This Is Not Our First Rodeo, But The Bull Teaches Us A Lot
Eight years ago, John went through three rounds of chemotherapy to become cured from testicular cancer. It was a difficult and scary time, but we got through it and learned a lot from cancer. Our oldest daughters were teenagers at the time, and our goal was to keep their lives as normal as possible during his treatment.
We learned to live in the moment, find joy in the small things, and live life more slowly
Regular treatments began a new tradition of stopping at McDonald’s for a cup of coffee (and let’s be honest… some fries and an apple pie). These times away offered us a moment to breathe, people watch, and feel human. Sometimes we would go to a little coffee shop, but for some reason, McDonald’s became our favorite place. I have to admit that for me, their coffee is still the best!
During that time we also made new memories. At the time these situations were painful, but the years have softened them and made them bittersweet.
John was diagnosed with his first cancer near Thanksgiving, and he started chemotherapy in December. A friend of mine invited my second daughter and I for a day away. We would hike around her woods to pick a pine tree from their forested yard that would become our Christmas tree. I had never picked out a tree without John before, but the day away in the woods sounded like a great idea, and John wanted a real tree (even though we worried that it would carry mold and bring health issues if his immunity levels tanked). With my daughter, my friend and her husband, we hiked around, laughed and enjoyed the day outside. Nature has always been healing for us. We found our tree, cut it down, and strapped it to the roof of my Volkswagon Jetta. It felt like something out of a Norman Rockwell painting, the sight of a freshly cut tree taking up the full length of my vehicle!
When we got home, we brought the tree inside. We were careful to pick a small tree because the home we were renting at the time was very small. After heaving and swearing and shoving the tree through the door, I tipped it up to find that it was too tall. It wouldn’t fit in the house without chopping it down. I jammed the tree back outside, grabbed a hand saw and cut from the bottom of the tree. Bringing it back in, John warned me, “That still looks too tall.”
“It is NOT!” I snorted back.
It was.
Again, I pulled the tree outside as it dropped needles in protest all over my front entrance. There was no place left to cut on the bottom. If I trimmed it there, the base would be too wide to fit into the tree stand. Now what, I wondered? After some more swearing and the opening and sipping of some motivational beverages, I decided that the only answer was to cut off the top of the tree. As a kid, I remembered driving around my hometown at Christmastime, looking at decorations. There was always one business that we drove past because they had a tree in the front window that was so large it seemed to go through the roof. They must have cut the top off of the tree each year and then put the top of the tree on top of the roof, right above the base, making it look like the tree had poked through the roof on it’s own. I carefully told this story to my family, trying to sell them on the idea that it would look cool. They looked at me with the typical expression that teenagers have. My husband just replied, “Whatever!”
I cut the top off, jammed the tree into the stand, and set it up in the corner of the room. It looked hilarious and we laughed at that tree all during the holiday season! To this day, it is the tree we talk about with the most joy, even though, at the time….. it was stressful. Luckily, John’s immunity levels stayed high until after Christmas, and when they were low and he was quarantined at home, that Charlie Brown Christmas tree went to the curb pretty quickly!
Most of all, we learned to slow down.
When your life becomes consumed with one major issue, time seems to stop. This is both good and bad. Days drag on as you wait for answers, signs, anything that tells you things will be OK. Each day begins to unfold in new ways. Things that used to take precedence don’t seem as important. Because John’s first cancer came during the holiday season, we were consumed with the grief of the diagnosis and baking cookies, sending out holiday cards, and even shopping for a pile of presents under the tree weren’t as important as they used to be. We had a simpler holiday that year, and have tried hard to keep our holidays much smaller ever since.
After completing his chemotherapy for testicular cancer, John was tested regularly for any recurrence, and after five years with no signs of cancer, he was considered cured. Find the joy. Make new memories. Live life more slowly. We tried to carry those ideas into our lives after he finished his treatment, but as life likes to do…… time makes things fade. Little by little we lived faster, stress made joy harder to find, and our old normal returned. This wasn’t bad, it was normal life without cancer.
We were done with cancer, or so we thought.
Beginning in June of 2016 and after months of doctoring for severe pain in his right knee, doctors were “stumped” by what was wrong with John. He was sent to a foot doctor, an orthopedic doctor, a physical therapist, a physical medicine doctor, and finally an appointment was made to meet with a cervical specialist. They were convinced that the problem was with the bulging discs in his back and the cervical stenosis they had found in his neck. None of them actually scanned or tested his knee, even though that was always his primary complaint. The appointment with the cervical specialist required us to wait for three more weeks, and John’s pain was intolerable. Every day, especially at night, he cried out in extreme pain, begging for me to rub his leg. It was the only thing that seemed to settle things for him. Finally, with no other options, I drove him to a major clinic two hours away in order to get an answer and in order to get help for his cervical stenosis. The answer we got was NOT what we expected. After 9 days in the hospital and numerous tests, he was diagnosed with Stage 4 Angiosarcoma in the right knee that had spread to a small spot on his lung and some questionable areas in the pelvis. It took another 6 days in the hospital for his pain to be managed well enough so that we could return home.
Our world came to a screeching halt.
Now, we find ourselves back at the rodeo, riding a different bull. We are living more slowly, looking for joy in every place that we can, and working to make new memories. This blog is about our journey to do so.
