Coming out
Last week, in a spontaneous moment, I confessed to two co-workers that I owned this domain name/website/blog/corner of the internet universe.
And then I instantly had a Homer Simpson “Doh” reaction and thought, “Was that the wisest thing I could have done?”
See, for years, I have read the blog entries of my OVCA sisters and thought, “Man, how sweet would that be to just say, “My partner is an amazing id-jit” or “My co-worker is as useless as tits on a bull.”
Long have I envied the candor which my more anonymous compatriots have brought to their blogs.
So, there it was, hanging there. And I wondered, “Did I ever say, ‘Damnation… I work with a legion of fools and wankers!”?
Cuz, frankly, I have had my moments of thinking that. As have we all.
Anyhow… I am at least partially outed as a OVCA blogger, at least at work.
And this outing has sparked a couple of cancer related conversations, which have caused me to think, even three years after the fact.
So, here’s a thing I should say.
Sorry I have been so crabby. I tried to be all Lance Armstrong-like, but unless you know what it’s like to lay in bed for the best part of a year, wondering if you are going to croak like all the statistics strongly suggest, well, I am not sure you get to be critical.
I took a book out of the library recently. It was a Cancer Survivor’s Notebook, or some such title. I really should memorize the title because somehow the book got water damaged and it ended up costing me over $30.
And after all that, I didn’t even read much of the book, since I was trying to get ready to move. But one wee tidbit that I did read was about how cancer patients/survivors can come across as angry, because we are so absolutely terrified right to the bone of dropping dead. So, angry is really about scared. Scared in a way that you can’t know till you get here.
So, forgive me. And forgive any other crabby seriously ill person you encounter.
It is frightening in a way that you can’t know yet.
More later.
April 6th, 2007 at 12:06 pm
I’m sorry you’ve had to go through that terror Spike…and that it continues to be manifested in your life.
April 12th, 2007 at 9:02 am
my dad was just diagnosed with esophagus cancer three weeks ago, it went from operable to inoperable in a week. my mom got ovarian when I was 16, my grandmother got bladder and breast, grandfather had hodgekins lymphoma and all my aunts, colon, breast, cervical had died from it by the time I was 20.
I am floating in the space of fear and anger and being alone. i thought a lot of things might have been hard but it’s nothing compared to this. to watching your friends recoil from hearing the word cancer. i have nursed my family through this horrible disease, one by one and here I go again. I am angry today too cause I am afraid.
April 12th, 2007 at 8:44 pm
I never thought you were angry, I always knew you were scared and sick to death of being sick. My mom just had a hysterectomy at 59 because of uterine cancer. We were scared to death of the C word at first but we got over it quick because her operation went well and her bloodwork came back perfect so we’re hopeful for a cancer free rest of her life. I have to start having mammograms this coming year because I am turning 40. (gulp) I am scared to death to have one and yet I have no reason to be really. I guess it’s just fear of getting older. sigh. Good luck to you Spike and keep on posting. Even if you’re scared.
April 18th, 2007 at 8:42 am
I love reading your blog because you manage to express and explain feelings of a cancer survivor clearly, with grit and humor.
Speaking of dropping dead, if you are three years out, good for you!
I am 2 years out, and am going in for a pet scan because my CA-125 is edging up a bit. New second line treatments are yielding higher remission rates so no matter what I still have hope. I try to laugh alot even though my husband is humor impaired. If I do have a recurrence I might have to slip some prozac in his coffee…
Keep on blogging Spike, no matter what your co-workers or anyone else say.
April 21st, 2007 at 7:29 pm
From one crabby survivor to another.. spike, you crack me up!
Sometimes one just needs a laugh… and you seem to be able to take regular life and spin it into a laugh or a smile…
Thank you
vicki