What my Cancer Challenge is all about… continued from ‘what having Cancer means to me’, written almost exactly two years ago to the day. When I wrote it I said I would follow up the thought, I didn’t think it would be this long coming. But the following are the collections of thoughts.
November 22nd, 1998
Message: Here I am
Question: What having Cancer means to me. (is that really a question?)
Thoughts:
To me having Cancer means, I can do very little if any work, it means having no energy to do regular things like walk around, it means having no hair, it means having platelet counts that are regularly under 20 when they are normally 150-450 and hemoglobin levels of less than 70 when they should be around 140-160, it means I’m in bed almost 24 hours a day 7 days a week, so far but that will change, it means I take a lot of drugs some of which give me a bad stomach and other aches and pains, it means these aches and pains lead to tests and often more drugs, it means I get way too many needles, it means, and I can’t believe I’m writing this, that I am getting used to way too many needles, it means I get to hear from people I haven’t heard from in a while or ever even, it means a delay in my schedule to take over the world, it means a change in short and long term priorities, it means I will have an opportunity to help a lot of people after my victory, it means I’m facing the biggest challenge of my life, it means that I may be in hospital for a very long time, it means when this is over, I’ll be stronger than ever and were going to have a big dirty party(dirty means good for those of you in more senior age brackets), it means a lot of things get put in perspective, it means you learn a lot about people and more importantly it means you learn a lot about the people in your life, and it means you look forward to the little things.
Tonight’s Thoughts:
What my Cancer Challenge is all about:
To me Cancer is all about being presented with one of the greatest Challenges we can face in this lifetime, and that Challenge involved facing my own mortality at the age of 22, and then as I turned 23, 24 and then 25, and in some way everyday of my life, it’s all about this Challenge involving opportunities and threats that I would not have chosen, but once faced with them, I would not have chosen any other course of action than to face them, in my own way, as the person I have always been, it’s all about a big part of the opportunities involving perspective, specifically, continuing to add to my perspective, it’s all about creating the opportunity to connect and share with many amazing people scattered all over our world, it’s all about my life taking a new direction as a result of some of those opportunities and some of those threats, it’s all about that direction being focused on sharing, it’s all about me progressing to a point in my life where I am more comfortable than ever before, it’s all about staying positive through the highs and lows, and realizing that Cancer, like any Challenge, is best faced with your positive attitude, it’s all about realizing that a victory is not determined by a “remission” or a “cure”, it’s all about me determining what the term ‘victory’ means and how and when I will attain it, it’s all about me discovering that no matter what happens with my health and my remission that I have already experienced the greatest victory I can ever know, it’s all about me learning that the most incredible feeling in the world is connecting with other people, sharing and learning together, it’s all about taking the time to realize where you are, where you have been, and then focusing on where you want to go, it’s all about personal development and learning what’s really important in your life, and life in general, it’s all about Love and surrounding yourself with it, it’s all about realizing that no matter how tough things are, no matter how trying the times are, there is always some one who is in a tougher situation, it’s all about having hope, when there appears to be no hope, it’s all about coming through a Challenge and seeing it as one of the greatest experiences of my life, it’s all about me making the move from the right to the left, it’s all about me opening my mind and heart, and adding to the person I was on November 6th, 1998, it’s all about great gifts I have and being provided with a special opportunity to make a positive impact on the lives of others, it’s all about understanding why I was presented with this Challenge, it’s all about developing an amazing appreciation for life, and my life, it’s all about seeing the same blue sky, differently, the same rolling ocean, differently, and feeling the same fresh air, differently, it’s all about having another reason to be in love with every single day I spend living and loving.
I was inspired tonight and this is the product of that inspiration. Thanks for reading.
Live Life. Love Life.
Geoff
#4
