I just got a statement today from our insurance company with the charge that was paid to Sarasota Memorial Hospital. It was $38,825.12!!! This is a HUGE amount for a stay that lasted only 23 hours. This I believe is part of the problem that I was ranting about in my last post, which was about Paula’s friend who is sick and without health insurance. I just don’t see how people can afford insurance when everything in the medical business cost so much. Does it really cost this much or do we see a whole group of organizations taking advantage of people when they are at their weakest. And that is if you have insurance. If you don’t then I consider this criminal profiteering.

Yes I did get excellent care at the hospital, the very best, but did I really get 39K worth? I believe that this amount is strictly for the hospital and not the doctors that worked on me. Hmmmm let’s see I did use a little room for about two hours pre-op and prepped by a pre-op nurse. And another nurse did roll me into the operating room on a gurney. Then there was the operating room with lots of folks there too. Then I got another ride on another gurney by the same nurse as the first ride. I had to wait in the post-op room for about an hour or so. And then I was off to my room where I spent most of my time at the hospital.

What in the world cost so much? The seeds? The building? Was it the electric bill? The fun rides on the gurneys? Maybe it was the not so free parking?

Dan and I have been living with cancer long enough now to see that at least for now there are periods of high intensity like when he is expecting the result of a scan or blood test, but the month of April has been somewhat of a respite from cancer in terms of active participation.

But make no mistake about it. It is always in the back of the mind. There have been very few times since September when I don’t feel its presence. Oh, I am sure that some people would say that I need to work more on mind control, and I am.,but until you or your spouse have cancer then you just don’t know what it’s like.

We do our jobs. We are trying to eating healthier and exercise more. We both know one thing for sure now. We know that living for the future is damned stupid, and anyone who is enduring their life right now waiting for that magical day in the future when they can relax or retire or whatever they are gritting their teeth through at present, is living a life of MAJOR DENIAL. Futures are not guaranteed.
Intellectually I have always known this, but now I experience that knowledge on the level of my body. i feel it in my bones. That’s a good thing actually. I have gotten to the point where I just don’t do much of what I REALLY do not want to do. What’s the point?

And yes, of course, we all have the mundane things that we must do in order to carry on a life, but now I work like hell to find a way to enjoy that stuff.
I sing or listen to music, but mainly I just feel grateful that Dan and I are still alive and able to see and to hear and to breathe and to walk.

I always know how damned fortunate we are. A friend of mine was diagnosed last week with stomach cancer. It just came on suddenly. He looked healthy as can be. He has no health insurance. I read today that 40% of Americans have no health insurance.

Health care has gotten so high that a new trend is catching hold. More and more Americans are travelling to India for operations and medical procedures because the cost of such is about thirty per cent of what it is here.

I don’t have positive feelings about the future of our world. We’re on a downward spiral so I say we should play Nero and fiddle as Rome burns.
I am taking less and less seriously these days.

I know one thing. I’m not going to get all stressed about world affairs and the all too obvious deterioration of our culture.
What I can do is help my friends and neighbors. Sitting around griping about world affairs is a cop-out. We’d all be better put to use by helping the folks, animals and environment in our own communities. Some of the biggest loud mouths I know who complain about world politics are not doing one damned thing here at home for their fellow man.

I feel very fortunate for what I have, I have a supportive wife and friends, I have a good job and I have many good people that I work with. Most importantly I feel very fortunate for the benefits of my job. I am a teacher and with that not the greatest of salaries but we have good insurance.

So far my care has probably cost the insurance company in the neighborhood of 60 thousand dollars of which I had to pay 10 thousand. Yes that is a lot of money but we have it and it is well worth the cost to have the very best doctor working on me. I have told others that if you got arrested you would surely find 10 thousand to get out of jail, that is a no-brainer.

I bring up this subject because this week Paula found out that one of her friends went out to eat and got sick and had to be taken to the hospital. He has no insurance. He found out that he has a hole in his stomach and that he has stomach cancer and no insurance. The hospital gave him some Vikaden and told him he would have to find an oncologist and sent him on his way. After all he didn’t have insurance. How many oncologists are going to come up to the plate and take this guy on as a patient? You know he doesn’t have insurance. If they do take him on how good of care will he get? Will he get the state of the art radiation from the state of the art machines? Will he get the very best medicine or will they just give him meds for his pain until he dies?

