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"You are going to die."
"What?.." I said, slightly
dazed.
"If you don't take these chemo
treatments,
you are going to die," he barked.
I listened to the fear in his voice.
He was
trying to scare me into it. Here I
am paralyzed
from the waist down from a tumor and
I'm
thinking to myself, doctors are supposed
to be healing people, not shouting
at them.
I hung up the phone as he was yelling.
This was not my first meeting with
cancer.
This was my second, only one year after
I
was supposedly cured. Now all they
could
offer was chemo.
When the realization sets in that this
could
mean the end of your life, there is
a break
that occurs. Everyone reacts differently.
After the fear turned into anger and
frustration
at a life out of control, I sat alone
and
wept like a baby. Not so much for the
end
of life itself - I had always had a
strong
belief that physical life was just
a time
of lessons and that death was a walk
through
a door to the real life. No, it wasn't
sorrow
for leaving. I had no family, no children,
no unfinished obligations. I was rebelling.
I just didn't want to be forced to
go through
this torturous disease process again.
After accepting that this may be a
life or
death situation, I made up my mind.
I chose
to stay. I wanted to live. There was
more
to do in this life. I felt I had not
accomplished
what my spirit had set out to do. I
was sure
I wanted to stay, but inside I knew.
In the
back of my mind, I knew the possibility
that
I may have run out of time.
This was now June of '89 and I had
been going
downhill since March, slowly losing
control
of my legs until I required a wheel
chair.
(I now have a new-found respect for
the handicapped
after trying to maneuver around my
little
apartment and negotiating with friends
for
rides.) I had plunged myself into a
regimen
of alternative healing treatments including
acupuncture, Reiki (a hands-on healing
technique),
macrobiotics, herbs, visualization
and anything
else I thought might work, but it wasn't
reversing it. There were small gains,
but
I felt myself slipping away.
I decided to go for chemo for a while,
but
it didn't seem to be helping either.
My friends
had to walk up to my second floor apartment
and carry me down like a sack of potatoes
and drive me to treatments. They had
to cook
and clean for me. I saw the look in
their
eyes behind their cheerful smiles and
well
wishing. They too were thinking what
the
doctors were: it's just a matter of
time.
Each chemo session was a procedure
of mental
and emotional discipline. The stifling
chemical
smell lay thick in the air as I waited,
pillow
on my lap, until they pumped the drugs
into
me through the small plastic receptacle
which
was embedded in the top of my hand.
Just
to sit in the little room at the clinic
with
all the other ill people was hard enough.
Then I knew what was coming.
I can't explain the feeling that follows
a treatment. It is like my body is
racing
and I am wide awake, my stomach always
on
the verge of giving up my breakfast.
All
I wanted to do was sleep until the
strange,
uncomfortable feeling wears off, but
it was
impossible. So I lay there switching
channels
on the TV for hours to take my attention
off of it, until I was feeling human
again.
This went on for about three months.
I did
half the treatments recommended and
stopped.
Despite the doctor's dire warnings,
I knew
that I just couldn't do any more.
The last time I wheeled into the clinic
for
a treatment, something strange came
over
me. I was really not wanting to be
there.
The feeling built and built until I
grabbed
the wheels on my wheel chair and just
bolted.
I took off for the front door of the
hospital,
the nurses shouting and chasing me
down,
until I was stopped because I didn't
have
the strength to roll myself up the
incline
leading to the front door, to freedom.
It
was quite a hilarious scene amidst
the gravity
of the situation. I was sobbing about
not
wanting any more. When they caught
up with
me, they told me something that I had
not
thought of before, that it is my body
and
I can do what I want with it. Yes.
It was
so simple. This is my body, my life.
That December, I left my decaying relationship
with my girlfriend, all my friends -- everything
-- packed up a few things and moved down
to my father's apartment in Florida. My mother
had passed from this place just last year
and I'm sure he thought I would too. I know
it was hard for him.
I pretended to see the doctors so he wouldn't
worry. Then I took all my pills, said another
prayer -- "your will, God" -- and
flushed them down the toilet. I really didn't
know if I could live, but I had to believe.
That's all I had, my belief. It was a great
leap of faith, a gamble with the highest
of stakes. Although I was aware of my spirituality,
this was my greatest spiritual test, one
which would determine just how committed
I was to what I felt was the truth.
Something happens when you are in the
whirlwind
of a crisis, when you are so concentrated
on healing and believing. It is as
if it
triggers a mechanism that denies you
from
thinking about the worst possible scenario.
It's what prevents you from collapsing
on
the floor in a heaving mass of jelly.
This
concentration kept my energy focused
on living,
not dying. It was more than positive
reinforcement,
it was an absolute necessity for healing.
For without the daily, hourly, even
minute-to-minute
thoughts creating a mantra of life,
love
and God, I would succumb to the human
fears
that would bring to me what I feared.
That
I knew. We attract to us what we concentrate
on.
Every day at my father's apartment, I would
read inspiring material, eat healthy food,
sit in the sun. Every day I would get up,
get myself dressed (a feat in itself) and
walk as best I could. At first it was just
moving slowly down the narrow hall of the
apartment over and over, slinging my legs
with all my might, steadying myself with
my hands. So much so, my handprints started
to show on the walls. Then I moved to a walker
and was able to go outside for periods at
a time. Slowly, the life force was coming
back to my legs. Finally I was walking on
my own, slightly hunched, like a little old
man or a toddler tentatively taking his first
steps…my rebirth.
By May of 1990 I was walking pretty
well.
By June I was ready to leave Florida
and
resume my life in Rhode Island. I had
gone
from completely paralyzed to fully
walking
in six months. I was skinny, but I
was alive
- at least for the time being. I showed
myself
to the doctors who said before that
I would
not live. They weren't impressed. But
I was.
Every now and then I look back at the
whole
ordeal. When someone wonders aloud
how I
ever got through it, I silently wonder
how,
also. I try to picture myself going
through
it to try to understand what it took
to make
it, but even that is too hard. The
only things
I will never forget are the lessons
I learned.
There were many revelations in my healing
process. The biggest of them all is forgiveness
-- both of self and of others -- and acceptance.
Acceptance of who I am, how the world is
and how others are. When these hurdles fell,
I started to heal. You can't measure it on
a graph, you just know it's true.
Being once so close to death, I am
now closer
to Spirit than ever before. In an intimate
way, every day, I am grateful for the
new
life that I have. I am also more aware
that
I am a part of God and a part of all
things.
To live life with this knowing and
strong
belief is a blessing. It keeps me centered
and calm, even in the midst of crisis
and
confusion. It keeps my heart open and
helps
me in sensing my spiritual self at
all times.
The soul that is here now telling this
story
is a far different person than before.
The
old me is gone, the new and hopefully
improved
version remaining with another test
under
my belt, another living testament to
the
strength of Spirit, the willingness
to release
old ways and the free will to choose
to survive.
Another soul still here working through
the
earthly experience.
I try to catch myself when I waste
my time
being angry or regretful. I take full
advantage
of all that I can to express my creativity
and to work through all my obsessions,
anxieties
and fears. I am still scared and uncertain
about many things, but I face them
more bravely
now. I try to live each day as if it
were
the last. Sometimes this means just
sitting
alone in silence or walking in the
woods.
But most times it means a lot of activity,
as I am anxious to experience as much
as
I can, and to contribute as much as
I can,
and learn as much as I can. For at
any time
when I least expect it, Spirit could
sneak
up behind me, touch me on the shoulder
politely
and quietly say, "It's time....,"
and I want to be able to honestly reply,
"I'm ready."
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