Time Out in the Cancer Center
Remember how Leroy used to talk about playing the “cancer card?” Just once he wanted to go to a very popular restaurant where it was tough to get a table and play the ‘c-card’ just to see if it worked. Would he get that special table and that hard-to-come-by reservation because he had cancer? He never did it…but it all came down to getting special treatment for a person who held the unlucky deck stacked with the cancer card.
Now comes the Holiday season and I hate to say it, but at the cancer center, you wouldn’t know it. I’m not talking about decorations or holiday songs playing in the background. You wouldn’t expect much of that in a major cancer treatment center. I’m talking about business as usual. So many people who will be spending their holiday walking into the chemo room, having their scans checked and hearing the words, “You have cancer.”
They won’t be planning special gatherings or baking Christmas cookies…not this year. They won’t be cruising up and down the parking lanes at the mall…not this year. This December they’ll be looking for a place to park in the medical building. They’ll be rushing to make it to their appointment on time.
Most of all, they’ll be wondering if they will be here next year to share in the holidays with their loved ones.
If I could have one wish this season, I would wish that we could call a” time-out in the cancer center” and give everyone some cancer-free time to make the most of this season.
I know that’s really playing the cancer card, big time…but I can wish, can’t I?
December 13, 2011 @ 10:00 pm
Yes, you can wish for it. AI was if possible “cancer-break”.
December 13, 2011 @ 6:03 pm
What comes to mind is the need to “keep Christmas in our heart all year.” Thinking of your friend, Kathie, and all the others for whom this season is not so merry.
December 12, 2011 @ 8:08 pm
I know doctors can’t stop working and treating their patients but just for a while if they didn’t have to deliver that horrible diagnosis to anyone would be such a blessing. It was so heartbreaking to go through the holidays not knowing if Jim would be here for the one next year. In reality none of us know if we will be here for this holiday or the next one but we don’t live life like it…we take it for granted…just human nature. Mo, I will keep your friends in my thoughts and your brother’s wife as well. Al, let’s hope and pray that your friend hears those all important three letters and the little ones have a magical Christmas.
December 12, 2011 @ 6:54 pm
It would be so nice to have a “cancer break”….but the reality is what it is, sadly. In spite of the ongoing grim news that is omnipresent in the cancer world, there are still numerous celebrations, yes celebrations that should and must be taken when the scans and treatments allow. My friend Cathy is home and doing well at a very good time for her..Christmas…and then back to the scans to see if NED has taken up residence. Some of the “little ones….7-8 year old little girls” fighting leukemia are doing well…not completely out of the woods but their counts are up, their energy is up and Christmas will really be special for them and their families. We must take the very small victories when we can and celebrate because we’ve seen enough of the darkness and despair.
Mo, wishing the very best for your friends. Encourage K to continue to seek treatments for as long as can be managed. One never knows which one will be the magic elixir that will send the disease into hiding.
December 12, 2011 @ 6:00 pm
Please keep in your thoughts and prayers my friend T., who heads to Duke later this month for a second visit, and family friend K., who grew up with one of my sisters. The latter has been told that none of her treatments has had any effect on her tumors, that at best any continued treatment will simply be to give her “extra time”.
This is such a hard time for my late brother’s wife. I’d give a lot for just one of those “thousand points of light” that C.S. Lewis wrote “leaped out” from that “moment [when] there had been nothing but darkness.”