Category Archives: Faith and Spirituality

Aging, Beyond the Boundaries, Faith and Spirituality, Family, Friends, Health, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Third Phase

Surgery July 8

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Beltane                                           Closing Moon

The consultation with the urologist went well. My cancer has some outside the prostate presence, which makes the situation a bit more dire, but still one within the reach of a radical prostatectomy.

Kate and I both feel good about Dr. Eigner, the surgeon/urologist, and his experience. He’s done hundreds of robotic prostatectomies and hundreds of open prostatectomies. Practice is important.

We discussed the options, from hormone treatment to radiation to surgery. The moderately advanced nature of my cancer, my age and general health (good), make me a logical candidate for surgery. Kate and I had decided that already.

On the irrational side, I want that organ out of me. It’s no longer on my side. On the rational side surgery gives me the best chance of negative margins, a procedure in which all the cancer is removed, none showing at the tissue margins.

I feel good this evening, at peace with the choice, confident in the skill of my doctor and the support of family and friends.

Aging, Beyond the Boundaries, Faith and Spirituality, Family, Feelings, Friends, Original Relation, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Third Phase

A Yamantaka Moment

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Beltane                                                        Closing Moon

Yama
Yamantaka

So. Today is June 11th. I feel a small hole in the pit of my stomach. Not often you meet a day when your life is at stake, but this is one of those days for me. This afternoon we’ll find out the stage (severity & aggressiveness) of my cancer. We’ll also decide on a course of treatment.

It’s been an interesting time since the initial news from the biopsy. Once I absorbed that information and read the Schwartz book on Surviving Prostate Cancer, I’ve let the matter go for the most part, at least at a feeling level. There was a bracket around the time between then, late May and now, mid-June. In that bracketed time no new information could be gained and no action could be taken.

Now that bracketed time is over and the next steps, the real choices are just ahead. My confidence level is still high. Kate’s knowledge and support is essential as is encouragement from friends and family. Dr. Eigner is competent and practiced, and, unusually, open to serious questions and probing. I’ve done my research, have a list of questions.

The appointment is at 2:30. More later.

Colorado, Commentary on Religion, Faith and Spirituality, Holidays, Music, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant.

JFest

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Beltane                                                            Closing Moon

 

Kate and I went to Boulder J Fest yesterday. It was on Pearl Street Mall, a three block long pedestrian mall that is the heart of downtown Boulder. We had a great time, wandering among booths that featured Jewish crafts people, Kosher food, humanist Judaism, Judaism Your Way and B’Nai Brith among many others.

We ate lunch in an excellent Italian trattoria with outdoor seating that gave us a comfortable front row seats to the performance tent. We first heard Lost Tribe, a klezmer band with extraordinary range doing everything from Bob Dylan to reggae klezmer. After they finished an acapella Orthodox group Six13 took over the stage.

Here’s a video of one of their number on youtube:

Faith and Spirituality, Feelings, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant.
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Beltane                                                               Closing Moon

When attention defocuses and my mind heads toward default, it no longer picks up a stray red flag: What about the $%*&$NG house in Andover? This creates space for other thoughts to arise, of course, like: what about my prostate? But that’s fine because action on it is ahead and noticing it does not create anxiety, just resolve. This means I now have some free space, some room to expand my horizons. That makes me feel good.

Anoka County, Faith and Spirituality, Family, Feelings, Health, Minnesota, Third Phase

Chunks of our life

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Beltane                                                     Closing Moon

Word on Real Estate Street is that our closing may, if the gods of the under(writer)world are appeased, happen today at 2 pm. May it be so.

Holter monitor gets strapped on at 11:45 this morning and then it’s out to DIA (Denver International) to pick up Mary. She’s flying here from Minneapolis where she goes to see her financial advisor. Mary gets around. She’s been in Greece, Indonesia and I don’t know where else already this year. Her home is still in Singapore.

Which brings up Mark. Brother Mark. Who reports that Riyadh is hot. He also sends me news of bombings and shootings in Saudi Arabia, many of them claimed by the Islamic State. He says he feels safe, especially since he lives near the King’s palace.

Steadier internal seas, less distraction. Even cancer can recede when it becomes ordinary, a part of the inner furniture. That’s not to say it’s out of mind, just relegated to the we’re doing something about this and have to wait pile. This will, I’m sure, go through changes, but right now, a good place.

(How I will feel after the closing actually happens.)

