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Thursday, December 18, 2008
I've been out of sorts this week with my festive spirit. I think it's because work has been entirely too busy for my liking, and I've been dealing with a rather horrible case of elderly abuse and neglect which has sapped some of my faith in the season. Even seeing the rather charming Inkheart last night had failed to return me to my natural Christmas jovialities. Someone suggested I had started getting into the spirit too early. Then after a rare afternoon off today, I had a bit of a nap and awoke to a crystal clear of my very own Christmas miracle. It's not like I had forgotten it, but it was such a vivid memory today that I couldn't help but be bought back to full festive cheer. So for all those who wonder why Christmas holds such a maniacal hold over me, I share this story...
By Christmas of 1998, I had been diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma for nearly 3 months. I was 24 years of age. It was an enormous shock to me, and the radiotherapy had taken it's toll but I was still hopeful, active and surrounded by friends and family who believed I could beat this thing. Cut to December 1999, and a year of radiotherapy, chemotherapy and a constant losing battle with the disease had cast an enormous burden on my body and my optimism. Each round of treatment failed to slow the disease as it crept through my body. Finally, it was agreed that I would spend December and Christmas with friends in Rush, New York - the father was an oncologist who would try some experimental new treatment. It's strange now that I recall how unspoken the "last chance" nature of this opportunity was. Tearful goodbyes from my family at the airport passed by in a blur as I struggled to walk with my cane to the plane. I arrived December 2nd 1999. At first I was too frail to have the treatment - ironically it was so aggressive that it could've killed me as easily as the cancer. My mind went into dark places and I started to get resentful of the Christmas preparations that went on around me. Finally, 10 days before Christmas I started the course of treatment. Every part of me hurt, ached, was sick, ached some more and just longed for some respite. The main course of treatment ended 17th December and it would be a week before any news of remission would be with me. What poetic timing. The week passed by robotically - i faked the Christmas spirit so as not to bring other people down, but also spent a lot of time on my own. Christmas eve was bitterly cold and barren outside, and with the labs backed up the results of my tests took longer and longer to come. Finally I drifted off into a sleep that was full of self pity, bitterness and remorse.
I'm not sure what cliche hit me first when I woke on Christmas morning. It could be that it had snowed, excessively, outside and the world was pure white wiping away everything that had come before it. It could be that the first thing I heard was a radio playing what would become one of my most joyful and favourite Christmas anthems "When A Child Is Born"...
"A ray of hope flickers in the sky/a tiny star lights up way up high/all across the land dawns a brand new morn/this comes to pass/when a child is born/a silent wish sails the seven seas/the winds of change whisper in the trees/and the walls of doubt tumble tossed and torn/this comes to pass when a child is born"
... or it could be that downstairs, in this house thousands of miles from my home my friends, their family, their friends and their friends families had stayed up all night holding a candlelight vigil of hope and optimism as the envelope with my results sat on the table in front of them. I exaggerate not when I say that there were over 100 people in the house, more online and the phone was non stop with well wishers and messages of love. Writing it down, it all sounds corny and cliched, but sometimes life does happen like this and with tears streaming down my face, I opened the envelope filled once more with the hope and anticipation and love and joy that Christmas can bring, whatever your circumstances. The cancer wasn't gone. But it was smaller. A lot smaller. It was the first treatment to radically shrink and slow the progressive disease. The rest of the day whizzed by - i seemed to be hugged a lot, i talked to family on the phone a lot and whether it was my new found optimism or the treatment working or a gift from Santa, I'd had my Christmas miracle and strangely, and for that day only, I didn't hurt anymore. Outside or in. Of course the story has a happy ending from there - more treatment shrank the cancer until I was completely clear, and my obsessive love affair with the radiant hope that Christmas can bring was born.
(apologies for the blurriness in the pics - they aren't on my hard drive and I don't have a scanner. Plus you don't really need to see me close up and personal without eyebrows :P )
MUSTS:
By Christmas of 1998, I had been diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma for nearly 3 months. I was 24 years of age. It was an enormous shock to me, and the radiotherapy had taken it's toll but I was still hopeful, active and surrounded by friends and family who believed I could beat this thing. Cut to December 1999, and a year of radiotherapy, chemotherapy and a constant losing battle with the disease had cast an enormous burden on my body and my optimism. Each round of treatment failed to slow the disease as it crept through my body. Finally, it was agreed that I would spend December and Christmas with friends in Rush, New York - the father was an oncologist who would try some experimental new treatment. It's strange now that I recall how unspoken the "last chance" nature of this opportunity was. Tearful goodbyes from my family at the airport passed by in a blur as I struggled to walk with my cane to the plane. I arrived December 2nd 1999. At first I was too frail to have the treatment - ironically it was so aggressive that it could've killed me as easily as the cancer. My mind went into dark places and I started to get resentful of the Christmas preparations that went on around me. Finally, 10 days before Christmas I started the course of treatment. Every part of me hurt, ached, was sick, ached some more and just longed for some respite. The main course of treatment ended 17th December and it would be a week before any news of remission would be with me. What poetic timing. The week passed by robotically - i faked the Christmas spirit so as not to bring other people down, but also spent a lot of time on my own. Christmas eve was bitterly cold and barren outside, and with the labs backed up the results of my tests took longer and longer to come. Finally I drifted off into a sleep that was full of self pity, bitterness and remorse.
I'm not sure what cliche hit me first when I woke on Christmas morning. It could be that it had snowed, excessively, outside and the world was pure white wiping away everything that had come before it. It could be that the first thing I heard was a radio playing what would become one of my most joyful and favourite Christmas anthems "When A Child Is Born"...
"A ray of hope flickers in the sky/a tiny star lights up way up high/all across the land dawns a brand new morn/this comes to pass/when a child is born/a silent wish sails the seven seas/the winds of change whisper in the trees/and the walls of doubt tumble tossed and torn/this comes to pass when a child is born"
... or it could be that downstairs, in this house thousands of miles from my home my friends, their family, their friends and their friends families had stayed up all night holding a candlelight vigil of hope and optimism as the envelope with my results sat on the table in front of them. I exaggerate not when I say that there were over 100 people in the house, more online and the phone was non stop with well wishers and messages of love. Writing it down, it all sounds corny and cliched, but sometimes life does happen like this and with tears streaming down my face, I opened the envelope filled once more with the hope and anticipation and love and joy that Christmas can bring, whatever your circumstances. The cancer wasn't gone. But it was smaller. A lot smaller. It was the first treatment to radically shrink and slow the progressive disease. The rest of the day whizzed by - i seemed to be hugged a lot, i talked to family on the phone a lot and whether it was my new found optimism or the treatment working or a gift from Santa, I'd had my Christmas miracle and strangely, and for that day only, I didn't hurt anymore. Outside or in. Of course the story has a happy ending from there - more treatment shrank the cancer until I was completely clear, and my obsessive love affair with the radiant hope that Christmas can bring was born.
(apologies for the blurriness in the pics - they aren't on my hard drive and I don't have a scanner. Plus you don't really need to see me close up and personal without eyebrows :P )
MUSTS:
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