Month: July 2018

I am one of eight kids.  Being a father of three I honestly don’t know how Mom and Dad did it.  Well, actually I DO know how they did it (yeesh!) but I am still in awe of them and their ability to have enough energy and love for all of us.  It was like a well that never seemed to run out of water.  Sure, there were plenty of punishments handed out when we went out of line but we knew that our home and our family would always be there for us.

Even though Dad always worked two jobs, he still managed to attend all of my high school football games.  To this day I don’t know how he was able to do that.  And Mom didn’t drive, yet she made it to all of my and my brother’s and sister’s important events.  And at 93 (Dad) and 87 (Mom), they are still on the job setting an example for all of us kids to learn from.

Last week they flew to Moline, IL to be there with all of us to help celebrate my little sister Santina be installed as the Pastor at the Hope United Church of Christ.  It was a great thing and we were all so proud of her.  My brother Kyle asked if that means Santina is now pastorized?  I’m sure the traveling was hard on Dad and Mom, but you wouldn’t know it by watching them.  Again, their love for the family seemed to give them superhuman strength.  I hope I have half that much energy when I get to 93 years old!  Come to think of it, I hope I make it to 93 years old!!

Yesterday our family bonds were shaken again when we heard that my older sister Gina had some sort of a stroke.  Fortunately her husband Rick was nearby and quickly got her into an ambulance and to the hospital.  After a real scare she seems to be coming out of it, slowly but surely.  Thank God!

I will tell you, you are cruising along thinking all is good when you get smacked up the side of your head from out of nowhere.  And what was the first thing anyone did?  Get word out to the family!  I think our extended family is the definition of the term “strength in numbers.”

And it all goes back to the great, loving example set so well by Mom and Dad.  Talk about having a seat reserved for them in heaven!

As you probably know, in addition to coming down with Multiple Myeloma (bone marrow cancer) sixteen years ago, I won the lottery and got Acute Myeloid Leukemia – likely caused by my Myeloma medication (!!) – a year and seven months ago.  With both cancers I have gone through some pretty tough treatments but I have come out the other end beating all of the odds.  So far.

I guess I am so used to living beyond my expiration date from the Multiple Myeloma that I do not think much about its likely eventual recurrence.  However, the possible recurrence of the Leukemia has been on my mind lately.  I am not obsessing over it and staying up nights sweating, but I do think about it once in a while and to be honest it kind of bums me out.  And with good reason since my odds are not too good.  I have been told it typically recurs with seventy-five percent of patients my age within five years.

But, and there always seems to be a “but” doesn’t there?  But I just learned yesterday from my oncologist and good friend that eighty to ninety percent of those recurrences happen within the first two years after a stem cell transplant.  And I am already one year and four months from my transplant and am currently showing no signs of Leukemia.  Yeaaa, excellent!!!  Just eight more months to go!! Wamp-wamp!!   

I know this routine.  Been there, done that. Many times!  I just need to remind myself not to dwell on it, especially because I can’t do a damn thing to change matters one way or another.  I keep telling myself to truly appreciate what I have and to do my best to be of some help to others.

Onward and upward!!

I have heard several people who have had cancer say things like “it was the best thing that ever happened to me.” While I tend to cringe when I hear a celebrity state opinions as if they are experts and NO ONE has ever felt and thought as they have, after surviving Multiple Myeloma cancer and Leukemia, I guess I qualify as someone who knows something about these matters.

Unfortunately it really is kind of true.  We normally are so busy living our lives that we rarely think about what makes our lives worth living.  But that is reality, not something to be ashamed of.  It takes a life threatening event to slap us around, grab us by the shirt collar and shake the shit out of us for us to stop and look at our lives.  Very lucky are the few people who did not have to go through this and yet they are tuned in to what really counts.

And what is it that “really counts?”  I would respectfully offer that it is family, friends and community.  Hardly anything revolutionary, but at our core I believe we are here to help others.  While it might be different for each person, I don’t think money, position, work or fame would make the list.

Gee, it sounds simple doesn’t it? Well, you try taking care of your family without money.  And good luck getting money without working for it.  I think it really comes down to making conscious, daily decisions and taking actions that serve others instead of ourselves.  They can be small things, but you will see they add up, including setting good examples for others to follow. 

I believe it was Mother Teresa who espoused this principal of “living a selfless life.”  I think the world would be a far better place if we all tried to be a little bit more like that amazing woman.

