Tragedy's Gift: Surviving Cancer (6 page)

David worked his magic, taking the tracks and making them sound like a song that was ready for the radio. We sat and listened for hours.

Up to this point in my illness I felt the life leaving my body little by little every day. As I watched him work and saw the love in his eyes for what he was doing, I could feel life and hope come flooding back to me.

When it came time for a break, David pulled me aside and asked me straight out if I was going to die. I told him that the odds were against me, but I was really trying not to die. His simple question made a deep impact in my heart. I knew people for a long time that never asked me that question, but he just blurted it out and caught me off guard. I found something curiously energizing about that.

He asked if we could keep in touch. I assured him that I would keep him updated with my progress.

David and my dad formed a strong bond that day. They both had lost their fathers at an early age, and found a few other things in common that made them feel very comfortable with each other. Many times over the next year David called to talk to Dad to check up on me. I went to visit him two or three more times as my chemo progressed.

I considered David to be a person that I could talk to and not have to hide my fear or pain. He was very up front with me about death and never made me feel as though I had to sugarcoat my feelings to protect him from the cruel truth about my cancer. I was just a friend who happened to have cancer. That openness and reality was refreshing for me. It seemed that whenever I needed a pick me up, David would call to check up on me. The Make-A-Wish Foundation had a huge impact on my survival. The strength and blessing I received that day truly helped to save my life.

I was so excited the night that I returned from my visit with David; I wanted to call Kasey to share my experience with her. Our friendship had become close enough again since our mutual break up, we started talking about more personal things, and I was sure she would be happy for me.

When she answered the phone I felt a distance in her voice. She seemed to be less excited for me than I would have expected. She had known about my admiration and respect for David and what meeting him meant to me. I was almost afraid to ask her what was happening, but I did anyway. At that point she told me that she had been seeing another boy, and that they were going steady. My world came crashing down around me. In the midst of the fight of my life, I was faced with the reality that everyone else’s life was going on as usual. I was the only one stuck in the mode of living one minute at a time. Kasey could see her future; she really did have an entire lifetime of memories to make. All of the reasons I saw necessary to let her go were still true. I just wasn’t ready to face it. My heart sank, my hoped left me, I cried. My day went from the highest of highs to the lowest of lows within an instant. How unfair that I was fighting to stay alive and being flooded with the idea that I didn’t have anything to live for.

With no clear motive or reason in my mind I went directly to my medicine case and took pills - lots of pills. I think I just wanted to fall asleep so the pain would stop.

I was not ready for another loss, and although I was the one who initiated the break up with Kasey, I knew I only did it to be fair to her. I was tired of worrying about fair. I wanted to start worrying about me. I was in pain, I was lonely, I was scared, and I was without hope. I was tired of people saying how strong I was. I didn’t want to be the strong one anymore. I just wanted to get the help I so desperately needed.

The Ward

The next morning, my mother found me slumped over the edge of my bed. She then saw the open bottle of pills scattered along the floor and next to my leg. Through my mental fog I could hear the sounds of panic, fear and sorrow. My mother immediately called my oncologist who explained to her that I had taken only enough pills to result in a very bad headache, but to bring me in for my regularly scheduled chemo the next morning and he would take a look at me.

This time my check-in was a bit different. This time I was not treated like poor Kevin with cancer, fighting off another fever, or immune system deficiency problem.

This visit began with me being transported to another facility and admitted into the psych ward for evaluation. The doctors considered my actions as a threat to my own well being and took them very seriously. I spoke for hours to a psychiatrist who wanted to help me uncover the reasons for my depression. I had fought depression and manic highs most my life. Now I was sick and didn’t know if I was going to live or die. Of course I was depressed! I didn’t need a doctor to explain that one. It wasn’t enough that I had been battling cancer for months and so weak I could hardly walk, or that every other week I had to be pumped full of deadly drugs that were ironically keeping me alive, or the fact that the girl I loved just told me she had another boyfriend. This doctor wanted to dig deeper and deeper still.

What I revealed to him was what had plagued my innermost private thoughts since the day I found out I had cancer. I felt as though God was punishing me for becoming sexually active outside the bonds of marriage. That teaching was impressed upon me from such a young age, and my parents were so sure of its importance, that I was feeling extremely guilty for not living up to that moral standard. Kasey and I had crossed a line and I couldn’t deal with the fact that I got cancer and she got a new boyfriend. My pain and guilt were so deeply seeded that I could no longer bear the burden.

My honest confession was the beginning of a long series of counseling sessions while I was having my chemo treatments. It was also the beginning of long discussions between Mom and Dad and I. My parents were devastated that I believed that my cancer was a punishment from God. It took them by complete surprise. They never wanted the faith we shared as a family to cause pain. The goal was a better life, not guilt and despair. I guess my tendencies toward worrying and my desire to please them somehow twisted the truths they were trying to teach me.

