FEELING DOWN BUT NOT OUT?

It’s been a minute since 2017 but I remember feeling down.

I wasn’t helpless, but needed help, and got it.

Since then I’ve thought of others who need help the same way.

Back then it was medical treatment for me.

The first day was a big one. I started by showing up.

The plan was to kill the cancer in my body with the available tools.

Herbs? Vitamins? Meditation? Yes, yes, and yes.

Ignore current medical treatment? Nooooo.

I decided chemo and radiation, along with everything else, was the best way forward, and I was going forward whether I wanted to or not.

In my time of despair I could see life going on without me.

How much despair?

I can’t be the only person to think, ‘I’m a dead man,’ after hearing the cancer diagnosis.

After a series of mistakes, some me, some not me, I rode in a taxi cab with an accessed port in my chest wall dangling tubes under my shirt from Tualatin to St. Vincent’s Hospital.

A series of mistakes included insurance and approval.

According to the current records I had no insurance, which I learned on the way to the Knight Cancer chemo lounge.

I’d been going through the discovery process for months with no insurance questions, then 2016 turned into 2017 and I was out on my ass?

With the idea that ‘cancer = dead man’ it made sense.

I rode in the cab along Hwy217 wondering if I’d die in a crash before cancer got me.

Somehow I was approved at the hospital, but not the lounge? That’s why the location changed.

I didn’t die in a crash, found my way to where I supposed to go, and got hooked up.

“Can I walk around?” was my question.

“If you feel up to it.”

So I walked the cancer floor of St. Vincent’s.

It was a sad walk passing grieving families and stressed staff.

After a few laps I returned to my room and waited it out.

 

Getting Treated And Keeping Up Isn’t Easy

When you’ve got cancer growing in some body part, and the smart guys all agree, fear is normal.

Not just regular fear, but a slow chilling fear of everything that could go wrong will go wrong.

It could be paralyzing fear the prevents you from being you, the you you know, the you everyone you know knows.

That you is covered in worry and concern, your worry and concern.

Will you be next? The next recipient of an administrative fuck-up?

I was off to a good fuck-up start in spite of the positiveness of everyone around.

The professional term for me at the time was a ‘runner’ because I canceled surgery appointments for port installation four times.

I would go to a hospital to get carved on, not some backwoods ‘surgi-center.’

Cancer death was one thing.

I couldn’t accept accidental death with cancer knocking on the door.

“Who is it?”

“Operating room death.”

“Go away, cancer is already here.”

It wasn’t a gun to my head being held by a dysfunctional person blasting everything in front of them, it was a needle and a radiation machine directed by people trained in their specific application.

The mortality part felt the same, waiting and hoping against all odds.

 

A Positive Outcome Came

I ran the race and won.

The treatment was deemed successful, I thanked everyone, and went home.

Everything worked out, even the glitches.

I saw someone recently who remembers 2017.

“I couldn’t tell it was you back then.”

It was me, all slim and big-toothed looking, fitting into clothes from 1974.

I was feeling down during and after, but slowing regained my stride.

What was the downer?

The medical team repeated their mantra over and over like they thought I didn’t understand:

For the treatment to work you must stay on schedule for every appointment. You can’t miss or you risk failure.

I understood real good.

They’d do their job and everything would work out.

I was the weak link in the chain, the wild card.

They weren’t wrong.

My biggest fear wasn’t dying. That’s always a possibility.

It was an event that would somehow stop the treatment mid-course.

I locked into the misery and pain and hunger and nausea, but not the idea that some dilly-dally fuckstick might choose to send a message by halting cancer treatment, cancer research, cancer trials.

They might send a message to needy families about their medical care and food resources?

They might send a message to elected officials by suspending government operations directed to their states?

If they do, what’s the problem with pulling the plug on cancer patients?

It’s one thing to face possible death from cancer, it’s another to see the lumpy face of a soft, unconcerned, party boy saying, “It’s just not your day, pal.”

PS: One day you’re sailing along steady and calm, the next you’re sitting next to a loved on in hospice singing Bob Dylan’s ‘Knocking On Heaven’s Door.’ (Hey Mom)

PSS: One day your bucking trees with your old man, the next you’re standing next to their grave with a handful of dirt. (Hey Dad)

Life comes at you fast, as baby boomers know more than ever, and it’s hard to take. But we do.

We are the elders now, the ones fielding answers to questions like, “How did this happen?”

And we’re supposed to know something about it?

Yes, we are.