I haven’t been around to read or comment to most of you this past week. Although I miss reading and adding my two cents, sitting at the computer for any great length of time, or being able to relax and immerse myself in others has been difficult. I have been running on a low grade anxiety that has my (imaginary) ADD going into overdrive. I’m irritated and anxious. Irritated at the unknown future. I know how very little we really have control over a lot of things in our lives, and that is extremely apparent right now.
The person that is close to me who has prostate cancer is my husband Kevin. And yes, there are moments when this just fucking pisses me off! Not really the politically correct response one should have when a loved one is diagnosed with cancer. But it’s honestly how I feel. The root of my anger, I know, is fear of the unknown. And fear of that ever dreaded “c” word. We all know friends or family members who have experienced one form of cancer or another. With every poor outcome, there are those who have battled it and came out of it free of the cancer. And by all indications, that will be Kevin’s experience.
It hasn’t stopped the anxiety though. Or the queasiness that set in for both of us this morning, as we readied ourselves for his first appointment to see the oncologist. I am thankful that Kevin has been up to his eyebrows in work up until today. It kept his mind off this, or even remembering that he had cancer until he woke up this morning. It’s a little hard to stay in denial when you walk into a huge oncologist’s office, and see the many people sitting and waiting for various treatments. Some with oxygen tanks, and others with no hair due to their chemo-therapy.
This is not Kevin’s future, though. With treatment, they should be able to cure him. By the end of this three-hour consultation, we had been so overloaded with information that both our heads were spinning a bit. The key information is there will be no chemotherapy, or long drawn out visits to receive radiation five days a week. Treatment for prostate cancer has come quite a long way over the last couple of decades. For that we are both thankful.
Because Kevin is not the “typical age” for prostate cancer, meaning he is not over 65, the wait and watch method is not an alternative. He has to treat it, even though it is in the early stages. To do otherwise is gambling with his life.
I have told you all before to have your PSA levels checked if you’re 50 or over. After all that I heard today, I would revise that recommendation: start around 45, if you’re told you have any enlargement to your prostate, through the normal exam. (i.e. the latex finger up the ass)
The anxiety I think let up some after hearing the doctor talk positively about treatment alternatives, with every indication that by the time he is done with treatment, he should be cancer free. They are going to do a bone scan, and a cystocopy to make sure there hasn’t been any spreading to other areas, although the doctor felt confident in saying what they will find should be nothing.
A close friend told me not long ago, that he thinks we have a bit of a backwards mentality towards the word cancer. That it is in some cases as simple as an overgrowth of irregular cells. And basically that is what Kevin has. I like to agree with my friend, because I positively hate that fucking word! I hate how many lives it touches, and how many lives it ends. The treatment at times almost as scary and toxic as the disease itself.
In the beginning of his diagnosis, he was, and to an extent still is, concerned about who knows. But after what we heard today, who knows seems to have very little relevance in dealing with this. So, I ask for those of you who read here to pray for a successful outcome. And that the sick feeling in the pit of our guts will dissipate. I want to be a strong support for him as he goes through his treatments, and my lack of confidence in my ability to be that for him also is in the back of my mind. I know I will do my best, but I can’t help but think of my basic jump-and-run mentality that provokes me to run from all things painful or scary.
It brings me back to my mother’s breast cancer, my girlfriend Cathy’s cervical cancer. I moved away by the time Cathy’s cancer had returned, and didn’t have to see or experience her struggle, or the family’s struggle over her disease. It’s not that I am not empathetic or had no compassion, it’s mainly because I’m a coward and completely fall apart when things seem out of control. I can’t deal with it, so I hide from it. And I didn’t return home for her funeral either. Part of me knows I should have, but I couldn’t.
When my mother had her double mastectomy, and I asked if she wanted me to be there...she said no, that my being there would be more of a drain as she would feel the need to “entertain” or make sure her house was clean. I asked several times, but I have to admit a slight sense of relief that she didn’t want me there. And, yes, a little hurt. (I’m pretty sure she was well aware of how much of an emotional mess I would have been. Which would have no doubt rendered me useless.) So instead I opted for sending flowers, which admittedly is what I do a lot when words and intestinal fortitude fail me.
So now it is my own husband about to go through the battle with cancer. I can’t make up for what I did or didn’t do in the past with others who I have loved dearly. But I can make a conscious effort to be more of what my husband needs while he goes through treatments that are going to be painful, uncomfortable and will cause a certain amount of his dignity to be compromised temporarily.
I pray for God to give me that strength and the wisdom to be what Kevin needs, during what I also pray will only be a small hurdle to overcome in our lives together.
Close it Up
Medical Mania & Verbal Vomit
