Experiencing loss 10,000 miles away
I suppose I "celebrated" too early in my previous post thinking what could possibly happen in a few weeks to change my 2016 reflection. Sadly, I got news a few days after that my uncle who had been battling cancer earlier in the year and seemed to be doing fine for the most part, all of a sudden fell extremely ill due to liver failure. I don't know much of the details, but apparently he stopped treatment for his cancer a few months ago because it was painful and the doctor relayed to him that survival rate of the treatment is only 30%. I suppose he got discouraged and decided to try alternative medication like Chinese herbs and diets, and from that point on the cancer cells started to spread more quickly and got to his liver. Once the liver fails, the body has no way of clearing up toxins, so starting chemo or similar treatments for the cancer at that point was pretty much impossible.
As soon as his liver failed, his health drained very quickly. Just hours after we finally arranged for my parents to fly to Malaysia, getting tickets sorted out, and splitting home responsibilities (downside of a large family), we got news that he passed away. In the end, my parents (and I and the rest of us) never got to say a proper goodbye. And this isn't the first time. Since coming to the states, we've gone through 3 deaths in the family where we were just too late, because even if we hopped onto the plane the moment we received the bad news, it would still take almost 2 days just to get to Malaysia from here. How frustrating is that?
A lot of times, I feel relatives think we have life easy and great over in the States, but it's been a struggle. I wouldn't say we don't have good times, but in moments like these, life becomes especially hard and draining (quite literally since our already non existent finances is being pushed to even further limits if we have to fly home every year or instance of bad news). Deep down, we want to be there for family and friends through the tough times, especially if they want or need our support. It's reasonable for them to expect our presence, but it doesn't change the fact that it requires a huge sacrifice on our part. A sacrifice we're willing to make for the most part, but at the same time we worry about how to deal with the repercussions. Aside from the obvious financial setbacks, there's issues of who should go back and for how long, and how should we handle emergencies when the head figures are gone?
I suppose this isn't an issue if we all lived together, but this time round Diane was in LA, Hannah in Texas, me and John in Sacramento, and Rena was in San Diego. The closest distance among two separate groups of us is 2.5 hours apart (driving) on a good day, pretty much impossible to respond to emergencies on time. To make matters worse, we have no other extended family support (other than John's parents who live nowhere near us either) we can call on any time. If it was a matter where parents needed to be present, well, they're two days away from coming home (on a REALLY good day and flight).
So sometimes we can't help but wonder who would be here for us if and when we go through difficult times? The relatives have made it clear to us they are incapable (and very unwilling) to come to the States should we run into trouble. Yet we cannot use this a basis to ignore their plea and emergencies. We can't even do it in good conscience even if they told us not to come. It's pretty much of a damn if you do, damn if you don't situation, since in their eyes it was "our choice" to migrate to the States. And to be quite frank, it sucks, but that was the decision we made when my dad received his calling. I suppose one could argue that if that were so, God will always take care of our needs. I mean I don't doubt it, but are feelings of conviction and discouragement (like the feeling of how much things suck) mutually exclusive?
Sigh.
Life has so many ups and downs. 2016 was especially crazy. The moment we get good news, we get a bad one almost right after, and so on. The moment we think we've figured something out or found balance, we get thrown off track once again. One thing I've truly learned to accept this year is that tomorrow is another day full of surprises, opportunities, and lessons to change and move forward regardless of how routined (good or bad) you think your life and your schedule might be, so always be ready. Overall, 2016 proved to be a challenging but good year for me and my family. Focusing on the positives, I graduated along with my best friend and little sister, John and I found new jobs we love, bought our first home, completed two home renovation projects, entered my master's program and so on, as mentioned in my previous post. Also, I forgot to mention that John's parents are back together! How crazy is that? Yet I wasn’t able to truly celebrate on new year’s eve because it ended unexpectedly on this very sad note of my uncle's passing in addition to how our family were all apart as a result. But each day is a new day, so here’s to year of exercising better physical, mental, spiritual and emotional health in 2017.
As soon as his liver failed, his health drained very quickly. Just hours after we finally arranged for my parents to fly to Malaysia, getting tickets sorted out, and splitting home responsibilities (downside of a large family), we got news that he passed away. In the end, my parents (and I and the rest of us) never got to say a proper goodbye. And this isn't the first time. Since coming to the states, we've gone through 3 deaths in the family where we were just too late, because even if we hopped onto the plane the moment we received the bad news, it would still take almost 2 days just to get to Malaysia from here. How frustrating is that?
A lot of times, I feel relatives think we have life easy and great over in the States, but it's been a struggle. I wouldn't say we don't have good times, but in moments like these, life becomes especially hard and draining (quite literally since our already non existent finances is being pushed to even further limits if we have to fly home every year or instance of bad news). Deep down, we want to be there for family and friends through the tough times, especially if they want or need our support. It's reasonable for them to expect our presence, but it doesn't change the fact that it requires a huge sacrifice on our part. A sacrifice we're willing to make for the most part, but at the same time we worry about how to deal with the repercussions. Aside from the obvious financial setbacks, there's issues of who should go back and for how long, and how should we handle emergencies when the head figures are gone?
I suppose this isn't an issue if we all lived together, but this time round Diane was in LA, Hannah in Texas, me and John in Sacramento, and Rena was in San Diego. The closest distance among two separate groups of us is 2.5 hours apart (driving) on a good day, pretty much impossible to respond to emergencies on time. To make matters worse, we have no other extended family support (other than John's parents who live nowhere near us either) we can call on any time. If it was a matter where parents needed to be present, well, they're two days away from coming home (on a REALLY good day and flight).
So sometimes we can't help but wonder who would be here for us if and when we go through difficult times? The relatives have made it clear to us they are incapable (and very unwilling) to come to the States should we run into trouble. Yet we cannot use this a basis to ignore their plea and emergencies. We can't even do it in good conscience even if they told us not to come. It's pretty much of a damn if you do, damn if you don't situation, since in their eyes it was "our choice" to migrate to the States. And to be quite frank, it sucks, but that was the decision we made when my dad received his calling. I suppose one could argue that if that were so, God will always take care of our needs. I mean I don't doubt it, but are feelings of conviction and discouragement (like the feeling of how much things suck) mutually exclusive?
Sigh.
Life has so many ups and downs. 2016 was especially crazy. The moment we get good news, we get a bad one almost right after, and so on. The moment we think we've figured something out or found balance, we get thrown off track once again. One thing I've truly learned to accept this year is that tomorrow is another day full of surprises, opportunities, and lessons to change and move forward regardless of how routined (good or bad) you think your life and your schedule might be, so always be ready. Overall, 2016 proved to be a challenging but good year for me and my family. Focusing on the positives, I graduated along with my best friend and little sister, John and I found new jobs we love, bought our first home, completed two home renovation projects, entered my master's program and so on, as mentioned in my previous post. Also, I forgot to mention that John's parents are back together! How crazy is that? Yet I wasn’t able to truly celebrate on new year’s eve because it ended unexpectedly on this very sad note of my uncle's passing in addition to how our family were all apart as a result. But each day is a new day, so here’s to year of exercising better physical, mental, spiritual and emotional health in 2017.
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