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Yes, I’m still in Odesa, Ukraine.

Hear me out...

The thing is right after we came back from San Francisco in 2020 and a little after the pandemic started, my mother-in-law was diagnosed with cancer.

It was Stage II and it was a shock for all of us—that silent killer had been there far longer and we didn’t know exactly how long either. From that moment on, all of us here tried to treat it aggressively with treatments: chemo, radiotherapy, dietary changes, and more around that summer. The treatment went on until January 2021 and that’s when it was finished. My mother-in-law took a while to recover and by spring she was more or less fine, and almost after a year she finally had a chance to go outside that wasn’t a clinic, hospital, or medical facility. But things started to turn grim as pains and aches started to come back around last summer; she stopped going outside, then she stopped walking around the house and looking out the window, then she couldn’t even get out of bed by last Christmas, and last month she needed essential care not being able to sit up. Her bones got so brittle that they broke one day and it ended up leaving both her arms in casts.

The last three weeks have been the hardest. Mainly because it got to the point where she lost more than half her weight, under heavy medication, and consistent pains all over her body. My wife, my brother-in-law, a nurse we hired, and myself were all taking care of her—to lift her up, take turns to sleep and/or watch her, everything.

Everything in pain, everything in tears, absolutely everything you can imagine.

My wife’s uncle, who is a doctor, gave a prognosis of a few weeks and the most we could do is ease her suffering. It wasn’t just physically draining, but also emotionally and mentally soul-crushing. We couldn’t handle everything at home so we admitted her into a private hospital where thank god for the time being she is doing better, but we really don’t know how much time she has. They told us a few months, her oncologist said a year should be enough—but that was before she broke her arm. It's Stage IV and terminal at the point. For all my students reading this who noticed me taking time off or canceling lessons, now you know why.

About this “whole thing” going on and the hundreds of messages I’m getting, the thing is—it’s easy for me to go. It’d probably be easy for our son too.

But not for my wife. I can’t imagine anyone going through what she has been for the last years, let alone horrific weeks and days. It’s like a complete and utter living nightmare. On one side you’re losing your mother day by day before your eyes, on another your have this supposed “imminent, any day now, brink of war” invasion, on another you have your child who needs extra help because he’s a bit speech delayed, on another you have your concerned husband getting messages from his embassy talking about evacuating and leaving.

And you know what? I already tried that yesterday.

Sebastian and I hopped in a car and fled the country. My wife and I decided that I would take him while she looked after her mom for the time being. She stayed behind, and the first time in a long time I cried to tears leaving her. Right in the moment the car pulled out of the drive way and the moment we crossed the border, I asked the driver to stop and I poured into tears. I wasn’t just leaving a “crisis” zone, I was leaving the country had given me everything, I was leaving the city that had changed my life, I was leaving my family, my wife and the mother of our child.

It was so fucking hard. So fucking hard. You have no idea.

Was I stupid for turning back into a potential war, invasion, take over whatever?

I don’t know, maybe.

Was I stupid for turning back to support my wife, bringing our son, and us back together?

Absolutely not.

Emotion may defy all logic, yet it is our emotion that guides us in the right direction.

The thought of leaving her at the most critically vulnerable point in her life was the worst feeling ever.

And that’s what family is about and I’m going to protect that.

The thing is she decided not to go initially because the thought that would plague her the most was that if she had left and her mother had passed while gone, she would live with regret for the rest of her life. Especially if nothing happened with the ongoing media hysteria. That is completely understandable, yet no person should ever face this.

No one.

All this has been going on, all the while here in the city of Odesa—people are calm, going about their days, and holding coffee in their hands. Spring is coming and there is zero panic at all. Either 44 million people here are desensitized, naïve, and gullible or just the main stream media is looking for the next story to pump out. I’ve talked about it with a lot of my students and none of them are worried; they’ve got work to do, homes to build, families to take care of, places to go, parties to hit up, and they ain’t got time for this shit.

Don’t get me wrong, if the situation deteriorates and in an event of a worst-case scenario that leaves us no future here, we’re bouncing.

Until then, we’re here.

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