What is wrong with our country that we can give basic health care for all of our citizens? Canada does it. England does it. In fact many many countries do provide inexpensive health care for their citizens. Whose fault is it? Is it the doctor’s? Mine is very skilled and should be compensated well. Is it the companies that make the medical equipment? Do they deserve a million dollars for a CAT scan machine or IMRT radiation machine? I don’t know. How about the pharmaceutical companies? One of the drugs that I have to have for my androgen deprivation therapy cost $2,000 a shot. One shot 2 grand!!

I fear for my wife’s friend.

One of the hardest things for me to deal with is the knowledge of the emotional pain that Dan is carrying around. There is absolutely nothing I can do it assuage it.

I just read his recent post, and it hurts my heart so. This is the first time in our married life where we are faced with a situation that we can’t figure out. We can only spend money on drugs and treatments. We can spend time reading and keeping up with any current developments.

However, the fact remains- there is no cure for any type of cancer. It is true that many forms of cancer including prostate cancer have become manageable to the point that the patient  often dies from other causes unrelated to the cancer after having lived a good while.

We are trying very hard to remain up and focused on good times ahead, but life offers no guarantees. I am being helped so much by a women’s group that I found online. We each post daily or so, and we reply to one another. It helps. I do not have one woman friend who really understands what I am experiencing. How could they?

Men, on the whole, tend to hold things in and feel uncomfortable expressing their vulnerabilities. I would be most happy if Dan were to seek some counsel.

I love you, Dan. I will never leave you. I am here for you.

Your wife,

Paula

The seeds that were implanted in me were Palladium 103, which is a radioactive isotope of palladium. The half-life of this isotope is 17 days and what this means is that every 17 days half of the radioactivity is gone. I just passed that point, the first 17 days. I have had some urinary side effects and some stomach indigestion from the seeds. For the most part not bad.

A week ago I got some stomach discomfort and felt that this was some more of the side effects. I quickly found out that this was an assumption that was wrong when I started throwing up. I had the flu. But the first thought in my head was that it was related to my cancer. Every ache, and pain I have now I think, “Does this have something to do with my cancer?” I don’t want to live in fear as that has never been my style but when you have cancer it just pops in your head when your body does something and you are not sure why. I don’t like that. I don’t like that at all.

My last post reminded me of a poem and a poet I admire so much.

A Dream Deferred

by Langston Hughes

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore–
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over–
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore–
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over–
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

What happened this past Saturday was significant because it was the first act that we have taken toward the future since Dans’ diagnosis.

We purchased appliances for our vacation home in northern Michigan on the beautiful Leelanau peninsula. Dan and I are not rich. It may sound that way because we have a second home. No, we have always been just damned hard workers willing to sacrifice a bit in the present for a big win in the future.

Actually none of it was ever a sacrifice. Although we lived in a tiny, used pop-up camper in the middle of the woods without a toilet for seven summers, I would not give up that experience for the life of me. Not only did we deal with an extremely cramped lifestyle, but we also lived in the camper with a Labrador and four cats! Somedays we were so sick of one another that we fought like cats and dogs. The pun IS intended. LOL. I remember that one summer it rained every single day and the weight of the rain would cause the canvas walls of the camper to close in on us making our little home seem even more like a claustrophobic cell.

Thirteen years later we have a majestic home on stilts overlooking one of the most pristine bodies of water in the country. It is land that my grandfather bought for less than a couple dollars an acres right after World War I. I come from a family of preservationists who have always lived simply and below their means. Both Dan and I came from parents who insisted on working hard and being self-reliant. For that, I give much thanks.

We will have a real kitchen this summer in our house. For the past seven years we have been cooking on the porch with a microwave, a gas grill and washing dishes, brushing teeth, etc, in an old 1950’s laundry sink we picked up at a local yard sale. Dan rigged it up with hoses.

Each year we have added one big improvement to this house. It is and has been art in progress. We were willing to keep our eye on the ball and wait for what we wanted. And the good part is that we enjoyed every single little improvement more than we would had we been able to get it all done at once. It was a big decision to start building rather than wait until we could afford it.
I am so glad that we decided to build the house the way that we did because we have been able to enjoy the property for going on fourteen summers now. It is not a good idea to put dreams aside.

