Four year and a day ago, a bunch of people in hospital scrubs tied me down to a bed and rolled me, kicking and screaming, into an operating room so they could fish around in my gut to find out if I had a left kidney they could dissect. Yep, four years and that kidney is still missing from my left side. It hasn’t magically grown back which means I am still a bit lop-sided.
Ok. I suppose I should be serious for a moment - if that is at all possible. A tumor had been found, cancer had been diagnosed and the kidney had to go. So, it went - on April 28, 2021.
One of the things that is similar to four years ago (and every year since) would be the forsythia bush near the southwest corner of the house. It is in bloom. Actually, it is on the tail end of the bloom season this year - but there are some flowers hanging on.
Despite my own cancer journey, Spring still comes and flowers still bloom. Almost as if cancer doesn’t matter. And maybe it doesn’t for people who haven’t been touched by it.
People and families who have experienced cancer, on the other hand, often count them among some of the most dramatic and traumatic of their experiences. And they handle it in all sorts of ways.
Publicly, I did my best to downplay the whole thing as much as I could. When asked, I held out the hope that the imaging could have been wrong. And when the doctor told me that the first biopsy came back clean, I felt vindicated in that hope. Unfortunately my sense of relief was only given half a moment to inflate because the doctor deflated it a moment later. Apparently, he didn’t have confidence that they had sampled from the correct location.
I don’t know about you, but I’m still not entirely sure I know how to feel about someone shoving a sharp needle into me and not knowing EXACTLY where it was going. And when I say exactly, I mean precisely and without error. I don’t relish the idea of being that sort of pincushion.
Heck, I don’t really know how I should feel about someone taking a chunk out of my kidney even if they do know exactly where they’re going.
Don’t get me wrong. I actually hold medical professionals in high regard. I am fully aware of exactly how hard it must be to take a biopsy from an internal organ with the least amount of disruption possible. But that doesn’t mean I am not allowed to feel the feelings and worry the worries.
Of course, the second biopsy went exactly where the image said there was a problem. And, yes, it came back positive for renal cancer.
Now that it was clear there were no other reasonable options, I settled into a combination of resignation and a simmering resentment. That resentment was directed unfairly at the medical profession, in general, because they were going to turn what I felt was a relatively healthy me into one that was not going to be feeling very good at all.
And underneath it all was a growing sense that I was a person that disliked roller coasters and I was just about to descend the steepest part of the ride… and I wasn’t strapped in properly.
If you don’t understand these feelings, maybe you haven’t experienced cancer. Or maybe you would use different words and highlight different feelings if you have.
Looking in the rearview mirror
One week before surgery, I wrote:
The recovery time that follows is bound to be frustrating as I realize I will be unable to do many of the things I am used to doing on the farm in the month of May. So, we're trying to do everything we can to prepare - and we're trying to do everything else that we feel we want to have done before surgery too.
It's not possible and we know it.
So, we will do what we always do. We will come to the realization that some things will get done and others will not. Our goals will shrink each day as we identify things we hoped to do that are no longer feasible. I'll berate myself for the half hour I spent with my eyes closed in a chair because I felt tired at midday. I'll question my efficiency and my choices for the tasks I elected to do. And, hopefully, I'll find myself in that special zone that lasts for two to three days and things on the task list get done, one after the other.
Sometimes, when we look into the future, we actually get it right...
Yes, I was almost constantly frustrated as I went through recovery. And, yes, as the days moved forward and the surgery loomed ever closer, our goals were reduced by necessity. But, happily, I was able to put on a very big push and many things got done.
A few weeks after the surgery, I reflected on all of the falsehoods we like to tell ourselves about recovery from injuries, illness, or surgery:
There was no way you can get ahead of everything before a major event like this - even if you do give it a valiant effort.
I wasn't really able to “take it easy” during recovery. I couldn’t enjoy reading or most other quiet activities I like for at least two weeks after surgery. In fact, I would NOT call that period of time restful. Instead, it was a lot of work. And, it mostly just exercised my tolerance for delayed gratification. Once I actually was able to read, etc, I had to get back to work. There was no “rest up so you can get better” time.
And no. Most of the world kept on walking as I tied my shoe. That left me trying to double-step to catch back up as soon as I was able.
