DISCOVERY
One wonders how they might feel if they were diagnosed with cancer - breast, lung, pancreatic, liver, whatever. In my case I felt sort of OK with it (breast cancer). It was only a Stage 2 and my surgeon thought a lumpectomy would do the trick, plus, of course, the chemo and radiation that goes with it. That was in 2007 and I got through it pretty well. Losing my hair was really the worst part.
Jump ahead three years and I find that I am faced with it again. Now it has mestastisized to my bones and liver and it is a Stage 4. And this time I am not as blase' about it - as if anyone can really ever be blase'... Last time, though, my surgeon removed the tumor and what she felt was a decent margin around the lymph nodes and I never really experienced any real pain. I tolerated the chemo pretty well, never was so nauseous that I couldn't eat, and chalked it up to a medium-bad experience. Now there is pain involved. In fact, that is what triggered the visit to my doctor - I simply woke up one night and felt as though my bones were all achey. When I look back on it, though, I realize that I probably had some prior signs - pain in my back usually late in the day, sharp pain in my coccyx area at times, sometimes a discomfort in one arm (all of which I attributed to "getting older"). But now the pain has gotten bad enough for me to have to control it with Tylenol and Ibuprofen; I wake up at night and have to take a second dose and I realize that this is going to be a whole different ball game than the first time around.
It also has started all kinds of alarm bells ringing, as I realize, and Kelley and Michael realize, that I won't be around forever. Cancer is a "no guarantee" type disease. I might beat it into submission, and then again I may not. So as you have all heard a zillion times: enjoy each minute, take time to smell the roses, etc., etc. My priorities have now been re-shuffled, as they should be at this time of life anyway. I need to give that a little thought. My next post will probably be more on that theme. In the meantime, here are two of my priorities...
