My life continues to roll with the punches that life throws my way. After all, it is the only thing I can do under the circumstances. Giving up is not an option.
John and I spent a week at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston last week, where he underwent another cancerous tumor removal. Sigh.
I wish I could say it was an overwhelming positive experience; but how can I...REALLY?
Cancer is big business. For those of you whom the "darkness" had touched, let me tell you, don't mess around...go to MD Anderson if at all possible. The place is like a small city with over 213 buildings spread over 1300 acres and employing over 20,000 people. Jeesh...it's huge.
Can you be happy in a hospital filled with people going through or ending various stages of different cancers? I think you can. However, I was not one of them. I'm being real and honest, here.
It was an overwhelming experience to be touched by MD Anderson. Most of the employed are happy and upbeat, which helped when I felt like a lost rat in the maze of life. People stepped forward, showed me that I wasn't lost and directed me to the correct elevator for where I needed to be. The food was tolerable. The overall building was cold and one day my elevator - elevator E to the 11th floor, did not work. Fortunately, the tower is equipped with a secondary elevator for staff and transporting patients. Eleven floors would have not made a happy Pat.
John's second tumor was wrapped around his carotid artery, but was removed successfully. He is on observation...cancer free. However, this does not include findings of anything smaller than they can see using various magnifying loops. For my husband...I wanted the Hubble...deep space looking. I got the surgeon's loop.
The care John received was phenomenal. His team of folk rose to the occasion giving instructions, information for after care and prognosis of care which includes speech pathology where John can learn to talk again. This was and is exciting.
We left a week later feeling confident that John would not only heal, but would have a quality of life touching on normal. We know he is not out of the cancer forest yet as the surgeons have agreed he will need either or both radiation and chemo after he heels. It's a nasty cancer bug...duh!
What is my take on this, the latest chapter? It still sux. I cannot kid you and tell you I am fine with all of this, for I am not. But what I am is this: undaunted and resolute.
I am undaunted by the mass of information and processes we need to ingest. I am undaunted by the nagging fear in the back of my head (which sometimes moves to center stage). I am undaunted in the energy I need to dig up from a weary me. I just gotta plow through.
I am resolute to continue to talk to my Higher Power, God. I am resolute to not lay blame or be angry for more than the time it takes me to say, "Hi God, me again...need a little help, here." I am resolute to love my husband no matter frickin' what comes down the path. I am resolute to continue my mantra of: I am Strong, I am Brave and I am Courageous! But, most of all, I want to read and say out loud the Serenity Prayer, that I now wear around my neck, every day with the conviction to say, God grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and wisdom to know the difference.
Thursday, April 28, 2016
Friday, January 15, 2016
life just happened...and right now it is crap
I don't know how or why life happens the way it does, but when whatever IT is happens, it disrupts. This time, when it happened, IT came crashing down like so many tons of bad baggage. You know...the crap we carry around with us. But, it wasn't my baggage. It was my husband's, John.
Let me begin at what I think is the beginning. My husband, John, spent 21 years in the Marine Corps before retiring. During the time he was in the Marines, he was in Vietnam with a whole bunch of young men (and women - nurses). Our government was so wise in trying to figure out how to rout the N. Vietnamese out of the bushes, that they dumped Agent Orange all over the jungle in hopes of defoliating it and hence..finding the enemy easier. Well, Agent Orange got dumped on people as well as trees and bushes. The effects of Agent Orange were disputed by the US Government. WHY?Well, we lost the war. Thousands of Vets returned and the government did not acknowledge their symptoms as a result of Agent Orange.
Fast forward spring 2015. John's voice began to deteriorate and after consulting a doctor, it was determined that he had throat cancer. A strange type of cancer - aggressive - resistant to normal treatments. He tippy-toed around the obvious and finally said, this type of cancer is directly related to Agent Orange. The doctor opted for radiation and all was good for about three months and the voice deteriorated again. This time, the tumor had grown back to a stage 3 tumor that had to be surgically removed. Ooohrah...
October 19, 2015, the surgeon removed the tumor as well as John's voice box, surrounding lymph and having only found 1 little, bitty lymph with cancer (which was removed), pronounced John clear.
The recovery was brutal and frustrating as John can no longer speak. He's a good speller - so he writes. We told ourselves, this is little price to pay for his declaration of cancer free.
John started chemo this past Wednesday almost three months to the day he was pronounced free of cancer. This sux.
The new tumor, it seems was a nodule on a scan...nothing to worry about...thought the surgeon. And besides, this type of cancer doesn't jump around...so, the nodule couldn't be cancer, right?
We sat in the doctor's office with our faces like stone. In fact, I wanted to become a stone and hurl myself at the doctor and his soft voice saying he hated to give us this news. I went where angels fear to tread and I simply asked, "How could you miss this?"
