E.C. Stilson's Blog, page 39

Cancer Diagnosis...A Sobering Reality

Well, today has been a sobering reality that I’m on a long, hard road. The doctor confirmed that this probably is what I’ll die from, BUT we just don’t know when. 

Sooo, let’s look at the positives:

No. 1 I might have longer than two years. 🤗

No. 2 Everything looks remarkably unchanged—they said “stability is not something to sneeze at” EXCEPT *drumroll please* after radiation my cancerous brain tumor is a little smaller than last time. Whaaa??? That’s awesome!

No. 3 There’s a support group for juveniles and young adults with cancer who are 39 and under. I might have “squeaked in” at 38 years old, BUT I’m considered a young adult with cancer. (Nothing like a cancer support group to make me feel young.) 

P.S. I walked past a man who’s probably 40 with cancer—too bad that schmuck missed the cutoff (bwa-ha-ha).

Sooo, the news isn’t bad...and it isn’t stellar. I’m a little deflated because it would’ve been super cool to be automatically cured like those folks in the Bible. But no.... Apparently I’m still terminal, I still have cancer, and I still have a brain tumor. Yep. That is hard to write. 

Today, all of this is so hard to believe...again. #SlowLearner I have days like that, ya know? When reality is tough to digest.

Sincerely,

A Young Adult with Cancer

She Has Cancer, and She is NOT Happy About It

 I’ve met a lot of people through this experience, but the new friend I think about often is a cantankerous woman who actually lives by me. She has terminal lymphoma and is NOT happy about it. 

“It’s such a beautiful day,” I told her last week.

“If you like that sort of thing.”

“It’s just gorgeous. The sun is shining. The birds are singing.”

“There you are, talking about the day when we both know we’re dying.”

“Everyone is dying,” I say.

“But we’re dying faster, and it’s a slo,  painful death. I hate my life. What did I do to deserve this!”

“Well, I don’t think either of us did something wrong. But while I’m going through this, I’m appreciating every day I can.” 

The conversation continued much the same until I told her how I’d be getting test results this week, and how I “might” get good news.

“But you might get terrible news,” she practically spat the words.

I paused. It’s hard because I understand that this whole experience has beat her down, but I don’t get why our responses are so different. I hung up the phone and kept wishing I could make her life better...easier. Just like she can’t sober me the way she wants to, I can’t help her grasp onto hope. We’re both stuck in the same situation—on opposite sides of a chasm—and no matter how much both of us want to “help” the other, we just can’t.

I’ve met a lot of new people through sharing my story. People who live far away and close to home. There’s a boy who’s heroically battling cancer; I read his updates and find strength in my own circumstances. There’s an older lady who offers me sage advice and encouragement despite her own terminal situation. (All she thinks about is others.) Then there’s a loving son who messages me and talks about the struggles his mother goes through as she fights for her life—all while finding the kindness to pray for me.

Cancer has been debilitating, to say the least, but because of this situation I’ve met so many people who have literally changed my life for the best. I don’t have an answer for why this is happening to all of them, but for myself, I’m grateful for the lessons and glad to still be on this journey to hope. 

God is a Biker in Heaven

 I’m hiking, but I’m not alone. The man to my left appears to have stepped out of a biker bar. He’s massive with muscles bulging from his sleeveless leather jacket. The whole thing makes me smile; I never imagined God to have a long, gray beard—or to look like such a legend.

We traverse rocky terrain and dangerous boulders. Even when I’m not looking directly at the man, I know He’s there. Sometimes I’ll catch His scent or hear His voice, and each time I almost fall, something helps me safely stay the course. 

Finally we reach the top of the mountain, but it’s not what I expect, and my heart sinks. “God,” I turn, “why are we here?”

His face wrinkles with sorrow, and as He stares at a stone altar, He doesn’t say a word.

“What is this place?” I press on.

“This is where all men must be tested. The tests come at different times and in different ways, but they always come.” He motions for me to hold out my hands. “Do you trust me?”

I nod and do what He asks despite my human desire to run.

God, that gnarly-looking biker, gently ties my hands before motioning for me to lie on the cold, stone slab.

“Am I going to die?” I ask.

“Everything has a season,” He says.

My stomach turns. I’m so scared. But as I stare up into His eyes, I see the mysteries of the universe and understand that He knows so much more than I ever could. He must have a reason for all of this.

“I don’t want to die,” I say, my voice shaky as I sit on the stone altar. Then, ever-so-slowly, I swing my legs up and lie on my back. 

“Close your eyes,” He says. 

And as I study His features for the last time, I realize that this is what it must be like to fully surrender.... “I...trust you,” I whisper. And I believe wholeheartedly that whatever comes next is for the greater good.