Aging, Faith and Spirituality, Health, Original Relation, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Third Phase

Tightrope

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Beltane                                                                         Closing Moon

Realized after talking to Kate yesterday that I have a tightrope I’m walking.  I need to recognize my prostate cancer as potentially fatal, because of that I need to find the best treatment possible. Yet. I also need to find ways to be with that possibility and not sink into the slough of despond. There’s a tension created by the act of staying focused on the medical issues and trying to maintain calm. I’m sure this is not novel to me. Anyone with a lethal agent inside them must face the same dilemma.

One solution is denial. Nope, nothing’s going on. I’m ok. Another is wallowing in the terrible fate. Poor me, why me, oh my. In between these two extremes is a path that sees things as they are, but does not give up living. Of course I swing between the two poles. At certain points I think oh this is no big problem. It’ll get fixed (how is not part of this thought pattern) and I’ll be better and life will return to normal. At other points the disease has already won and I’m planning my last good-byes, writing my obituary, planning my funeral.

Most of the time I’m aware of the disease, know I’m taking the steps that can be taken, and am at peace. Life is not normal. Concentrating for Latin or writing has not returned. Daydreaming seems to have a foreshortened horizon. I no longer imagine long projects like Superior Wolf or translating Ovid, finding a way to go on another cruise or start researching certain facets of Western history. Now my daydreams stop at tomorrow or next week, do not extend into the next decade. This is, I suppose, my subconscious reminding me of the predicament.

I do not feel anxious. I sleep well and, for the most part, am level and engaged, not wandering off to thoughts of doom or what might be. In my opinion I’m handling the situation, if not always well, at least honestly. Not sure what else I could ask of myself right now.

Faith and Spirituality, Great Wheel, Great Work, Jefferson County, Mountains, Shadow Mountain, Weather +Climate

For Millions of Years

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Beltane                                                      Closing MoonUpper Maxwell Falls Trail350

 

A mile or so from our driveway is the trailhead for Upper Maxwell Falls trail. I went once in the winter and didn’t take my yak-traks with me. It was too icy to navigate the altitude gain.

Today, as the gloom began to settle in late afternoon, and as my own mood began to mimic the gray overhead, I set out for Maxwell Falls.

Upper Maxwell Falls Trail1350The trail is not long, about a mile and a third round trip, but it does climb, then decline through ponderosa forest. Piles of large boulders, weathered and jumbled together, cling to the side of Shadow Mountain above and the trail, while Maxwell Creek flows with equal parts power and grace, going white over rocks in its way, curling around them, too, in gentle embrace.

The falls themselves are modest in height, but there are several, one after another, giving more speed to the already rapid water. This is the way it’s been here for millions of years after the snow melt and when rains come. The water starts up high and finds these channels that allow it to collect and be the chisel. Later, it will grow calm after having taken a fast ride, perhaps pooling behind a beaver dam or a spillway or flowing into a lake or pond.Upper Maxwell Falls1350

It is a privilege to live so close to this magic. It dispelled the gathering gloom in my Self, allowed me entrance to the Otherworld, the place where humans are still one among many and not more important than any other.

Faith and Spirituality, Health, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Science

Zombies

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Beltane                                                                         Closing Moon

Cancer still on my mind. This time the battle, war, fighting, struggle words so often attached to thoughts about it. Cancer caused 585,000 deaths in the U.S. in 2013. That’s a city, a whole city the size of Tucson or Milwaukee. From this social perspective perhaps a fight against or a battle against or a war against cancer makes some sense. That’s a lot of people to lose and war would be fought if some nation took out Tucson or Milwaukee.

On a personal level though, say my level, those militant words feel like the wrong metaphor. Cancer is not, in my body, an outside invader that has breached my defenses. No, it’s more like a group of deluded idealists, a utopian commune to which I (or at least parts of me) belong, dedicated to the concept of their own immortality. To extend this metaphor the commune might grow and grow and grow, taking resources from the larger population until everyone outside the commune starves.

Another metaphor might be mental illness. Gripped by the illusion that certain actions will make me live forever, I first cut off a foot and eat it, then a hand. Later, hungrier still, I cut off a leg. At some point there will be nothing left to feed the illusion, but the conviction remains and I take no other sustenance. Death results.

