My mother had an incredible tolerance for pain, and was quite stoic in physical matters (conversely, she could get pretty wired up regarding emotional contretemps). I did not inherit her high pain threshold. I’m such a weenie that I start to squeal BEFORE the dentist touches my teeth with a scraper. And “Marathon Man” is the only movie I’ve never been able to watch again since my first viewing.
I DID inherit something of Mom’s calm, focused, stoic approach to crisis management. For example. The night before football tryouts in my freshman year of high school I slipped and gave myself a massive second degree burn, huge lymph-filled eruptions on my left hand and forearm, while ironing my workout jerseys which was a (quirky and, in retrospect, quite weird), coach’s requirement. It hurt like all screaming hell. I iced it down, finished getting my gear together, and sat up most of the night drifting in and out of sleep and replenishing the ice. When the intense pain subsided around 3 a.m. I got 3 straight hours of deep sleep. That day I bandaged the arm to hide the damage from the coaches, worked through all the tryouts, and survived the cut. My career as a mediocre offensive lineman was off and running.
Oh. Then there was the time I was driving a state government vehicle full of cheap chicken hotdogs and illicit beer. In a parking lot, I hooked my bumper into the left front quarter panel of an elderly woman’s brand new Chrysler luxury cruiser and ripped a big sheet metal gash from headlight to front door. I took a moment to suppress my heart rate, clear my mind, and accept the reality of the accident as something that had to be properly dealt with. First, I peeled the “In Case of Accident, Call State Police” decal off the dashboard and crumpled it into the nearest trash can. I got my co-conspirator to haul the cases of beer behind the store in case the cops showed up, and talked things over with the little old lady. I apologized, told her it was my fault, gave her all my contact information and the appropriate state numbers I found in the “In Case of Accident” kit in the glove compartment. Then we drove a couple miles to another shopping plaza and I called the Administrator’s office back at the ranch. First thing the Administrator said was “whatever you do, don’t admit it was your fault”. I said “uhh, Trish, it WAS my fault. I stated as much it in writing in the stuff I gave the lady”. Trish swore at me. We swung back to pick up the abandoned beer and headed into the wilderness to take our overnight shift, hauling smallish sharks out of gill nets and packing them on ice for later measurements and conversion to graduate student rations.
The follow-up from the accident was almost as comical as the incident itself. The lady of course had trouble mobilizing the state bureaucracy despite my having given her a signed note acknowledging responsibility that should have been a hefty hammer for the most lackadaisical attorney. I was forced to pay a $2.50 fine and read a sheet of safe driving tips. I SWEAR.
I am not recounting this by way of braggadocio. I’m setting the stage to tell you how important my inheritance has been in the transition from the real world to here in Cancer Land (copyright, trademark). Being able to calm myself and free my mind has served me well for everything from dropping harnessed leaches into my gore-filled mouth to helping the doctors shove a huge chunk of metal tubing down my throat and into my lungs in preparation for surgery.
And being able to mobilize a little Zen dispassion on demand helps me with my current difficulty. Which is the continuing struggle with nutrition. I’m managing to find ways to get enough liquid emergency rations pumped in to allow my weight to creep up instead of down. But damn, once I pour in that last slurp of vaguely disgusting milky syrup, I have to put myself into a Zen trance, empty my mind of active thought, and sit upright, eyes closed, paper towels at the ready, barf bucket at hand, and let the waves of nausea pass over and through me.
And this is WITH the continuing application of miracle anti-nausea drug Zofran. And I’m not always successful. A couple nights ago my gut simply turned in revolt and pumped up a mess. I spent a really uncomfortable night in recovery. My ickiness factor is, at the moment, close to maxed out.
But. I have to say that it seems like there will be a real payoff in the long term. For the moment, I’m having trouble managing my day so that I can get in some activity. But with the uptake in my weight, I’m feeling stronger. I think if I can struggle over this hurdle and get my weight back up in the neighborhood of 190 pounds, I may kick in a feedback loop where a larger, stronger, more active body will let me “eat” sufficient “food” to keep healthy without so much travail.
I thank my Mom for giving me the strength to wrestle this mess to submission. And I thank you all for being here for me. You have my love and my gratitude. Summer is here, everybody. It’s time to rock and roll. Live ‘em while you got ‘em. See as many as possible of you at the beach!!!
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