Spectacular

I began to see the reality of my situation -

I'm here in body but my spirit is being called away.

For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of the glory...

Neverending

For a moment I hated my doctor today. I hated that he wouldn't tell me this was my last chemo dose, or even second to last. He told me he was encouraged, but he offered no words committing himself.

Maybe he was in a bad mood, maybe he was having an off day. Doesn't he know that I'm riding on his words, waiting for the one key sentence "You're done!"

How many longing eyes He must look into, those searching for the glimmer of hope that He bares.

Then I closed my eyes for a moment, and let things shift back:

• This dreadful room that made no attempt to be anything but a medical establishment is unexpectedly peaceful.
• The frightening drugs are not as scary with my loved one always next to me.
• The needles, syringes, and IV blur into the background as my nurse waits on me. No matter how many other people she is dealing with at the same time, she always makes me feel special.
• And the patients. We hardly exchange words, we know how much the other suffers. But underneath it all there is an unspoken affection that makes us acknowledge one another, if only by an exchange of smiles.
  

Almost as soon as I hated my doctor, I loved him again. He is given the difficult task of seeing me all the way through the treatment, even though my weary eyes always beg him to stop. He possess to the objective clarity that I completely lack. This is a man that not only really wants me to get well again, but he still believes I can.

We have an agreement Him and I, we're not going to give up on each other - no matter what.

On Hold

Sound downloaded from http:/thefreesoundproject.iua.upf.edu, R09_0031 garden chimes by Monterey2000.

I Don't Smoke Anymore

I'm addicted to pain.

I don't know when it started or where it came from, I just know I have this love of suffering.

I feel at home in misery. It lures and comforts me.

It used to be a pleasure/pain addition. Dropping the pleasure was easy, but the pain - that's the difficult part.

I suppose it's a lifelong habit. My negative inner voice is strong, sure, and insisting. The emotional pull is undeniable.

I can now see my endless optimistim as a partner to disappointment and discouragement.

By day I'm all good, by night I can't wait to turn off the lights and embrace the failures.

Persistent, tenacious, ugly, destructive = Pain, misery, suffering, cancer.

I am addicted to pain. It comes around everyday with an irresistible offer.

I just say I quit last week.

And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

Go Right Up to the Door

Strength is not the key. I let the weakness overcome me.

Die for a day, or two or three.

I went for a walk. I can hardly find my way back.

My heart pounds surprisingly hard. No pain at all.

I see patterns when I close my eyes. Open to rock sparkles.

I'm not in control here, I'm just a passenger.

I feel tired but not from lack of rest.

I'm not afraid. He holds my hand the whole Way.

Accidental

Denial. Some people like to throw that word around.

I wonder if it is true that I deny my cancer? If I don't sit around feeling sorry, or dwell on the unpleasantness, does that make me unable to confront my disease?

It's true I have no patience with the cancer warrior or "fighter" image. Being here is a struggle, not an honor. It doesn't help to complain about the horrors of treatment, and it doesn't make me feel tough cause I'm having to go through it.

Denial. Am I denying the face of my disease just by getting up everyday and trying to forget, to some extent, that I have cancer?

Call it denying the truth, if you want.

Tell me how to do it? We are not taught this thing. We are only told how to live. No one gave out instructions on how to be a cancer patient, or even how to die as one.

I can only focus on the glowing ember, or the ash of destruction.

Playing Dress Up

Sometimes I pretend to be like everyone else.

I like to talk about the lastest thing my kids are doing,
or chat about a favorite recipe.

Or maybe reveal my feelings of a troubled relationship from the past,
or bore you with my perspective on politics, people or life in general.

But it would be nice to spend a little time thinking about how its almost time to get a haircut,
or go out shopping for some new clothes without worrying about getting sick from crowd exposure.

What about wondering where I'll go on a vacation far away? And to think nothing about going on a rugged 8 mile hike through the desert mountain, that was fun, as I recall?

I'd like to be as everyone else and have full use and the appeal of a normal looking left arm/hand, but sometimes I forget that it is swollen and try and use it like its not.

If I was healthy again, I could pretend to be like everyone and think I have a future before me. Then I can plan where I'd be, what I'd be doing, and who I'd be with.

But right now I'm here in the midst of treatment, in the middle of not knowing, inbetween health and disease.

Sometimes I forget that I'm here, only to be rudely reminded to put off all decisions for now -

and perfect living for the moment, regardless of where I'm presently standing.

From the Outside-In

I hate chemo. I hate thinking about it, talking about it, hearing about it.

Some people want to talk about it all day, the challenges and unpleasantness. Maybe it makes them feel like some sort of warrior for having endured it?

I don't feel like a warrior; not brave or full of courage. I do what I have to do, thats all. I hate it, and am always scared of it. There is no hero like quality to facing cancer or its treatment. I am only here to get through it and past it.

My own survival depends on my abitlity to see beyond my cancer, my mortality, my situation, my dislikes, my fears, my challenges - EVERY MINUTE OF THE DAY.

Don't admire my strength, don't pity my life, don't be glad it's not happening to you, don't wish you were here, don't stand at a distance, don't invade my space, don't run away from me.

What you know about me, you don't know. What you don't know about me, you already know.