I have declined to talk to anyone who wants to call this shit, a journey or a challenge. I refuse to talk to people without looking at them like they are ignorant and completely delusional who believe that God has put John's feet on this path? SAY WHAT?
My belief in God, my Higher Power, does not believe that God orchestrates all of our moves and then waits to see what we do. EEGADS...
If I believed in THAT kind of God, I would believe, then, that none of the choices I have made have anything to do with my brain. THAT kind of God sits where ever he/she sits and moves us from chessboard square to chessboard square according to his whim. The Mythological Gods, like Zeus, did that. Nope. I don't buy it at all.
My God allows me the dignity to think and make my own choices to take whatever path is laid before me. His hand is always there for me to reach out and hold, but I do not for one itty, bitty nano second believe he chooses our paths. For if I believed that, I would have to ask him/her why he gives people paths that cause pain, suffering and death. A common question thought by those who are agnostic and atheist. I am neither.
I fully believe that God gave us brains to make decisions. What we do with those decisions and how we react in the situations define us as human beings and allow us to ask God for direction. And once through the situation, we can give our thanks and gratitude to him for never abandoning us.
The Life is life on Life's terms mantra, does not diminish my faith or my trust in my Higher Power, my God. It allows me to be real about God, not get burned out on a God who may choose to set my feet on paths that are crap. I reject that God and embrace the God who never said their wouldn't be dark valleys, but that he would always be there walking along side of us...waiting for the call.
Let me begin at what I think is the beginning. My husband, John, spent 21 years in the Marine Corps before retiring. During the time he was in the Marines, he was in Vietnam with a whole bunch of young men (and women - nurses). Our government was so wise in trying to figure out how to rout the N. Vietnamese out of the bushes, that they dumped Agent Orange all over the jungle in hopes of defoliating it and hence..finding the enemy easier. Well, Agent Orange got dumped on people as well as trees and bushes. The effects of Agent Orange were disputed by the US Government. WHY?Well, we lost the war. Thousands of Vets returned and the government did not acknowledge their symptoms as a result of Agent Orange.
Fast forward spring 2015. John's voice began to deteriorate and after consulting a doctor, it was determined that he had throat cancer. A strange type of cancer - aggressive - resistant to normal treatments. He tippy-toed around the obvious and finally said, this type of cancer is directly related to Agent Orange. The doctor opted for radiation and all was good for about three months and the voice deteriorated again. This time, the tumor had grown back to a stage 3 tumor that had to be surgically removed. Ooohrah...
October 19, 2015, the surgeon removed the tumor as well as John's voice box, surrounding lymph and having only found 1 little, bitty lymph with cancer (which was removed), pronounced John clear.
The recovery was brutal and frustrating as John can no longer speak. He's a good speller - so he writes. We told ourselves, this is little price to pay for his declaration of cancer free.
John started chemo this past Wednesday almost three months to the day he was pronounced free of cancer. This sux.
The new tumor, it seems was a nodule on a scan...nothing to worry about...thought the surgeon. And besides, this type of cancer doesn't jump around...so, the nodule couldn't be cancer, right?
We sat in the doctor's office with our faces like stone. In fact, I wanted to become a stone and hurl myself at the doctor and his soft voice saying he hated to give us this news. I went where angels fear to tread and I simply asked, "How could you miss this?"
I have declined to talk to anyone who wants to call this shit, a journey or a challenge. I refuse to talk to people without looking at them like they are ignorant and completely delusional who believe that God has put John's feet on this path? SAY WHAT?
My belief in God, my Higher Power, does not believe that God orchestrates all of our moves and then waits to see what we do. EEGADS...
If I believed in THAT kind of God, I would believe, then, that none of the choices I have made have anything to do with my brain. THAT kind of God sits where ever he/she sits and moves us from chessboard square to chessboard square according to his whim. The Mythological Gods, like Zeus, did that. Nope. I don't buy it at all.
My God allows me the dignity to think and make my own choices to take whatever path is laid before me. His hand is always there for me to reach out and hold, but I do not for one itty, bitty nano second believe he chooses our paths. For if I believed that, I would have to ask him/her why he gives people paths that cause pain, suffering and death. A common question thought by those who are agnostic and atheist. I am neither.
I fully believe that God gave us brains to make decisions. What we do with those decisions and how we react in the situations define us as human beings and allow us to ask God for direction. And once through the situation, we can give our thanks and gratitude to him for never abandoning us.
The Life is life on Life's terms mantra, does not diminish my faith or my trust in my Higher Power, my God. It allows me to be real about God, not get burned out on a God who may choose to set my feet on paths that are crap. I reject that God and embrace the God who never said their wouldn't be dark valleys, but that he would always be there walking along side of us...waiting for the call.
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