For this post, I want to talk about my sister’s boyfriend, M. Ever since day one, M has been at my sister’s side unflinching, unwavering as a rock. He is “only” a boyfriend and at any moment, he could have left. But he didn’t, even when my sister is suffering the worst of chemo or bearing the worst of news. His smallest gestures mean the biggest thing to my sister. When she was undergoing periodic injections of Cisplatin, a notoriously rough treatment, she endured extremely terrible bouts of nausea. She became apprehensive of eating anything, fearful that what she ate would promptly be regurgitated. This vomiting wasn’t the vomiting from a stomach flu or from a morning hangover, but a long, continuous, painful, vein-in-the-neck popping hurl over the toilet bowl. The retching was very loud and horrible to hear. I know everyone who was with my sister also felt a knot in the stomach because there wasn’t much to do but to let it happen. M, when this happened, would unfailingly rush to bring a stool so that she could sit while hovering over the toilet bowl. He would have one hand on her back, one hand holding a glass of water. He would memorize how many liters of water she had drank during the day to ensure she didn’t become too dehydrated (which would worsen the nausea) and recall the 15 or so medicines she needed to take and when to take them (both the common and the scientific names). M is the caretaker to my sister that I aspire to be.
My family all knows what M means to my sister. He keeps her happy, a tether to normalcy. My mother, ever the worrier once confided in me, “I’m really worried. What if he leaves her?” My father, ever the tiger dad, who only months ago didn’t think he was good enough for his daughter replied, “I know his heart now. He wouldn’t leave her.” “But what if he does?” “He won't.”
The measure of a man is the loyalty to his woman and by that measure M is a man by a mile.
“In sickness and in health”…. he may have never uttered them in vow, but he has done them in deed. Sweet words are rarely true, true words are rarely sweet but true actions, the very sweetest.
My family all knows what M means to my sister. He keeps her happy, a tether to normalcy. My mother, ever the worrier once confided in me, “I’m really worried. What if he leaves her?” My father, ever the tiger dad, who only months ago didn’t think he was good enough for his daughter replied, “I know his heart now. He wouldn’t leave her.” “But what if he does?” “He won't.”
The measure of a man is the loyalty to his woman and by that measure M is a man by a mile.
“In sickness and in health”…. he may have never uttered them in vow, but he has done them in deed. Sweet words are rarely true, true words are rarely sweet but true actions, the very sweetest.
It's comforting to know that it's M that is by her side. Long before all this happened, we saw his sincerity and love towards her. I am in awe by your sister and M.
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