People talk about fighting cancer; in some cases I am sure that is true. What has been and continues to be most maddening about this to me is that there is nothing I can do, directly, to fight it, to beat it back, to defeat it. Yeah, I can maintain a healthy diet and keep myself in best shape as I can physically and yes these do make and keep me healthy and strong overall but they do nothing to directly affect the cancer itself. The analogy I've often used is rehabbing an injury, or setting and letting heal a broken bone; thru specific and targeted exercises and therapy over time that injury can be strengthened and healed, by setting a broken bone and doing whatever it is needed to do (again, therapy, or even simply staying off of it) to mend it I can. I can do those things, directly. But with this... the only real thing I do that directly impacts and- hopefully- beats back the cancer is to sit in a Barcalounger in a clinic every two weeks and get pumped full of poisons. I know I drive my med people crazy obsessing over this but it is the lack of personal ability to and personal control over what I can do to help beat this thing back that is so maddening. It's not their care that I'm disappointed with; I'm receiving the best care and treatment that I could ask for, by truly committed and compassionate people. But it's just that- receiving- rather than doing something pro-actively that directly affects and, again, hopefully improves my condition that is perhaps the most frustrating thing about all of this.
Closing in on one year it is still difficult to accept that I cannot be in control over this, that I cannot, thru my own efforts, beat and defeat this thing, that I'm at the mercy of others and the effectiveness of what they alone do for me. I suppose I have to figure out how to deal with and accept that, frustrating as it is. I'm not letting what I cannot do interfere with what I can do (to paraphrase John Wooden)- I just would like to be able to do more, from my end.
Hell, maybe it's just the weather here today...
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