This will sound depressed and morose, but I really mean it to sound practical and sensible. How long should we fight back? It takes enormous energy, time and way too much money. Even after my insurance paid last time, I owed a fortune. The fight is so hard on the family, especially on my wife. Are we just feeding the medical monster by fighting with our last dollars and breath??!!
Yes, I got to meet my 3 grandchildren, I got to go back into the classroom and teach, I got to counsel a little more, I got to do some writing. All wonderful and worth the fight. But there are losses too. I am without my sense of taste, my sense of smell and my ability to swallow. My teeth are gone, my neuropathy in extremities continues and my balance is bad as a result. I can't ride my bike. The chemo stole the calcium in my bones so now I have osteoperosis and can't "risk" many of the activies I used to love. My peg keeps me from swimming or hot tubbing - two things I really miss. New normal? Sure. Can I live with those limitations? Sure. Have I had a wonderful time in the past 4 years the treatment made possible? Absolutely.
But what else can I afford to lose to another round of treatment? What else am I willing to give up to be alive? I don't know. I'm not preaching - just sounding off. I'm angry about it. Another round of treatment will drain the last of my retirement money. Whenever I eventually die my wife will get nothing. Not exactly what I saved for. What price to pay for each additional day? What amount of pain endured, stress endured, stress given to those around me?
Dying by inches. I remember my step-dad telling me how he just wanted to leave now. He was dying of emphzema. A big, robust man who loved life - reduced to a coughing, vomiting weakling. He tried to overdose but failed. We talked when he got home from the hospital and he said he couldn't stand to die by inches. "There is no dignity in this." he said. I didn't get it then. Life is precious. Life at any price. Now I understand what he meant.
When people close to us die we keen and cry and miss them. We wear black. We have a funeral. Lots of Kleenex. Then the sun comes up again. Some guy gets a flat out on the interstate, there is a new baby camel at the zoo, the gas bill needs paying, and somebody has to scoop the snow off the sidewalk. The news changes, the weather changes. Life goes on. There is barely a ripple left from your passing through.
In twenty years you are just a name on a marker. Does it really matter what day you die? Does it really matter then how hard you fought? that you lasted one more week or one more year?
No, I'm not looking for a bridge to jump from. I'm just angry and trying to make good decisions about what to do next. Give it a fit for three months and then re-evaluate? Go after it till my bank account gurgles and then quit? Stay with it till I lose 2 more human functions, then find a bridge?? Give my money and goods to the medico's till I am broke and then die of pneumonia sleeping on the corner of 3rd and Main streets? Interesting choices. Dark and whiny, but interesting.
Yes, I know this has been discussed before, but do again for me. Does anybody else ever have these thoughts? What happens when poor people get sick? There weren't any poor people in our chemo rooms, I can tell you that. I feel a little foolish posting this blog, but I do feel a bit better. Tom J
