It's time to introduce my partner on this journey, my wife of 45 years. Her name is Nancy but she's known throughout the family, even through the younger generations, as Nurse Nancy. You have symptoms? She has a diagnosis. Your doctor said it's A? She'll tell you it's B, and maybe you need to consider seeing a more competent doctor. The really scary thing is sometimes she's right. She's not a real nurse, she's a retired teacher. But as a caregiver, she's the best. She has an instinctive feeling for what to do when things get mucky. Maybe it comes from raising four kids and doing it so well. She's a beautiful Irish redhead (and no, Al, she doesn't dye her hair) of a certain age, who looks at least 20 years younger. She's often mistaken for my daughter. She graduated from a Catholic college, all girls, where there were basically three career options: teacher, nurse or nun. Anyone who knows her would get a good laugh trying to picture her as a nun. Just try telling her what to do (I gave up long ago), then duck. She would have been a good nurse, but made the right choice of career as an elementary teacher. Many happy parents and kids over the years would agree. She's the friendly one in the family. She has a ton of friends and is responsible for about 100% of our social life. I'm just along for the ride.
Right now Nurse Nancy has three or four theories about my persistent cough, the only symptom I'm having (the chemo has been remarkably kind to me so far, knock on wood). She has explained each theory to her son, an actual doctor, who has carefully explained why each one is unlikely to be true. This has, unsurprisingly, had little to no effect on her thinking. So the four possible causes remain prominent in our conversations, and the cough, which is apparently due to irritation of my esophagus from a tube used for anesthesia during my chest biopsy, continues. But still, I wouldn't want any other partner for this journey, or for the bigger journey we've been on for the past 45 years.
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