Monday morning, my dad asked me to call my mom to ask her about some business stuff. Our housekeeper answered and said my mom was out at a golf tournament.Afterwards, I asked my dad if he was jealous that mom was out on a tour and playing golf. He replied, "No, I'm actually very happy for her."
Then he said how my mom doesn't make friends easily and it was hard for her to adjust to life in Shanghai. But now she gets calls from all these people asking her to do stuff.
My aunts came over at around noon, and since my dad was in good spirits, we decided to go out to eat. My second aunt likes nicer, sit-down establishments, so she suggested Taipei 101. We ended up at this Shanghainese restaurant, very close to the end of their lunch hour.
We ordered saguo yu tou soup, cao nian gao, and cai fan. The smallest bowl that the saquo yu tou soup comes in serves 10 people, but we put a pretty good dent in it.
My aunts left to take care of some business, so me and my dad hung out at Taipei 101 for a little while. Lately, my dad needs time to rest when he goes out. He can't just get up and go. He needs an hour or more to just rest his body before moving again.
We went home at around 4:30 p.m., taking the #5 little bus back to Wuxing Rd. I know that my aunts would have preferred us take the taxi, but I want my dad to feel that he can still do some things independently, even if it's with my help.
My dad told me that about a month or so ago, he went out by himself to eat. I'm not sure if he told my mom or what, but he set off on his own. Well, he had a sudden urge to go to the bathroom, and he had to ask the restaurant owner to let him use the bathroom. He was pretty desperate. We're talking small restaurant here, like hole-in-the-wall.
My dad says that he was praying "Om-yi tuo-fuo" the whole time, because he was in so much agony. He didn't even know if he could make it home. When he finally got the energy to leave the bathroom, his clothes were wet from sweating so much. He said he cried when he got home.
Occasionally, my dad will sweat a lot. I read somewhere that the liver helps regulate body temperature. In general, when we're at home, he feels hot even though he doesn't have a fever.
When we got home that day, my dad went to sit on the couch and immediately fell asleep. Within an hour, I heard my name being called outside. It was my aunts again.
I had thought they were gone for the day, but I was wrong. When they got upstairs, they said they went to Taipei 101 to look for us, but we weren't there.
We ate leftover wonton and bai cai xi-fen that evening. After my aunts left, my dad and I sat in the living room talking about his cancer and his meds. He told me to look up the Isotonix drink powder that my second aunt got him on the Internet. My aunt seems to be big on it. She wants my dad to drink 3 times the recommended dosage every day, to "catch up." She takes it regularly and swears by it, saying it makes her skin soft. Isotonix turns out to be high in anti-oxidants, although I looked at the label and it contained quite a bit of fructose sugar.
Sugar, especially refined sugar, I explained, is not good for you. Your body expends a lot of energy and B vitamins to break down sugar, so quite a bit of research says that refined sugar actually depresses the immune system.
I also explained to him the role of anti-oxidants and how some doctors believe that it could work against cancer meds. Firstly, they could repair cancer cells that are damaged on purpose by certain chemotherapy drugs, or block the efficacy of these drugs.
We agreed to take just the regular drink dosage and talk to the liver cancer specialist on Thursday to see what he says.
Somehow, the subject of my mom came up. My dad told me about how he never thought her family would help him out so much. My mom's brother really hooked him up with a reputable liver doctor, who helped get him out of the hectic emergency room and into a real hospital bed.
And then his eyes started to well up with tears. He told me when he was released from the hospital, it was my mom's birthday and he wanted to buy her a birthday cake.
"It's one thing if you don't have money to buy someone something," he said, crying. "You could get a piece of tofu - at least it shows you tried. But you feel so bad if you can't even cross the street to buy someone a cake - if you're not even physically capable of doing just that little thing."
