Reasons To Be Cheerful, Parts 13-20

In order to try to counteract the woe-is-me vibe of the last couple posts, I felt like another "Reasons To Be Cheerful" entry was in order. This is Thanksgiving week, after all. If I needed a good reminder to be thinking more about gratitude than personal anxieties, this is surely it.

13 - I should probably begin by saying that I'm very grateful to be alive. That might sound intentionally dramatic but, when we first got the "Stage 4: incurable, metastatic prostate cancer" diagnosis back in March, we were so scared that we weren't sure if I'd make it to the end of the year. I'm very grateful to still be here.

My wife's love and caring for me during this process initially prompted me to write a journal entry called, 'My Hero', back in April. Then, when I stumbled on the idea for posts like this, she was actually my #1 Reason To Be Cheerful back in June. However, It didn't feel right to now say something like, "I already mentioned my wife, so let's move on." There is literally no way I could be doing any of this without her. She has done so much for me during this battle, from making sure I eat well to helping manage my appointments and medications to holding me tight when the going got really rough and/or I got really down. She has showed me so much love and encouragement every single day that I am eternally grateful to have her by my side during all this. 

My daughter has been great through all this, too, although she no longer lives at home. It has been scary for her to see her dad so sick but she continues to be strong, loving, and supportive. I'm so proud of the young woman she has become.

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Similarly, I'm still grateful for all my previous "Reasons To Be Cheerful", but I won't repeat those here. Instead, I'll list some new(ish) gratitudes...

14 - I will be forever grateful to the friends who have visited me, sent heartfelt cards, gifts, messages of encouragement Facebook or Messenger, and generally supplied me with pats on the back as I went through chemotherapy. I don't think I can ever repay what that has meant to me.

15 - I'm SO thankful that the chemo is over, at least for now.

16 - I'm relieved that all the treatments I've received have been successful. 

17 - My doctors feel that I won't need any more poking and prodding until the end of January. ... Is that the same as #16?

18 - I'm grateful for the times when I have the energy to get outside and be in nature. The relative rarity of those times makes me appreciate them even more.

19 - All of the enforced "down time" I've experienced this year has reminded me of the value of slowing down and doing nothing at times. Just being quiet and alone with the thoughts in my head. That's got to be a form of meditation. I didn't realize I had lost the ability to do that until the chemo forced me to recognize it again.

20 - All of my enforced "down time" has allowed me to reconnect with music in ways that I haven't been able to for a while. My listening habits had become somewhat cursory and much less intentional in recent years. Lots of listening on the go but very little listening with the intent to fully absorb. Having little else that I could do this year has refocused and improved my relationship with music.

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The title for this particular series of posts was inspired by the delightful song from Ian Dury & The Blockheads called, "Reasons To Be Cheerful, Part 3". It came out when I was in high school around 1980 and was supposedly written in the aftermath of a near-death accident where a lighting roadie of the band's was electrocuted. It's actually a happy song, though, because even when Ian Dury went dark he still wrote fun songs.

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 For reference:  Reasons To Be Cheerful, Parts 11 & 12

Chemo Flashbacks and Dread

It's been almost a month since my last journal entry, and almost two months since my last chemo infusion. It would be nice to say that I'm feeling so much better now but I can't. I'm still very weak and have almost no stamina. I still need my cane for stabilization because my balance is atrocious. My issues right now could be due to the lingering effects of chemo, the testosterone inhibitors that I'm still on, or the fact that I've had almost no significant exercise since February (10 months ago). 

What's most likely is that the fault lies in some combination of the three.

In addition to still being very weak and tired, I seem to be having all sorts of nerve misfires these days. I've been calling them "chemo flashbacks" since the chemo really messed with my nerves and caused numerous problems throughout my body. Many of them are less severe now, but I still can't get used to them. Sometimes...

• I'll get some neuropathy (uncomfortable tingling) in my hands. 
• It will feel like someone is using my heel or big toe as a pincushion. 
• One of my eyelids will just start flickering like crazy. 
• It will feel like someone is jabbing me with something sharp.
  

The list goes on, unfortunately. The chemo brought these things on before and they often lasted for torturous lengths of time. Now, they are much shorter in duration but seem to happen much more frequently.

Then there are the hot flashes. I wasn't really sure if these were caused by the chemo or the lack of testosterone under my other meds. There are some days when they're few and far between but other days (like today) where I've probably had a dozen hot flashes through the day. Although I know my body is still trying to clear out the chemo drugs, I'm leaning more and more toward blaming the hormone meds for the hot flashes. It's a disappointing conclusion because I'll probably have to be on the hormone drugs for the rest of my life. (This cancer feeds on testosterone.)

Honestly, though, I feel like the main reason I haven't written in a while is depression from dwelling over the word that has been repeated over and over by my team of medical professionals... "incurable". I'd like to think, after everything I've been through since February, that I'd be "cured". Such is not the case and, even though doctors have been telling me that since the start, the reality of it still brings me down. It didn't help that I recently read about a guy who had the same cancer, a similar level of metastasis, battled it until he thought he had it beat, then it came back even worse a year later. 

People often talk about the physical issues associated with this battle, but not always about the mental and emotional ones. I'm not even sure I'm ready to talk about it here. I am, however, grateful to have a very open and communicative relationship with my wife and daughter, as well as friends who check in and send me messages of encouragement and love. Both have helped me navigate through this post-chemo darkness in my head. It's still there but at least I'm starting to feel like I'm starting to see some light.

The weirdest aspect of the depression is how it took me by surprise. I thought for sure that I had been through the worst (mentally and physically) and that the clouds were going to lift and I'd start feeling (mentally and physically) much better. Instead, I've gone into what my mom used to call "a funk" over the idea that I still have cancer and that it will still try to kill me. 

Not might... will.

How does anybody handle that kind of weight? I'm in the process of trying to figure that out. One thing I do know is that dying suddenly without any type of warning is definitely the way to go out. There's a heck of a lot of dread involved in knowing you've got a problem that is going to eventually kill you.