Perhaps it’s my imagination, but I’m feeling my disease more these days. To save the casual reader an archival search (yeah, like that would ever happen) a year ago I was diagnosed with chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML). 800 mg per day of the miracle drug Gleevec has held the cancer’s progress at bay, but this oral chemotherapy is not without its side effects. With every passing day my stamina is diminished a bit, and the gastrointestinal upset brought on by the drug occasionally seems like its going to evacuate my insides altogether. I surmise that my preexisting depression contributes to the sense that things are not getting any better.
I am truly grateful that it was possible for me to witness Rachel and Steve’s wedding, and while the end is not imminent it certainly looms larger than it once did. It only seems responsible to focus my attention on getting my affairs in order to make sure that Mary and Rebecca are provided for to the best of my ability. I have such great respect for the way my good friend, Don, left things when he died of cancer a couple of years ago. His was such an untimely death, but he left his mark on family and friends alike.
What I find most disturbing is to ponder whether or not I have lived the good life. It seems that so many of the things to which I aspired when I was younger will likely not be fulfilled, and yet in the spirit of Emerson I remind myself that success is not so much measured by material things as it is by the relationships that have been cultivated and nurtured along the way. To have loved, and to have been loved, this is what really matters most!
I read your post after I finished writing my own tonight and can't help but think that we have similar coping mechanisms. If keep our thinking on the negative side, then the little good things that happen in our lives seem almost like miracles. But if we try to keep thinking positively then we end up being crushed by bad news. When Steve and I were talking about family medical histories, I had to admit that my odds of getting cancer are pretty high considering how many of my family members have been affected. However, we also talked about how nearly all of them have gone on to make amazing recoveries. And that is the only option that I am giving you. I don't usually expect miracles, but with you I do. I still like to think of you as being right around the halfway point in life with a lot of good things still ahead. I'm sorry that you're not feeling well, but I can't help but see it as one tough step on the journey to your amazing recovery. So prepare for the end all you like, but I am not giving up on you, even if it means doing a bone marrow transplant in our living room. I'm sure they have one of those "Major Surgery for Dummies" books out by now.
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