I started this blog in 2008, I think. In 2012 I was diagnosed with endometrial cancer, stage 3. In the post when I first talked about this, I said something to the effect that life is like a wobbly bicycle. You weave side to side and hope to stay upright. I liked that. I started calling the blog “My Wobbly Bicycle.”
The bicycle continues to wobble. I have just been diagnosed with a very small breast cancer. I spent yesterday with the“nurse navigator” and the surgeon.
I’m changing my diet to mostly vegetarian. I am, however, eating the occasional fish when it happens to swim into my mouth. I am also cutting down on dairy. Fat and sugar: major fuel for cancer. All studies say so.
What’s life without fat and sugar? A great big hunky glazed donut, cherry pie, steak, pork tenderloin. Surprisingly okay so far. I’ve eaten, and will continue to sometimes eat, a small slice of cherry pie. I have never been a big sweets person anyway. Also, I love vegetables more than meat anyway. So we’re good there.
Jerry just asked me if I was going to put it out there, about this cancer. After a moment of annoyance (“Are you telling me what to write?), I said yes. Then we talked about the fine line between putting our difficulties out there by way of making some sort of art out of our life and putting them out there to get sympathy. The same could be said about memoirs I’ve read. You can feel the weight of someone’s psychological need sometimes, stronger than the need to make art out of it.
Re: cancer—I thought I’d give you another taste of my collection of essays, “Mortality, with Friends,” coming out next month from Wayne State U. Press. Below are excerpts from the title essay, which includes small quotations (in italics) from friends about their own cancer:
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…. The shock of cancer is so great your entire body has re-set. It now operates on some sort of deep alert, below language. Your logic has met its match. It has learned to collude with magic.
Gail: There is a gap between my intellectual understanding of my situation, and deeper psychological processing. I understand that my recurrence odds are high, but my brain is protecting me from fully comprehending this fact. For better or worse, I don't go around thinking about it every minute.
I’m waiting to hear from the doctor about this year’s scan. My mind is off into another dream, triggered by the pain in my back. I’ve noticed that there’s not a heck of a lot of difference between awake dreaming and asleep dreaming: there is a tumor growing on my lumbar spine. There is cancer in my bladder, which accounts for my frequent need to pee. The doctor has not yet called because he wants me to be able to have a few precious hours of hope before he tells me there is none. Or, he hasn’t called because he’s not good at giving bad information. He’s putting it off.
The entire year after I was diagnosed with stage 3c endometrial cancer, I blogged every week. I talked about the fear, the details of treatment, my doctors, what I was doing with myself while deadly chemicals were coursing through my body, while radiation was eagerly wiping out both the good and the bad. It has been seven years, or 84 months, or 365 weeks, or 2556 days, or 3,680,640 minutes since then. Am I “cured”? Since then three friends have died of cancer after the five-year marker, one other is tentative. My stepdaughter Pam has stage 4 breast cancer. In a toxic world, our immune systems are gasping, sometimes gasping their last. Is it too late for everything? For the trees, the birds? I think sometimes it would be better to get hit by a truck. To wait for immediate results is almost unbearable. But long-term is another thing.
Peggy: Every day, I run my fingers over my breast, first before I rise from bed and later when I’m soapy in the shower. If I sleep in a way that puts pressure on the breast, the discomfort lasts for hours. I worry. Scar tissue makes it impossible to tell whether there’s another jellybean of cancer growing. The oncologist’s PA says, “Just be aware of anything different.” I fret that I’m not perceptive enough to notice each change.
Some medical person told me that the cancer cells are always there, but sometimes some of them go crazy. So I acknowledge what I carry. I try not to list all the possible triggers.
I wonder if anyone knows what “living fully” means. You could head for Patagonia at last? Finally see an opera at the Met? Get married or un-married? I got up this morning, did my stretches, meditated, ate oatmeal with raisins, as always. I suppose living fully means “with awareness.” I knew a woman who found out her cancer was going to be quickly terminal. She said life was wonderful, knowing how little of it was left. The increase of fear could spark the present moment. Or, the lack of fear, when there’s no hope left.
Joan: People I know who've had, for instance, breast cancer, talk about the statistics and analyze every aspect of themselves that might make a difference. But the cancer I had is so rare, and survival so unlikely, that there aren't sufficient statistics on which to make a prediction. In a way, that's liberating.
My oncologist told me the statistics for five-year survival for my cancer, which were dismal. “Disregard them,” he said. Might as well have told me to not see an elephant when someone says elephant. He said, though, that research is making giant strides, and these numbers were out of date already. He also said, “You are not a statistic.” My brother-in-law, a mathematician, explained the difference between average and mean. It looked considerably better his way. I am past the five magical years. I have a friend who died in her sixth year.
Linda: My wife has had cancer six times. Only one of these was a recurrence. We don’t talk much about her nine-year remission, but it’s there every time we set the table. We use the prettiest dishes!
That’s the thing. One cancer can go away and another, seemingly unrelated one can pop up. If the body was a breeding ground before, what’s to say it isn’t still? And now it’s damaged with radiation and chemotherapy, so it’s more prone than ever. Green tea. Drink green tea. Eat well. Meditate. Live well. Have loving friends. Practice tightrope walking.
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End of excerpts: The book is out on Sept. 7. My life has been so involved with, ahem, other things, I fear I haven’t promoted it enough. I would be delighted to read on Zoom for your group. I would be happy to come to your club or organization.. Just ask.