All Pinked Out

It has been 149 days since my last chemo treatment.

Lionel is married female writer who is sixty one years old. She changed her name , but not her sex ,at fifteen. She just  wasn’t digging being called Margaret. That must have been pretty “far out” in the sixties.

Lionel might ring a bell for you as she is the author of We Need To Talk about Kevin (and 12 other novels) Senor and I were in the library the other week and I spotted So Much For That (by Lionel) I checked it out without opening the cover to see what this book was about as I  have previously read two of her novels and I found her to be an excellent writer.  Yikes.  I came home and discovered that I had selected a somewhat, heart wrenching ,  witty criticism of the US health care system .The book illustrates how a serious illness can impact a family on both emotional and financial levels. In this book the wife has a type of cancer that has a very ,very low survival rate. But what is the price of a life ? Do you put all of your assets to the point of bankruptcy into the suggested treatment plan ?What really “knocked my socks off”(that is an old expression of my fathers) was how Lionel had the whole cancer drill down so well that I had to google to see if she ever had cancer herself. You know the saying “you don’t know it till you do it”.

She touches on the insincere offers of help from people who never liked you before anyway, the chemo experience including blood-testing prior ,anti nausea and Ativan(the family in the book jokingly called it Marzipan )two hours prior to the chemical dump, hours in the chair for you and your handler, a Baxter bag filled with chemicals which turns your body into a toxic wasteland, pills and more pills, fear of infection,the refreshment cart like you are on some kind of an airline, and needles, and being freezing cold all of the time. And the hair thing and the choice of turbans or wigs. The injections for some people (self included) for five days after chemo to try and restore your immune system. She did my ranting for me! Thank you Lionel ! I have now tried three different anti-hormone drugs. Each has provided terrible side effects and Senor and I have decided, with guidance and input from our vet, that I will discontinue this part of the treatment. I might live a week less but at least I should be able to walk up a flight of stairs. I seemed to have believed that all I really needed to do was be a good little soldier, fight the good fight,remain cheerful and annoyingly optimistic, and do my fifteen months of chemo. After the first six months of chemo start to  take a little pill every day for five years… I have given it almost ten months and I am done with it. It sounded simple. We need to have this thing finished. I demand it! As if I really had any kind of control.

On a  happier note, we are now grand dogs to a Maltese, Shitzu? cross who will be seven pounds when fully developed. I have cooked turkeys larger than that. She has been named Honey and it sounds like she is going to be some kind of doggie fashionista.

We will chat again.