Age 16
Dear Diary,
My mother is making me go to support group, it's this sad, boring group of cancer patients, like me, to help you accept that you are going to die, I guess. We sit around in a circle with crap coffee or lemonade and listen to everyone go around in a circle and discusses their diagnosis, name and how they are feeling each day. We meet every Wednesday because my mother and my doctor agreed I was depressed. I wasn't depressed I was just obsessed with this one book, An Imperial Affliction, and I was going to die so I was going to ask weird questions about death. Support group blows but it allows me to try out different looks around other people some days when I am just not feeling it I am a total mess, some days I am Anna from An Imperial Affliction, some days I am sophisticated others I am dangerous and mysterious. So yea, support group generally blows but today was different, because Isaac brought his friend Augustus Waters. How do I describe Augustus, he is like a fresh breath of air that I haven't been able to take my entire life. Until I saw him I never understood teenage fixation surrounding the opposite sex. He is now the second reason I go to support group.
Dear Diary,
Sorry it's been so long since I wrote, it's just well how bout I start from the beginning. It was after I went to support group one Wednesday evening and Augustus walked up to me and started to talk and I really could not think of much because all I could focus on was how my hair looked and why I had forgotten to wear better looking clothes instead of my sweat pants. There was this feeling in my stomach like a million tiny butter flies were tickling my insides, but then he said six magical words that set things into motion. Want to go watch a movie? It all started from there our little infinity, we would spend the next 3 or so months together creating memories. Then, one day Augustus takes me on a walk and we sit on a bench and he tells me that his cancer is back. Why is life just so unfair? I spend my days lying in my bed next to my phone hoping that the next notification isn't telling me Augustus has died. Augustus spends his days in critical care. How can life be like this? We already been so close to death with our cancer and we have given up ears of our lives to live in hospital beds barely surviving! But that is not enough?! Augustus must now die from cancer and only after he has made me fall in love with him! Why?! Really someone explain to me why it must be this way cause it doesn't make any sense to me. But his suffering is over now and he is in a better place. Augustus did not die with dignity there was no brutal fight till the end he just simply was there one day and then gone the next. I would like to believe he is in a better place a place with out pain and suffering, a place where there is no cancer and existence is only joy. I haven't really thought that much about what happens when someone dies. My mother says I need to learn how to cope with Augustus's death because me staying in my room and re-reading An Imperial Affliction over and over is not healthy.
Dear Diary,
I went to support group again the first time back since Augustus died a month ago. This time I did not go for someone else this time I went for me. With Augustus gone I have a gaping hole in my life that I need to learn how to fill and support group helped. Patrick said something to me that kind of made me realize that though our time was short and Augustus died far too you he gave me something, our very own little infinity. I have learned to come to terms with his death and see the joy. I will definitely have days where I will miss him very dearly but I am glad for our small infinity. Thank the universe the small piece it gave us.
Age 20
Dear Diary,
I just moved in with my parents again because my cancer has progressively gotten worse, I now need help and support from my parents or two best friends. With Isaac dead I have no one left who I can talk to besides my parents, my cancer has gotten in the way of a normal life currently. Today though was monumental, today was the day my doctor told me I am dying. I have been told this before and with thyroid cancer and Mets in my lungs it was something that we always know but now it was confirmed and had a definitive end date. They told me that I have 1 or 2 weeks left. My mother governs my life now, a strict food regimen and vitamins. My life has changed drastically in the few hours I got that news. Mother has gone through anger and denial and then a sort of calm acceptance, which I think will also end in sobbing later tonight. It is just wrong that a parent outlives their child. It should not be that way.
Dear Diary,
I have been thinking about death a lot lately, mostly about what it would be like after you die cause there are really only theories that explain possibilities'. I would like to think that I would be able to see Isaac and Augustus again but maybe we just fade into oblivion. I am not scared to die I'm just afraid of all the pain the cancer will put me through before I die. I have also found I have this incredible urge to not want to die alone.
Dear Diary,
They moved me to the hospital today, I hate hospitals this is the place I go when I am about to or am close to death. That is all it has ever been. I obeyed cause it made my mother happy, it did not make me very happy. I don't want to die sad and alone.
Dear diary,
It became impossible to breathe today so I have a tube draining the fluid in my lungs so I can suckishly breathe. The doctors tell my mom news about my condition because they think I'm too weak right now to hear bad news but I know they are telling her that I'm going to die really soon. I really don't need them to tell me that I have been seeing Augustus for the past couple days, I think he is here to bring me with him when I die. I think there is a life after death and it will be wonderful, no more pain. Funny thing about pain, it demands to be felt.
Dear Diary,
They cant do anything more for me but that's ok my infinity has come to an end. Augustus is here for me. I just hope my mother realizes tha