Well, I suppose I should actually write down the little snippets of thoughts, or moments of outstanding clarity that really should just be shared with others, or my clever insights into disease and life that if only others could read, would make them that much more able to handle their own inconviences and “life bumps.”

But I don’t think folks really learn that way.  I never did.  I could hide really well from people who where sick when I was young.  I can still do a pretty good job of that now… although, I will say I’ve come along way in that department.  Some of that is through my own rumination, a lot is through the example of the wife.  She has certainly taught me much.  

We just had a Judge die, I think of pancreatic cancer.  I don’t think he had it long, or knew about it long.  By all accounts that I am aware of, he was exceptionally private about his illness.  But he was out numerous Fridays, which I always like to think of as the working folks day for chemo.  He became very pale, and lost his hair.  Everybody in his court would notice his appearance and wonder, and assume, and then to a person comment on how nice, and pleasant and professional he was in court.  On one hand I admire that, on the other hand, I wish he had been more open about what he was going through….. if only for selfish reasons.  He  had this, (again, I believe it was pancreatic) exceptionally aggressive cancer manifest itself and overtake his person in a very short fashion….   perhaps a year?  

There was also just a woman who belonged to our pool, 44 years old, who died suddenly of a heart attack.  44.  I’m 48.  Selfishly, I seem to always compare my illness to these examples and then contemplate who has/had it better.  Which is why I write this shit here……   My first remembrance of doing this was when Joe Berg was beheaded by terrorists and it was filmed and I made the mistake of watching it…. it wasn’t too hard to find on the internet… some 15 years ago…   and i though, my god, I may have cancer, but I have not been beheaded in such a horrific manner (I’m not sure what method of beheaded would not be horrific…   guillotine less horrible than manually with a knife???)….   When a Syrian refugee child washed up dead on beach after his boat sunk, I thought, I may now have metastatic cancer, but I have lived into my late 40’s….  I was not drowned as a child after being forced to flee my home…   

So, is this wrong? To constantly calibrate myself this way?  I have been formally diagnosed with stage IV cancer since September 2012.  So, 5 years is coming up this September.  5 years.  Used as such a marker in so many studies, in so many statistics, in so much evaluations as to whether a drug or a treatment is “effective.”  Has some treatment, has some drug, helped get a patient to 5 years survival rate.  When I was 34 and primary cancer, and they talked about 5 years survival rates, I was part outraged and part incredulous.  What does a 34 year old care about 5 year survival rates… when you are THIRTY FOUR FUCKING YEARS OLD!!!  

Now, I’m 48, stage IV, and coming up on 5 years…. and feeling like its a worthy milestone.    I’ve been very tired the last few months… exceptionally so after my first treatment of Doxil a month ago.  Doxil is my first IV chemo since I was diagnosed in 2012… I was on Xeloda for about the last year, and it seemed to do well… brought my markers down from over 600 to under 200… but then, as the disease is want to do… it adapts, figures out the drug, and continues to be… well…. cancerous.  With me, it seems to be predictable in that ribs break…. aches and pains get worse….. and I feel…. less.  Maybe because my body is fighting it on a level I can’t articulate or understand?  Don’t know.  But, the “plan” than becomes to find another drug and carry on, soldier, carry on.

I had my second infusion of Doxil today.  And it’s now 1130pm at night and I haven’t gone to bed.  The first time I had Doxil, last month… I had difficulty with the drug…. there was actually a code yellow when they started to push it through the port.  Which means that about 12 different nurses and doctors descend upon you on the floor and flush your port and administer different drugs and benedryl to try to reverse the feeling of tightness in your chest that seems like you will shortly not be able to breath.  Thankfully, this time was boring and uneventful.  But, I haven’t gone to bed… I was so tired last time for about 2-3 weeks that I think I’ll just stay up until four days from now, and maybe if I don’t go to sleep, then I can’t wake up and be so tired for 3 weeks?  Sound reasonable?  What?  What’s that you say?  That’s poppycock?  That’s silly talk?  Perhaps… and I am getting a wee bit sleepy…..  

Speaking of comparison to those who had it worse than me, and give me perspective…. One of those souls that had it worse has been redeemed…. placed back into the world of the living…. snatched from my sadness  and punted from nightmares…..  I was recently watching a documentary on the making of “Faces of Death.”  If you remember this movie, you will know exactly the scene I refer to when I say, “the monkey scene.”  I have, for the past 30 years been traumatized by that scene and they cruelty that we can inflict.  However, during this documentary they were interviewing the director, and discussing how some of it was real, and some was fake.  The director explained that lots of industrial accidents and car accidents were real, because they could obtain footage and pictures from those events.  However, the scenes of murder… AND THE MONKEY SCENE… WERE FAKE!!!!  FAKE FAKE FAKE!!!!  That monkey presumable lived a long natural life after his brief acting career, dying peacefully some many years later surrounded by love and bananas.    Is this not the most amazing disclosure!   I mean, what else from the eighties was faked!!!????