Skiing

Today was chemo #4 (aka - the second chemo treatment in cycle #2). It wasn't eventful accept that Eric, our infusion nurse and I had a great time. I chose to have my infusion in the chair instead of the hospital bed; Eric therefore had a wonderful time (joking all the way) sprawling out on the hospital bed - shoes off, hands behind the head ... He thought he would wake up with an ABVD treatment only he called it ABDM or something of the sort.... wrong chemo pal. It was super fun. So since there isn't a ton to tell you about today, I thought I'd take you on a ski trip (I'm trying desperately to use a metaphor for my lymphoma journey ... hearing that metaphors are good writing and all ... dude. Try to bare with me. )

1. THE BUNNY HILL - I had such a wonderful 4 days leading up to this treatment (I felt like myself --- great!) that I struggled to WANT to go to chemo today. At such a point my choices are clear. Option 1: Don't have chemo. Hodgkin's Lymphoma is a fast growing cancer which makes chemotherapy effective as chemo attacks fast growing cells. It is easy (easy is of course the wrong word) for the drugs to spot the fast-growing cancer cells of Hodgkin's from the normal cells and to kill them. On the other hand, a fast-growing cancer without treatment would kill someone within a year (now that's a total load of you know what. I read it "somewhere" but have no idea where and I can't re find the data online. However, I do know my uncle died fairly quickly in 1956.) Option 2 - Have Chemo. I chose option 2 obviously. Is anyone singing the Jon Bon Jovi song Dead or Alive? "I'm wanted ... WANTED ... Dead of A ....live." yes yes.. it's too much. I digress. This Bunny Hill is too easy... let's move on.

2. THE BLUE SQUARE (a step up from the bunny hill; it can get steep at times) - We already chose to go to chemo (You could also think of it as choosing to not get hit by the bus barrelling our way while walking to work.... same same) What's next? Next, is not just wanting to live, but showing our body how much we want to live. Is there anything else we can do for our own health? For example, did you get an annual exam this year? Have you gone to the Dentist lately? Are you eating 5 servings of fruit and veg every day? The questions I've been asking myself is what else can I do to ensure a long life. Basically, the answer is that I can't ensure anything, but there are a few things I can do to help make me feel as though I have a little control over my fate(though not a lot of control) I can try to take care of my health by eating great, excercising, and keeping my sanity through meditation, family, friends, and community.

First, eating. I've always wanted to know how to make the glop they eat on the movie The Matrix. They describe it as the perfect food with the perfect number of nutrients. It sure would take all the guesswork out of meal time. I've thought about and talked to my health care team about Juicing and the Budwig Diet (cottage cheese and flax seed oil). These two diets are the closest I've seen to the glop from the Matrix. It turns out that some parts of these practices can interfere with an immune-system specific cancer like lymphoma. The research and my health care professions are telling me steer clear from the Budwig Diet, but I can juice any cooked or peeled vegetable. Any other vegetable could bring bacteria with it and cause more harm than good. In addition to juicing, I am going to make sure the rest of my diet is basically as perfect as possible. No granulated sugar, lots of fruits and vegetables, lots of warm foods (this is a Chinese recommendation regarding cancer) whole grains, nuts, bean, lentils, a large variety of healthy food of all colors etc etc ... and although controversial .. I'm eating all organic. (Side note: I've talked to several Hodgkin's patients who are doing or have done a variety of things to conquer the blue diamond ski slope. Some are exercising more, some have chosen the best oncologist in the US and are traveling to see him, some are vegan/vegetarian, some are taking more herbs, some are eating normally - whatever that means for them. There are as many ways to feel like we've conquered the blue diamond ski slope as there are patients. )

The rest of the ways I've thought about controlling the outcome of my encounter with lymphoma is meditation/prayer, family /friend and community. During meditation, I've been telling my body how much I want to live and why I want to live (sounds hokey, but hey... it can't hurt ... just don't expect me to talk to my cells in front of you! If you can tell me whether they respond better to emails, VMs, SMS text, or google messenger, I'd appreciate the tip) In other words, After the weeds are pulled by the chemo (aka cancer cells), I'm trying to fertilize the healthy cells in my body by talking to them and letting them know that I want to live.

Family/friends/community is still a work in progress. Basically, it's me being overwhelmed by the onslaught of amazing people in our world. I am being cradled and loved by the community around me and I'm just sucking it in and enjoying it. Good family and friends sure do put me in the right frame of mind to fight cancer. (I will learn from this and change who I am ... it's already starting, but for now, I'm absorbing and learning to accept my community's generosity.)

In summary, we're talking about Mohammad saying "Pray to Allah, but tie your horse." I want to help god and my heath care professionals fight lymphoma by tying my horse. To do this, I am eating certain foods, surrounding myself with loving people, and staying in the right frame of mind.

3. DOUBLE BLACK DIAMOND - (Hardest hill on the mountain. I always go down the double blacks but I never look pretty doing it.) Once I've chosen to take action by going to chemo, then I do whatever I can do to stay in the right frame of mind, to feed my body the best nutrients possible and to make sure my body knows how much I want to live, and last but most importantly, I "Let go and Let god." It's out of my control at this point. The prayer I say (or try to say) is that the universe has the final say and it "knows" a lot more than I do. My job is to get out of the way, believe in the next step whatever that step is, and be gracious ... whatever the outcome. Like I said --- it's a double black diamond, but I'm so stoked (ecstatic) to be able to point my skies down it ... it's usually quite a trip.