Cancer

Every so often, Tom remarks how he is sick of this cancer thing. Recently we realized that he has been dealing with cancer for 10 years. Ten years of cancer. Cancer sucks, and I am sorry that it happens. My advice? You can’t control all the factors that lead to the development of cancer but those that you can, you should. I am not a perfect person and I don’t do everything in the best way, we can all try to do something better than we are doing now. Second, be a good friend, a good sister/brother/daughter, etc to anyone who has to beat down the demon. Cancer has lasting effects – physical and psychological. Don’t forget about your friend or relative when the treatment is over. If you don’t know what to say to someone, say what you feel, what is in your heart. If that is nothing besides, “Geez. I’m sorry. I’m sorry you have to go through this. What can I do to help?” deliver it genuinely. Third, donate to a cause, show support, give blood, give something… hold someone’s hand. I believe it is so important to be a kind person. You never know when you will need someone to be kind to you and if you are kind to a stranger, you build faith in humanity and maybe it will spread. (And selfishly, it feels very nice to be nice). We each have a profound effect on each other, our attitude and actions have effects on others, undoubtedly. Like the Buddhists believe in this karma, I agree our actions have a bit of a ripple effect on each other.
People appreciate simple things; people appreciate your full attention. Tom stomps on the flowers and I stop to smell them. Everyone deals with this cancer thing differently, I guess you can try to read them and be there how they need you, but I have to believe that kind words, prayers, and helpfulness have to be appreciated by most people. And I guess I wouldn’t think of this, but for my husband he seems to greatly appreciate what people do for me rather than him. Me as the wife of the cancer victim. Me as the mother caring for the young children that we share. So I bet this is true of others dealing with cancer – if you support their family, they feel supported. From my estimation, this probably has two parts for Tom – one is that there isn’t much sometimes that you can give or do for the person dealing with cancer and the treatment – they have to go through the motions and take the drugs and you can’t do that for them. Second is that he wants to feel that if he cant win this battle, then his family is going to be ok and when he sees the support of loved ones, he can be comfortable knowing that we will be ok. A painful subject to broach, but I’ll bet you that anyone who hears that damn diagnosis, these things pass through their heads and for my dear love, he has heard it 4 times now.
We all have room for improvement as humans – and I guess this is important because if you end up with a demon to fight you will know that you lived well and have little you would wish to have done differently if you are forced with the possibility of checking out of here earlier than you want.
Here is my mind on paper this morning as the demon is always around for us. Right now he is sleeping. Sleep tight demon, and never wake up…
Ten years is enough.