my aunt (who has been doing chemo for two years for lung cancer) told me to “visualize building walls”
i went into this part of the hospital where they have a lot of big kinda-comfy chairs, they hook me up w/ an IV and put in 1 litre of saline solution. towards the end of that, they piggy-back on the Interferon. all told it takes about 3 hours. a lot of time
then i went home and waited for “it” to hit, whatever “it” was going to be. “it” ended up being headache, and really feverish joint aches. followed by chills, and then a nasty fever w/ sweats. it totally sucked around midnight – chills alternating w/ fever – sweated out my bed. but i feel today just kind of hungover. supposedly the chills drop off and the fatigue builds over time.
today’s thinking: i can do this
when i went in i did the breathing meditation i was working on w/ my massage/healer person. i did it to brian eno’s music for airports, which is probably my ‘desert island album.’ it is nothing but perfectly syncopated arrhythmical tape loops of pianos and other synths. and so calming. though some people cant stand it.
then i switched to the first half of the jack kornfield meditation for beginners cds that a fam friend gave me. i did the breathing meditation. and mindfulness. and then right when it ended and he rang a bell and i opened my eyes, the nurse was approaching to talk to me. timing = perfect.
she stopped by to tell me about the chemo drugs. the interferon. its interesting. in nyc they never used the word chemo. here they only use the word chemo. i can’t tell if it is some kind of technical/chemical differentiation, or a philosophical/emotional diff. like the nyc’ers are all about denial and pretending it isn’t what it is. and pdx is all about just calling it what it is. but isn’t that a flip for what i would expect?
she kept telling me how expensive the drugs were. each daily dosage is $9,000. insurance covers it. but $9K. crazy.
yesterday, about 3 hrs before i went in, something clicked. and all of a sudden i had no more anxiety. all of a sudden it was ‘game on’.  like i felt 3hrs before a big soccer match, or a ski race. i was prepared, calm, collected, and ready to kick ass. i was walking on the balls of my feet w/ a spring in my step. bring it on.
i used to be a competitive ski racer (in college.) skin-tight downhill suit. helmets. and very very fast descents down icy icy steep slopes. i was pretty good. i never won anything but considering i was racing against ppl who were ex-world cup racers and ex-olympians (25 year old romanians and czech olympians who came to obscure US colleges on skiing scholarships), it is understandable why i never won… LOL.
ski race pr0n attached below. this is mbe 10 yrs old. someone sent it to me about two weeks ago. first pic i have ever had of my skiing, really. many were taken, but none got to me. here it is 10 yrs later… its hard to tell b/c the shutter speed was so high, but i was prob doing about 45mph at that moment.
off i go for day two. it will be at 230 every day, for the next four weeks.
m
