very bad news. On the Oncologists' advice, Rocky completed the last two rounds of chemotherapy and underwent another CT scan. The two new masses were still there, and so a PET scan was ordered to determine whether they were cancer. On December 3, what would have been Amar's 27th birthday, we got the results. Rocky had tested PET-positive for cancer. The battle was not over.
While everyone prepared with excitement for the 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver, my brother underwent test after test to ensure his body was healthy enough to withstand a stem cell transplant. He had a tube inserted in his chest which went directly into his heart. This tube would be used to administer extreme dose chemotherapy, which would essentially wipe out Rocky's bone marrow. The same tube would then be used to transplant stem cells which would hopefully rebuild healthy marrow.
Vancouver 2010's Opening Ceremonies took place on February 12, 2010. Rocky was admitted to Vancouver General Hospital's Leukemia ward on February 15. He would not be discharged until after the world had gone home. He was released from hospital on March 9. He watched the entire Games from his hospital bed, rather than being out and enjoying the games in his hometown. But that was okay, because the hope was that in 2014, we'd be headed to Sochi. While the world watched the men's gold medal hockey game, my brother slept, too exhausted to wake up and watch with me. He woke up literally 30 seconds before Sidney Crosby's historic goal, lifted his arm in the air, whispered "Sid the Kid" and fell back asleep. But everything was okay because this treatment was supposed to make him healthy again.
In late April, Rocky went in for another PET-scan. Rocky's Oncologist called me at work with the results. I listened speechlessly as he said "Randeep, it came back positive" and then I just started crying. What was it going to take? I asked the Oncologist, "Doctor, what do you think - what are Rocky's chances at this point?" and for the first time, he said "Randeep, I'm worried." After consulting with a board of Oncologists, the team decided that Rocky should undergo intense radiotherapy, so 5 times a week, for 4 weeks, Rocky underwent radiation to target the mass on his liver. This mass swelled and pushed up against his diaphragm, making it extremely painful for Rocky to breathe. At this point, Rocky said that every pain episode that he had experienced since the abdominal pain that had started it all, was worse than the last. He had rated the abdominal pain at a 15 out of 10, but even that was starting to feel like child's play after the pain episodes that he experienced afterwards.
Rocky completed radiation on June 16, 2010 - one year to the day since his diagnosis, and on the 8th anniversary of Amar's passing. He looked great, he felt great, his blood counts looked promising. For the first time, June 16 felt like a good day. It was short-lived. A mere 10 days later, Rocky was taken back to Emergency after feeling extremely dizzy, and after more tests and another transfer up to Oncology, Rocky was told that the cancer had spread and that there was nothing else that could be done. I will never forget sitting speechlessly watching my brother react to the news and then beg the Oncologist to do something...anything. But there was nothing else to do except make him "comfortable."
On July 13, a couple of days before his 25th birthday, Rocky experienced an extreme pain crisis. Rocky was a quiet young man. He never complained about his pain, despite ranking his episodes at 15/10. But on this day, Rocky's eyes were wide, tears streaming out of them. He was thrashing all over his bed, SCREAMING. He looked me in the eyes and screamed over and over that "this is beyond an emergency! I need help! Do something! I'm on fire! Help me!" After what felt like an eternity, doctors ordered enormous doses of hydromorphone and ketomine (even more potent than hydromorphone) to be adminstered. On this evening, as other patients watched in shock, my beautiful baby brother, 2 days shy of his 25th birthday, was transferred to a private room in the Palliative Care ward. A room reserved for patients facing imminent death. The Oncologists told us to call family, because they would be surprised if Rocky made it through the week.
Remarkably, after a couple of weeks, Rocky had stabilized enough to be discharged from hospital, but received at-home care because of his terminal condition. Around the clock, my mom and I administered drugs to keep his pain under control. Together, he and my mom prayed everyday. We laughed, we cried. We even went grocery shopping. But Rocky's condition was evident. His legs had swelled to the point that he could not get up and down stairs without assistance. He could not walk normally and resorted to the use of a cane. His shoes wouldn't fit because his feet were so swollen. His appetite was next to nothing. But every morning, he came into my room, grabbed my foot and tickled me until I got out of bed. The Rocky that we had lost after Amar's passing was back, but only for a short time.
On August 7, Rocky returned to hospital for a blood transfusion because his counts were too low. He would not come home. On August 16, surrounded by his family, Rocky left us forever. When Rocky passed away, he had 11 different ports on his arms and thigh for all of the medication that he was receiving. He was finally free of the pain, the medications and cancer in general. Rocky was gone to a better place. But our lives had just turned into a living hell.
I know that I will never come to terms with Rocky's passing. The funny thing about time is that it forces us to get used to living without our loved ones, but the pain doesn't ever really go away. I look at my mom now and wonder how she lived 33 years with the pain of losing her brother, only to be faced with the same disease afflicting her son. I know how I have struggled with my brother's passing. I cannot even begin to imagine how my parents are dealing with their son's passing.
This disease has to stop. It has affected too many people. It has taken too many lives. It continues to devastate families each and every day. Cancer does not discriminate. It affects the old and young. Male and female. Rich and poor. It doesn't care if you have obligations. It doesn't care if you have hopes and dreams. It doesn't care if your family needs you.
The only way to do anything about it though is to continue to raise funds in the hopes that one day, another Rocky will be saved, and will be able to live a long and fruitful life. Why do I ride? I ask myself this every single year. Rocky as the nearest and dearest to my heart. There is not a single person on this Earth, whose passing will affect me the way Rocky's has. He was my everything. So why should I care to help anyone else if nothing will help him? Because as Rocky lay on his deathbed, he specifically asked to keep the battle going after he was gone, because "no one deserves this." Rocky was an amazing young man. A couple of weeks after he passed away, i went into his room and opened up his nighttable drawer and found a piece of paper with the following words:
"Though nothing will bring back the hour,
of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower,
we will greive not;
Rather, find strength in what remains behind."
Rocky deliberately left these words for us in case he never returned from the hospital. Few his age would think of others when they are facing their own demise. He asked for a small funeral comprising only of those who would help us during our time of need, rather than those there for a show. He asked that his friends be told of his passing after the funeral so that they would remember him for what he was rather than what he became. The thought of Rocky imagining his own funeral rips through my heart. I cannot even describe what I feel when I think of this.
I ride for that amazing young man. A young man that gave it his all to get better, more for his family than himself. How can I be selfish when he was so selfless? It would be an insult to his legacy if I chose to be selfish and not help anyone else. He deserves at least that much.
Over the last 3 years, with the support of wonderful donors, our team has managed to raise nearly $30,000 to help with cancer research. As we all know, there is work yet to be done, and for that reason, I sit before you asking once again for your support in this very important cause. Once again, I ask you to open your hearts and wallets so that together, we can make a difference and so that I can help keep my brother's dying wish alive.
Once again, we have set up our webpage: www.conquercancer.ca/goto/Rockstars2013, where you can click on either my name, or Paul's and make a donation. Your support in the past has been sincerely appreciated, and it is my hope that we can count on your support again in the future.
Please help us make a difference. Help us keep Rocky alive. Help us fight so no one else has to.
Please, give courageously.
And from the bottom of my heart, thank you.
Kind regards and best wishes,
Rocky's sister
Randeep Gill
Team Captain
Rocky's Rockstars
Ride to Conquer Cancer
Website: www.conquercancer.ca/goto/Rockstars2013
Blog: www.rockysrockstars.blogspot.ca