It is good to learn to take things slowly and enjoy what we have in the present. It is good that we are not looking too far ahead. Building our house this way helped teach us this. Living with cancer is teaching us even more.

I am going to post a little note that I received the other day from an Internet pal. I met her from the women’s group on PHML that is a mailing list for women whose husbands have prostate cancer. Here it is:

"Two Days We Should Not Worry" By Author Unknown

There are two days in every week, about which we should not worry, two days which should be kept free from fear and apprehension. One of these days is Yesterday with all its mistakes and cares, …we cannot erase a single word we said. Yesterday is gone forever.

The other day we should not worry about is Tomorrow with all its possible adversities, its burdens, its large promise and its poor performance; …Tomorrow’s sun will rise, either in splendor or behind a mask of clouds, but it will rise. Until it does, we have no stake in Tomorrow, …

This leaves only one day, Today. Any person can fight the battle of just one day. It is when you and I add the burdens of those two awful eternities Yesterday and Tomorrow that we break down. It is not the experience of Today that drives a person mad, it is the remorse or bitterness of something which happened Yesterday and the dread of what Tomorrow may bring. Let us, therefore, Live but one day at a time.

Have a good day.

Paula

I had a good long conversation with one of our dear friends today. She asked me if Dan and I ever have normal days. Absolutely we do. For now and hopefully for many years Dan will feel good.

Prostate cancer does not make a man sick right away like some other cancers. In fact, one of the positive things that being on the Internet so much has taught me is that there are many many men with statistical parameters much worse than Dan’s who are up and about. And it is this reality that we must focus upon.

Another thing that may help some of you out there who are scared is the knowledge that a person diagnosed with cancer just has some information on a piece of paper that most people do not have.
It is very likely that some of  those folks will die years before those of you who have a pathology report in hand.

Look at the headlines each day. People die in freak accidents. People die from a condition they did not know that they had. None of us know when we will go or how we will go.

Dan and I try to laugh together each day. We get DVD’s via Netflix. I highly recommend the HBO series Curb Your Enthusiasm. We are not scheduling these laughter sessions in hopes of a cure, rather we laugh because it feels so good. And cancer does force oneself to make the most of each day.

Laughter is a gift from God. I do not want to think where we would be without it.

It has taken me the five months since the diagnosis to cultivate an upbeat attitude.
I first had to acknowlege my fear, my anger and my sadness. I still get sad, but that is only if I am looking ahead.

Please do not push your feelings down in hopes that they will go away. I truly believe that my allowing myself to feel and to write about my array of feelings has helped me get to a place of equanimity with the situation.

Your fear is not bad. Your anger is not bad. Your sadness is not bad. I always would tell my students how much journaling helped me realize where I was in relation to a particular life event.

Allow yourself to feel whatever comes up.

I like this thought: WHATEVER COMES UP IS ON ITS WAY OUT!

“The excursion is the same when you go looking for your sorrow as when you go looking for your joy.”

Eudora Welty

I have always loved quotes. They bolster my spirit. Reading has always been one of my best friends. I am working hard to look for the good around each corner. I am working hard to live IN THE MOMENT.

Conscious breathing really helps. On a good day I lie down on the couch and breathe consciously for thirty minutes.I take in as much air as possible on the inhale and go gentle on the exhale.

This process is one I learned many years ago. It brings up suppressed feelings since our bodies remember and store our joy, our sadness, our anger, our fear, etc. in the body.

I practically always end up crying a bit, but the key is to keep breathing.
I keep breathing through all of the feelings allowing them to surface, and I always feel a tremendous lightening of the spirit after my session.

My cats are very attracted to this breathing I do, and invariably they join me on the couch thus increasing my very joy in the moment.

Try it. It is good.

Well, Dan and I had a really nice Saturday. I just read his latest post, and I publicly want to say what I love about my husband most. I love Dan’s sense of humor. We have been watching funny DVD’s often. Currently we are looking at Larry David’s Curb Your Enthusiam.

We don’t have HBO, so we are always a season behind but who cares? It is so important to laugh lots each day. Dan and I have always laughed and joked around with one another.

Right now I feel very thankful for humor, and its gift of release and its ability to change the context in which we view things.