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By Lawrence Cope "You win." I said to my young daughter as she moved the last game piece past the finish line. I leaned back on the kitchen chair and thought about how lucky I was: My daughter and I had a great relationship, the renovations on our home were finished, and with the security of my new job I had just purchased a truck to help us go camping. However, there was something wrong. Over the recent weeks I started losing energy and becoming weaker. I thought that this was a consequence of stress from beginning my job and also from the challenges of being a single parent. After some lab work at my primary physician's office I was sent to a phlebotomist for more tests, and then to an oncologist for even more tests. A few days later I was admitted to the hospital - I had leukemia. How could this be? One moment I was sitting with my daughter enjoying a game, and the next moment I was sitting on a hospital bed being poked and prodded by a team of physicians. As I lay in the hospital bed I could see my life changing; I could see things slipping away. My health was deteriorating. I lost my job. My truck was sold. My house was sold, and most of what was in it was given away. My daughter moved in with my former-wife, and I lost my pride and self-confidence in the process. Soon all that was left was just me and my battle with cancer. After the shock of all this loss, I soon realized that circumstances can take away everything - but not my will and determination to live. All that mattered most was that I would somehow survive. To help me through this period my mother moved from out of state and rented an apartment close to the hospital. She visited me everyday and gave me great encouragement even when things were not going well . She assisted the over-worked nurses and really made my treatment more tolerable. Little did we know my mom was also about to save my life... One evening she was sitting near the foot of my bed reading a murder mystery. It was late and normally she would have left by now - but she was engrossed in her book. One of the characters was being strangled and turning gray. My mother looked up at me and noticed with shock, that like the character in the book, I was also turning gray and not breathing. Immediately my mom ran out of the room to get the attention of the nurses and a "Code Blue" was called. The emergency team came and resuscitated me. Several weeks later I learned that the first treatment of chemo did not work and that I had to have a second treatment. This scared me. My hope instantly dropped. But my reassuring doctor told me that requiring more chemo was quite common and did not affect my chances of survival. I kept my hope alive by looking at family pictures, praying with the chaplain, and being determined to survive. Almost as soon as I started feeling hopeful again, another major obstacle struck me... I was receiving a unit of red blood cells and after the infusion I became very ill; I was having a bad reaction to the blood - a one in a few-million chance. My lungs slowly succumbed to an infection. Breathing masks and treatments were not affective. Each day I was receiving an increased amount of oxygen. I was sent down for a lung biopsy but the results did not prove too helpful. A few days later I could barely breathe I was rushed to the ICU and immediately intubated. One of the nurses told my mom that she has seen the ICU-team perform miracles. The doctors, however, did not know if I would survive. I awoke a week later - a miracle had happened: I was alive and my lungs were clearing. During my hospitalization I had bouts of high fevers over 105 degrees Fahrenheit. To lower my temperature the nurses placed a cooling blanket under me. I felt like I was a frozen fish on a bed of ice. At first I thought this blanket was a remnant of primitive torture devices. To get through the chilling, trembling hours of use, I remembered the amazing story of Sir Ernest Shackleton's Antarctic adventure; how after his ship, the Endurance, was crushed by ice the crew had to survive living on an ice pack for 17 months with bone-chilling temperatures of minus 31 degrees Fahrenheit. If they could survive their horrific situation, I could too. Several months later after my chemo was completed my doctor said that I still had leukemia - the treatment was not working. I was devastated - maybe I was not going to win this battle after all. He suggested a bone-marrow transplant, telling me that it is a tough and risky procedure - but I knew that it was my best and only hope for survival. I approached the procedure with fear and determination. As my side effects worsened I clung to the encouragement of my doctors; it was very important that I repeatedly hear that my experience was common and that I still had a chance for success. I would look forward to seeing my lab results. Are my kidneys holding up? Is my liver functioning OK? How are my blood levels? Time became blurred by the large doses of pain killers and soon two months had gone by and I was ready to go home - I had survived the transplant! For the next year or more I would be recuperating at my Mom's apartment. Sometimes it takes a major crisis for us to step back, and re-evaluate our lives and how we have chosen to live them. My crisis was leukemia. I was taking my life for granted. I was rushing through life just barely balancing everything; always racing as if I was blindly speeding through a narrow tunnel. Like a giant flashing caution sign, leukemia forced me and my body to immediately slow down. This caused me to re-evaluate what is important in life. Before my illness, I expected there would always be a tomorrow: A tomorrow to fix the things that were not right; a tomorrow to start exercising and eating better; a tomorrow to start relaxing and working less, a tomorrow to spend more time with my family and friends. But tomorrows are not guaranteed. Cancer does not care whether you are young or old, rich or poor. It attacks with the same venom. But thanks to the doctors, nurses, chaplains, social workers, and my family, cancer has not taken away my life. As a result of my illness I will never be the same person I was, nor would I choose to be if I could.
AACH Narratives Committee
Beth Lown, Jack Coulehan, Susan Massad, Paul Haidet, Mary Shomon, Sandra McCollum, Margaret Vulgaris
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