As I was going into treatment, I promised, and intended, to "write my way" through it. I did not, and there is a reason for it: I could not.
I know the doctors told me beforehand it would impact me psychologically. And they even have a staff shrink at the Emory cancer clinic where I was treated and social workers as part of the treatment package. But I did not have a clue. I mean not even a hint of a shadow of a clue about how this would affect me psychologically.
For the first week or so of treatment I saw lots of things I was going to write about. I even remember thinking of what I was going to say in a post about the political sociology of chemotherapy. And then the treatment hit.
They call it "chemo brain" and that's part of it. But the other part is something I didn't know. The human brain typically uses 25% of a person's caloric intake. And that intake should be at least 2000 calories a day. But even before I lost my capacity to eat, I completely lost my appetite.
After the first week or two of treatment, there may have been one or another day when I got 1,000 calories. But not very often. Even with a pump to push stuff down the feeding tube, the best I ever did was four "Ensures." There may have been a day when I did five, but much more common I think was my intake being three.
I was 25o pounds in June, and 170 by September.
As the treatment progressed, I became less and less functional, to the point where I simply could not even keep track of what medicines I'd taken.
I don't know what I did to deserve this, but my ex took me in for a couple of months, and with the help of our children, kept me taking medicines and bottles of those Ensure shakes. My friend Paul --who fought his own cancer battle a decade ago-- came to see me every day or two to keep me sane.
The people at CNN en Español were incredible -- one beautiful lady organized transportation for me with different colleagues taking me for treatment or just to go to the store. But it wasn't just helping me with the practicalities, but reminding me every day that once I was out of this tunnel, I had something to do, somewhere to go.
Because I was really in bad shape. It is all a haze now, but I remember desperately seeking appointments with the psychiatrist because I though I was going crazy. I couldn't sleep more than three hours a night. My mind was racing with all kinds of worries. The million things all these people did for me I don't remember and I feel like an ingrate because they saved my life, and I can't thank each one for every kindness because I don't remember.
I had gone into treatment strong, optimistic, but also at peace with the thought of dying. Because of something Sal said I researched online the 5-year survival rates for head and neck cancers and it was something like 15 or 20 percent. I came out of treatment cured of the cancer (last week I had another exam and a couple of months ago a scan -- still all clear) but not cured of the treatment and its side effects.
My treatment ended at the beginning of August. But for 2-3 weeks afterwards you keep spiraling down, as the effects of the chemo intensify. And of course my throat was completely swollen, shut down from the radiation. For a time I couldn't even speak.
That's when I fell in love with Billie Joe Armstrong's "Wake me up when September ends." That was my goal. I desperately wanted my life back ... and was determined that my lost summer would not extend into fall.
"Ring out the bells again, as we did when spring began." Because that spring, until I was diagnosed, I felt better than I had in many years. I had quit smoking, and the pills my doctor prescribed to help control the cravings are also an anti-depressant, which I think I needed.
At the end of August or beginning of September, more or less, I was able to begin swallowing again. My intake of Ensures shot up, and within a few days I started eating. Everything tasted like cardboard, but the least unpalatable were scrambled eggs and bacon. I suddenly started to feel half human as I was no longer starving and the side effects of the chemo and radiation began to subside.
I started driving again, and my first real real drive was on Friday, September 11. September 11, 2009. Last decade. Not this year.
My friend Chris, who had been head of CNN en Español for several years, had been asked to step aside to make way for a new leadership for the network. I desperately wanted to be there for him when he said goodbye to the staff, a group that, in our Latino way, was --is-- a family, as their support for me had proven once again.
It did not occur to me --sometimes I'm absolutely hopeless about taking delivery when the cluetrain comes-- that involved as so many had been in helping me through the cancer ordeal, my presence would change the event. And I'd made the decision to drive down there on the spur of the moment, what I'd arranged was to listen in on a speakerphone.
So I was not just embarrassed, I was mortified when I was greeted with applause and even a cheer or two. Sure, here's the idiot that started smoking during the Kent State massacre national student strike in May 1970 and didn't bother to stop until January of 2009, and he is being hailed for apparently dodging the bullet that he'd been told --for decades-- could well be heading his way.
At any rate, Chris said he appreciated the gesture, when the truth is, I think, I did it just as much or more for me, desperately trying to go back to what I had mistaken for my life.
I did, I think, imagine for a while that I'd "gone back" to my life. But there is no going back. A year ago I woke up from the fog of treatment when September ended, and went back to work, and now that another September has ended, I realize I never went back.
Because I still have to figure out who I want to be when I grow up.
If I live that long.
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