........

I had several tests and scans yesterday. I’ll have more tomorrow. But as I wait for results, I keep remembering the previous story and how it came to me long after reading the story of Abraham and Isaac (Genesis 22). 

I have no idea what the future will hold, but I’m amazed how liberating it feels to finally let go. I have no control over this situation. It really is in God’s hands now. I love how I picture Him; I bet He owns a Harley to ride on those streets of gold.

I really hope we’ll get good news tomorrow, but right now I’m lying on that altar, just trusting God.

Looking for Rainbows

 Why do bad things happen to good people? This is something I’ve been asked a lot—especially when someone finds out that I have cancer. But it hits me funny because I’ve always seen God as a clockmaker. 

In my imagination, He works and works to build these intricate, multifaceted clocks and watches. They run for however long they’re supposed to. Maybe a clock is caught in a house fire or an earthquake. A watch could be left out in the rain, even when it’s not weatherproof. The clock might get cracked or overly worn with time. Maybe the thing lasts and lasts much longer than expected. But the point is that at some point, the clock will stop. When it’s run its course, only a fool would blame the clockmaker. Cancer sucks, but I’m not about to blame God. He gave me life—He wound my clock—death was just part of the bargain.

Our world is filled with so many terrible variables. But if something “bad” does happen, it can usually look good with a change of perspective. Even a crack in a clock’s face can look like a rainbow when turned in the right light. So that’s what I’m looking for today: rainbows. Sometimes even the biggest imperfections can make life beautiful. 

We can always find the good if we take the time to look for it...always.

Fishducky Died, But She Still Beat the System

I limped back from the mailbox, so proud that I didn’t need to use my walker. “Of course the letter didn’t come,” I told myself. She died in 2020 and no amount of trips to the mailbox would make the letter magically appear. 

Fran was unlike anyone I’ve ever met, so energetic and full of sass. I just loved joking around with her and seeing how she could make literally anything funny. And I know it sounds trivial, but I looked forward to the birthday card she sent to me each year because it meant she was still doing well, happy, and loved by everyone she met.

But this year I would never be able to talk with Fran again, and the hilarious birthday card wouldn’t come. So, I told myself to stop checking the mailbox!

My birthday progressed—honestly one of the best I’ve ever had. Despite pains from cancer and intermittent nausea, I really lived in the moment, enjoying my family with every bit of me. But as I started opening my gifts, my 11-year-old suddenly panicked. “The green envelope. Where is it?! The green envelope.... Have you seen it?”

I shook my head. “No. I haven’t.”

In fact no one knew where it was. 

“But I made you something really awesome! I have to find it.” Then she got up and started rummaging through drawers that rest to the side of our kitchen. “Like this!” she spouted, before running over waving an envelope. “The envelope looks just like this one. Have you seen it?” She placed it on the table in front of me, and my eyes grew wide.

“Indy, where...did you get this?”

“The last drawer, why?”

I held my breath as I picked up the envelope. It was unopened, postmarked Dec. 13, 2018...addressed from Fran and her husband...when they were both alive.

My hands shook as I opened the card. It felt as if Fran sat there with me, almost smirking because she’d somehow rigged the system. And when I pulled the card from the envelope I burst out laughing. She’d sent me a holiday card with a duck on it. Of course she had! Fran absolutely loved ducks so much that some people called her “Fishducky.”

I immediately told my family why this was such a strange thing. “It’s from 2018! We always open our mail. And it was in the drawer with our tax returns! This is unreal.”

That night, I clutched the card and thought of my dear friend. Wherever she is, I sure hope she knows how much I love her—and how much her friendship meant to me over the last decade.

“Fran sounds like she was a character,” someone said after I told them the story.

“Oh, she really was. She could make anything better. Even a birthday when she’s no longer here.”

The Kindest Eyes

A few Sundays ago I was pretty surprised when the Baptist pastor called me out by name during a prayer! And it wasn’t short either. He prayed for my health, my renewed strength, but most of all, he prayed for God’s will. This was all a shock because I’m not a member of that church, I don’t even believe in Jesus.... I just like hearing the sermons. Yet, there they were, praying—for me.

After the service ended, I noticed a family to the left of us. A couple of them gazed curiously, probably wondering why I hobble or why I’ve lost my hair. And now that the pastor had prayed for me, well, that incited even more interest.
Sometimes these humanly curious stares can make me uncomfortable, but they didn’t that day. And instead, I met the older couple’s eyes and smiled. Time stopped. 
It was an intimate moment shared between strangers, and I honestly wondered about it all week until Wednesday night when my son came home from youth group.
“Remember that man to the left of us in church? He was a little older?”
Of course I remembered. He was the man with the kind eyes. “Yeah?” I said.
“Well, he died this week in an accident.”
I had to sit down. It felt so surreal.... To think, they’d been praying for me in church, when all of us should have been praying for him.
I might have been given an expiration date by the doctors, but this unexpected death was a stark reminder that all of us face the same inevitable end. 
I wish I would’ve gotten that man’s name. I looked over at my son. “It’s so hard to believe that he died. He really did have the kindest eyes.”

