The Last One

My last day of chemotherapy treatment, just after ringing the bell. I’m smiling under that mask. A lot.

I have little recollection of my final chemo, number 6. For reference, it’s been five months (yesterday) since I found out I was in remission. I’ve officially been out of treatment longer than I was in it. That’s strange to say. And stranger to feel.

What follows is what I remember before it’s all a complete haze: there are two sides to the chemo floor. For three rounds, I had the side with the windows, for three rounds, I didn’t. Not consecutively.

My last chemo took place in the windowless area. It was particularly busy that day and the nurses were under staffed. The way chemo goes, at the Cancer Centre anyway, is that you almost never get the same nurse twice. Today was no different, I had someone I hadn’t had before.

Halfway through my treatment an older woman sat down beside me. You can always tell when it’s a person’s first time and it was hers. She had her son with her. It wasn’t clear to me if she couldn’t speak English at all or if her son was just there to help her along a little. Regardless, it was nice she wasn’t alone. They gave her the iPad to learn about “all the things you need to know when you’re on chemo.” Her son translated in a language I didn’t understand, while watching a video about a language I’d come to know very well, the language of active cancer treatment.

It’s strange and quiet and sterile on the chemo floor some days. This was one of them.

My nurse didn’t know it was my last day. The people beside me didn’t know either. Eventually I told the nurse it was and she asked me what I wanted to do. Some people write notes. Some people ring the bell. I wanted to ring the bell.

As I got up from my chair, for hopefully the last time ever, I smiled at the new cancer patient and her son, as I neared the hopeful end of my journey, hers had just begun. I can’t remember what I said or if I said anything at all. But what I was trying to say was, just breathe. Soon it’ll be your last treatment, too.

We rounded the corner to the bell.

Ringing that beautiful bell. June 17, 2021.

The nurse took my phone to take a video. Then more people appeared, on their way to the chemo chair. They stopped. I motioned for them to keep going — it was too quick. After they walked by, my nurse recorded the video of me nonchalantly ringing the bell. Then she took my picture. All the while people I don’t know are clapping for me. And staring at me. I like being the centre of attention, but for whatever reason, I didn’t like this. Maybe because this isn’t something you want. This isn’t the kind of attention you’re after. Maybe because so many of the videos of people ringing the bell at the end of treatment feature family with the patient — all teary-eyed and grateful. But I was all alone, as I had been in this hospital since the first day I walked through its doors and sat in the ER waiting for a bed. Regardless, I said thank you to the nurse and that she had been nice but I hoped never to see her again. She was too busy to laugh, she had to hustle to all the machines beeping saying infusions needed changing. And to collect iPads that had been given to the first-timers. Maybe she didn’t laugh because everyone says that. Or because people say that and eventually she sees them again. I can’t imagine the life of an oncology nurse. It has to be harrowing.

With that, I turned and went to the bathroom. The bathroom especially for chemo patients (we’re bio-hazards for a week to anyone that isn’t pumped full of poison). And as I peed my pinkish-red stream from the doxorubicin, closed the toilet seat and flushed twice, I got up and looked in the mirror. The tears were going to come. I could feel them. When they’re somehow stuck in your throat. I washed my hands and walked away. Down to the first floor. To a quiet area. To the area I’d sat and talked to my cousin after the first round and said it wasn’t so bad. I called Lucia again. This time when she answered I said “it’s over.” With a shaky voice and choking on tears I repeated myself “It’s over. I can’t believe it’s over.” As I waited for my little family to come get me, I laughed and cried with my cousin as she laughed and cried with me. My cousin who lost her parents to cancer. My cousin who lost her in-laws. My cousin who has lost so much. How glad I am that she didn’t have to lose me. How weird it is to be done. To always wonder “is it really over?” And hope that it always will be.

In the days that followed, I found myself in a glass case of emotion à la Ron Burgundy in Anchorman. Some moments I felt high, most moments I felt weirdly low and unsettled. As I looked into it more, I learned how normal it all is to feel that way.

One of many cave days

What cancer looks like. Alone. In your room. With no energy but to lie there. A black hole in your eyes where light used to be.

