It might be cancer. I have two more doctor appointments on Tuesday and maybe even more after that. My mom is coming to Boston to go with me so I am not going alone. My brother comes three days later.
I’m so tired. I think back to how I used try to write blog posts while breastfeeding. I was so tired then, and I still wrote. I am telling myself to just write. Just keep writing.
The hardest thing about cancer — before your life and every life close to you is twisted — is not knowing what to do with the time you might have left.
Here are some things I do know:
If it is cancer, it’s esophageal cancer.
Crap. I’m going to have to write a list. It’s the only way I’m going to get through this post.
4 Ways to Know if it’s Esophageal Cancer! (The last one will really surprise you!)
1. You were bulimic. Esophaguses shouldn’t have junk from our stomach messing with it. Too much mess leaves an cancery residue. This is not medical school, this is listicle school, okay? So cancery residue it is.
2. You stop eating solid foods. This is something that is unintentional, it just sort of happens. I guess I just told myself I really like liquids. Then I thought to myself it’s weird that I can’t eat rice anymore. I tried putting butter on it and I still couldn’t get it down. I ate slower. Smaller bites. I just couldn’t eat rice. And then I had to throw it up to get it out of my throat. But nowhere did it ever occur to me like MY THROAT MIGHT BE FULL OF TUMORS.
3. You cough a lot. I’ve basically been coughing since I got Covid in February 2020. I thought I had long Covid. They told me no it’s probably COPD even though I still don’t know what that is. Then I thought I got Covid like five more times. I started thinking maybe I’m coughing from stress. Maybe it’s psychosomatic. Do you ever hear how people used to explain the weather by making up stories about ancient gods? That was me with making up stories about my cough.
4. You were at the World Trade Center. Yeah. This is a rare cancer that is linked to people who were in cloud of dust when the towers fell. The dust that blinded my eyes and coated my insides. I should probably save this part for my annual 9/11 post but what if I don’t live that long.
Anyway, now I’m thinking about Hubspot, which is the very expensive software I pay for that I can never decide if I’m actually using or not. I think I shouldn’t use it. If I want to sell someting I can just post it on my blog. I can’t stand all the segmenting and the targeting and the A/B testing. It’s so not my style. Plus, it’s probably hard to be selling stuff if I also have to be writing about dying.
At least I need to find out the stage I’m in. Of cancer. Like, do people sell stuff to their email list at stage II but not stage III? Has someone already liveblogged stage IV? I think I might be doing that now, because I looked at what does it feel like when you start dying of esophageal cancer and I feel like that.
I can be flip right now because I cried with Melissa.
I’m trying to stay normal with my kids. I did throw a plate. I mean I don’t want you to think that it’s all fun and games here. Actually I threw two plates, and also a lamp.
When someone someday is writing their dissertation on me, they will feel compelled to compare the lamp throwing incident in Boston with the lamp throwing incident on the farm.
Just forget that, okay? I’m doing it for you. Some things never change. And when it feels like the world is closing in on me and control is slipping away from me that’s when you’ll find me being me, desperately trying to destroy it all first.
You know me. I love porcelain. So I destroy it. That’s a solid reading of my life right there. It’s just too bad that people who live with me also live with divots in the floor.
I know the obvious thing is to not think in terms of dying when no one’s even told me it’s imminent. But I think imminence helps us make good decisions, and I know I can’t afford to waste any of the days I have left.