I had a long road ahead of me, but this time I was not only fighting cancer, depression was added to the battle. The road to recovery had just gotten longer.

Everything about my treatments changed after that night. I had a psychiatric counselor visit me every time I was in the hospital. I was put on anti-depressant drugs, and I was sinking into a hole that I felt would fall in on top of me and bury me alive. The cancer treatment was wreaking havoc with my body and the depression medicine was messing with my mind.

Nights: Something Left To Do

Being sick was always worse at night. Sometimes I was so sick I prayed that my visitors would just go away and let me sleep. I couldn’t keep my eyes open. I felt horrible and truthfully, sometimes I didn’t want to be around anyone. Other times I felt differently. There were so many nights when I wished my visitors would never leave. I cherished anyone who was the last one at my bedside. Some of my guests were people I hardly even knew. They came to see me because they went to my school or knew my parents. I was always thankful for the caring that accompanied them. Some visitors were my dearest friends who knew how being cooped up and inactive was gnawing away at my spirit.

Nighttime was the great equalizer. I cherished any person that gave me reason to keep the light on and any voice that would keep speaking to me.

There was something about the darkness that brought out my fear. Of all of the demons I had to wrestle with in my life, it was always the ones that visited during the night that could fight the longest. I always thought it was because they brought sadness and guilt along as back up. When one got tired another could jump right in and take over.

One night in particular stands out in my mind as a life-altering event. My dad was asleep on a bed next to me in my hospital room. I was extremely ill and groggy from the pain. I felt an eerie presence in my room impressing upon me that I should give up my fight and die. Almost audibly it was reminding me that this fight was much bigger than I was. What ever it was had an evil that made a chill run down my spine. I tried to scream, but the terror I was feeling was blocking the sound from escaping my mouth. I was paralyzed. Finally, I managed to eke out a yelp that awoke my dad. He came to my bedside to comfort me, but could immediately see the panic on my face. I told him, “He’s trying to get me. He’s trying to get me.” When Dad asked who was trying to get me I told him it was the Devil. He held me and told me everything was going to be all right. He had no idea what had just happened. After we settled back into bed, the same thing happened again two more times, each time becoming more and more intense. My Dad came to my rescue again. The third time I asked him to pray with me. For every prayer he prayed, I doubled his pleas in my heart, which helped to ease my fear. I never experienced a supernatural evil before. It was real and it was beyond explanation.

After he returned to bed and fell asleep, I had another visit, but this time it was pure peace. I was not feeling any pain; I had no fear, and didn’t have a need to call to my father. I felt safe. I wasn’t sure if it was a visit from an angel or God Himself, but whoever it was reassured me that cancer was not my destiny. I had a much more important destiny. In a quiet tender voice I heard the words, “You have something left to do.” That was exactly the moment I knew I would live. I didn’t know how long, but I knew that this was not the night I would die. I was certain that I needed to keep fighting if I ever wanted to find out what my purpose in life was and why I was still alive. If I indeed had something else to do I wanted to know what it was, and why I was important enough to get two extremely different visits in the middle of the same night.

The next morning I never spoke a word of what had happened. I was sure my dad thought I was having a reaction from my medication. I didn’t feel the need to try to explain or persuade him or anyone else to believe any differently. I was convinced that I knew the truth. I felt that I was somehow let in on the “real truth.” Only living would allow me to find out what my true destiny was. I vowed in my heart to search for my destiny until I was sure I found it. I hoped that someday it would be revealed to me.

Round Two

The events that occurred in my life during my second year of treatment were beyond my comprehension. I reached my all time lowest point and I experienced an all-time highest point in my nineteen years.

The effects of the chemo this time went beyond torture. When my doctors told me that I would come close to death they weren’t exaggerating. Within a month of the first cycle I was convinced I would not survive. I started to deal with the fact that I was going to die. I accepted it. I wondered how I could have prayed for victory just weeks before and now wished I could just blow away. The hardest part for me still was watching the faces of the friends and family that visited me. I felt so sad for them. I wished I could comfort their pain.

Every time I had to go for another round of chemo I would start to get sick before I got into the car to leave the driveway. The ride to the hospital was like slow torture. The smell when I entered the building started my body’s gag reflex and I would throw up before I got through the lobby. By the time I reached the pediatrics or cancer ward I was already so sick I needed a few hours of recovery time before I could start my actual treatments. There are certain smells and sounds that go hand in hand with cancer and chemotherapy that only a cancer patient can understand.