I’m Not Dead Yet (I.N.D.Y.)

Well, here it is: my last day of treatment of this stage of my cancer. Like a good pavlovian dog, I started feeling nauseous as soon as I got in the car to come to the hospital. Now, I may have mentioned that in times past I have had difficulty with the parking garage, or the wait to get treatment, or the side effects after treatment. Debra, a good friend, suggested that instead of letting these things bother me, I should just accept the fact that chemo sucks and just expect a generally sucky day when going for chemo. The nice thing, that little pep talk helped; I have been (somewhat) less annoyed at the parking garage (though, I continue to be surprised that some people think a Ford Escalade is a compact vehicle). Moreover, I have been much less upset by the process of getting my labs drawn and getting treatment. Just that simple reframing really helped.  Nevertheless ,when I got to the hospital today, though, the parking garage fairy was looking down on me and a car was pulling out of the FIRST parking space as I was pulling into the garage! *SNAP*

I have to say, though, that I am feeling particularly angst-y with this last treatment.  This treatment represents the last thing I am scheduled to actively do to fight the cancer (beyond the general eating right, exercising, taking my vitamins, and saying my prayers — some of you might get that odd reference).  Moving forward, my fight with cancer becomes passive; I live my life, keeping up hope, but there are no plans to have any other treatments unless something shows up on a CT scan.  The other day, my friend Karen, called me a Type A personality (actually, I think she said I was a laid back Type A — which seems very similar to calling someone an uptight Type B person).  At any rate, I am not sure I agree with that assessment, but I do know that I don’t like waiting, but for all intents and purposes, that’s what I’ll be doing from here on out.

On a happier note, I’m wearing one of my birthday presents today: a t-shirt MaryBeth designed (using an inkjet printer and iron-on transfer). On the front, there’s a picture of me in my “I’m not dead yet” t-shirt with the phrase, “Merle, you just finished chemo. Whacha gonna do?” On the back, there is a picture of Cinderella’s castle and the phrase, “I’m going to Disney World.” I felt it was particularly appropriate to wear this t-shirt to my last chemo treatment.

Tomorrow, the family and I will load into the car (when the boys get home from school) and start our drive to Valdosta, GA (which is a little more than half-way between our house and Disney World. We’ll drive the remaining distance on Friday and begin our adventures in Kissimmee.

In preparing for our trip, I have read many different Disney-based message forums and uniformly I remain in awe at how obsessive some of the people going to Disney can be. For example, there are the people who include all the different dates they have gone and resorts they have stayed at over the years as part of their signature. Now, I do understand going to the same vacation spot yearly (though, I tend not to do this), but one of the things that makes Disney “magical” is that we haven’t gone a lot. It’s a special trip and something that our kids will hopefully remember fondly for years to come (I mean, that’s a major reason why we are going — so the whole family can have this magical vacation in the event that I respond less than optimally to this treatment).

Despite my lack of picture blogging thus far, my goal for this trip is to blog daily about our adventures, including pictures.  You can be sure I’ll be taking the pictures; hopefully, I’ll be able to get them on the web.  In the meantime, thank you, as always, for joining me on this journey.  I enjoy this particular milestone all the more knowing all of you are there supporting me.

Merle

Tags: Bibbity Bobbity Boo, Main // 1 Comment »