So this is it. 100 days post transplant. We celebrated by waking up at noon, walking the dogs, and sitting at home watching TV and cuddling the girls. Basically the same routine we always have. We kind of celebrated the 100 day post transplant at my birthday party, but I am amazed at the lack of fanfare in my own head about the event. I made it 100 days with a new organ in my body. The fact that I'm still alive is a bit amazing. But that's just it. I'm not jumping up and down in celebration. I didn't even realize that it was day 100 until about three or four hours ago, so that just goes to show you how meaningful the day was.
Here's the problem as far as I'm concerned. 100 days seems like a lot, but it's not that big of a deal when you're told that it will be a long, long time before I'm declared cured. In my attempt to downplay to bad aspects of my cancer, I think I end up downplaying the good. Don't get me wrong, I'm very happy I'm alive, but celebrating 100 days might just be like the Japanese celebrating after Pearl Harbor. If they had known that the U.S. had a nuke, I bet the partying in Nagasaki and Hiroshima would be much more subdued.
Comparing cancer to a nuclear explosion made sense when I first starting writing that last bit. Cancer in most cases hits with a force that no one really expects. It devastates the soul much like a shock wave rips through buildings and flesh. Those who survive the first blast walk the earth pulling out clumps of hair while trying to figure out where their house went. Some of the survivors never make it more than a couple months before giving up, while some fight with every fiber of their being and live. And sometimes the fighters die to.
Now imagine watching that first Nuclear bomb fall from the plane knowing that in a minute, someone you love will be dead. You've now entered the world of the cancer patient's family and friends. It is for that reason that I think I downplay what the cancer effects to people in everyday conversation. No one wants to hear about the bomb. It's too hard for them to hear, so they think "Oh, he was mis-diagnosed" or "It's just like a six month flu". sorry people, it's CANCER. I caught family members and friends on several occasions downplaying the diagnosis when I first told them. My personal favorite is still "It's a good kind of cancer" That one still cracks me up.
Getting back to the role of the Cancer patient's spouse or family, I think they have a harder time with this than the patient. I admit openly to not remembering much about November. I also will admit to not remembering much about December or some of January. I went through some really horrible times, and I only faintly recall a few of them. I don't even dream about them. The rest comes back to me in flashes while reading what other people are currently going through. Caity doesn't like it when I read other people's journals out loud, and I often wonder why until I realize that she remembers every day that I was in the hospital as clear as a bell. While I was enjoying some wonderful hallucinations in my hospital bed, Caity was watching her husband die. Now, we all know that I didn't die back then, but who could have reassured Caity that her husband would indeed make it to 30. All a person in Caity's position can do is hope for something good to come from all the bad.
People ask me all the time when I'll be out of the woods. I laugh to myself every time I hear that. I will never be out of the woods. I have seen my own mortality and I can never go back to the normal world. With cancer deaths rising, rampant obesity, deadly viruses and numerous other diseases floating around, I have to ask you something...
Are YOU out of the woods?
Seriously, do you read this at work, and then think "Wow, poor bastard. Good think I'm not him". I don't smoke. I don't drink. I don't do drugs. I used to work out everyday and I could squat 600 pounds. I got cancer. Caity got a cancer patient for a husband. She lives even healthier than I do and she now has the joy of wondering when she's going to become a single parent for the rest of her life. She didn't even get cancer and she's suffered more than I have.
I guess in my own rambling way I'm trying to make the point that while being a cancer patient sucked a huge amount of ass, I would go through it all again if it meant never having to see someone else go through it. 250 people get diagnosed with my form of Leukemia every year in Canada and I always used to say that I'm glad the cancer picked me, rather than some single mother of two with no health benefits from work. I'd like to change that to include all my family and friends. I would take another three years of treatment if it meant that I never had to see any of my family or friends sick.. I'm not going to get my wish however. Someone close to me, on some future date will get sick and I'll have to watch them from the bedside while wishing there was something I could do.
After you read this, don't send me an email in hopes of disrupting any suicide attempts I may be considering. I'm of sound mind and body, and I'm not going anywhere despite what the tone of this journal entry implies. I want you to stop what you're doing, lean back in your computer chair, and think about how lucky you are. Find anything that you feel lucky for and hold that thought for a few seconds. If you happen to be religious, say Hi to your deity of choice. It's up to you. As for me? I'm going to think about how lucky I am to have a full tank of hot water waiting to fuel my extra-long shower tonight.
Why don't I use today's 100 day anniversary? It's just a number. It's like the odometer in your car. Rolling past the first 100000 kms is cool, but in the end it really doesn't mean much if you get squashed by a Mack truck three days later. 200th day? Big deal. The five year "official" cured date? Oh well.
"When I have lived to the end of my days, only then will I know that I have beaten Cancer." Adam Price. Feb 17th 2005
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