On April 27, 2022, it will be one year since I was first officially told I have lung cancer. My first inkling that something more serious than COVID was going on came on my 52nd birthday, April 21. That was the X-ray that showed the large pleural effusion, with the radiologist stating "concerning for lymphangitic cacinomatosis". It turned out to be adenocarcinoma of the lung, but nonetheless a scary thing to read on an X-ray report. So my pulmonologist called me on the 27th to confirm that it was indeed lung cancer, and got me in with my oncologist on May 3rd, and this whole journey got started.
So how am I now? Physically I am decent. Some side effects, I have less energy than I used to, and I am in a continual battle with the mental and emotional effects. So it does seem sort of ...weird... to be celebrating (or more precisely, acknowledging) that a year has passed since I was diagnosed. However, everything I read between April 27 and May 3 last year led me to believe that I had 3-12 months left to live, and at the time I physically felt very much like I was dying so it was not hard to believe. Exhausted, coughing, barely able to go up a flight of stairs without having to take a break halfway up, weird visual disturbances from the brain metastases. Nothing really pointed to anything other than that I was very sick, so a terminal diagnosis, while devastating, was something that I could believe was true based on how I felt.
So it is with great happiness and gratitude that I am celebrating still being here one year later, and frankly in pretty good health. Within the context of the worst luck I've ever had, I have since been extremely lucky. Lung cancer treatment has progressed to the point where so far, the only treatment I have had is a once daily pill (Tagrisso, a third generation tyrosine kinase inhibitor specifically for treatment of lung cancer that has a targetable EGFR mutation, and the first TKI that crosses the blood brain barrier). This treatment has so far been extremely successful in that there is no detectable cancer in my brain and body at this time. I have an employer that has not only provided excellent health insurance for me and my family, but who also gives me the time off I need to go through all the appointments I've had, particularly in the beginning. I have a family that I love very much and who loves me, and without their love & support this whole ordeal would be much much harder, if not impossible. I have friends that are extremely supportive and helpful. I have the New Mexico Cancer Center and my team of doctors, nurses and support staff there, who have all been extremely kind, helpful, and most of all professional and competent in exactly the way one would want when dealing with Capital-C Cancer. Should any of you reading this ever find yourself needing cancer treatment (and I sincerely fucking hope none of you ever do), I whole-heartedly endorse and recommend the New Mexico Cancer Center as the place to go.
And I have Kirsten, whose love and support has helped me immeasurably through this past year with my physical illness and my grief, fear, and anxiety through all this, even though she is also dealing with her own grief, fear and anxiety. With her I feel like I can withstand all the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune that have come my/our way over the last few years. She and Maya and Dylan give me all the motivation and strength that I have needed and will need to endure.
It's easy, when faced with a diagnosis of this seriousness and magnitude, to get bogged down in the negatives. Why me, angry at the world, grieving everything you will lose, etc etc etc. And I have. But here's the thing: while doing that, you are missing out on the moments flowing past you all the time, squandering what time you have left on fear of the future. And so I have been working lately on not doing that, on enjoying what I have now when I have it. On finding the joy and contentedness in my daily life, with my family whom I love beyond all else, at my job that I enjoy so much that I've been doing it for 23 years with no intention of stopping until I'm forced to, with my friends when I can (even though they keep moving out of town), with my many (many many) pets. Life, in short, with all its beauty and ugliness and in-between. Its all part of Life's Rich Pageant, to quote a scene from A Shot In The Dark (or to quote an REM album title that came from a scene from A Shot In The Dark).
With blogs like this, or social media posts, there is a tendency to edit and curate your life so that only the best bits show. Look how courageous and strong I am as I go through this terrible ordeal with a can-do attitude and heaping helping of pluck and vim and vigor! It's bullshit though. I mean, some of it's true, but so are the late nights not able to sleep from anxiety, the desire to withdraw, the wish for all this to be over because the "journey" is terrifying and difficult. All those thoughts go through my head, as well as the positive ones. I am lucky. I am unlucky. I am courageous. I am afraid. Things are good. Things are bad. I'm doing well. I'm struggling under the weight of everything. All this is true and contradictory at the same time, and in the end I will get the full experience of the Human Condition. I do not want it, and I am grateful for it.
Mostly though I am grateful for my friends (past and present) and the experiences good and bad that have shaped me. And I am especially grateful for the three people above who mean more to me than anything else. I won't go so far as to say that The Beatles were right and that All You Need Is Love, but without love so much of life would be both harder and less meaningful. Thank you Kirsten & Maya & Dylan, I love you all very very much.
