The answer to the question

After 6 month’s we finally returned to The Marsden. It’s been 6 months of searching for peace and solace, only to find there isn’t any to be had. The world doesn’t just go back to normal, and although people still stay it’s still very new, it feels like a lifetime since I laid in bed with my little girl.

I talk a lot about the guilt I feel and, whether it’s warranted or not, but it’s still always there and it’s consumed me recently. Guilt that I’m here and she isn’t, because I’d swap places in a heartbeat. Guilt that this has made me more affectionate to my other children and I don’t think I was with Rory. Guilty that I didn’t do enough to save her, even if I know I did more than most. I’ve always had this overwhelming fear of failure, and nothing makes me feel like I’ve failed more than waking up everyday knowing that my little girl isn’t with us anymore.

I suppose we went to The Marsden to get answers. Answers to questions that keep us up at night, and  bring with it waves of tears that things would’ve been different if somebody listened to us sooner. I spoke before about this guilt being a hard burden to bear, that it was my fault that Rory didn’t get diagnosed quicker. I think I tried to convince myself that if she had, things would have been different. If she’d been seen quicker, we’d still have her.

Turns out, I was wrong.

When we spoke to the specialists about Aurora they told us that regardless of how quickly a diagnosis was confirmed, they’re confident that outcome would have been the same. Although it doesn’t happen often, when this type of cancer returns, it’s almost impossible to cure, and hers was just too aggressive. It just kept coming back, no matter what we threw at it, and no matter how many times she got the all clear. Intense chemotherapy was only enough to keep at bay, and eventually the disease was going to take her no matter what. She relapsed on treatment, and only 5 weeks after a transplant, which is the most extensive treatment she could have received.

Whilst her diagnosis journey was far from perfect, and whilst avenues that should have been explored were not, ultimately it didn’t matter for the outcome. It matters to me though. It matters that my little girl wasn’t deemed sick enough to warrant treatment, and I don’t want this to happen to other parents. I don’t want other parents to have to fight tooth and nail to prove their children are sick. That my child, who was actually dying still got told to go home.

I guess I wanted to be able to blame someone else for what happened instead of blaming myself. I’d convinced myself that if she’d been diagnosed earlier and she hadn’t reached stage 4 she’d would have been okay, like the other little girls and boys we met when we were there. And I still see them now, over my news feed, celebrating their little lives which is a bitter sweet pill because I’m so happy for them, but I’m envious too. I’m sad that it’s not my little girl who got to ring the bell like she desperately hoped for. Sad she isnt arguing with me about walking home from school, or staying up late to sneakily watch TV. But this is life, and this is what it is now.

With all things considered, I think it’s given me a small bit of peace, because I was bitter. I mean, I still am, but it’s not as bad. The guilt still hasn’t left completely, but it doesn’t consume me anymore like it did. The anxiety though? That’s a different story.

Honestly, sometimes I wake up feeling sick to the pit of my stomach and my whole body shakes. Sometimes I have to force myself out of the door to go to work, when all I want to do is sleep or cry, or both. Sleep is all I want to do right now, sleep the days away until I feel better, but I don’t think I ever will. Some people say it’s depression, some people say it’s grief, some people say it’s PTSD, but whatever it is, it’s fucking shit. Probably a mixture of them all, because we weren’t prepared for what the last 2 years brought with it, and we certainly didn’t prepare for this.

I don’t really know how to help myself either. I’ve always been so open about my feelings that I don’t know if seeing a counselor would help. I used to write, but my brain has been foggy and my addictive personality has come out again. I’ve read almost 40 books since October, and if I’m not busy I’m struggling. Struggling to think, struggling to breathe, struggling to be. But it goes deeper that that because even on the days I get through where I’m not a complete horrible mess, or a bitter horrible person, or I manage to actually enjoy, they’re followed by a comedown of guilt for managing to smile when my pride and joy is gone.

Grief is an ocean, and I don’t know whether I’m sinking or swimming anymore. All of the lines are blurred. Whilst I feel comforted at the news, I still don’t feel like I’m willing to accept it, or ever will.