Post Number Six

TRYING SOMETHING NEW

I have decided that one remedy for my obsession with Terry's illness is to do something I have never done before. So today was the day I submitted a story to TRAVERSE MAGAZINE asking that they consider it for publication. This is one way to refocus and put a little positiveness back into life.

The story I submitted is a modification of a Christmas Eve sermon I delivered a couple of years ago entitled When One Light Fails.  It tells of a December night when the power went out to the lighthouse at the end of the north pier at Frankfort.  I have taken much ribbing from my family for that story sermon. When I first told the story I said that when the lighthouse lost power the Ann Arbor car ferries were guided into the harbor by the light of the gigantic Christmas star mounted atop Paul Oliver Memorial Hospital.  My family, especially Terry, allowed me no poetic license with this story.  They doubted that the lighthouse ever went dark and they laughed at the idea that the Christmas star on the hospital could act as a substitute.  For my part, I was disappointed in my family's captivity to a literal interpretation to the story.  In preparing the story for possible publication I have modified the telling to allow for a more flexible interpretation.

Here's the thing.  I must be able to look beyond the facts presented and attach an experience to something greater.  That is just the way my heart works.  A lighthouse is not just an aid to navigation.  It also points to our need to find our way in the dark.  A Christmas star is not just a seasonal ornament.  It also points to the spiritual gift of the incarnation.  How dull life would be if a lighthouse were just a lighthouse and a star just a star.  Our present medical crisis must point us to a greater reality.  I do not understand it as yet, but I intend to keep looking.

Dave Gladstone

Post Number Five

HOW TO SHRINK A TUMOR

I do not know if the tumor that has invaded Terry's body has begun to respond to the radiation and the chemotherapy she is now receiving.  We will not know that particular detail for several weeks. What I do know is that when cancer strikes it invades both body and spirit.  When the doctors told us that the first step in this battle was to shrink the tumor before surgery they were talking about the physical presence of the cancer.  I have learned that there is also a need to shrink the spiritual and emotional presence of the cancer.  To accomplish that I recommend a heavy dose of family and friends therapy.  We tried it this past weekend and it really works.

Four days into treatment Terry and I traveled north to our cottage on Lake Louise to host a wedding shower party for our daughter, Mary and her fiance, Andrew.  People began to arrive on Friday and our place exploded with friends and family in great humor all through Sunday evening.  We laughed.  We sang. We told stories on one another and we experienced the power of this kind of gathering to put illness in its place.  Emotionally and spiritually we shrank that tumor and put it into proper perspective in our lives.  This too is a part of the battle - keeping cancer at bay to insure that it does not take over.

One dear friend knew just what to say when Terry talked about confronting the fact that she is sick.  "No." Judy reminded her.  "You are strong and healthy.  You have a disease, but you are strong and healthy and you are battling a disease." Her words were targeted directly toward the emotional presence of that tumor.  May the shrinking continue.

 Dave Gladstone

Post Number Four

BEYOND THE INITIAL SHOCK

After we got Terry through her first day of radiation and chemo and comfortably home once again, I spent my day tending to many details of our household that had long wanted attention.  I found it a great way to observe my birthday given the circumstances of the moment.  It was comforting to take on some things that I could actually control.  I met with AAA and saved a bundle of money on our car insurance.  I got the oil changed in our car.  I tended to some pressing needs for Terry's parents and I went shopping for groceries since we were out of many staple items.  

A member of my church called me while I was in the grocery store.  She wanted to wish me a happy birthday and she wanted to check in and see how we were doing.  In the midst of the conversation she remarked that this is when life gets real.  She said, "We like to think that life is easy and fun and should be that way all of the time.  But life is frequently hard and we need our family, friends and church to help us get through it."

She is correct, and here is why.  Returning to my controlling metaphor, if life is lived in the tension between danger and home we must be careful lest danger comes to dominate our lives.  Evil does that.  It seeks to push out everything until we can see nothing else.  Navigating through danger requires that we never loose sight of home. That is were the loving support of family, friends and church comes in.

Yesterday I set about to be in charge of the things I could manage.  It helped me remember that we still have a life to live and love to celebrate.  It helped me keep the danger of this moment in perspective.  Wandering down an aisle in Kroger, I was close to losing that balanced perspective.  Then a friend called and helped me regain my grip.  If you wonder, "What can we do to help?" that is it.  

Dave Gladstone

Post Number Three

The Unexpected Gift

Tuesday is my 60th birthday.  I have spent considerable emotional energy getting ready for this unavoidable milestone.  I had worked myself into a positive frame of mind.  I was determined to shed my proclivity for whining about such things.  I told myself that this was the dawn of a new and wondrous era in my life.  

Then we received the news about Terry's illness.  Suddenly we are confronted with the reality of our mortality.  I am still confident that her cancer will be defeated. The doctors continue to tells us that this confidence is justified.  However, the bravado I had assumed regarding my birthday is now gone.  What if this cancer had not been discovered?  Another month undetected and my present confidence might have been simple denial.  We really are mortal.  Life for us will someday come to an end; perhaps sooner rather than later.

One thing is now certain.  When Tuesday comes I will be receiving a gift I never expected.  That gift will be the privilege of driving my wife to her first radiation and chemotherapy.  I am quite certain that Terry will not see it as a gift, but it is.  It is the gift of hope.  It is the first step in a long road to a cure and a complete recovery.  It is the gift of opportunity - the opportunity to be the rock for her that I have always wanted to be since we made our wedding promises to one another in 1973.  

Dave Gladstone

Post Number Two

UNWELCOME REALITY

July 18, 2009

We are reeling form the discovery that Terry has cancer.  A routine test last week discovered the mass.  Biopsy confirms it.  On Thursday, July 16 we met with the oncologist and the radiologist. She will undergo a six week course of radiation and chemo therapy to shrink the tumor.  Surgery will come late in October.  Once she recovers from surgery she will face four months of follow on chemo therapy.  It is the follow on therapy that is likely to be the worst.

 Neither one of us has ever felt such panic as when the mass was discovered.  Once the word "cancer" was spoken I cannot hardly remember a thing the doctor said.  Her mouth was moving, but I could only hear the word "cancer."  I guess we had become a bit arrogant in our expectation that good health was our right.  We know better than that.  We have no privilege beyond the reach of cancer.

Now we are trying to face this unwelcome reality.  Optimism is justified.  As serious as this is, we have good reason to believe that the treatment and therapy will be effective.  The next ten months will be very difficult and Terry will face things we never wanted to face.  Never the less, we have already been surrounded by the love and the prayers of our family and friends in the church.

How often I have counseled people to trust in God, take one day at a time, and find the blessing in each and every day.  Now it is time for Terry and me to allow others to counsel us in the same way.  To every thing there is a season; a time to serve and a time to be served by others.  This I know.  Nothing is certain ahead of us, but our hearts are filled with confidence and hope.  Whatever may come, the love of God has sustained us and will continue to do so.  

Dave Gladstone

Enclosure