Sunset's Inching Closer

Final Sunsets Shouldn't Be Known About

Sadly, some things, no matter how special, are doomed to end. That's the reality of life. Things that you love will stop being, and people who matter will stop knowing what you really went through. Ultimately, for the majority, you die alone.

Just 30 months ago, the world began to come to a screeching stop. Peace and the future began to diminish as if being burned away, turned to ash on the winds. It was about 30 months ago that I learned I was sick. Initially, all I knew was that it was cancer.

It took about 90 days, believe it or not, to get diagnosed. I promised people closest to me that I'd fight, and that I would be around for them, for as long as possible. What else does a person say?

Back then, all of 30 months ago, things were so different. I barely recognize the world today, and I mean my immediate world. Today, I'm struggling with a lot. And nobody sees it.

I'm struggling with pain, the world, and my feelings. When you get prostate cancer, especially aggressive prostate cancer, there's a pill called Orgovyx. And it is a rough one for guys to take. It is, as it was explained, what kills your testosterone and helps starve the cancer cells. But it comes with a couple of trades.

Orgovyx changes your outer appearance. It makes you weaker, costs muscle tone, and lowers your energy. Over time, your weight goes up, your shape changes in places, and you aren't as mentally together.

It also causes men to lose their sexual health. The doctor who prescribed it warned me, in what at the time was the most unusual advice I'd ever get from a doctor.

"Get all you can for the next two days. Because after that, it's over."

It's a sacrifice, risking death over being able to have a woman in your life, or choosing life. At the time, I chose. Sometimes, as I look back on everything I've said goodbye to, I wonder.

The "I WAS" of it all weighs on you. I was a good kisser, a lover, strong, physically capable, emotionally happy and comfortable, and a grandfather. I'm none of those things anymore.

Now it hurts when I wake up. It hurts when I get out of a vehicle. It makes me unable to straighten up some days, due to the bone pains in my ribs, the pains in my spine, and in my hip.

While two of the 80 tumors resolved, the others are still active, according to oncology. And while they say to stay hopeful, there's little of it. And life doesn't leave me much in front of me, other than pain, misery, and despair.

So, why would I fight? It isn't as if there's a reason in front of me to hold onto anymore. In a few months, I will have lived further into my son's life than my parents did mine. There's less and less need for a 54-year-old who can run for a couple of days, then do little else; he's so inflamed from head to toe.

I could hold out hope for the Russian vaccine. Even that's a long shot. And it'll likely take years before the vaccine gets widespread enough that it's available to the U.S. market.

I could hold out for the personal milestones I hoped to achieve. But, they're slipping further and further away as I lose myself along this road I'm on. The need to do something; it is all that I have left. But there are days when that something is too much.

I no longer see the future.

After 30 months feeling like my head's inside a guillotine, I know that it's going to drop sooner than later. The body talks louder than the doctors. Not that they ever had anything positive to say. I'm not sure how to live, but I'm definitely not going to die in a good way.

To all who are approaching their sunset, I get it.