A Little Perspective

When I was in the hospital at Good Sam last week, David went to visit a colleague who was there at the same time that I was. She had recently gone to the doctor complaining of back pain. The doctor could find nothing wrong with her back but ordered some tests. She had advanced cancer that had spread to her lungs, liver, and lymph system. David called me yesterday to tell me that she had died, two weeks after diagnosis. She was thirty-five years old.

This gives me a little perspective when I want to complain about the difficulties of chemo. I have been remarkably lucky. My cancer was caught early, and although it’s an aggressive form, it hadn’t spread far. A mastectomy, chemo, and hormone therapy put my ten year survival rate at 90%. Just the fact that it’s been almost six months from diagnosis and I’m still alive is a miracle indeed.

So chemo went well. I had almost no nausea. I even felt well enough to attend my group last night, pink wig and all. My group is very sustaining to me. It was so good to be among those incredibly wise and compassionate women.

Today I woke up and, well, I didn’t feel so great. Every muscle and every bone ached. I had little appetite, although I made myself eat and I felt better. I tapped and got my pain level down, but I’m moving slowly and that’s okay. Tomorrow is the B’nai Mitzvah and I can tell it will be too much for me. I think I’ll sit it out.

But it’s life in slo-mo and slo-mo is okay. It’s nice to sit around in my pink pajamas and contemplate the world from my attic window. The sun is so low in the sky these days that I can watch the sunrise and sunset from it. It’s a good time of year to be laying low. I read the newspaper, not just the front page and the editorials, but the arts section and long articles on this and that. I do the crossword puzzle, the ultimate luxury. Most of all, I revel in the fact that I’m alive and my chances of staying alive for quite a while are very good. As I remember, 90% is at least a B. And that’s more than passing.