The 'C' Word

I started this months ago, but could not seem to bring myself to finish it...I don't know if this constitutes as "finished" but here it is.

I came across someone's blog chronicling their battle with cancer.  Postings were done both, by husband and wife.  I only managed to get through about four of them before I broke down.  One of the things that struck me in the blog was the wife saying "everyone keeps asking how I am, yet I have no answer".  There are and never will be any words that can convey this experience, at any time.  Not before, during or even after. 

I know because I am a cancer survivor's wife.

When someone asks me about our experience with this, I literally break out in cold sweats.  Even as I write this, tears stream down my face.  Just typing those words have the ability to almost break me yet again.  I am eternally grateful and obscenely lucky to  have my spouse with me still.  I know far too many that can not say the same.  This is one experience in life I wholeheartedly wished I had no part of.

It all started with a weird pain and "something weird" on one of his testicles, which he hadn't told me of for weeks.  When he finally did come to me, I immediately hit the internet.  It's always the same - you can find symptom lists to match everything wrong with you, or nothing at all.  Not taking any chances, I called the Urologist to make an appointment.  "I'm sorry, the doctor is booked for three months." "I"m sorry, my husband might have cancer." "Yes, we can see him, tomorrow at 1:00".  Oy!  I think it was at that point, where I started floating above myself and watched everything from a very weird and shadowed place.

First diagnosis, infection, because "cancer does not come with pain".  Well, we're here to tell you otherwise.  It can.  Fluke...maybe, but still can.  Free advice - don't accept what a doctor says if it goes against your gut feeling simply because he's a doctor.  Challenge them, they're not always right.  Stand up for your body!  It's yours.  You have the right.   At that point, we figured, at best it is an infection, ok simple.  At worst, it is cancer, which we would be catching early, so let's try the antibiotics and see what it does.  Needless, to say, it was not an infection and the antibiotics were nasty.  It then became a hurry up and wait and so many questions.  Argh!!  Surgery - was it successful?  Did it spread? What about this?  What about that?  How, what, who, when, huh?!!  Needless to say, after chemo, and many, many sleepless nights, we all came out the other side...alive.  

That's just the physical side.

Emotionally is where it hurts the most.  Well it did for me anyway.  It fundamentally changed who I was.  I didn't know who I was anymore.  My life was shattered.  My confidence was gone.  I had been so far thrown off my path and I was in utter confusion.  Living in despair and chaos, even for a few months, will abjectly change your perspective.  My internal barometer was so far out of whack and I had lost my  referendum for "north".   I didn't know how to right it.  I was no longer comfortable in my own skin and who ever I had been was clawing their way out of me from the inside, shredding every ounce of my sanity along the way.  I can only imagine, as someone's reading this wondering "can it really be that bad?".  Yes, yes it can and is and was and always will be.  This is one experience that can not be fluffed off by any platitude or made light by anything.  Cancer is devastating.  Period.  We need to find a cure!! 

Five years later and Geoff has been given the "all clear".  A day we marked in remembrance and awe.  Five years marks the "official" out of the woods for recurrence zone.  Thankfully, Geoff's physical scars faded along with our children's emotional scars.  Me? With therapy, a great family, many good friends and good husband, have managed to set me to rights again.  Well, as right as I'll ever can be :) but not without paying a cost I would rather not have given.  I'm still very twitchy about it and I think I might always be that way.  My experience with cancer, unfortunately, sometimes even overshadows the happiest moments in my life (in my mind).  It tainted me and for that I will be forever pissed.

I fervently hope that when I'm old and gray (oops forget that, will never be "gray") that I won't feel the sharp stab of pain when it's mentioned.  But I'm not holding my breath...


Forever, we will be eternally thankful for, all the wonderful doctors at Sharp Res-Stealy and Sharp Memorial Hospital in San Diego.  They were amazing.  In particular, Dr. Shankar Sundaram.  His optimism and knowledge of oncology kept both of us in the right frame of mind and helped us walk a terrifying path in life with ease (take that with a very large grain of salt).