A White Feather Means Hope

My mom used to tell me that if I found a white feather it meant an angel was around, looking out for me. I didn’t believe her, even if I did think it was a neat idea, and as the days have passed, I’ve sure wished an angel could be here, with me as I fight cancer.

My oldest daughter paid for me to have a wig fitting. The two beauticians pulled a stocking over my scalp, and Mike helped me pick wigs we both thought would be cute. We all laughed and joked about a white bob. At one point I told them a story and said, “Well, I’m glad I finally found something worse than cancer. It’s THAT wig!”

But something happened halfway through the session. As if the music slowed to more foreboding melodies, I looked in the mirror, and the gravity of the situation hit me.  

I look so much different than I did six months ago. How much worse might I look within the next year? The magnitude of stage 4 cancer falls on me in waves every once in a while. I never know when or where the sadness will hit. And as tears started to flood my eyes, I wished again that someone somewhere—even if it were an angel—could be looking out for me right now. But even if God is as real as ever, angels have begun to feel like the Tooth Fairy or the Easter Bunny, and as I continued looking in the mirror, I rushed to wipe away the tears before the beauticians or Mike could see.

I finally picked a wig, and the beauticians let me wear it home. The thing is a blonde number, hanging just to my shoulders. It is meant to make me feel fun and free, but as we pulled into our driveway, I felt fake...and sick.

The tears really came then. “What’s wrong?” Mike asked gently, parking the car. “What do you need? Are you nauseous again?”

“No. Today, I’m just scared.” It was a huge confession, something hard to even say out loud.

We stayed there, parked in the driveway. And as he held me, I gazed out the windshield. 

Then, as if time had stopped, the strangest thing happened. When my fear was at the worst it’s ever been, a white shape started falling from the sky! I watched as it ebbed and flowed, barely swayed by the wind. Then the white feather landed on the windshield, resting RIGHT in front of me!

I immediately stopped crying. “Hang on,” I told Mike and hobbled out of the car.

The feather remained despite gusts of wind. So, I gingerly picked it up, almost cradling the thing, and brought it back into the car.

“My mom always says that when you find a white feather like this, it means an angel is watching out for you.” My voice caught on the words. 

And as odd as it sounds, a strange peace folded through me, from the top of my head, down, through the rest of my being. A peace so thick that it has stayed...

After we’d walked into the house, I hung up my wig, stared into the mirror and touched my own sheered hair. As I placed the white feather in my keepsake box, I couldn’t help shaking my head. Maybe even when things are at their worst, when we feel like they won’t get better, someone, somewhere is looking out for us. 

And now there’s hope.... I still don’t know what to “really” think about the feather. But maybe—even when I’m all by myself—I’m not fighting this alone after all.

All That Remains is Love

 As I drove through the snow-infested mountains, with the wind nearly ripping our truck from the road, I couldn't help thinking about Zeke; my son who died on Jan. 30, years ago. I shook my head telling myself to remain calm. This drive was dangerous enough, without me trying to see through tears as well. 

    But what happened next, surprised me.

    I didn't recall all of the sad circumstances of his death. Instead, I simply remembered a specific day nearly a month before he died.

    Zeke's nurse had said I could hold him in a rocking chair. Right before she was about to pass him to me, he started crying really hard. Another nurse came by and said I shouldn't hold him, that they needed to up his vent settings. But I pleaded, BEGGING them to let me hold my baby. So they handed him to me. 

    I rocked slowly, careful since he had so much tubing in him. And instead of crying harder like they'd thought he might, he melted into my arms, always meant to be there. I put my pinkie near his hand and he wrapped his little fingers around it, holding on so damn tight. Tears filled my eyes as I rocked him forever. And in that moment, it didn't matter how sick he was or how hard this was. We loved each other.  Nothing could take that away, not time, not sickness, not death. And that moment, admist the stench of medicine and all those whirring machines...that was a perfect moment.

    I could hardly believe how many years it’s been as I blinked, focusing on the road ahead. The weather began clearing a little then, and it wasn't quite so terrifying.

    After we were safely home and all of the kids were in bed, I told my husband about the memory. "I can't really remember the bad parts of Zeke's life anymore, but I do remember every detail of when I held him in the rocking chair for the first time." 

    Mike squeezed my hand.

