STOMP OUT CANCER FROM THE KICK OFF

Stomp out cancer was the theme for the Oregon Ducks v Michigan State football game at Autzen stadium.

It was a fitting theme in my family where cancer is no stranger.

Maybe your family, too, but I hope not.

Here’s what it looks like and sounds like:

Wife: You have a call from Dr. P.

Me: At seven o’clock at night? Nobody calls that late.

Wife: Here’s your phone.

Me: I’m not answering.

Wife: Then I will.

Me: Give me that phone. Hello Dr. P.

Doctor P: Good evening, David. I hope you are, uh,  sitting down.

 

I was sitting down . . . in the bathroom.

That’s where I learned the testing I’d recently done came back with cancer.

It was a shocking phone call, to say the least, and I went into shock right there. Cancer? Me?

I was the bone breaker growing up, breaking my collar bone twice, my finger, with two shoulder separations.

They happened playing the game of Swinging Statue, going over the handle bars on a bike, falling out of a tree, sports, the usual kid stuff.

Cancer in my early sixties was a shock because no one else got cancer.

Diabetes and heart disease, yes, but no cancer. Until then.

I needed a plan right away, a plan to avoid telling my wife the same night I found out.

I dodged it until the next morning, until I got back from my regular gym visit.

Me: Honey, I need a paper bag, or the suitcase with the broken handle. Do you know where it is?

Wife: For what.

Me: I’m taking a trip.

Wife: You’re taking a trip? Really? I have to drag you out of the house to go anywhere and now you’re taking a trip. Okay, so where are you going?

Me: Come on, where’s the suitcase?

Wife: In the storage space off our bedroom. You know where it is. Where are you going?

Me: You’re going to drop me off at the bus stop at the bottom of the hill and never see me again. The call last night? I’ve got cancer.

Wife: Oh no.

 

We hugged and cried it out. It was awful.

We agreed to face cancer together, and that maybe I was overreacting.

Maybe.

 

Me: But if gets to be too much, don’t worry, I’ll just disappear.

Wife: Would you take the suitcase, or a paper bag?

 

Stomp Cancer Starters

You don’t stomp out cancer alone, which was my initial plan.

Since my wife is a Naturopathic doctor with over forty years experience I had an idea.

 

Me: Let’s find the cancer cure that puts chemo and radiation out of business. It’ll make you famous. We can do it with vitamins, juice fasts, and high colonics. You know the right people.

Wife: I do. I know people with the same cancer as you, HPV16, who decided to cure themselves.

Me: Perfect. Let’s call them.

Wife: We can’t. After they tried ‘alternative cures’ they went back for the chemo and radiation but were too fragile to survive the treatment.

Me: What did they do instead?

Wife: They died. You’re not dying, you’re going to treatment.

 

The Treatment Starters

Off I went to the ENT with my neck lump, the fine needle work, the scans, all to pinpoint the precise target for radiation.

I also needed a new driver’s license, so I got a picture.

I had mixed feelings ranging from I’m a dead man, to I’m a guinea pig, back to being  a dead man walking.

You could say I was packing my bags, or packing my paper bag, my Oklahoma suitcase.

Then I met the radiation and chemo people.

My start on radiation began after an appointment with Dr. Hansen.

I walked into his office and noticed a huge book on Radiation Oncology like the old dictionaries a foot thick that people displayed.

Me: That’s a big book. Have your read it?

Dr. Hansen: I have. I also wrote the clinical guide people use around the world.

Me: You’re that guy?

Dr. Hansen: What do you mean by that?

Me: You know the topic so well you wrote the guide to apply the knowledge.

Dr. Hansen: That’s a fair observation.

Fair? I was wildly hopeful I wasn’t going to get roasted one second longer than needed.

Then I met the chemo man who recommended three different brands along with a chemo pump.

I learned I’d lose my hair so I got the worst haircut I’d ever had so I’d be glad to go bald.

A second opinion from Dr. Yee of the Knight Cancer Institute recommended one chemo with no hair loss.

Me: Not three chemos and a pump? No hair loss? How does that work?

Dr. Yee: I’ve reviewed your case and this is the treatment indicated.

Me: And it works.

Dr. Yee: Yes, it works.

Me: Alright, when do we start?

 

It All Worked Out

Thirty-five blasts of radiation, three chemo hits, and minus sixty pounds later, I didn’t ring the bell.

I sang Hit The Road Jack with a choir of nurses, instead.

I was a free man with the worst haircut of my life, but why complain.

Cancer treatment comes with other problems and things can go wrong. Not this time.

That all happened in 2017. I started near the Trump inauguration, which felt a little ominous.

Since then I’ve written a 120,000 word memoir that I continue to work on.

I recently submitted the first ten pages to an agent who explained what I needed to do to make it better: Fewer oral sex jokes so I don’t sound like a horny fourteen year old.

If I’m being honest, and why not, I find sex a funny topic, and oral sex even funnier. Here’s why:

Because it’s fucking hilarious if you do it right.

If you and your partner aren’t having a good laugh together, you’re doing it wrong.

The right way?

Ask her to tell you what you’re spelling with your tongue is a real knee-slapper.

It shouldn’t include cancer, but if something isn’t right, get things checked out.

Any questions? I’ll answer in comments, or try to.