When we tell another person to "be nice to themselves" and "take time to recover," it always sounds so pleasant. The fact of the matter is this: It is TRUE that we need to take time to recover and we need to give ourselves permission to do so. But, it is NOT necessarily true that the process is at all nice, or at all relaxing, or... frankly... at all desirable (other than the hope that full recovery will eventually be reached).
Maybe we need to say things like, "give yourself permission to focus only on the work that comes with healing." Or, "it's okay to feel frustrated or a bit down while you are recovering, but don't give up!" And, "remind yourself that is okay to ask for help, even if you really don't want it sometimes."
Recovery for the few days after the surgery was played out in fifteen minute increments.
Fifteen minutes in the chair in the recovery room.
Fifteen minutes standing in the recovery room.
Fifteen minutes pacing in the room, dragging all of the various post-surgery accoutrements with me.
Fifteen minutes in the chair with my head back, thinking, I have to sleep.
Waking up and thinking, "HA! I got some sleep!"
Then looking at the clock and seeing...
yep, 15 minutes had passed.
I would like to tell myself that this will never happen again, but I suspect that we all will have times in our lives where this is the way things will go. Fifteen minutes of survival, followed by fifteen minutes of survival.. and none of it terribly pleasant. At least I had the promise that this was very unlikely to be permanent - and that was very important to me.
On the positive side, I was given the gift celebration when things that I had taken for granted prior to surgery were returned to me.
The night I was able to sleep in my own bed after a few days in a recliner wasn’t perfect, but it was worthy of note. Walking out to Crazy Maurice the willow tree and back was a huge accomplishment.
But early on, the accomplishments might sound ridiculous to those who are healthy. Once I was home, I put some music quietly on a continuous loop and it became a constant companion to see me through each cycle of survival. The moment I woke up after sleeping for MORE than fifteen minutes at a time made me ridiculously happy and optimistic for my future. And I actually "celebrated" having a bowel movement!
But it was all progress. And I was gifted with that progress on a regular basis - and for that I am grateful.
And, looking back, I am humbled by the help provided by friends and the well-wishes sent through the mail. All of these things were critical components of what I think could be called a "rapid recovery period" even if I constantly chafed at what I felt was a terribly slow process.
The longer road to recovery
For weeks after the surgery I continued to struggle to regain my concentration and energy levels. In 2021, at the end of May, I tried to put in words what it was like:
This tired is a special kind of tired that people who have had similar surgeries might understand. The brain just kind of ... refuses... to do more. In a little bit, it will just flip a switch and I'll be asleep. That's pretty odd for me, as I am typically a light sleeper and it usually takes a while to wind down so I can sleep.
This is something I no longer must deal with, thank goodness. But, it actually took me several months (maybe as much as a half year) before I could say I hadn't felt that way recently. Sure, I can get tired and fall to sleep quickly now. But, it's not the same thing as the kind of tired I was attempting to explain here. This was a tired where there was no choice in the matter. I was done and my brain and body weren't having any more of whatever I was doing. If I didn't get to a place where I could rest, it would all shut down and I would be resting wherever it was that I WAS at that moment.
Hey! Why is Rob curled up next to the parsley? Eh, don’t mind him, his body just told him he had to sleep now.
The good news is that I rapidly learned the symptoms of when my body and brain were about to quit so I could get where I needed to be and/or let Tammy know what was going on.
Yet another thing to be grateful for.
Through it all, Tammy was the ultimate Guardian Dragon. I suspect she felt as tired - or more tired - than I did at times.
But, this year, we don't have to deal with this sort of thing! And, today, I'm going to leave you with the thoughts that I wrote on the day prior to surgery - to be published on the day of surgery:
I hope you will be well. Be kind to each other. Remember to stop and greet the flowers when they dress up for you. Nod a greeting to the bees as they pass you by on their way to work. Skritch a cat and provide them with taxi service if they ask and you are able. Patiently listen to a tree as it takes the time to use all of the words it needs to describe something to you. Really listen to some music or to a bird sing. Watch the sunrise or the sunset. Do what you do with integrity and show empathy for others. Work hard and take care of yourself. Learn something new. Share something you enjoy with someone else. Listen carefully and think well.
And, be the voice that tells someone else that they are loved.
Thanks, Rob, for this thoughtful, sensitive recap of that episode in your life. It is especially helpful now because so many of us know someone who is in that journey. And your closing paragraph is one everyone should read, ponder and adopt.
Amazing. Thank you!