I got to talk with someone yesterday who also has had a melanoma. She’s the only other person who I know, although hers was, I think, 1mm deep, and more years ago than my first one. She’s not a new person, but she’s one of the handful of people who I know who has/had cancer and the only local one. Too many people are in the “everything’s going to be ok” camp. Which puts them in the realm of people I can’t or don’t want to talk to. It would be nice if everything was going to be all right, but that’s not where I am. Doctors have given me the same survival rate as they did when this started three years ago — one to five years. With five being good chances. I got through three before it reappeared. How many next time?
My friend, another friend who’s a nearly eight year breast cancer survivor said cancer is a sleeping dragon. It’s there and you know it’s there, and you don’t know when it will wake up again. That analogy makes sense to me. My aunt had another good one. The dragon laid a couple eggs before it went to sleep, and they just developed enough to be seen this summer. Now they’ve been killed off, and with luck no more will surface for a good long time.
I try not to dwell on the negative parts of any of this, but I can’t avoid it either. I think not having people to talk to makes it worse. There is no local melanoma support group. I’m not dying, so I don’t want a end of life sort of support group. I’d just like one with other folks who are in familiar territory. I’ve considered looking at ones for other types of cancer, but I didn’t even have a standard cancer treatment. I don’t look like many cancer patients do. No chemo, no huge hair loss, although mine keeps thinning for reasons I can’t identify. It’s hip length, so there’s plenty of it — I’m the only one who notices. I’m still taking steroids (dexomethasone) at three and a half months in to this, so I’ve gained weight and have a hugely puffy face — rather than the thin and can’t eat chemo look. But my immune system is screwy, thanks to stress and the steroids, and I’m tired, and moody, (not nearly so much as at the beginning of the steroid at least,) and I wish I could just be off them. Until the tumors are further gone, the steroid is keeping the inflammation from them down and letting my use my right leg and foot properly, which is important. Especially since that’s the only easily trackable sign — I think the inflammation effects my judgment for driving too, but it’s harder to spot that one easily. I suspect that one in hindsight.
I feel better from having talked to the friend yesterday. I worry a lot about things like how my stress effects my daughter. She’s aware of all of this, and she’s a big reason I am doing everything I can to focus on my health. But I don’t want to focus so much on myself that I loose track of her, or make her more stressed. She’s been high strung from the start, like me. (How did I get a child just like me… right, dumb question.) This friend has a high strung child in a stressful situation too — a completely different one, but it’s helpful to be able to compare notes. And to talk with someone who is willing to not say things will be alright, but who’s researched melanoma. She’s got a little more distance from it than I do right now. I try to research — I’m a research person normally, and I loose focus and get overwhelmed. And it’s happening on things that aren’t related to cancer too. I don’t know if that’s just that my health is taking so much of my focus, or if it’s exhaustion, or the steroid, or a combination. Often on the weekend, I fall asleep randomly. Sit down to read, and nod off. Sometimes during the week if there’s down time too. Nothing is getting the attention that I’d like it to right now, beyond keeping up with taking medicines and vitamins, and eating the foods I’m supposed to eat, and all that. Staying busy enough that I’m not thinking about whether cancer is going to show up next week. Life is overwhelming. I want to get past that.
