Walking With a Lymph

I should really be coming up with something snarky and irreverent to write, and I don't want to enumerate poultry, but I think I'll let this one stand on its own. ---------------------  From: HU , BEI MD  To: LEVINE, STEVEN MARK  Cc: HOLLIFIELD , WHITNEY S;  Sent: 1/24/2022 10:38:05 EST  Subject: General Message  Hi Mr. Levine, Just wanted to let you know the great news of your pet/ct which showed a complete metabolic remission. This is the best response we could hope for. We will still need to do 3 more cycles of the RCHOP. We can talk more about your pet/ct in detail at the visit tomorrow but wanted to let you know the good news in advance.  Best,  Bei Hu, MD

"my hairy ear"  by  prazz  is licensed under  CC BY-NC 2.0 When you have Cancer, all your hair falls out except for ear hair. Ear hair feeds off the Cancer. It grows stronger, more resilient. Ear hair will survive a nuclear apocalypse. Like a cockroach. Ear hair is the cockroach of hair. I also have a new symptom, Neuropathy. While that sounds like some sort of super-cool mind control ability, it’s really just tingly fingers, and I have it all the time. It’s what I imagine Peter Parker’s spidey-sense feels like, but instead of telling me when danger is imminent, it’s just fucking annoying. It also feels like my feet are falling asleep, which is helpful when the Prednisone keeps me awake - at least my feet are getting a good night’s sleep. Neuropathy is a known side-effect of Vincristine, one of my Chemo drugs. Dr. Hu told me that it usually pops up around the fourth or fifth treatment. Being the over-achiever that I am, mine kicked in after the third. There’s really...

“I love you, but you’re going to have to shave that beard.”  I was lying in bed when these words were spoken to me. Though it was not my own bed, I was naked from the waist down save for two pairs of socks, and had only met the man speaking to me the day prior. My wife was there, too, but she was just watching. The sudden announcement was surprising because I was already prepped, and the CNA was ready to administer the sleepy-go-bye-bye meds. Truth be told, I was in surgery about two weeks earlier than anticipated because my surgeon, the man I had met one day earlier, had a cancellation. So, even though my beard was hard to miss, it had escaped any sort of pre-op conversations that would have otherwise been routine. They brought me hospital clippers, and I raced from the pre-op room to the bathroom with my wife valiantly trying to hold my hospital gown closed from behind, ass cheeks flapping in the breeze nonetheless. A nurse lined the sink with a towel, and I proceeded to shave my...

I have always said that once I had kids, I became a better actor because my emotions lived so much closer to the surface. If that's true, then this shit should make me fucking Olivier. I've had numerous moments of emotional fragility over the past couple of months. It’s usually been when I’ve had more questions than answers, and when I’m home alone with nothing to occupy my mind. (Showers are particularly bad.) I do best with information, but I’m being very particular as to where I get it. I’ve been avoiding Dr. Google like, well, Cancer. I’ve also avoided legitimate sites like the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society , or National Cancer Institute . Nor do I pour over the voluminous handouts the various healthcare professionals give me. I figure I’ll only understand about 10% of what I read, and the other 90% will send me in to a tailspin. They enumerate all possibilities from the best-case scenarios to the worst, and one’s mind never fixates on the best, “Clearly, based on what I re...