You hear that a lot, along with “sending thoughts and prayers.”  In fact, that has been so over used it has almost become a sad punchline to a bad joke.  But take it from someone who has been there, prayers do have real power.  Not that I think prayers can necessarily make instant, magical things happen.  But they do have power.

Sixteen years ago when I was at Duke having my first stem cell transplant, at one point things started going not very well.  I was getting infections when I didn’t have an immune system to fight them off.  I didn’t want to recognize it at the time, but I really was in a bad situation, even close to death.  They had parked me in the hospital while they were working on me, pumping me full of antibiotics.

That night when all was quiet, I laid awake in my hospital bed and started thinking about all of the people who were praying for me.  The list went from my large family to all of my friends.  I also remembered my friends who were teachers and had told me they were having their young students say prayers for me too.  And the list went on and on.

After a while I started having the feeling like I was at the ocean and had gone out into the water.  You know the point where you are floating in the water and bobbing up and down with the surf?  Like the water is holding you up.  That was the exact thing I was feeling.  I know this sounds very cosmic, herbal and organic, but it was a very real, physical manifestation of the power of all those prayers holding me up.

At that point I decided that I was going to get past those infections and recover, so I dragged myself out of my hospital bed – IV tubes and all – got down on my knees and said a thank you prayer for all of the people who were sending their prayers my way.  And I did recover.  And I will never forget that very real feeling of the prayers that were holding me up.

Most people don’t know how to deal with someone who has cancer.  I know it is not a matter of they don’t care, because I know they do.  But it is a ton of info to process and empathize with that a person’s life has now been turned upside down.  Even the concept of “life” is now a question.

When my brother Jeff was diagnosed with a Lymphoma, he constantly down-played everything and was very private about the details.  And he seemed to be doing okay for many years, so it was rarely discussed, which was the way Jeff seemed to want it and I was glad to go along with.

When Nancy’s Mom was diagnosed with breast cancer and later with a soft tissue tumor, we were aware of her treatments and the daily ups and downs of her condition.  However, as much as I loved Ann and worried about her, I had my own life to keep living including my job and taking care of my family.  I am kind of embarrassed to say that most times when we got into the details of Ann’s situation, I would become overwhelmed and tune everything out.  I really did care about her, it was just very hard to handle her cancer and everything that went along with it and keeping all the balls up in the air with my own life.  

While I understand all of the different forces that were at work, I did, and still do, feel guilty about how I dealt with Jeff and Ann’s cancers.

So I totally get it now that I am on the other side of the fence.  I know that people really do care when they ask how am I doing.  But now I also understand that they can only process a piece of what I am dealing with, not all of the details.  But that’s okay.  I get it.  Been there, done that. So I am very grateful for any and all concern that my family and friends have for me.

And I thank God for my wife, Nancy, who has lived my daily struggles along side of me, while managing to hold her own life together.

I am one of eight kids – more of that in a later post!  But one of the best parts of being in a large family was the very close bond that I had with my brother Jeff (who was one year younger than me) and my brother Kyle (who was three years younger than me). We spent the first fourteen years of our lives either wrestling and fighting with each other, or running around in circles and getting into some sort of trouble together.  That must be why Mom has a halo and a spot reserved for her in heaven.

But one of the best things in the world, though, was when we were kids, Dad was one of the early musicians working at Disneyland.  This meant that during many days in the summer, Dad and a couple of his friends could get me, Jeff and Kyle into the park for free.  As fourteen thru eleven year olds, it was a dream come true to be able to spend all day together, roaming around Disneyland.  We discovered every nook and cranny of that place.  We never got into trouble, but we became experts on all of the little known spots in the park.

At that time they used tickets to get on the rides, and we had the books with A through E tickets.  E tickets were for the really cool rides like the Haunted Mansion and the A tickets were for the dumb rides like the street trolleys.  Needless to say, by the end of the summers we would have drawers full of unused A tickets.

We had so much fun, especially because we were doing it together.  We always got to stay late enough with Dad to see the fireworks show.  And we had jobs and some money at that point, mostly from paper routes, so we could buy lunch and dinners.  It was especially fun to go to the Golden Horseshoe Revue and watch the show with Dad playing drums in the band and eat a hamburger lunch.

As we grew up, Jeff, Kyle and my feelings of closeness ebbed and reformed over the years.  Having families of our own tended to keep us apart more than we liked, but that was life.  

Then the real earthquake hit three years ago when Jeff died suddenly from complications arising from his long time fight with Lymphoma.  Yesterday was his birthday and the hole in my heart still hasn’t healed – and probably never will.  He was a very special man, husband and father.  But he was and will always be one of my little brothers and my best friend.