Memoir - The Beginning
Chapter 1
As I promised in my last post, I’ll be trickling out the first four chapters of my memoir free for everyone. All I ask is for your feedback, especially if you find the content relatable. I’d also like to hear your “elevator speech” if you’re also going through a difficult time. It doesn’t have to be the same diagnosis or treatment. There’s no competition in cancer or other hard life experiences.
The remainder of the memoir will be available to paid subscribers, so if you like what you read in the first chapters, please feel free to join - BTW - I’m offering a 50% off discount until the end of June.
I’m still not sure of the title, so for now I’ll call it:
Memoir of a Cancer Created Introvert.
Prologue
“Most likely.”
When I heard the doctor say those words my mind flashed back to the senior superlatives from my high school year book.
Most likely to succeed.
Most likely to become president.
Most likely to become a doctor.
Most likely to have a life-threatening disease.
Dr. Adams didn’t want to wait until my appointment next week.
Instead, he called.
Chapter 1
Every person’s life is filled with turning points. Births, graduations, marriages, accidents, and deaths are the most common. Covid was a world-wide turning point. Everyone was affected by the same pandemic in unique ways.
Covid shredded everyone’s lives. Suddenly I no longer wanted to live in Fredericksburg, Virginia, a city I’d loved for close to 30 years. It was too crowded. We found a place on the Chesapeake Bay, sold the house in the city, and were set to move in January.
It was painful to sort through all of the stuff we’d collected through the years. We had to get rid of so much because we were downsizing. Every day I fell into bed exhausted.
Then my father died on December 13th, the week after my 63rd birthday. We moved three weeks later in the middle of a rainstorm.
By the end of January 2021, I thought I was having another emotional breakdown. I’d had one in January of 2002 toward the end of my first marriage. It was a horrible time when I could only sit on my back porch and smoke.
I loathe January.
The grief I felt over my father’s death surprised me. He’d been sick for a while, so we knew it was coming. The loss of him hit me like a tidal wave. The funny thing is that we weren’t all that close. But I had an eerie sense that this was the beginning of something really bad. I couldn’t shake an ominous feeling of dread.
The first time I encountered death, I was six years old and a boy from my class was murdered by his neighbor. This was when my fear of the dark and my obsession to prevent tragedy became profound.
My grandaddy died when I was eight. His loss impacted me most by how much it hurt to lose his unconditional love.
Now my Dad was dead. All I remember about Christmas of 2020 was being with my mother and working on a puzzle at her house. Looking back I have to laugh because my mother hated puzzles. I guess she was willing to do anything to be distracted from her grief.
I hoped the dawning of a new year would change my mood.
But, January 2021 was dreary and cold. I was exhausted all of the time. After we moved, I couldn’t muster the energy to do anything. By the middle of February, my depression and exhaustion had increased.
By March, I was practically catatonic. I couldn’t focus on anything. My legs and back ached. I had a constant buzzing in my ears, and chronic urinary tract infections. All I wanted to do was sleep. I finally decided to get some help, so I went to a local primary care doctor and asked for antidepressants.
“Before we put you on anything, I’d like to do a full blood panel to see if something else is going on,” Dr. Carter said.
Two weeks later she had me come back for more blood work.
“I don’t like the look of your results,” She told me at the follow up visit.
“Your white count is critically low, and your red count isn’t in the normal range. I’d like for a specialist to investigate this further.”
So, she referred me to a hematologist named Dr. Adams.
When I pulled up to this new doctor’s office building the sign read, “Riverside Cancer Center.”
I felt a tightness in my chest and my stomach lurched as reality set in. No one was going to give me antidepressants here.
Question:
Have you ever experienced a turn of events that caught you by surprise?
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Mine was similar after my primary recommended seeing a hematologist and I pulled up to the Henry Lynch Cancer Center. I thought, “is this the right address?” I knew what a hematologist did as my mom had been diagnosed with a blood cancer years earlier. From that point forward I felt as if I was in a different world.
I’ve had a few turning points in my life. My big brother diagnosed with cancer, his death, my little brother diagnosed with XLP and finding out that’s what killed my bid brother, my son diagnosed with XLP. My Dad’s death. Life is about learning to accept the good and bad, and focusing on my own behavior and blessings.