Can you ever return to "normal" life with cancer?

In the first year of dealing with my diagnosis, it was so much about cancer and the treatments that recently, when life returned to somewhat normal, I have allowed myself to go elsewhere in my thinking. Once you have received a cancer diagnosis it is as if the whole world looks different. Everything looked simultaneously brighter colored and was moving faster. I felt a distance from others, just different as they went about their daily life while I was immediately contemplating my life coming to an end. 

 

And then came the treatment phase when it was hard to think beyond the physical realities of those treatments, when there appeared to be no breathing room between the visits to the Huntsman Cancer Hospital. It was the ever present elephant in the room except the elephant was sitting on my chest and unwilling to move. More than a year has passed now since my "birthday" or the day I received my stem cell transplant. To make sure to get rid of the traces of cancer that were still present in the blood and urine after the transplant, they placed me back on a fairly rigorous "maintenance" program which was not much different from the treatment before the transplant. However, after 6 more rounds of the three different drugs, the doctors finally declared that they could no longer see evidence of the cancer. In February of this year, I was effectively in what they called, Complete Response or remission in other parlay. 

This entered me literally into a new phase in life. My hair was growing back, albeit rather short still. I was back to full physical mobility. I began to earn a living again as work come to my doorstep to make me feel back into the normal world.  Both Alan and I were able to get the Covid 19 vaccine at the beginning of March. My levels of paranoia about being in the public immediately reduced and I felt excited about getting into life again, at the same time as everyone else it appeared. Looking back on it now, it was easy to slip into old ways of viewing the world and some of the color seeped out of my view. I have not been so focused on viewing every moment as a gift, of being grateful for the air I breathed in all its simplicity. 

Of course, it is a hard thing to keep living life on the edge of your seat, not sure if you are going to see another tomorrow. This is especially true if you are working towards a more long-term existence of living with the disease and seeing 10, 20 or even 30 years ahead. (Yes, I am that optimistic!).

Ready for hookup

 

                IV in place for the infusion

I was at the Huntsman hospital this week for my monthly blood work, meeting with the PA and infusion of bone strengthening drugs when a little of that wonder came back to me. Alan and I were discussing how it might work with treatments if I were to travel for more than a week or so. The good news was that she saw a way that I might take additional medications with me to make such a trip possible. 

Alan then asked a probing question. "What kind of window do you think we are looking at before we might expect the cancer to return?" Her answer pierced me to the core. "Probably about two years so this is an ideal time if you are going to do any travelling or have any plans."

In with the PA

Although I knew this was a conservative estimate she was giving to me, I was plagued with the thoughts, "What do I want to do in the next two years to make the most of this time when I feel largely normal?" It was not quite a bucket list question as I knew that once I relapsed that I would undergo even more treatment. Waiting for me in some frozen storage somewhere are enough of my stem cells to do yet another transplant. There are also new treatments available. Saying "two years" was not a death sentence so much as a reality check that the first year of treatment craziness could start all over again, that my physical abilities I was enjoying so much at this time might change back to my earlier days with this cancer. 

And so I have begun to have that bright color all around me again. I have begun to look at the world differently and I have this thirst to drink it all in again, at speed, before I just can't anymore. My mind immediately went to my children and grandchildren. This is not an easy one because they are in New Zealand which is still closed down tight because of Covid 19. However, my mind also went to far flung places I would like to explore, books that I wanted to read, connections that I wanted to make and most importantly, it went to my earthly mission. What did I yet have to achieve before I became incapacitated or died? I have already been reading a great deal more than ever lately and I am clear about what is expected of me. I am to help to strengthen individuals and couples to know who they are, to develop the ability to have the emotional or psychological resilience to face their challenges and to remain whole. There is so much work to do and so little time that I may have to do it. I have to remember that the Lord is in charge of timing for everything and that He will give me just enough time. I want to do it all, but more than ever, now more than ever is the time to get closer to the spirit so that I can prioritize and do what is best not just what is good.

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