What to Say?

Most of this blog has been oriented to get what's inside me out into the light. Whatever gets stuffed down and in still comes out - sideways, often in the form of bizarre behavior. Sideways used to work for me, but at the expense of others and to my relationships. Stuffing it is not useful to my health and in this case fighting cancer. Rather, stuffing feelings down and in feeds cancer and every self destructive thing in my life. God help me get it out.

It's probably a culmination of fear, sad, grief, depression, shock, but this little white chemo pill has put the biggest lock on feeling much of anything. My body is tense from head to toe. I need a sleep aid. I feel numb, dull, shadowed, and closed.

This poisonous medicine has built up in my system to where it must be to be effective at shrinking my tumors. The effect on my brain however is very frustrating. Each day has from 2 to 5 hours of near debilitating cloudy thinking, increased forgetfulness, and decreased coordination. My balance is shaky and sometimes I should not drive. The side effects were predicted to be acne-like rash (minimal now), diarrhea (none yet) and fatigue (some of every day). Maybe the increasing levels of brain centered difficulty is a just for me side effect. How special is that?

The longer I have been clean, the more light weight I have become with many OTC and/or prescribed drugs. 1/8th of a sleep aid. One Dayquil capsule instead of two. Finding an effective medicine to treat my depression was a very long process of trial and error through about eight different drugs. Each tiny increase or decrease had a definitive noticeable impact on me. I suppose therefore that the little white pill (chemo is my friend) should be no different. Its effects on me include some not even noticed by other patients or acknowledged by doctors. Certainly not mentioned to me before starting. Even in cancer I have become very sensitive to drugs.

None of my subjective and nebulous symptoms are that big a deal. As far as chemo goes, my oral stuff is a breeze compared to IV treatments that overwhelm patients. I am grateful for that. The ego trashing I gave myself over not working is finally swept away - there is no way at all I could do any job with any structure or regularity. Even social security was easy for me to qualify. No check until August, but at least I know something will be coming in.

Jacki told me to write. It has helped a little. Wrote this one with no tears; a first. I'm not sure that's a good thing, but it's where I am today. Thanks for hanging in there with me. Now, there's a tear.
Bill