Losing Ground

Lynne and I were going to drive up to Clearwater next week to spend Christmas with my mother. I had to phone my mom a few hours ago and tell her we wouldn’t be there. I can’t make the trip.

It’s not that I need to be hospitalized or anything near that. It is simply that the thirty months of on-again, off-again chemo I’ve had since my diagnosis have worn me out. I wake, go to my fellowship meeting, run an errand or maybe two, and come home to fall in bed. I work a bit in the afternoon and that’s it.

I take drugs to battle fatigue. It seems to me they don’t help.

So I was concerned about a five-hour drive and more concerned about getting sick while I was with my mother and not getting enough rest in a house filled with relatives and noise.

My mom understood. "It’s more important that you take care of yourself," she said. "We all know you want to be here."

I could tell she was sadder than she let on. I’m her favorite. I know that. And we have fun when we’re together. And when I’m with her, she’s not alone, at least for a few days.

It’s times like these when I think of the cancer as a live, virulent, hungry thing that wants only my destruction. It’s taking longer than anybody thought. But it’s times like these when I fear it’s really getting the upper hand.