Just talk with me, my beloved friends.

And he said unto him, if they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither
will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead.

Hiding Out, Looking Out

Running for cover, explosions everywhere, eyes burn, stomach turns.

I'm hopping across the torrential river, carefully, the rocks are slippery.

I'll rest now in this dry spot. Recover before the shooting starts again, soon.

The enemy is lagging, losing site of me. A little more fire, a few more explosions. It can't last much longer, I'll be far out of reach.

Beautiful life.

Start from Where You Are

I forget where I am sometimes.

I recall the drudgery and pain, all to easily. When it pulls me under, I remember that I can swim.

Then I look at where I'm at and what I'm doing and how far I've come. I'm stable, positive and emotionally healthy. I've changed dramatically and don't need the things I used want.

I've turly repented and turned around. I will not go back to the way things were or who I was. I've been broken down and rebuilt.

His work will never finish but He forgives me all the same.

So the last shall be first, and the first last: for many be called, but
few chosen.

The Biggest Excuse

"If there is a God, then why is there so much suffering in the world?"

Without a belief in God then the world seems a chaotic, dangerous place. Subscribe to that idea and you will never want to leave your home.

To ask the question of why suffering exists is to imply a desire that stems from a place of true compassion accompanied by a strong need to resolve the human dilemma in some way.

Yet, how can you resolve the question without either resigning to an already apparent hopelessness, or else devoting your life to finding a connection to the problem of suffering?

Most people who will ask this question will never bother to move beyond their own self righteousness.

They have no genuine interest in the answer to their own question.

It is pain and suffering that cause me to believe, or else I would be forever lost.

Enter ye in at the straight gate: for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat...

Not Fighting the Fight

I won't respond to your anger,
I won't answer your call,
I won't fall into your fear,
I won't listen to your cry.

It is taking every bit of me not to push back.

I am not going to save you this time, cancer.

Sibling Rivalry

I won't believe in this cancer, in this disease.

I won't accept the pain, the discomfort and the uncertainty as proof that the cancer has power over me.

I won't invest in the fear that its stronger then me, then God, then all else.

I won't allow this affliction to rob me of who I am, what I believe in, or crack the foundation of my faith.

I'm not falling into the darkness and despair or the hopeless visions that so pull at me.

Though the arrows come from every side, attacking in my weakest moments, my faith tethers me to the Truth and Light.

I will not drown in these shadow of lies.

What Numbers Tell You

One in 8. That's how many people will get cancer.

I know more then 8 people, and none of them have cancer.

Maybe they mean if you followed 8 people, from birth to death, one of them will get it.

If I had a party with all the people I know, there would be at least 75 people, and none of them have cancer, but me.

Maybe the statistics for those my age would be different, like one in 40, one in 60, one in 100?

I think God has a special message for cancer patients, He wants us to take the time to prepare ourselves for departure, to want us to linger in the moment; the long, long space of time between now and then. He is teaching us something, as well as those around us. How deeply our life is affected, in so many individual different ways, both good and bad.

I imagine having a party to celebrate my cancer.
It seems so contrary yet not half bad idea. It could be a party to celebrate my life and those around me. Everyone would want to come. It would be like having your first birthday party.

Falling off the Fence

The scales have tipped. The cancer has taken over. It has succeeded in spreading all over the bones in my body.

If the cancer is me, then I am killing myself slowly and painfully.

I can no longer handle this on my own. It is not going to go away because I change my diet, or heal painful memories, or will it away.

I am no longer thinking of full recovery, I am now in survival mode.

There is nothing I can do on my own to make it disappear. I need outside help.

To think my body is capable of producing such destruction on its own is hard to grasp. What's more difficult is trying to figure out why.

It is a short leap to fall into a desperate state of feeling out of control and full of fear. Somehow I haven't completely submerged into that murky area.

It is a fine, delicate line to not resist what is happening to me and trust I am in His hands. Only my faith keeps me a float.

Double-edge Latte

My oncologist wants to kill a part of me, the cancer part.

I wonder what part of me that will kill. Will it be my thoughtful moments, or my angry rage? Will I be a better person when that bad part of me is gone?

I never thought cancer was really about cancer. I know it's more then that, it's about me.

So how can I agree to kill a part of me. There is a part of me that wants to protect myself, is that not normal? Yet here I have to agree to be poisoned, in order to protect myself?

Do I love my cancer if I sometimes want to nurture it, the cancer, which is actually me? They are my self-initiated malignant cells, after all.

Can I be sort of proud of their (my) tenacity, endurance and proliferation? I almost want to root for them.

But then why am I killing them, if they are a part of me.

They are killing me and I am killing them, which is me.

White Noise

Tomorrow I will go into my oncologist's office to see if the cancer has spread any where else beside my skull.

I am neither anxious to know nor dreading to hear if it did, or not.

There is some sort of neutral zone I seem to linger in, which I actully like very much. It is a special place for which I feel fortunate to experience. It's the white area, where no matter what they tell you, it's going to be okay.

There is so many steps to bad news. At times I think I have experienced the worst. Yet I alway get to the other side of it. It doesn't stay bad for long.

This is not a conscious effort, but it happens that way. All I have to do is let it go.