cancer sucks

 About 3 weeks ago, I was diagnosed with Squamous Cell Carcinoma, a form of oral cancer. It was discovered early (read: before it metastasized), the surgery was “successful” and **should** not require additional treatment (radiation/chemotherapy) if I don’t have any additional tumors. Which, all things considered, is a Godsend. If this had happened in 2020, or if the early discovery was in 8 weeks, this would be fundamentally a different letter- one where I essentially eulogized myself. 

I find myself at a crossroads: I fully recognize that with just a little shitty luck, I could be on a guaranteed death sentence. I recognize how grateful I should be that I’m getting extra time. 

I’ve had cancer before. Twice. The first time was a death sentence that if I’d known the severity I definitely wouldn’t have made it, but I was 6...it was brutal- I occasionally wake up in the middle of the night with flashbacks to the chemotherapy- which I hear has improved which I can only imagine because in 1976 it felt like being burned from the inside. I don’t have to have radiation- and it’s the radiation that, if doctors took truth serum, would tell you was the cause of cancer in the first place (radiation I had to get when I was 6 and all this tech was still in its infancy comparatively). As shitty as both of those were, it looks a whole lot like I may be spared...

When people ask how I am, what I say is “all things considered, aight.” I say that because people don’t really want to know how you’re feeling, and even if they did, most don’t have the strength to even listen to my emotional baggage, much less hold it. 

What I want to say when people ask “how are you?”

Sad. Every time I’ve been diagnosed, it’s meant that **something** I love will be taken away from me. I spent 15 months getting back to “normal” when I was a kid. The 2nd time I had cancer was while my dad was **also** dying (but if heart disease) and the energy it took from me was the energy I couldn’t give to my father in his last days, and I don’t know how you deal with damage to the soul, and I sure AF don’t know how to quantify it. 

Exhausted. Because we live in America, and my health care is tied to my job, I have to do my job **as if nothing is going wrong** which is only possible because it’s what I did in all of 2020. Except sometimes it’s that I’m nauseous because it’s really hard to get calories when you don’t really want to eat because **pain** - mostly manageable but sometimes excruciating, and because there is a limit on soft foods, soups, and smoothies. Sometimes exhausted because I can’t let people know how exhausting this is- because as shitty as this is, as shitty as this feels, it’s still better than the look of the Fear of Death in people’s eyes- their inability to say the “right” thing so they say everything or nothing- forgetting that there’s a person they’re talking to that, despite how this is for you, for them is another word I didn’t list but will now: fucking terrifying. More on that later...

Angry. I realize how grateful I should be- I mean I could **easily** be dying right now, and I’m (as of right now) not. I should be dancing the jig- it’s like getting a lease on life...but is it? Why can’t someone else- perhaps someone who hasn’t already been through this- have this lucky encounter? I’ve been to this rodeo before, and even in its best form, it’s really shitty. I’ve pretty much weaned myself off the pain killers, but it **does** mean that sometimes I’m in a fuckton of pain- a risk I accept to lessen the risk of pain killer addiction, which may be more in my head than a real concern, but I’d rather not find out. I’m in pain and know that normalcy is at best 12 weeks away but conceivably could be as much as a half-year- which I try not to think about but here we are. I want my face to stop hurting. I want to feel full but not slushy when I’m done eating. I’d like to sleep through the night pain-free without worrying about pain pill addiction.

Terrified. As well as things are going *now* I realize how fast things can go sideways- if I wake up and my mouth is bleeding it’s pretty likely I’ll be in chemotherapy and radiation within 24 hours. Anything that happens to my body anywhere on it right now makes me think about metastization in other organs- which means that the stomach issues I’m having today are being linked to the cancer diagnosis in my head.  And my terror isn’t just **my** terror- I’ve lived through this- twice actually- but that doesn’t help Carol or her family in this endeavor. I try my best to put as positive a spin on things as I can because I know that Attitude Matters in this fight...

Initially, I wasn’t planning on talking about this publicly- mostly because people don’t know how to act so they overcommit or ignore when all I really need to for you to acknowledge you’ve been told- I don’t expect anyone to say “the right thing” and if you can be there in support, I’m for that. Inevitably my shrink told me that if I use this format for disclosure then I should do that here, too, “to give your network an opportunity to support you” 

I’m hoping I don’t regret this...