My “Courageous” battle with cancer part 4
Before I begin I have been contacted a while ago by David Haas. I do not know the gentleman nor (in the words of radio stations everywhere) do I endorse what he has to say. He has asked me to attach the link below to his blog on cancer and says there is valuable information for anybody interested.
This commercial announcement has been brought to you by… (David don’t be offended I cope with life through humor)
After a long absence I’m back. It became very difficult for me to write for a while. I’ve been thinking about why and came up with two theories and both are partly true.
Firstly, I can’t tell you how many times people have told me, “well at least after your experience you know what’s important and wont sweat about the unimportant things in life anymore.” As if because I had cancer and looked death in the face I don’t have to earn a living, feed, clothe and shelter my family.
Hey so what if the factory screws up an order and my customer is having a stroke, I had cancer and lived. So what if someone is acting like a fool and upsets me, I had cancer and lived. So what if the economy tanks and people stop spending money on jewelry, I had cancer and lived. You get the picture. I guess I feel if I keep writing about it I should be able to rise above such “petty” things and I can’t. After all how can I go on with life as if nothing happened because I had cancer and lived? I felt guilty and believed that the less I thought about it the easier it was to go on with life as “normal”. Writing about my experiences would only make things even more real.
Secondly, three people from my SHUL, Rabbi Bald, Yossi Weiss and Mrs. Gradstein were diagnosed with cancer at about the same time as me. They are all dead. Close to his end I went to visit Rabbi Bald with Rabbi Herbst and some others from the SHUL. He looked at me and with what little strength he had he hugged me and started to cry and told me to be strong for both of us.
However I was just fooling myself there is nothing normal about life after cancer, there are aches, pains and the specter of the return of the cancer with me and my loved ones twenty four / seven.
On the other hand I’m about as deep as a cucumber and really should not try to delve too deeply into emotions. It really doesn’t work well for me.
Radiation: The Gift That Keeps Giving
As I mentioned earlier in part one I found out that the radiation can be hell on teeth, jawbones and gums. I thought I knew all about it. WRONG! It took the dentist almost two hours to pull the tooth. The radiation made my whole mouth, jawbone and teeth, so brittle the dentist couldn’t get a grip on my tooth without it breaking.
When I talked to him about implants (no breast joke) he said my jawbone might be too brittle. The only way we’ll know for sure is through trial and error. Yay with extra yay sauce!
Another wonderful gift of the radiation AND the surgery turned out to be “frozen shoulder”. No my shoulder wasn’t cold, I lost 80 -90% of the range of motion in my left shoulder. This too was a new and exciting experience. Dr. Halmos sent me to a shoulder specialist. I went to see him on a Friday afternoon and he promptly scared the living daylights out of me. He sent me for X-rays, looked over my chart and gushed for about five minutes in a high sing song voice about how strong a man I am and how remarkable I was to be even walking and not curled up in a ball at home. Then he looked at the X-rays and says “It looks like the cancer might have metastasized into the bone of your shoulder.” He said the only way we would know for sure was if I went for an MRI however the earliest he could get me in was Wednesday.
“But don’t worry,” he said, “go, have a good time enjoy your work and I’ll see you on Thursday.” RIIIIGGHHHTTT!
Of course I didn’t tell anybody. They had gone through enough with me in the last hell of a year and we didn’t know anything for sure.
Finally on Wednesday morning I did what I should have done right away, I called Dr. Halmos. After listening to what I told him he said not to worry, the brand of cancer I had does not attack bones only tissue.
Sure enough the MRI proved him right and I was sent to another doctor who promptly diagnosed me with “frozen shoulder”. Both doctors asked me the same question, how the lack of range impacted my life. I told them both that I couldn’t even wipe myself. The second doctor asked me why I didn’t use my right hand to wipe myself. Silly rabbit, I needed my right hand to hold the book.
He then set me up for physical therapy, a new and fun experience. As I call it, Physical Torture. All kidding aside, it helped immensely.
Sorry its so short but I will try my best to keep up with this
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