    "It's crazy, Mike, but I feel so much peace right now. When time has passed and everything else is gone, all that remains--all that really matters--is love."

    And so now when I think of Zeke, the memory of his love is in the forefront of my mind. I hope that's what he remembers about me as well....

How to Help Someone With Cancer

 “I have terminal cancer,” the receptionist next to me said. She didn’t do the greatest job at work, and honestly I’d wondered how she still had her job. “I put in my notice because I can’t work much longer.... But I wanted you to know—you’ve always been so nice to me.”

“Why didn’t you tell me before?” I asked, feeling REALLY bad for judging her previously.

“Well, when people know I’m sick, they treat me differently—like there’s something wrong with me. And I guess there is...but you know; I don’t want to be treated that way! And then usually that’s all they want to talk about...”

“You’re really dying?” I couldn’t stop myself.

“Yeah, but I’m at peace with it. My youngest is a junior, but at least I’ve been with him this long.”

And the cavalier way she talked about death shocked me. My impulse was to tell her to have faith, that she would absolutely recover. But then I stopped myself. I suddenly understood her nearly translucently hanging skin, her tired eyes, and something that I realized must have been a wig for all of those months. 

“Can I take you out for dinner and drinks? Since you put in your notice and I wanna wish you well?”

“Ummm... Sure! All right! I can’t drink alcohol, but I would love to go out.”

So we met with one of the other receptionists at a local restaurant. I ordered a little too much to drink as I thought about this poor woman’s fate. BUT I didn’t say any of that to her. Instead we had the best time laughing and joking. At one point we laughed so hard I almost spewed my drink and had to use a napkin to wipe my chin. But none of us said a word about cancer...or death.

On her last day at work, she gave me an anchor necklace—always thinking about other people instead of herself. “This is what you’ve been to me,” she said. “You made me laugh—every single day. And you treated me like nothing was wrong. You’ve been my anchor.”

“But I didn’t know anything was wrong.....”

“You knew at the restaurant.”

She gave me such a tight hug, and I felt how tiny and frail she’d become. Tears flooded my eyes as reality hit.

Over the following weeks and months we’d talk and text, but it still came as a shock when I read her obituary. That day I donned my anchor necklace, proudly wore it to work, and thought of a woman who had changed my life.

It’s surreal now that I have stage four cancer. I think of my friend so often. How strange that even after she’s gone, now she’s somehow become an anchor for me....

What a Creep!

 I’ve only driven myself a few places because the pain from the tumors has gotten notably worse, and I’m still struggling with stamina. But I needed to get out and see strangers and a store filled with the sort of modern conveniences that people take for granted—like...peanut butter. 

I used a grocery cart instead of my walker and could only grab a few light items when my hip and leg started throbbing. I limped to the front of the store, knowing I’d need to sit down after I paid, or call Mike to come and pick me up.

I smiled at the cashier, who was still helping someone else. She didn’t need to know I was in pain and that I keep having dreams about a long, cancerous death. So why not try to brighten HER day?

And that’s when it happened.

The guy in front of me seemed like a total jerk. You know the kind: Still wearing his class ring two decades after graduation... He had bling all over the butt of his jeans and a shirt that was a size too small—in an effort to show off his huge muscles. (See how good I am at not judging? 🤦‍♀️) 

Anyway, he flirted with the young cashier and then started ranting. “2020 was the worst year of my life. The day sports got canceled was the worst day ever! And now we have to wear masks! I can’t even see what you really look like,” he told the cashier. And as he continued complaining, I had to stop myself from ripping him apart. I’m normally so sweet and nice—a doormat when I should take a stand. Yet, this man enraged me.

He thought he had it bad? Because he CAN’T workout? And he CAN’T bring girls to his favorite restaurant. And he HAS to wear a mask.

I made up the whole monologue in my head as I slumped over the cart, my right leg about to start shaking because I needed to sit down. I *wanted* to say, “Try having stage four cancer. Try being told you will die within two years. Try explaining death to a couple of teenagers and two preteens. While you’re busy worrying about sports and women, I’m fighting for my life, losing my hair and my dignity, scared shitless that I’ll die before my baby is 18 and my kids’ lives will be turned upside down. So before you go on about how shitty your life is, think about the lives lost because of COVID, the people separated from their families as they died. Hell, even think of me contemplating funeral arrangements at the age of 37.”

And just before I could say any of this, he took his bags and left. 

“What a creep,” the cashier whispered. “He could have kids my age.”

I went and sat on a bench at the front of the store. And I thought about how I shouldn’t judge. I guess those things are hard for him; he doesn’t know any better. But it would be so nice if people like that could break free from their bubbles and realize how lucky they really are. He’s healthy. Instead of complaining—he should just go live!