The Cancer Diaries

"Nah, Doc, you got the wrong room. I can't have cancer! I just turned 43 years old - I'm too young for cancer! Check your chart again... Cancer is for old people!"

I tried to say these things, but when my mouth opened, no sound came out. I just sat there looking stupidly at the cherubic face that looked so out of place floating above his white jacket. As I sat on the hospital bed, looking like a fish laying outside his fishbowl, the next thought that floated through my head was that, surely, I could convince this stethoscope-wearing child he had made a mistake. I was just constipated, not cancerous. He'd say, "Oh, my bad!" and we'd laugh and he would carry his bad news to another room.

That's not what happened. After he explained to me the pain in my gut was the result of an egg-sized tumor that was likely cancer in my lower intestine, he told me I would need immediate surgery.

Preposterous. Not doable. I had four dogs and two cats at home and things to do. We were in the last stages of an intensive campaign to elect Dana Benson as Ouachita Parish's new clerk of court. I had projects with looming deadlines. Dropping everything for surgery just wasn't an option.

I was fairly irritated when Doogie insisted if I didn't have surgery immediately, I would die. I used my considerable powers of persuasion (which bore absolutely no resemblance to a childish tantrum) to convince him I at least needed to go home long enough to pack a bag and see to my critters. He gave me four hours.

When I woke up from surgery, I had been split from stem to stern. A row of neat stitches ran from the middle of my chest to below my belly button. Doogie (ok, ok, his real name is Dr. Patrick Smith, but he really does look 12, as I informed him in my morphine-induced haze) came in and told me they were running tests on the tumor, which he'd cut out along with 14 inches of intestine. I was completely confident the results would come back fine - that the tumor was benign.

A couple of days later, he came back to tell me the lab results were in. It was cancer. I set my jaw, took a deep breath, and asked what was next. Most of what he said in the next few minutes was lost in the roar of blood in my ears and one word that echoed over and over again in my head.

Cancer. Cancer. Cancer.

No, no, no, it couldn't be. Couldn't. It just wasn't possible. I was healthy. Nevermind the fact I'd spent years gamely taking every risk that looked like it might be fun. I was supposed to die doing something stupid, not from... No.

I smiled and thanked him when he left the room. I waited until the door closed behind him before I loosened the iron grip with which I'd been holding myself together. The room spun, tears flooded down my face, and my breath came in ragged gasps so hard I couldn't even scream. A nurse came in, quickly realized what was happening, and chased Dr. Smith down to get me a script for Valium.

The drugs kept me able to be my usual goofy, irreverent self for the rest of the hospital stay. I drew a picture of a poop on the "goals" portion of my in-room whiteboard chart. On the "Fall Risk" sign on my door, I scrawled, "Nah, just clumsy." I entertained the nursing staff with an endless stream of scatalogical humor that most of them at least pretended to find amusing. I had visitors every day, and was rarely alone long enough to start processing my new reality.

But process it, I did. By the time I got released back into the wild, I had more or less accepted it. I was going to go through chemo, I was probably going to lose my hair, and I might die. There was nothing I could do to change any of it. And, oddly enough, I was ok with all that.