Saturday I learned that one of my dearest friends has inoperable pancreatic cancer. Even in this day of improving cancer treatments, the odds on that particular type are … well, better than the odds of winning MegaMillions, but worse than almost every other type of cancer.
On the good side, she’s got a partner who loves her and is capable of taking care of her. She’s also got one of the world’s great daughters, who flew thousands of miles to be here as soon as she heard.
But all things considered, that’s not much of a good side.
It occurs to me that among the many, many hells of having cancer is being forced to deal with friends who are well-meaning but don’t know whether to give you space or smother you with love, offers of help, casseroles, egregious advice on alternative therapies, and weeping.
—–
Saturday I was angry-numb. Sunday, too. No Easter rebirth in these parts. Angry about J’s cancer. Angry at feeling unable to help. Then angry at myself for being so self-centered when my friend, and not my own feelings, should be the focus.
Sunday evening I did something I never do — drowned my sorrows in not one but two hefty bloody Marys. (I’m usually stupid enough after one drink.) Then I called another friend of mine (and J’s), a medical person who has a talent for bringing calm and good sense to bad situations.
It helped.
—–
The weather, usually bleak this time of year, decided to be obscenely cheerful. So I went outside, took a claw hammer, and began ripping tatty old fiberboard shingles off the walls to uncover the cool 106-year-old tongue-and-groove wood beneath.
That helped, too.
(Oh yeah, and for you who recall my earlier posts on the topic of siding, it also helped that the junky shingles getting flung into a heap at the fenceline appear to be something cardboardish and not, I am blessedly assured, asbestos.)
Doesn’t look very impressive now, but you just wait until I’ve painted the walls and trimmed the windows and corners with cedar. Meantime, it may look like heck, but deconstruction is doing my mood a world of good.
**hugs**
I don’t know what else to say.
Ellendra, I wish you could send your hugs my friend’s way. I’ll assume they’re all meant for her.
I’m just angry and sad as a friend would be, but me accepting hugs would just be selfish. You giving hugs is typically kind.
Now … back outside with claw hammer and ladder …
I am sorry to hear of your sorrows Claire.
Claire- Your suffering may not seem “fair” for you to claim in light of your friend’s illness, but it is no less real. So, since I don’t (know if I) know your friend I offer my virtual hugs to you, too. You are free to pass them along, of course.
Sorry to hear of your friend. Hugs.
Well, if you do send food, don’t send anything with sugar in it.
According to this doctor, and a few others, sugar feeds tumors:
Is sugar toxic?
http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/109045.html
Commiserations to you and your friend. I’ve had too many good friends and relatives suffer and succumb to various cancers. Far too many who popped their clogs in their thirties. It isn’t pleasant and all those conflicting emotions don’t make it any easier. Hopefully your friend is open enough to let you know whether to back off or get closer.
My dearest aunt was given a prognosis that all but assured that the grim reaper would show up within months but she’s still kicking, healthier than ever. You just never know. My hopes are with your friend.
“It occurs to me that among the many, many hells of having cancer is being forced to deal with friends who are well-meaning but don’t know whether to give you space or smother you with love, offers of help, casseroles, egregious advice on alternative therapies, and weeping.”
Interesting. I was recently diagnosed with early stage renal cancer, Transitional Cell Carcinoma to be precise. For the reasons you cite above I have decided to tell almost no one. My spouse knows, of course, and my sister who is a registered nurse. None of my other siblings or my elderly mother know. I don’t know how this is going to work out yet. I know that my friends would likely feel bad if they knew and make me feel worse by trying to help. Better they should just be my friends like they always have been without the burden of trying to say or do the right thing in a shitty situation. I am determined not to spill the beans even if I should survive, which seems likely at the moment. If what I have turns out to be inoperable and terminal they will find out after the fact. I will not be dying in a hospital if I can avoid it.
Thanks, all, for the good & kind thoughts. Amen on not feeding cancers with sugar. Amen on hoping my friend is open enough to say what she needs from others. But damnation that she should have to. She’s got enough burdens already. Her mother died of this disease and I’m sure she knows the odds she’s facing.
And NeverMind — My best to you as you go through your own cancer treatment. I think I’d do the same in your shoes. I’d be inclined to tell my best friend, but secret-keeping isn’t among her virtues. So yeah, I totally understand you keeping it to yourself.
If I did have cancer, I’d tell my friends right out — NO BS. No pity. No phony-baloney good cheer. Just keep it straight and be my friend like you’ve always been. Good damned luck to all who have to go through that.
“It occurs to me that among the many, many hells of having cancer is being forced to deal with friends who are well-meaning but don’t know whether to give you space or smother you with love, offers of help, casseroles, egregious advice on alternative therapies, and weeping.”
I have found over the years that the most satisfactory approach (for both) has been to ask: What can I do for you? How can I help make this easier? What do you need, how best can I give it to you? I’m here for you when you need to talk, or cry, or rage, or worry.
And sometimes friends can’t really help, they can only *care* — and that knowledge is sufficient.
