Thursday, March 28, 2013

March 27, 2013 - Beautiful


When I return to my home town of Dayton, Ohio I always make sure that I go by places from my past, places of familiarity. I always like to run by the house that I grew up in, always hoping that it might be for sale and I could act like an interested buyer and take a look inside.  I’ll even run by the baseball field that I hit my lone home run as a young baseball player.  Lastly, I will run by Calvary Cemetery to visit my parents’ graves. I’m not sure that they can hear me but I always have something to say to them. It always brings me a little closer to my past and all that they meant to me. Familiarity is important to all of us.
 
Nurse Gerri Wensloff at Four Winds Hemotology.
Since I started this journey four years ago there have been many, many people in my life. I have had hundreds and hundreds of blood tests, twenty five radiation treatments, fifteen immunization shots, two cataract surgeries, two bone marrow biopsies, one kidney biopsy, two complete sets of body x-rays, multiple MRIs and somewhere around seventy five injectable chemotherapy treatments. Through all of that I have had four constants, Mr. Mikhael, Dr. Obenchain, Dr. Hogan and Gerri Wensloff.

Gerri works for Dr. Obenchain and she was the very first person to inject me with the poison that has kept me alive for those four years. I’ll never forget the day that I showed up for my first treatment of Velcade and Doxil.  Understand, I have never been one to appreciate having a needle stuck in me. As a kid I even passed out when I received a shot. Let’s don’t even go into how many times I have been a bit shaky when I have had a blood test. The thought of getting an IV and sitting there for four hours was not exactly something that I had on my bucket list. You hear about the horrors of chemo and you just never know what to expect.

Yet Gerri was there for me during the entire four hours even missing lunch to make sure I was comfortable and not dying from some type of allergic reaction to the chemo.  She didn’t have to do that, but that is who she is.  I don’t think that you could find a more likable, caring person to deal with this dreaded disease.

Until you have experienced being in that room, it is impossible to comprehend what is taking place. This isn’t like the dreaded trip to the dentist when you know a filling is coming. That feeling comes and goes and you are pretty much by yourself. When you receive chemotherapy, you are in a room with five, six or seven other people that are going through the same thing.  We are all at different levels of potential death and none of us know who will be back next week. You all hope that this will be the answer, but you never really know for sure.

Some of us like to talk to those around us while others try to sleep away the experience because of the pain, nausea and general tiredness. Yet, Gerri always seemed to know how to deal with each of us. If we wanted our peace, she gave us that. If we wanted to talk about what was happening, she gave us that. As you can imagine, I was a little different.

Over the last four years I have received everything from Gerri from a hug to banners with my name on them to a fake trumpet serenade to a pole dance (yes, you heard that right.)  She even came in on her normal day off just because she knew I was going to be there. She has always known what I needed. But now I will have to continue my journey without her as she will be returning to Indiana to be with her family and a new grandchild. I’m sure we will both move on as you always must, but it will never be the same; I will forever miss that familiarity, that caring touch.

There are younger and prettier nurses than Gerri but I am not sure that I will ever know a more beautiful one.

Monday, March 25, 2013

March 21, 2013 -- Incomplete Cremation?

While Jason was home for spring break, he and I decided to take in a Coyotes hockey game. Neither of us are huge hockey fans but we had gone to a playoff game last year and had a good time. Since he was stuck in Chandler for his week off, I thought that it would be good to get him out of the house as he wasn’t on a beach in Mexico like half of the college kids seem to be doing these days.

The area around the hockey arena is an entertainment complex with restaurants, bars and shopping. In addition, on top of the buildings, they have a number of rather large billboards, one of which caught my eye. It stated that you could get a “Complete cremation for $586.25.” This brought to mind a couple of questions. The first of which was, “What am I getting for that extra $0.25 that is included in the price?” The second question was even more important, “If I can get a complete cremation for $586.25, how much would an incomplete cremation cost and just how big would the chunks be?”

This might seem trivial to most of you but the cost of a funeral can be huge and as much as most of us like to avoid the discussion, we will all have to go through the process of death and a funeral. Julia and I have had an ongoing discussion over the years about how we would like to have our remains handled after we die. We are on opposite ends of the spectrum on this and oddly on ends opposite of where most would think we would be.

As many of you know, I tend to be a bit of a penny pincher. Some would call it being cheap; I prefer to call it being frugal. The possibility of only spending $586.25 for my funeral certainly has its advantages, but it flies in the face of what I have always wanted to do. I would have to say that I am a traditionalist when it comes to funerals and burials. It’s not that I feel like God will be upset with me if I am cremated, I just feel more comfortable with being put in the ground in one piece.

Julia, on the other hand, wants to be cremated. She would then like to have her ashes scattered in the Caribbean as she loves the beauty of the region. The best way to do this would be while on a cruise off the back of the ship in numerous places. For some reason, she isn’t too crazy about it when I ask if she minds if I take a date on this cruise. Geez, sometimes she is just no fun.

This trip to the hockey game came shortly after I went to the funeral of one of my co-workers. Jeff Richards had been suffering from Leukemia that led to complications including pneumonia and ultimately his death. Jeff was as nice of a man that you would ever meet. I don’t think that he ever had a bad word to say about anyone. My boss said it best when he referred to Jeff as a gentleman.

At the funeral, a friend of Jeff’s from his church gave an amazing eulogy that laid out Jeff’s life and all that he had accomplished. It really got me to thinking about what my eulogy would include. I’ve always felt that I have had a good life, but I’m not sure how much material I have created for a gut wrenching, boy what an amazing guy John was, kind of eulogy.

It made me wonder if I should have spent more time in my life creating a better eulogy resume’. In the end, it isn’t about how many toys we have at the end of life, but just what we have done to make the world and the people around us just a little bit better. I think we all hope that we have changed the world for the better. I think I have, but I’ll have to leave that up to the guy that reads my eulogy. I guess I still have some time left on this aging body and as long as I am still breathing I have an opportunity to improve that five minutes of remembrance. Maybe all of us should give a thought as we live our lives, just how we will be remembered on that day.