There are so many thoughts that run through ones mind when downtime is all you have. Life’s little peccadilloes come to life and begin to gnaw and eat at your soul. There is then the reality of the situation coupled with the pain and all of the ancillary issues brought upon you by this disease.
When I first came home I felt good. Certainly not at the top of my game, but for my circumstances, I was good. I do not know what happened after the first few days, but I started to get nauseous, break out into cold sweats, get these short, quick headaches that were like blinding flashes of light and the pain was just shy of a migraine. This would happen every time I took my medication and seemingly enough, everytime I would try to eat something. The only remedy to all of this, believe it or not, was what I call "power naps". If I lay down for thirty to sixty minutes it made me feel better. The only problem with that remedy was that it was much easier to stay in bed than it was to get back up and move around for fear of the issues starting all over again.
What then was my decision? What was my response to remedy the remedy so to speak? It was nothing that I should have done and I did not do it in moderation. I decided to medicate myself and stay in bed for a good portion of the day. It was, as they say, a way to go. Not necessarily the right way, definitely not the direction God wanted me to move in I am sure and it was certainly not the direction my wife wanted me moving toward. We had countless conversations regarding the issue all of which ended up with irritation. She thought she was being helpful and I thought she was picking at me when I was down. Needless to say it did not make for a pleasant situation and certainly not leading toward a resolution to the problem. As we have all done in this type of a situation was talking to our friends about it. Well, I did not, I was too busy sleeping, Shelly on the other hand went out to dinner with a very good friend of ours and this friend’s parents and they had a good long talk followed by prayer, followed by more talk and prayer. They left it with God. As we all know, God has a way of using any means at his disposal to get his message across and sometimes he does this very quickly.
The very next day I had my second visit from the home health care nurse. She was not the same as the first nurse that came out, but she was very nice and pleasant just the same. She was going through the usual motions of checking my vitals and making sure that everything was as it should be. I was expecting as very short visit. She was asking questions as she was moving along and then she asked me how the cancer manifested itself. Most of you do know the story but for those of you who do not, it is a very long story encompassing four months and at least eight different hospital stays. She wanted to hear the whole thing. So, I told her the tale and she listened intently asking a question or two but mainly just listening. She then asked “How are you doing on a day-to-day basis around here?” Well, that lead me to explain to her the story I am telling you about my wife. She agreed with me on certain small parts regarding my lying down theory and I thought WOW I have an ally. The second thought that rang through my pea brain and that I let myself vocalize was how I wish Shelly were around to hear this. It was about the time I opened my mouth that my nurse let me have it with both barrels :).
Even though she was gracious enough to agree with my statement of resting when I didnt feel good, she did not agree with the rest of my theory. Essentially she spent the next twenty minutes scaring the hell out of me and opening my eyes. I consider myself a very positive person and I feel that I can get through anything. All I have to do is keep pushing forward. Cancer was no exception or so I thought. She proceeded to inform me that regardless of how “positive” of a person I am, regardless of what I tell myself, regardless of my smile and how much I push forward if I continued to stay in this room by myself, with the lights off, totally medicated and sleeping my way through this then this disease was going to win. She was not trying to take away from my positive outlook. No, actually her perspective was that in her experience it does not matter who you are. If you put yourself in the situation I had placed myself in you are going to lose, regardless of who you are. There is not a person powerful enough to combat the multiple battles that I am going to be fighting. It does not matter how positive you are the disease will suck you in and take you out of the game. The point is, you have to stay connected to life. Stay connected to everything that is important to you. Sure, if you are not well go lie down, go feel better. However, when you feel better, get up and get moving around. If you have work to do, then get up and get the work done. Get up and go interact with life, go interact with your kids, go interact with your wife, friends, family, whoever. Get up and interact with life, fight to keep doing it and never stop. It was a definite eye opener and I will be very honest to say that it scared me a great deal. You see, on this subject she speaks from hard experience. I speak from speculative thought. Those are two very divergent thought and action processes. She had my attention. I now was the one doing the listening.
After she left I had plenty of time to think about what she said and what my wife had been trying to express all along. I realized that they were both saying the same thing, it was just being expressed in a different way. My wife was not trying pick on me, she was just not expressing it in the way my ears and pea brain could interpret the message. That was my fault. So to my wife I owe a tremendous apology. I am sorry for misinterpreting your words my love. I should know better by now and I truly hope you can accept my apology and forgive your husband for his foolishness. I love you. Thank you for everything you do. I also want to thank my nurse for being open enough and caring enough that she did not hold her words and just spoke her mind. I am glad for that because it was everything I needed to hear.
It's God, plain and simple and He uses anyone or anything to get His Message across and to move His Will forward. God is amazing and works in so many ways to help you, hold you up and make you strong. Nothing…I repeat nothing is impossible with God. I am reminded of this everyday. I try like anything to keep God at the center of my life and put him first in everything. I slip all the time, but the more I slip, the more I am reminded of how empty life is without God in it. The more I slip, the more I am reminded of His love for us and how much we mean to Him. The more I slip, the more I am reminded that He is everything and we would be better to remember that statement and carry it with us in our heads and in our hearts at all time. So let's all stay connected to life. Regardless of our life's circumstances. Let's stay connected and remember at all times that at the center of that life we are fighting to stay connected to is a loving God who is fighting just as hard to stay connected to us.
