The man with advanced cancer insists on driving a car-hailing website just to save more money for his mother
"Goodbye, take your time." Wang Jun, the driver of the online taxi, stopped the car steadily and turned around to greet the passengers in the back seat politely. His face was slightly pale. After delivering a passenger, he stuffed a pill into his mouth and took it with boiling water in a thermos cup. Then he drove to the next destination according to the voice prompt of his mobile phone.
This is a scene that took place last week. No one could have imagined that the driver was a terminal cancer patient.
Wang Jun only wanted to drive for one more day when he was confident that his body could still support it. He didn’t dare to stop because his mother, who was dependent on him, had uremia and mild Alzheimer’s disease. The monthly treatment fee of several thousand yuan was a fixed expenditure, and he wanted to save a little more for his mother’s living expenses and medical expenses.
Son who suffers from cholangiocarcinoma and still insists on driving a car
Wang Jun, a native of Yuzhong District, was diagnosed with cholangiocarcinoma in early July, having always been in good health.
The scariest thing about the disease is the insidious nature of the disease. Patients often have no symptoms in the early stage, and once detected, they are advanced. Doctors say that patients with the disease can usually survive for six months to a year, and if treated well, it may last for two years. But so far, no case has been found in the world that has survived for five years.
Wang Juncai is 37 years old.
This was undoubtedly a huge blow to any family. But Wang Jun didn’t fall, he didn’t even stop getting out of the car. Because he knew that there were more important things to do.
Wang Jun used to be a driver of Chongqing Bus Company No. 2 and drove the No. 202 bus for nearly a decade. When he was driving the bus, his mobile phone vibrated for more than half an hour. When he saw that his mother was calling, Wang Jun felt nervous. He drove back to the terminal, parked the car, and quickly dialed. It turned out that his mother was diagnosed with uremia.
Uremia usually doesn’t kill people all at once, but dialysis must be adhered to. Since then, dialysis three times a week has been unstoppable.
Each dialysis needs 200 yuan, and the monthly dialysis fee is at least 2,400 yuan. And Xie Zaigui’s pension is only 2,600 yuan.
In order to take care of his mother and increase family income, in 2015, Wang Jun resigned from the bus company and started to drive an online car. The car was purchased with a loan and operated by an online car-hailing unit. Nearly 140,000 yuan for the car, a monthly payment of 3,200 yuan, and now there are still 3 years of loans, about 88,000 yuan that have not been paid off.
After being diagnosed with cancer, Wang Jun felt that his physical strength could still support him. Under the condition of ensuring driving safety, he continued to drive every day. Earning a little more counts as a little bit.
He calculated the account, opened an online car, and earned three or four hundred yuan a day. Every extra day of running, he could save one or two more times to do dialysis for his mother.
Wang Jun’s driving skills are good, and he drives steadily. No passengers notice that the master who drives for them is a terminal cancer patient who races with death.
Wang Jun kept a lot of photos of his mother in his phone. When he was resting, he took them out to take a look.
This was the source that supported his desperate efforts.
A mother with uremia and fading memory
Wang Jun’s big eyes, long eyelashes, and double eyelids were just like his mother’s.
The mother and son have always had a very good relationship.
His father used to be a unit driver. Wang Jun died of an illness when he was 4 years old, and his mother brought him up. His stepfather also passed away a few years ago. After Wang Jun divorced in 2016, he and his mother depended on each other for life.
Since Wang Jun had to drive, most of the time Xie Zaigui went to the hospital for dialysis by himself.
Last year, Wang Jun vaguely felt that something was wrong. One day, the dialysis was supposed to end at 11 am, but his mother didn’t come home until 1 pm. It turned out that she suddenly didn’t know where she was going and took the wrong car. Another time at home for dinner, his mother suddenly looked up and said to him, "You and your father will go out later, and you need to come back early."
He took his mother for a checkup, and it turned out that her mother had mild Alzheimer’s disease. Memory declines, and if left unchecked, severe cognitive impairment can occur.
Mom now often sits at home watching TV or watching the neighbors play cards. She used to like to keep the house spotless, but now she doesn’t like to clean it, and sometimes she doesn’t even care if the rice in the pot is mushy.
