A surreal 12 days

It has been 12 days since I was diagnosed with a brain tumor, and I finally feel ready to share a few things in writing. Be forewarned that this will not be anywhere near as beautiful or eloquent as Lindsay's previous post. It will be "word vomit", an effort to get my thoughts and feelings on the page in an effort to process and ponder them intentionally. As a planner/second-guesser/all-around anxious perfectionist, just writing what comes to mind with little editing has never come easy for me, so thank you for bearing with me.

Over the past 12 days, I feel like I have experienced a lifetime of emotions. To be honest, when I had my seizure early last Tuesday morning, July 22, I initially felt a sense of relief. After all, I finally had an answer to why my scapula had mysteriously broken 3 months earlier. Maybe it was denial, maybe it was what we call "premature closure" in medicine, or maybe I was still experiencing some post-ictal confusion, but I just assumed I was going to be diagnosed with adult-onset epilepsy. After all, I didn't seem to have an infection, I didn't seem to have suffered a stroke, I hadn't started a new medicine or ingested anything weird. The thought of a brain tumor didn't even cross my mind (rather embarrassingly, in retrospect). 

That relief was shattered when the young emergency room attending physician told me that my CT scan showed a mass in the left frontal lobe of my brain. Relief gave way to unmistakable, primal fear. I found myself physically shaking in my hallway bed, now suddenly thinking of all the horrible potential diagnoses I had ignored earlier.  I, of course, immediately thought of a glioblastoma, the most common primary brain tumor in adults with a horrible median survival time of about 15 months. I was trembling uncontrollably, trying to come to terms with the possibility that I might only have a few months to live. Racing through my mind were all the life events I feared I would miss: my daughters graduating high school, my daughters getting married, growing old with Lindsay by my side. 

It was Lindsay arriving to the ED to be at my side that allowed me to gather my composure while we awaited more news. That primal fear again gave way to relief when the neurologists and neurosurgeons both agreed that they felt the tumor was not a glioblastoma, but most likely a low grade glioma, a much less aggressive form of brain cancer, albeit with the potential to eventually turn into glioblastoma if not treated. 

For the past 11 days, I have been living somewhere between those two extremes of fear and relief in a state of mind I can only describe as surreal. On one hand, life goes on as it always did. As we await further imaging studies and specialist appointments, I still get up every day, help the kids get ready for school, and make my way to work (I'm trying to avoid taking further time off work until the time of my biopsy and surgery). Yet at the same, our family is trying to deal with a monumental and irrevocable change to everything we once knew. Calls to the insurance company, calls to doctors offices, calls to the radiology department, managing the fact that I cannot legally drive for 6 months after my seizure. And so on and so on. It is has been hard to live between those two realities, the routine and the unprecedented. It seems everything now is painted with that surreal dichotomy. 

As we anxiously wait for more answers about my medical diagnosis and prognosis, I have realized it is not the uncertainty that scares me, but rather the possibility of certainty. Most of us live our lives not knowing when we will die. That uncertainty allows us to live each day with a certain blissful obliviousness towards our mortality. Now, I am likely a few weeks away from having at least an expert's opinion on how long I can expect to live (Will it be 10 years? Will it be 15 years? Will they even give me a number?) I don't know how I am going to react to whatever that news will be. 

As I await more answers, I have already noticed some changes in myself. I do feel an overall sense of clarity regarding my priorities. I suddenly find myself motivated to do many things I have been putting off or second-guessing for years. I now read that book without guilt. I pick up the acoustic guitar without that nagging voice in the back of my head telling me it's not worth playing because I'm not very good at it. I pick up my DSLR camera with the desire to capture the world around me without concern for the end result. Interestingly enough, I also feel move conviction in my values. When I see something I perceive as wrong in the world, I feel a much stronger desire to speak out with much less concern for how I will be judged for doing so. It is as if I have developed some sort of innate desire to live more authentically with whatever time I have left on this physical earth. And perhaps not surprisingly, decisions and stressors that once seemed so important (should I pursue fellowship after residency? do I want to keep doing research as part of my career? etc.) now seem to be taking on more appropriate levels of concern in the scope of my life. 

What is surprising, and refreshingly so, is how little regret I feel about my past. As someone who has always agonized over decisions large and small, I am shocked that as I now face the possibility of a premature death I am not plagued by endless thoughts of could'ves and should'ves. Instead I feel peace. I can't totally explain why. But my best guess (and forgive me for waxing philosophical), is that perhaps the real important decisions in life, the one's that really matter, are far fewer in number than we think. And if we nail those, if we get those right (or even right enough), our life will be a sweet and fulfilling one. I think of the friendships I nurtured, I think of the time spent with family, I think of marrying Lindsay and choosing to have 3 wonderful children. I think of trying to do good, even if I wasn't sure what form that should take. 

I don't know what the future holds. I hope that I have many more years to live. I pray every day that I get to live long enough to see my daughters grow into adults. In the meantime, I'm trying to savor every day. I hold my children a little tighter and a little longer. I listen to and speak with Lindsay more intently. I make decisions with a little less second-guessing. The reality is, no matter what the future holds, life will never be the same for our family. I do mourn that "before cancer" life. Everything since July 22 is now seen through the surreal lens of brain cancer. 

What has helped make all this bearable has been the astounding outpouring of love and support we have received from far and wide. Our church community has brought us meals, given us blessings, and prayed and fasted for us. My co-residents have covered shifts for me, covered my patient messages, and have raised a ton of money for me to pay for Uber rides while I cannot legally drive. My program director gave me tickets to a Dodgers-Red Sox game, where I (finally!!) got to see my favorite baseball player of all time, Clayton Kershaw, pitch a game in person. My brother-in-law Craig and his wife Kendra set up a GoFundMe that over a hundred people have generously donated too. My parents, in-laws, and Craig and Kendra all flew in to be by our sides in the immediate aftermath of the diagnosis. And so, so, so many other examples I cannot name them all. I remain overwhelmed and eternally grateful for all this love and support. It has meant the world to us. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I don't know what else to say, but I will keep saying it over and over. 

I sense myself rambling, so I think it is time to sign off. Thank you for reading and thank you for your love.