To explain, my wife has a history of generally ignoring the mail and to some extent I don’t blame her, especially now – bad news comes in the mail. It goes deeper than that but I won’t belabor the point; she got the letter with the Novant return address emblazoned on the top left of the envelope. I’m sure the word oncology appeared as if it was in 10 foot high letters to her.
Normally, we would have a mail box full of junk mail – circulars, credit card solicitations, coupons, you name it – but today, only one fucking piece of mail…from the cancer people. On those other days, that letter may have gone unnoticed by Mari Jo, but not today; one lonely piece of mail sitting on the floor of our mailbox. She was meant to know. So why didn’t I tell her? OK, time for some background.
Over the last few visits to my doctor’s office, he noticed that my lymphocyte count was higher than the normal range. On my visit three months ago, he expressed mild concern and said we will recheck it in three months to see if it is still high. At my most recent visit when the new labs came back my lymphocyte counts were higher than they have ever been, 4900. But, my doc didn’t seem to recall that previous conversation about rechecking them until I pulled out a list of counts from 3 years back. My lymph counts have been steadily increasing over that period of time. When I showed him that, he got more concerned, used the lymphoma word and decided to refer me to a hematologist – a blood disorder doc. No one ever told me that blood disorders and cancer go hand in hand.
So, three days after my last doctor’s visit his office called to tell me they were setting up an appointment for me with Dr. Gene Paschold and that I would receive a mailed confirmation from them soon. That’s where I should have intervened and said, “Well, you just gave me the information I need so please don’t waste paper and a perfectly good postage stamp by sending me in writing what I already know.” Brain fart! It never occurred to me that I wouldn’t get the mail from the mailbox, that a series of quasi-unlikely events would unfold that would have my wife waiting for me at home with this concerned look on her face while sipping a tonic water. When I got home today I knew immediately something was amiss but didn’t know what. You know, that coolness in the tone and eye contact avoidance thing, that’s what I was getting. Almost like an initial emotional detachment because of a future but inescapable doom.
I wasn’t going to tell her about the appointment because I didn’t want her to worry unless there was something to worry about. God, now that I put that in writing it seems so cliché. But, isn’t that a valid reason to withhold information or is that just ‘guy-think’? My dad kept an atrial fibrillation secret from my mom for over 30 years for that very reason! I really saw no need for two people to worry when I was quite capable of worrying enough for the both of us. Seriously, she was supposed to know and no matter what I would have done, the cosmos intervened and thrust the news upon us both. Two people worrying is an exponential rise in worry, right? Like, worry-squared.
If you look up hematology on the internet, you get pretty straightforward meanings: the study and treatment of diseases of the blood. Things like hemophilia, anemia, leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma, a veritable death-wish list for those wanting to take the natural, slow route to demise. Enough of this morbid talk. Let’s think happy thoughts because Never-Land may be closer than we think and I can’t wait to see Tinkerbell in that cute little green outfit. She’s so smokin’ hot and can sprinkle her fairy dust on me any day!
I’m doing my best to resist a total internet search of everything that could cause a slow but steady rise in lymphocytes. Why bother? Will that change the outcome? Not one whit, but I’m naturally curious, even if they may be out to kill me. Oops, there I go again slipping into morbidity.
What I really want to do is stay focused on doing things, to keep my mind occupied. Even this blog is doing that, in a way.
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