I bumped into an old friend the other day. One whom I’d not seen for many years. I asked how he was keeping as you do, and he replied, “fine.” He returned the question. I didn’t mean to shock him, but I looked him straight in the eye and said, “mate, I’m dying.”
My friend’s face drained of colour and at first I’m sure he thought it was some sick joke. Sadly, though, I was telling the absolute truth. You see, I’m dying of prostate cancer and have actually been battling it since 2010 when I was first diagnosed at the remarkably young age of 46.
I’ve had state of the art robotic operations, caught the bugger early, been free of it for eighteen months only for it to return – then I thought I had smited the cellular demon with six weeks of daily radiotherapy. I’ve tried anti-androgen tablets and been on monthly hormone injections for the past two years. Alas, it never went away returned like a bad smell in a room with a closed door, this time travelling through my lymphatic system and now, there is no curative treatment, just drug trials, different hormone cocktails, chemotherapy and then the long, long sleep.
Approaching my 54th birthday, it’s not what I had in mind for my middling years although I must add that since 2010 when the word ‘cancer’ entered the daily vocabulary of our lives, my wife and I have travelled like Michael Palin, from continent to continent, beach to beach and we have enjoyed city breaks throughout the bulk of Europe. Had I not known or at least suspected my fate back then, I would have no doubt meandered my way through middle age always planning for things to do tomorrow and never doing, which brings me back to meeting my old friend.
You see I’m not unique in this dying lark. My friend is dying too. I hate to say it but in the midst of your ordinary life you are also. In fact, the undeniable truth about life is that at the precise moment of conception, our fate is genetically sealed with the same outcome for each of us, just a different date stamp. I just happen to have drawn the short straw at birth and never knew about it.
Yes, I feel terribly sorry for myself, for the loss of my elder years, the loss for my wife and grown up daughter’s for the cantankerous old git that they will never know, the grandfather my daughter’s eventual children will never see. But somehow, in some peculiar, perverse way, knowing I will be dead within the next few years gives an inner power that someone, unless they are in that position themselves, will find impossible to comprehend.
My disease course takes away complacency in one fell swoop. It allows sharp focus on each day, gives impetus to plan, to seize the day, to make the best of life and do things now that, in the real world, we all under normal circumstances, put off until tomorrow. It is a strange quirk of the human condition that very few of us actually get around to doing the things we really want to until it is either too late or death takes away the opportunity. Getting cancer has kind of focused the mind. It is a gift of the most unwelcome kind.
Despite the drugs, the endless hospital visits, the scans, the regular meetings with oncologists, my life since diagnosis has taken on new meaning and, ironically, new contentment as well as occasional freneticism. Some in the same situation will wish to keep their “journey” a private affair; friends only knowing when they’ve passed away to gasps of, “Blimey, I never knew he was ill at all.” Others, like myself, who perhaps wear their hearts on their sleeve or are a little less private will want to tell everyone, as exposure is a form of catharsis if not cure for the perpetual mental torture this disease causes – for cancer now affects 1 in 2 of us. Yes, this insidious, crafty, very clever cellular leviathan will kill 50% of the population at some stage of their lives according to recent studies – and so it makes no sense in my opinion to keep quiet about it. I admire the way women have embraced their own particular nemesis, breast cancer, and so much strength and good has been created because women have proudly shouted their illness from the rooftops. I just wish that the male gender would shout just as loud about prostate cancer. There should be, in my view, equanimity between blue and pink.
To conclude, I continue and will always continue to fight the b****** going on in my body until it overwhelms me. I will vape, I will drink, I will eat dairy and enjoy great food. I will travel, I will soak up life’s new experiences like a child-like sponge, I will always seek out and experience new highs when I can. I will continue to love like I have never loved before and above all, I will make memories – for memories reflect the life you lived – they are the love you leave behind – they are the pictures that form in the mind’s eye when you are no longer in view. They are the whisper on the breeze when your voice is no more. They are simply priceless but cost nothing. I thank you!
Edited by member 07 Feb 2016 at 21:57
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