(My best friend’s father died on Sunday [it was expected, and not nearly as devastating as discovering pancreatic cancer]; she needed to talk, and her husband had to work on Monday, so I spent several hours with her and then, because she had foot surgery last Wednesday and couldn’t drive, I took her to the funeral home to sign papers. [She also went through this with her mother seven years ago.] She came back home more relaxed, ready to take a nap and face a number of legal problems she [who was her father’s guardian] and her husband had to figure out after he got home.)
I’m sure you will be there for your friend when the situation arises, Claire.
Sorry to hear about about your friend. We just lost my uncle quite suddenly to liver cancer. My grandmother says no one should outlive their own kids.
Please be extra sure about the siding, if there’s one thing I’ve learned working on my 100+ year old place is that there is asbestos in EVERYTHING. The old tile, the old adhesive for the tile, the old grout, the old siding, etc. You can’t tell by looking at it, you need a microscope and someone who knows what to look for. I would strongly recommend spending the $35 to have a sample tested. It’s worth it to get it off though, ours had beautiful v-groove shiplap under the asbestos cement (the vinyl the 50s.)
Nevermind, you’re a thoughtful man. Luck to you.
Dying is such a private thing and it becomes all too public. One gentleman I know has five books on all kinds “cures” and whatnot from well meaning friends. Everyone wants to help. If diagnosed with something like pancreatic cancer I would not be avoiding sugar… or bacon every morning for breakfast, porcetta for lunch and BBQ for dinner… right up until the end. I would also avoid any kinds of “therapy” that suspends my life in nauseating misery. Bless you Claire for being sharp enough to see the truth of it. It’s very hard for us all to understand that this is up to others. Having a friend or loved one taken from us makes us all want to fight for control of something we have no control over. Often times the dying end up stoically tolerating everyone’s good intentions right down to the end.
Aw, such sad news….hugs and strength vibes to you Claire, and to “J”……
I’m with EN, I plan to do everything I love as often as possible even if it is eating something unhealthy…and I have witnessed others go thru Chemo and Radiation and I know that’s not for me, either……
If you have lived a full life, and “done it all & said it all” to one’s satisfaction then death isn’t quite as intimidating….it’s the unfinished “business” that starts the panic….
We can be healthy as a horse and still have it all end unexpectedly, so make every second count……
Good luck with the siding, good timing for using a hammer too, the great anger/frustration-releaser…….
I am so sorry about your friend’s diagnosis… prayers and good thoughts for her and for you …. for strength and comfort, healing and peace … all you can do is offer your love and support .. and live each day as if it were your last.
Sorry to hear about your friend.
Pancreatic cancer is particularly nasty in that most people don’t know they have it until it is terminal because of lack of symptoms. And at that point, time left is often measured only in a matter of a few weeks.
Have 2 more heafty bloody mary’s again tonight.
It’s not fair, it really isn’t , but it is life. Be there for your friend, one of the worst thing is the ones who will be afraid to say or do the wrong thing and so abandon the friend. As long as you are there, it’ll be all right. Of course you may grieve, you may rant and rave, you may rail at the world, you have that right and you may do all of that, it’s normal. Hope is the best medicine, keep up the positive thinking. My thoughts go with you and your friend.
Hey, I posted this over at your co-worker’s blog (Mas) do you think it’s any good? I kept thinking of you pounding and clawing away with your hammer as I wrote it. I hope it doesn’t look like something I wrote after gardening.
Also, I hope this is, as you’ve written, an example of acting as an example for others much as I hope i do when i ride my bike in town: maybe People will see me and think (!) and say, “hmm, that looks like a good idea, maybe I should too?”:
First, I have a question I hope to get an answer for:
I carry an extra mag in my front pocket, sometimes the hollow point in the top round gets packed with pocket lint.
Is this considered a barrel obstruction?
If so, is it a high priority worry, er I mean, concern, or is it a low priority concern?
Second, I notice just about everyone on this website talking about stock piling ammo, as is true on many websites.
Is it lost on People that those who might wish to boss around you all against your wishes didn’t notice that too?
Doesn’t an alarm bell go off when bureaucratic organizations are equipped as if they were an army?
Lastly, ScottieG59 wrote, “So now, there are too many old people and the medical system is unable to profitably serve their medical needs.”
This is whatchya call a “meme of the Power Elite” … as if this is somehow a failure of the market and not a symptom of goberment meddling?
If you haven’t spent a few minutes over at The Daily Bell, perhaps you should, and make up your own mind as to what’s what?
Push will soon come to shove, as it does with all bullies. Submit or resist. At the same time, the ability for them to act like they can “protect” will diminish, so security is in your own hands, same as it ever was.
Of course it would be far better if everyone wised up and walked away and started something new and better and more peaceable. Wouldn’t that be cool, secession and nullification:
Secession: The Hope for Humanity
http://www.lewrockwell.com/longcore/longcore17.1.html
However; based on things like the lack of reaction the administration has towards certain things, and the intense hostility others such as the New Black Panthers and the Neo-Nazis has, things seem to be coming to a directed boil.
