OUT OF ORDER

Some of you know and some of you don't know that we are living with the Big "C" in our lives. It requires treatments of chemo and radiation five days a week and our commute is 170 miles round trip.

Ron and I both have experienced multiple illnesses from arthritis to broken bones, back problems, heart and lung disease. Yet this has to be the most frightening of all. You never know from one day to the next how you are going to feel. You go from bad to worse. The crazy thing about this is that the week before his cancer was discovered, Ron was feeling better than he had felt in a long time. The treatments are debilitating.

What is equally as bad as having cancer is looking at the multitudes around us that have cancer. There is no age discrimination. It strikes infant to elderly. I wait while Ron is in treatment and hear the stories of every form of cancer... brain, breast, bladder, testicular, skin, esophageal, ovarian, lung, lymph node, liver, stomach, kidney, etc. Pick a body part and someone will have experienced a cancer invasion there. The saddest story is when they add, "My cancer is not curable" and you are looking at a young mother with four year old twins.

Some are looking at 25 treatments, some at 55 treatments, some will finish a group of treatments then wait a couple of weeks and start another round of treatments.

I thought I had empathy for cancer patients, but until you have lived it as the patient or their advocate, you really don't get a sense of the toll it takes. Walking into the cancer treatment areas is mind blowing as you search for a seat in areas already packed with people waiting.

I have found that my magic wand is out of order and this stick I'm waving around just doesn't cut it.