What then was my decision? What was my response to remedy the remedy so to speak? It was nothing that I should have done and I did not do it in moderation. I decided to medicate myself and stay in bed for a good portion of the day. It was, as they say, a way to go. Not necessarily the right way, definitely not the direction God wanted me to move in I am sure and it was certainly not the direction my wife wanted me moving toward. We had countless conversations regarding the issue all of which ended up with irritation. She thought she was being helpful and I thought she was picking at me when I was down. Needless to say it did not make for a pleasant situation and certainly not leading toward a resolution to the problem. As we have all done in this type of a situation was talking to our friends about it. Well, I did not, I was too busy sleeping, Shelly on the other hand went out to dinner with a very good friend of ours and this friend’s parents and they had a good long talk followed by prayer, followed by more talk and prayer. They left it with God. As we all know, God has a way of using any means at his disposal to get his message across and sometimes he does this very quickly.
The very next day I had my second visit from the home health care nurse. She was not the same as the first nurse that came out, but she was very nice and pleasant just the same. She was going through the usual motions of checking my vitals and making sure that everything was as it should be. I was expecting as very short visit. She was asking questions as she was moving along and then she asked me how the cancer manifested itself. Most of you do know the story but for those of you who do not, it is a very long story encompassing four months and at least eight different hospital stays. She wanted to hear the whole thing. So, I told her the tale and she listened intently asking a question or two but mainly just listening. She then asked “How are you doing on a day-to-day basis around here?” Well, that lead me to explain to her the story I am telling you about my wife. She agreed with me on certain small parts regarding my lying down theory and I thought WOW I have an ally. The second thought that rang through my pea brain and that I let myself vocalize was how I wish Shelly were around to hear this. It was about the time I opened my mouth that my nurse let me have it with both barrels :).
Even though she was gracious enough to agree with my statement of resting when I didnt feel good, she did not agree with the rest of my theory. Essentially she spent the next twenty minutes scaring the hell out of me and opening my eyes. I consider myself a very positive person and I feel that I can get through anything. All I have to do is keep pushing forward. Cancer was no exception or so I thought. She proceeded to inform me that regardless of how “positive” of a person I am, regardless of what I tell myself, regardless of my smile and how much I push forward if I continued to stay in this room by myself, with the lights off, totally medicated and sleeping my way through this then this disease was going to win. She was not trying to take away from my positive outlook. No, actually her perspective was that in her experience it does not matter who you are. If you put yourself in the situation I had placed myself in you are going to lose, regardless of who you are. There is not a person powerful enough to combat the multiple battles that I am going to be fighting. It does not matter how positive you are the disease will suck you in and take you out of the game. The point is, you have to stay connected to life. Stay connected to everything that is important to you. Sure, if you are not well go lie down, go feel better. However, when you feel better, get up and get moving around. If you have work to do, then get up and get the work done. Get up and go interact with life, go interact with your kids, go interact with your wife, friends, family, whoever. Get up and interact with life, fight to keep doing it and never stop. It was a definite eye opener and I will be very honest to say that it scared me a great deal. You see, on this subject she speaks from hard experience. I speak from speculative thought. Those are two very divergent thought and action processes. She had my attention. I now was the one doing the listening.
After she left I had plenty of time to think about what she said and what my wife had been trying to express all along. I realized that they were both saying the same thing, it was just being expressed in a different way. My wife was not trying pick on me, she was just not expressing it in the way my ears and pea brain could interpret the message. That was my fault. So to my wife I owe a tremendous apology. I am sorry for misinterpreting your words my love. I should know better by now and I truly hope you can accept my apology and forgive your husband for his foolishness. I love you. Thank you for everything you do. I also want to thank my nurse for being open enough and caring enough that she did not hold her words and just spoke her mind. I am glad for that because it was everything I needed to hear.
It's God, plain and simple and He uses anyone or anything to get His Message across and to move His Will forward. God is amazing and works in so many ways to help you, hold you up and make you strong. Nothing…I repeat nothing is impossible with God. I am reminded of this everyday. I try like anything to keep God at the center of my life and put him first in everything. I slip all the time, but the more I slip, the more I am reminded of how empty life is without God in it. The more I slip, the more I am reminded of His love for us and how much we mean to Him. The more I slip, the more I am reminded that He is everything and we would be better to remember that statement and carry it with us in our heads and in our hearts at all time. So let's all stay connected to life. Regardless of our life's circumstances. Let's stay connected and remember at all times that at the center of that life we are fighting to stay connected to is a loving God who is fighting just as hard to stay connected to us.
2 comments:
Thank you honey. I love you. So very much and I am so happy that you are finally "staying connected". Every day, I thank God for you. You are such a strong man and I am pretty darned proud to be your wife.
Always,
Me
So glad Dan, that you are "staying in the Now" for it's all we have. to be present in each moment, or "staying connected.
Heere is a great quote I love. I wanted to share it with you.
"Keep your thoughts positive because your thoughts become your words. Keep your words positive because your words become your behaviors. Keep your behaviors positive because your behaviors become your habits. Keep your habits positive because your habits become your values. Keep your values positive because you values become your destiny.
~Gandhi
In short, stay positive Dan. You have lots and lots of wonderful life that awaits you.
We love you.
Sonja
and the rest of the Gang
Sonja
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