See: Trayvon Martin and the Cult of Government Supremacy
http://www.freedominourtime.blogspot.com/2012/03/treyvon-martin-and-cult-of-government.html
Heck, Next Time: … They’ll Just Send In The Drones
http://www.freedominourtime.blogspot.com/2012/03/hutaree-case-next-time-theyll-just-send.html
Walter Williams wrote an article once about a neighbor building a cannon and aiming it at his house. How is this is any different considering everything else they’ve done i.e. V.I.P.E.R. checkpoints and the promise to expand them likely using newly purchased bullet resistant sheds with stop and go lights; thieving T.S.A. pervs gone berserk nonstop; the likelihood of being forced to buy health insurance; the possibility of having all older cars being outlawed; the solid reality of farmers having their livestock taken without compensation or due process; searches of innocent individuals everywhere without warrants? And on it goes…
To think that things aren’t going to come to a head, and a collapse or default of some kind isn’t eminent, seems sort of naive.
“There is going to be a government default at some point. Tens of millions of these people will lose their jobs.”
http://teapartyeconomist.com/2012/04/06/tax-burden-40-million-government-workers/
It seems to me the goberment is preparing for the inevitable:
When Government Safety Nets Break
“When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall.
And down will come baby, cradle and all.”
http://lewrockwell.com/north/north1121.html
Anyway, I was just looking for an answer to my lint question. Hope you don’t mind my input and will consider the links.
After all: We Are All Prisoners Now
http://www.lewrockwell.com/roberts/roberts229.html
And, whoa: How Things Change Out From Under Us
http://www.lewrockwell.com/roberts/roberts266.html
All I can say for certain is: Quietly, Quietly, The Revolution Arrives
http://www.informationliberation.com/?id=38631
No, I just re-read that and it is horribly written.
As if posterity matters anyway, right?
What is that Winston said in the end, something about, yes, the system is good?
First Don, now you,… I think I need a drink too.
But one last bit, I hope this doesn’t come across as insensitive, it’s not meant that way. It’s far better for your best friend to meet the end due to natural means rather than losing them due to them going to the darkside and becoming one of them. Jmho anyway, and something your writing made me think about. Let me tell you,… heh, just an expression, i won’t tell you.
As i heard second hand from a friend who was there at the time, another friend of mine (who didn’t go to the darkside) who died at sixteen in a car crash, didn’t seem to think it was so bad going out like that then. He wasn’t the only one. [Does most everyone have that shared experience?]
Since then, I considered every extra year i got past 16 was a bonus extra.
Ok, I’m done. I do hope that wasn’t as terrible as I didn’t intend it to be.
“Then angry at myself for being so self-centered when my friend, and not my own feelings, should be the focus.”
One of the saddest things I can think of would be having no one who cared enough to grieve at our pains and passings. Imagine if friends and loved ones weren’t angry and hurt by such devastating news. As the other posters have said, just be there and hopefully your friend will let you know what she needs. She might need a safe place to be angry and scared. She might need optimism and false hope. As long as you’re there and she knows that you will be there, that’s more important than words or casseroles by far.
I know that this is a time of profound shock and most people don’t know what to do but succumb to traditional medical procedures. There are cures out there that Big Pharma don’t want you to know about. There is increasingly more info out there on Vit. C curing cancer, but the medical establishment won’t embrace this. Intravenous doses of vit C can be found…this is said to cure cancer.
http://foodmatters.tv/articles-1/vitamin-c-effective-from-colds-to-cancer
I’m sure sorry to hear about your friend, Claire. I’ve seen so much of that in my nursing, and everyone needs to find their own answers. Lots of good advice here already.
One thing to remember, however… You do not have any love or gift to give another unless you love and take care of yourself first. You can’t reap the crop if you don’t plant and water it first. That is not being “selfish” at all… it is just plain common sense.
But a lot of people have spent a lifetime trying to force their false altruism of self hate on us. There is every difference in the world.
Thanks for all the caring and good advice. I’m playing it slow with J (whose week is in any case being filled with several multi-day trips to the big city (the real one) for consultations with doctors). But I’m in touch with her daughter who’s going to be a huge help in letting me know what J needs — and doesn’t need — from her friends.
A lot of good advice has already been given concerning your friend’s condition-better than I can-also, on old houses white lead,(or white litharge) was the Universal Gunk in a lot of old houses-be careful when sanding or tearing stuff out.
Hi, Claire:
I am so sorry to hear of your friend’s diagnosis. As a fellow cancer sufferer, I sympathize with her situation, and your frustration.
You may want to take a look at some of the research surrounding the diabetes drug Metformin. It costs pennies a day and has few side effects. Here is a link, but you can find many more through a Startpage or Ixquick search:
http://www.health.am/db/more/pancreatic-cancer-prognosis-in-patients-with-diabetes/
I hope this helps.
Warmly,
Katherine
Katherine,
Thank you! I didn’t want to send your link directly to J. because of all those dire statistics in the article. I’m sure she knows them all, but I didn’t want to be responsible for the bleak reminder. But I sent it to her wonderful daughter — who checked and reports back that YES, J is already taking Metformin. Whew.
J. continues to do well and seems to have a fine attitude. She and I have been emailing (though she’s not ready for visitors), and now her daughter is keeping me posted regularly as well.