Thoughts while waiting

Have we made a mistake here? Have we broken some kind of rule here, becoming so entwined in each others' lives...such great and caring friends within the confines of this office?? We have grown to care so much about each other. The doctor and the nurses.....stepping over the line into a deep emotional relationship with their patient....with me.

Right now, they are all worrying about me, praying about me "sending me nothing but good thoughts", the PC Rebecca says (I know she is praying), hating the fact that I have been called with bad news and called in to run scans two weeks earlier than we thought. I know they are pulling for me, hoping against reason for me, and at times they grieve for me. (maybe today?)

And I am a study in opposites right now, sitting in an exam room, waiting for Maha, overwhelmed by gratitude, overcome with a sense of guilt. Guilt because I hate dragging them all into the constant drama of my up-and-down cancer-ridden life. Gratitude because I love them all so much and they are part of my family, part of my life, and, partnered so very well with God, a huge part of the reason I am still here after all this time.

As I wait for my latest meeting regarding a higher tumor marker and the latest pictures of possible disease progression, it is hard to explain the emotions I feel. I try to write them on a yellow legal pad, knowing that my doctor will use the next page of the same pad to describe what things look like and what drugs we will try next. I know she is waiting just as anxiously as me, having given out her cell phone number to the radiologist who is reading my CT scans. By the time she makes it into the room, I am, for the first time ever in the exam room, crying.

When Maha does walk in, her first question to me is "have you been crying?" I am sure she is surprised to see evidence of such a thing...rarer than the pileated woodpecker. I tried to explain, now dry-eyed, that my tears were shed because of everyone's concern for me right now...my family, my friends, my dear family at CCNC. Knowing that they were riding another roller coaster with me, all of us gripping the guardrail in front of us, petrified of making the crest of the highest point and seeing what the drop will be like. My tears had not been for me and the upcoming results, they were for everyone who loved me and who were waiting to know what was coming.

"There is progression," starts Maha, "but it is slight." Seven little words, another flood of tears,
from me...how bizarre. She must think I'm losing it. But these were tears of relief. Not for me but for the dozens of phone calls that will have a positive message. Relief for my girls in the back,
for Janet, for Rebecca who had been bustling around the exam room area. Smiles all around for the fact that we had a new plan, a new set of artillery, a starting point much less scary, much less urgent than the last time. We will save the big guns for later. Hugging Maha, and crying tears of relief for her, my heart of hearts, because we had a fight to fight on relatively even ground. Because she hadn't had to tell me news like she had last November. Because what she is scribbling down on the yellow legal pad is a battle plan we are approaching with calm and confidence. Hallelujah.

As I was driving back home yesterday, making my phone calls, hearing everyone's relief through the cell signals, the new set of drugs already coursing through my veins, I thought a lot about the fact that the group of women who surround me at CCNC may have crossed over an invisible line into my dramatic little world. But what should I expect?
Three of them have been with me almost eight years, one at least five. I am a long-termer. Something they don't see a lot of. No wonder we all love each other so. Out side of their immediate family, they see me more often than their relatives, and vice-versa. There have been no rules broken here.....but there have been many followed. Rules like "This is my command: Love each other." John 15:17., and "if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have I not love, I am nothing." 1Cor. 13:2b, and this one "Whoever loves God, must also love his brother." 1John 4:21. When it comes down to it, we are following some of the greatest sets of rules ever written,

SO we all are just as we should be: caring for each other, loving each other, inspiring each other,
making my life, and hopefully theirs, richer, deeper, purpose-filled and meaningful. No rules broken, no mistakes made...we are all doing it just right.