Friday night it was time for the second round or poison to go through my body.
The same poison that is supposed to kill the good cells and the bad cells. We
hope it will pass over the good ones…the poison entered in the afternoon, after
they gave me something that knocked me out and I slept until morning. Saturday
and Sunday passed relatively quietly, and I was even allowed visitors…(thank to
all those who came and gave me strength!)
This week a friend who visited asked how I fell. He emphasized that he didn’t mean physically, but mentally. This question brought me to a new understanding. These two planes, the physical feeling and the mental feeling, which typically coexist side by side, can’t exist together as it relates to my personal battle. You all understand, this is how it works – the third day of chemo brought with it the side effects – a choking sensation in my throat and a feeling of exile that I feel side by side, dryness of mouth, a general terrible feeling and a loss of appetite and so forth. I got up and it was there. And then I understood – the awful physical feeling cannot be connected and not even slightly to my mental state. If I connect them, Cancer will win another “v” in its corner, and I will have another “v” in the losses column. And that simply cannot be.
What does one do in this situation? Try to define a daily victory – and that is what I did. I decided that instead of lying in bed and surrendering to the side effects, I would get up and shower, and thus remove the feeling from my body, and start the day with my small victory. I don’t have the privilege to lie in bed several days, like we did when we were just sick, and be spoiled with another disease. I am obligated to move forward, slowly and determinedly, and to continue to fight. Surrender is not an option. Not to the side effects and not to the disease.
My friends in the ward continue to come and talk to me, to hear a bit about my daily realizations that I sharewith them. I continue to tell them that if we focus on why the disease attacked us as individuals, we lose vital energies that instead should be directed towards how we can overcome the disease and remove it from our bodies. This isn’t easy. It is a long process. And I continue and demonstrate the process in a sentence that I really love: “A drop of water doesn’t carve through stone by virtue of its own strength, but due to its perseverance.” A central element is perseverance. Being consistent. Getting up in the morning, opening the window, turning on the light, opening the soul and not allowing oneself to succumb to the feeling of sickness. Obviously, some days are more difficult, but I believe they can also be a bit better if we know how to manage them correctly. I’m still learning, I admit.
The side effects this round, meanwhile, aren’t necessarily similar to those after the last round. My body is a bit weaker, because it has already experienced one round of the poison. But mentally, there is no chance that the cancer will mark a “V” in its victory column. Not this round, and not the next one. Because that’s how it is in life – it is too dear not to fight. The meaning of what we do with our lives is too dear to me to let a foreign element enter my body and subdue it. And that is why perseverance is so important. That is why I continue to fight each and every day – and fight the small fights in this big war.
This week a friend who visited asked how I fell. He emphasized that he didn’t mean physically, but mentally. This question brought me to a new understanding. These two planes, the physical feeling and the mental feeling, which typically coexist side by side, can’t exist together as it relates to my personal battle. You all understand, this is how it works – the third day of chemo brought with it the side effects – a choking sensation in my throat and a feeling of exile that I feel side by side, dryness of mouth, a general terrible feeling and a loss of appetite and so forth. I got up and it was there. And then I understood – the awful physical feeling cannot be connected and not even slightly to my mental state. If I connect them, Cancer will win another “v” in its corner, and I will have another “v” in the losses column. And that simply cannot be.
What does one do in this situation? Try to define a daily victory – and that is what I did. I decided that instead of lying in bed and surrendering to the side effects, I would get up and shower, and thus remove the feeling from my body, and start the day with my small victory. I don’t have the privilege to lie in bed several days, like we did when we were just sick, and be spoiled with another disease. I am obligated to move forward, slowly and determinedly, and to continue to fight. Surrender is not an option. Not to the side effects and not to the disease.
My friends in the ward continue to come and talk to me, to hear a bit about my daily realizations that I sharewith them. I continue to tell them that if we focus on why the disease attacked us as individuals, we lose vital energies that instead should be directed towards how we can overcome the disease and remove it from our bodies. This isn’t easy. It is a long process. And I continue and demonstrate the process in a sentence that I really love: “A drop of water doesn’t carve through stone by virtue of its own strength, but due to its perseverance.” A central element is perseverance. Being consistent. Getting up in the morning, opening the window, turning on the light, opening the soul and not allowing oneself to succumb to the feeling of sickness. Obviously, some days are more difficult, but I believe they can also be a bit better if we know how to manage them correctly. I’m still learning, I admit.
The side effects this round, meanwhile, aren’t necessarily similar to those after the last round. My body is a bit weaker, because it has already experienced one round of the poison. But mentally, there is no chance that the cancer will mark a “V” in its victory column. Not this round, and not the next one. Because that’s how it is in life – it is too dear not to fight. The meaning of what we do with our lives is too dear to me to let a foreign element enter my body and subdue it. And that is why perseverance is so important. That is why I continue to fight each and every day – and fight the small fights in this big war.