When he was young, Xie Zaigui was beautiful and capable. He was responsible for pulling cloth in Datong general merchandise company. He measured, calculated, cut, and worked very quickly. When his mother was young, she had long black hair and loved to dress up. It was the most beautiful look in his memory.
Mom was still very diligent. She had a table full of more than a dozen dishes with her relatives and friends at home. Sweet and sour ribs, white chopped chicken, fish-flavored shredded meat… It was even more delicious than in a restaurant.
Wang Jun checked the Internet and found that being lazy and not moving are all symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease.
He had seen the movie "Eraser in My Memory" and knew that Alzheimer’s would erase his memory bit by bit like an eraser until he could remember nothing.
Seeing that his mother’s memory was fading day by day, Wang Jun was very anxious. He heard that practicing calligraphy can exercise his brain power, so he bought a copybook, like coaxing a child, and asked his mother to write it against it. After writing, he gave her his favorite dessert.
Wang Jun also coaxed his mother to cook. He often told his mother that if you cook, I will come back to eat and not eat outside.
But with little success, my mother remained the same.
In order to take care of his mother, his son has not traveled far for many years
Huang Lu, a friend who has played together since childhood, said that in the past, Wang Jun would actively participate in friends’ gatherings and outings. But after his mother fell ill, he never went out again.
Wang Jun was looking forward to taking his mother for more walks. Due to dialysis on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, he couldn’t go out for more than two days.
This spring, he drove his mother and aunt to the Fuling Great Wood Flower Valley. Xie Zaigui was as happy as a child, wearing his favorite clothes, wearing a silk scarf, and taking many pictures in the sea of flowers. Seeing his mother so happy, Wang Jun decided to take her out as much as possible before her memory deteriorated. If you can’t go far away, you can go nearby. Let her memory leave the best look in this world.
Earlier this year, in order to make it easier for their mother to receive dialysis treatment three times a week, the mother and son sold the old house that Wanglongmen had lived in for decades and bought a second-hand house near the Jiulongpo District Hospital. The new home is only one stop away from the hospital. Xie Zaigui can take the bus and walk back.
The new home of only 50 square meters makes the mother and son very satisfied.
Wang Jun thought to himself that this was a new beginning. He had to drive well and try his best to give his mother a good life. But he didn’t expect that fate would play such a joke on him again.
To make her son happy, my mother made another "specialty dish"
After learning that her son was sick, her mother was obviously more "obedient" than before.
She may not be completely clear about the severity of Wang Jun’s condition. But her temper is not as stubborn as before, and she is much more obedient.
After driving for more than ten days after finding out his condition, Wang Jun felt that his physical strength was gradually running out. He knew that driving while sick was also a safety hazard. Due to a blocked bile duct, a stent drainage operation was required on Tuesday afternoon. Last week, Wang Jun was reluctantly admitted to the hospital.
He told his mother that the weather was hot, so he would stay at home and not come to see him. But his mother still insisted on taking the car to the hospital, guarding Wang Jun’s bedside, holding his hand tightly, unwilling to leave.
Wang Jun had to ask his classmates to help him build a small bed on the side. His mother accompanied him during the day and slept here at night.
The mother and son took care of each other. He combed his mother’s hair, and her mother gave him sick meals. In the evening, she accompanied him to the hospital downstairs for a walk. Xie Zaigui held her son with her thin and shriveled hands, just like when she was a child, holding hands and sending him to school.
Last weekend, Xie Zaigui also made a first-of-its-kind dish for his son. It was his favorite white-chopped chicken. But Xie Zaigui’s memory deteriorated, forgetting the garlic paste and pepper oil, and the salt-to-sugar ratio was also wrong.
Wang Jun picked up this childhood dish that his mother used to specialize in, and stuffed a few large mouthfuls into his mouth. In his heart, this white chopped chicken with missing ingredients was still the best taste in the world.
Xie Zaigui would forget what she had done five minutes ago, but she remembered her son’s childhood very clearly. She muttered silently, "Yaoer has been very obedient since she was a child, and she is not naughty.
Our reporter, Ji Wenling