Imerman Angels is an international program that recruits mentors to provide emotional support for cancer patients and their caregivers, matching them with someone going through the same type of cancer and treatment. I signed up to be a Mentor Angel and was matched in 2014 with Kay in Colorado. We talked fairly often by email and sometimes by phone.
“How do you fight depression?” she asked one day.
Seeing Chris so weak during radiation was scary. Formerly robust and full of vitality, he became skin and bones, sleeping a lot, and looking like “death warmed over.” I struggled to keep a strong front, holding a tsunami of emotions in. Occasionally, billowy waves crashed over me, destroying my façade.
Many mornings I’d have a smile on my face as I kissed Chris good-bye before I went to work. But as soon as I got in my car, tears started flowing, and I cried all the way to the office. My client and his wife, Jay and Lou Ann, were so compassionate. Having worked with them for eleven years in their home-based office, we’d become close friends. Seeing me walk in the door with a shiny red nose and bloodshot eyes, they knew I was having a rough morning and let me cry on their shoulders while they comforted me.
