Friday, February 16, 2024, was a graduation day of sorts.
My last appointment with my radiation oncologist, Dr. Joseph Meyer.
There was no bell to ring.
If my cancer treatment center has one of those bells I see in videos and photographs of other patients at cancer centers around the country, I’ve neither seen it nor heard it.
I did get a certificate of completion back when I finished 28 rounds of radiation to my gluteal crease back in 2012.
There was no bell then, either.
Not that I minded. Completing radiation was the end of the first stage of my cancer treatment journey. Surgery and 12 rounds of FOLFOX were still on my horizon.
I love Dr. Meyer, and he loves his patients. He would see us for the rest of our lives if it were medically necessary.
Radiation treatment increases the risk of secondary cancers, often years down the road. I will always have to be mindful of any changes in the operation of my bladder, prostate and other organs in the pelvic region.
My junk got sunburned during radiation treatment, and the damage to my aforementioned gluteal crease was extensive. Blisters where the sun doesn’t shine. My anus was swollen open by the inflammation caused by the radiation.
Totally normal.
Only no one said so beforehand.
I could have been prepared. Bought a package or two of Depends before they were needed.
Instead, I found myself waddling into Walgreens with a wad of toilet paper lodged in my blistered and swollen crack to prevent soiling myself or becoming a walking biohazard.
On Friday, Dr. Meyer reminded me to be mindful of the operation of all my below-the-belt systems. If there’s any issue, I need to bring it to my primary care physician’s attention as soon as possible.
We reminisced about the journey I’ve been on.
Twelve years since diagnosis.
No recurrence.
Amazing.
I’ve had one radiation oncologist and three medical oncologists during my journey.
“Dr. Liebman was great, wasn’t she?”
My first oncologist, Dr. Micheline Liebman, was great. Over the course of six months she revealed, like an onion, how close my cancer came to being stage IV disease.
The cancer had spread to my lymph nodes but had not broken through the capsule, she explained. If another two weeks or another month had gone by before my cancer was found, my story might have been entirely different.
Not long after treatment ended, Dr. Liebman’s husband took a new job in Michigan and the family was moving. I found out only because Dr. Liebman and I spotted each other at the airport the day she was flying to her new home and her new job.
Not exactly the way I wanted closure with one of the doctors who saved my life.
Dr. Patel followed, and then Dr. David Chism was my third oncologist. He set me free from his care a year ago December.
I cried that day, overcome by the emotion of the moment. Ten years in cancerland and the surreal feeling that it was all over.
Dr. Greg Midis, my magnificent surgeon, freed me from his care after five years. He used the “C” word — cured — when he set me free, but that’s not a word I’m willing to own.
I cried that day too.
Dr. Midis saved my life. Got all the cancer out. Felt worse about my ending up with a permanent ostomy than I did.
I didn’t cry on Friday.
He gave me a choice, actually.
Come back in another year, or call and end to the relationship.
I love Dr. Meyer, but there is no medical reason for me to keep coming back. There is no lab work to look at, just a quality of life check-in and then an over-the-clothes palpation of my belly and pelvic area.
”I think it’s time to call it done,” I said.
He smiled and said he understood my wishes, but also said he was going to go to his office and cry.
Another patient success story.
”He’s graduated,” Dr. Meyer said to his nurse when we came out of the exam room. “No follow up appointment needed.”
”Congratulations,” she said, a broad smile across her face. “Best of luck to you.”
When I got home, I stepped out onto the back deck to listen to the wind chimes ringing in the breeze
Close enough to bells for me.
Ringing in the next phase of my life and all of the precarity that comes with it.
Love, so very much love.
And also the occasional loss.
Beauty and ashes.
To this beautiful and sometimes shitty life.
Thanks be to God.
No Comments