Cancer, of course, has no motive. It has no intention, other than survival. Yet, it is my own cells gone off on their own, to a different rhythm than the rest. As they grow, zombie like, staying alive when they should be dead, cancer recruits other cells to supply it. The host, me, must furnish more and more resources to keep the cancer cells alive. This process has a finite limit.

Cancer cells are more horror movie than battlefield. The first step, it seems to me, is to stop seeing cancer as an enemy and begin to see it for what it is, a deviation from normal cellular processes that left unchecked will slowly consume the host from the inside. It is not fear or violence that will put a stop to it, but careful application of known techniques like surgery (removal), chemotherapy and radiation (to stop the zombie cells). Will these techniques always succeed? No. Not right now.

Horror movies rely on fear for their effect. So do the metaphors of war. We need to back away from both and demythologize this monster. See it clearly. Then, deal with it.

 

 

Faith and Spirituality, Health, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant.

An Enemy Within?

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Beltane                                                                           Closing Moon

No longer the same terrifying monster that stalked through my childhood and adult years, cancer yet demands careful attention. And, it kills.

No longer hypothetical for me, but a fact. Inside my own body, lodged in the core, lies a strawberry sized organ (mine’s a bit bigger) that now carries the seeds of my own apocalypse. I imagined I would feel my body had betrayed me, but no. Instead, if I understand it correctly, some of my cells have reached for that long held human fantasy of immortality. Oddly, if those cells reach their goal they will end their dream and me.

Yesterday I felt stunned when Ana, Dr. Eigner’s physician’s assistant, told me I had a positive biopsy for prostate cancer. So much so that her next words about the Gleason score came in my ears, rattled around hunting for understanding and failed. Later, in the book Eigner recommended, How to Survive Prostate Cancer by Patrick Walsh, they fell into place.

Cancer was what I had expected, given my PSA, the digital exam of both Dr. Gidday and Dr. Eigner and my family history. Dad’s prostate cancer at age 65. And, survival until age 89. Even so, the movement from hypothetical to real caused a reeling sensation that momentarily scrambled my thoughts.

Slept fine last night though there was, before I could get to sleep, a small fiery knot in my lower abdomen, a signal that I had unacknowledged fears. Through a trick I learned from either Carl Rogers or gestalt psychology I let this fiery knot speak to me. It spoke not in words as sometimes happens, but in a release of tension. Those fears needed acceptance, not repression. After that, sleep came and my dreams were usual.

On June 11th Kate and I will see Eigner for a long consult on what treatment option to take. After taking into account the pieces of information I have now and calculating that I have over fifteen years to live, I imagine radical prostatectomy, complete removal of the prostate, will be my choice.

Next up. Echocardiogram. Gosh.

 

 

Anoka County, Faith and Spirituality, Health, Our Land and Home, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Science

they cannot and will not define my life

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Beltane                                                             Closing Moon

The closing process with dribs here and there. At the UPS store in Aspen Park, Lauren, in a turquoise UPS shirt, opened her book of notarial acts (not kidding) and recorded her work on our closing documents. I signed them in her presence. Creedence Clearwater played on the muzak. When I said, I like your music. She nodded, I’m 67. 68 here.

The closer wants a document we sent by USPS two weeks ago, a document we couldn’t fill out online. Why’s that? Anyhow I took a photo of it with my phone and e-mailed that to her this morning. Another hard copy goes in the mail today.

A lien waiver for work we had done to follow up the inspection report. None of this amounts to much, but after three months on the market and six with double mortgages everything related has an edge. Though. Glad to do it. Want this done.

Got an appointment for an echocardiogram next Tuesday. They’ll fit me with a Holter monitor, too. I’ll wear it for a month. This is the follow up to those episodes of shortness of breath and palpitations. Could be stress related, I suppose. Trouble is, I don’t feel stressed. Slept fine last night for example.

Then, in other news, I get my biopsy results tomorrow. You might image a scene from Mel Brook’s High Anxiety, but instead I’m calm. Yesterday, as I said, I was weary of all the threats to my life and with this weariness I felt a bit down, but that has lifted.

Exercise helps. So does having framed all this in the week after my physical. That frame puts all of it, the house closing, the prostate biopsy, the heart follow-up in life as it is, not as I wish it would be. The closing takes time and exacts small cuts, none fatal. The prostate and the heart, though each could be fatal, do not change my life. I can still read, laugh, love, plan, hope. They may define my death, though I hope not, but they cannot and will not define my life. However much of it is left.