Dying is a process
Doctors deal in absolutes.
It’s chemo day tomorrow. I will get up early and motivate my friend. She is tired. She is tired of doctors, of hospitals, of tests. She isn’t tired of life.
For months, almost a year now, the scans have been great. The tumors have been decreasing. On the other hand, the side effects and the pain have been increasing. Smaller tumors mean less cancer means more life. That’s the theory, anyway.
The doctor will want to discuss her scan results tomorrow. We’ve already looked at the results. They appear in the patient portal (the magical gateway that lets us peer inside her body without having our view filtered by the doctor). Most of the tumors are unchanged. Two are a bit larger and several are a bit smaller.
It’s a strange conversation to have. The doctor will want to focus on the tumors and the effectiveness of the chemo. My friend wants to focus on her life. Next month, she is going to Cancún. She has always wanted to go to Playing In the Sand, but it was out of her price range. Thanks to some generous friends (and strangers) she is going now. In February, she is coming to New Orleans with us. She is not getting chemo for those two months. It might shorten her existence, but it will definitely improve her life.
Her main concern, and mine as well, is that she wants to be as pain-free as possible. She wants to enjoy her life, not necessarily extend it. If both could happen, that would be perfect, but that is unlikely. Chemo is helping to slow the tumor growth, but it leaves her tired. The dilaudid helps with the pain, but it does not take it away.
Dying is a process. It has been studied and labeled, but only in its end stage. Death is more than the end of life. It is a dance. We have moved from disbelief to strategizing, from preparing to ignoring, from accepting back to disbelief. She is done with chemo, unless she decides she isn’t. That is what is makes those conversations with the doctor so strange. Doctors deal in absolutes.
Death is an absolute. Dying is not. Dying is a negotiation. It is a constant give and take between what she wants and what her body is able to do. Today we went for a walk in a town near her house. We looked at shops and murals. We investigated a breakfast place she hadn’t known about. It was closed, so all of our information was gleaned through the windows, but she wants to try it. She loves eating breakfast out. This tired her out. She went to bed at 7 pm. Some nights we can talk until eleven. Not tonight. Negotiate.
We talked over what she wants to tell the doctor tomorrow. She is resolute. She will not have chemo for 2 months. Period. After that, she will revisit the idea. Dying is an idea. We can step closer to it and then step back again.
My friend is dying and she is living. We are planning trips and adventures. She is learning when she needs to rest and when she can keep going. Dying is living for her. They exist together. We are going through a process that has room for both ideas. Death may be absolute, but dying is not.
(If you want to know more about my friend and our journey, it is here: Death is Only Real for the Living.)
