Clinical trials and the pit of my stomach

Michael talked to his father last night. We had just gotten back from chemo and Hazen wanted to know what the plan is from here. Will he try to get into a clinical trial? Does he have a health care proxy? Will he stay in Cary until the end or move in with me?
Hazen is eminently practical. Everything has to have a plan right now. We can't move until we've sat own and thought about all the alternatives and mapped everything out in detail. It's one of the reasons we didn't stay together. Danny's that way too.
But Michael and I need time to absorb things before we start moving again. I stand with my feet rooted against the storm until I know I can move. I don't want to make decisions when I'm still reeling from the news, and Michael is too numb to start thinking about practical matters yet. We're writing down questions for the doctor as we think of them. He has asked his cousin Shannon to be his health care proxy because she's a nurse and she knows him better than almost anyone else. But he asked her awhile ago. She agreed, hoping she never would be called on. That's as far as we've gotten.
I don't think a clinical trial is a bad idea. I used to think it was grasping at straws, and maybe it is. But there comes point when straws are all you have left to hold onto.
I learned to interpret clinical trial results when I worked for the nursing journal. I remember reading that this drug or that combination gave people an average of five weeks or eight weeks longer. I wondered then why anyone would bother with a few more weeks. Now I know. Every day is a gift. Every single one.
I didn't sleep well last night again. I kept hearing people crying -- Danny or one of the grandkids or my mother -- and I would wake up with a pain in the pit of my stomach, knowing what they were crying about.
My stepbrother, Scott, e-mailed me last night with a long and lovely -- well, I guess I would almost call it a heartfelt sermon. Scott is an Evangelical Christian whose faith fills him with joy and comfort. I'm a liberal Christian with the same outlook. I felt as though he had reached out across the miles and embraced me as we wept and prayed together.
I need the support I get from friends and family to hold me up right now. Every call is another support, another set of arms embracing me.
When Ellen was diagnosed with lung cancer, people pulled together around her and I remember how surprised she was.
"I feel so, so... popular," she said. "I never knew I was popular."