The true feat isn’t escaping death, rather, learning how to live.

This was originally a post over on the Hodge Board, but thought it a good enough post for here:

Well, hello!

Some of you know me a little, and some of you have no freaking clue who I am! That’s ok. I will still update you anyhow, lol.

I fell off the face of the earth this summer. The main contributing factor to that would be the prednisone. onc actually got me up to 70mg/day at one point. according to one of my nurses, that is a “very very very high dose”. I will tell you, those who don’t know, prednisone is a hell of a drug and wears you down like NOTHING!

I have had rage like a madman - screaming and screaming and screaming. i have gained 55 pounds. retained a LOT of water.

and that’s all just from the prednisone.

the chemo in general has created a lot of problems for me. constant state of, not what I would call chemobrain, but mental issues. the concept of time is still a huge problem. it’s quite lacking. my memory, which used to be impeccable, is gone. long term is mostly ok, but short term is shot. Some concepts are really hard for me to grasp. It’s sometimes hard to differentiate the truth from untruth, or real from fake, etc. I was looking at a website earlier and couldn’t tell if the website was a joke or real. I will sometimes have moments of grandeur, and sometimes my judgment falters and I can’t appropriately realistically judge a situation. ie, a really STUPID idea, that will NEVER amount to any accomplishment seems like the best idea ever.

neuropathy is bad. still today. i have gone through severe tremors, numbness, and my latest: falling. my legs will sometimes not support me and just give out…out of nowhere. I will be walking perfectly, no problems, and then down I will go. The last fall wound me up in the ER and still unable to walk completely 5 days later. (This was this past Saturday)

I have also gotten sick this week. We are trying to keep it from going to pneumonia. Severe wheezing. Cold/sinus/lung symptoms. I am on two inhalers, and my third type of antibiotic this week. If I am not better by tomorrow, I get to add another cycle of chemo, and will not be able to ave chemo tomorrow. (Been at the chemo thing since May 5th. It will be 5 months this Sunday.)

But here is the thing.

I can whine, I can complain, I can moan, and b*tch, about all of the above, but I won’t. I don’t feel that I can - fairly, as about a month ago my onc told me that, at that point, I was in partial remission. After next Friday (my last day of my 14-day straight chemo cycle) I will have another PET/CT and granted everything is okay, I will move to radiation. 3 months ahead of schedule.

Everyone…I am alive. And through everyone’s support, everyone’ prayers, modern-day medicine, and the will to survive…I am alive. I can’t say I would have had this outlook a month ago. Hell, I was probably too angry from the prednisone to know the difference, but now, looking at everything, I know - all of the above things, no matter how horrid, and how hard, it was worth it. It gave me more time to raise my children, more time to live. More time to learn how to live.

Please be with me tomorrow and pray, if you’re the praying type, that he will let me finish my chemo this next week, so that I can be done with chemo and not be too sick to have to do it again.

And to all of you going through this yourself - hang in there. It is hard, but the end is more than greater than the means!

I will close with a little quote of my own:
The true feat isn’t escaping death, rather, learning how to live.