When I returned home I was told that my job as clinical coordinator was being eliminated. I had been given this title while I was in the hospital having my stem cell transplant. This sounded great and increased my hours and salary, but the position had been created more out of kindness and good intentions than need. Now there was a financial crunch and the clinic could not support such a position. I would need to cut back my hours. I was very anemic and the interferon increased my fatigue. Yet, I had been working hard and focusing my energy on teaching.
That night I dreamed of the burning bush. I had a vivid picture of fire burning, but not consuming the bush. Anger triggered the dream, but upon awakening, I felt energy and peace. I realized that my spirit was the bush. The energy of my anger, passion, and will, were fire and fuel for the spirit. The bush was my will to live a full and meaningful life that could not be destroyed. The dream represented my intention to persevere, to be free to use anger and not be burned by it. Chemotherapy could sear my cells but it could not consume my spirit.
Then I had a medical emergency. During a routine visit, my oncologist, Dr. Becker, noticed my fingertips were blue. To check my oxygenation she had me walk around with an oxpulse machine. It read 78. It should have been close to 100%. Immediately everyone in the clinic panicked. I was put on oxygen and rolled in a wheelchair to the nuclear medicine department to rule out a pulmonary embolism. I was also given other tests.
I had to fight not to be hospitalized and observed for the night. The next day I had a cardiogram. I did not feel sick, but I had been tired as usual. This was attributed to anemia. I also was tested in pulmonary and endocrinology. We discovered slight hypothyroidism and a drop in my heart’s ejection fraction.
I had to go off the interferon that I had been taking to boost my immune system and forestall a relapse of lymphoma. I had to have my heart and thyroid function checked again. I was sent to cardiology, nuclear medicine, endocrinology, pulmonary medicine and oncology. I remember thinking that this wasn’t the way I wanted to get to know the physicians at the medical center. I continued exercising and told myself repeatedly, “I will NOT panic.”
It was traumatizing to have all these tests and be a patient again. Visits to doctors were taking up much of my time and it was dis-ruptive and wearing. Each morning I would give myself Metta and continue to do so through all my tests.
Nothing serious was discovered. No one could explain what happened. Dr. Becker thought that it might have been a side effect of the interferon. Perhaps I had asthma. No one was sure, but my energy dramatically improved once I stopped the interferon. I began taking some medication for my thyroid function and my energy increased more. It was a new world! I could do much more. I had zest!
I could not bring myself to take interferon again. But going off it was a risk. As long as I was on it, I felt I was doing something to help myself stay well, yet my quality of life was diminished. No one could guarantee that interferon would increase my life span. Even if it could, I wanted to live well and have energy rather than drag around as I had been doing. I decided to go for quality, hoping it wouldn’t affect longevity too much.
“Thank goodness! I feel so good now that my thyroid is regulated and I am not anemic. I cannot bear to go back on interferon and be so achy and tired again. I will take my chances. Whatever time I have to be alive I intend to experience it vividly!”
During this period, David’s mother was hospitalized four times, had a pacemaker put in, still wasn’t well, and had a heart attack. David’s father was dying of lung cancer and we were commuting almost every other weekend to Florida. My daily meditation helped, but I still found myself struggling to maintain a state of peace. I felt as if the container that was labeled “me” was full to the brim and overflowing with wants and shoulds and wishes of what could not be.
10/19/98
Grief is arising. If only . . . If only the world, my life were perfect. Of course it isn’t. Of course it can’t be. While being on interferon I thought that I was doing something to prevent relapse. Now I feel a greater sense of urgency to experience each moment as perfect, special, and full. I must be wise and use every moment fully. I find myself getting upset if I am less than perfectly happy.
“Ridiculous,” I tell myself. “You’re just living a normal life.”
Strange, now that I am better it feels harder to maintain a sense of all rightness.
In my role as senior teacher, I sat in on Jim Carmody’s class. I was feeling sad, so I related to the angst I heard by class members. People were filled with doubt. How could meditation help their anxiety, their pain? They complained that they couldn’t meditate; it was too unpleasant. I listened to hear how Jim responded and as I observed I was impressed not only by his words, but by the calm and caring way he steadily contained the pain being expressed, and held it so people could feel safe.
As I sat in the class and listened to the patients, it seemed that many of the patients were suffering from severe anxiety that had taken hold and firmly gripped their hearts and minds. I realized that they lacked trust and faith. Jim was showing them that underneath all the fear and pain and storms of feelings, there could be calm. This calm is equanimity.
I realize that even in the midst of my anger and self-pity, there is perspective. I do believe that my sticky, ugly feelings will pass away. They are gone now as I write this, but I know I am vulnerable and they will come again. It doesn’t matter because they’ll also go again.
The challenge was to maintain my faith and determination and to keep practicing — being here now — with an open heart and more accepting mind.
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