For this round, my parents were over the following day. Usually it was just Willis and the kids the next day. I wasn’t in a great mood. I just wanted to stay in my room watching The Handmaid’s Tale on my laptop. Or maybe it was Insecure, I can’t remember what I was watching, just that it was on Crave. I emerged from my cave at some point and my mom asked what was going on and said I didn’t seem like I was having a very good day. I told her I just wanted to be alone. I was in this weird space where all I wanted was to have a minute to wallow in self pity. To hole up in my room and make myself a burrow. Instead, I was in a situation where there were five other people in my house and alone-ness was all but impossible because we’re still in the middle of a mother-fucking-once-in-a-generation pandemic and my kids had been with me since March 2020 and now it was June 2021. Not to mention, everyone was so excited for me that I was done going through this hell — each of them sure it was gone, that I would be fine. But I couldn’t match their excitement. I didn’t know for sure, I wouldn’t know for sure until a cat scan a few weeks later, after which I still waited on PET scan results to really let myself feel somewhat safe. So for me, I wasn’t relieved. I wasn’t happy. It wasn’t over. Instead, I had just emerged from the bowels of hell to enter limbo instead.

What I learned in the days, weeks and months that followed was oddly, the physicality of it all, the having to deal immediately with the physical pain, the swelling, the not breathing, the every 2-3 weeks getting bloodwork or scans or chemo, that’s strangely the easy part. And by easy, I mean excruciating. But mentally, it allows you to cope. You’re doing something. You know something is working. You know there’s a plan. Once that’s all gone and you’re suddenly out on your own amongst the living, it is very very very unsettling. This insane thing happened to you. This trauma happened to you. Your body was trying to kill you. Your cells said, “nope, we’re going in a different direction. We’ve decided to fuck everything up.” If you had been born at another time or had another type of cancer, that could have been it. But you’re still here and now you get to deal with Survivorship and all the complexities that come with it. Everyone else resumes their normal lives — which is great, you’re so happy for all of them — but it’s unsettling to be tossed back into the water so suddenly. No more meds. No more needles. No more meals. No more flowers. No more gifts. No more cards. No more texts. No more phone calls. No more check ins. It’s over. You’re still alive, and now… back to your regularly scheduled programming.

Us survivors (some people don’t like this word, I on the other hand am happy to take it on. I was a survivor even before cancer. I’m just more of a survivor now I guess) don’t begrudge anyone for returning to life as normal. Life is busy and messy and we’re glad you’re out there living it. But you can’t help but feel like you’re floundering. Especially in a pandemic. My immune system still isn’t fully online. We don’t know if my vaccines worked. So Willis, the kids and I, are stuck here in this weird space between pandemic and endemic. Torn between wanting to be indoors and hug friends and have a chance to actually celebrate that I didn’t die and waiting it out because we’ve made it this far and surely this shit has got to almost be over.

Five-second PSA: for the love of all that is holy, please, get vaccinated. If not for you, then for elderly people, for the immunocompromised, for people like me who can’t resume life as it was until we’re a little closer to endemic. We have to do something to end this. The science shows far and wide that vaccines are the answer. Society has done it before to protect themselves and each other — we need to do it again. Until we do, this will continue. More people will get sick and die. For a plethora of reasons. Not just COVID. Because they missed their important surgery. Because their chemo was postponed. Because their mental health is off-track because of the isolation of it all. The virus will continue to spread and mutate. So please, stop faltering, get vaccinated. Okay, PSA over.

As I close out on this post today I’m on the heels of my 37th birthday. A day I felt genuinely happy just to be here on this blue spinning rock. Several times I teared up with sheer gratefulness. But as I write this, a few days later, that unsettled feeling has returned. I know I have no choice but to let it come. Moments comes in waves and because I drew a short straw somewhere, the waves I have to ride from now until the end of (my) time, will sometimes be very high. Sometimes I’ll feel engulfed by them and maybe sometimes I’ll go under for a moment or two, but I know I have to ride them. That I will emerge again. Anew. And hopefully, the next wave won’t be as ominous. Maybe the next wave is a ripple and I can rest my toes gently in the water and enjoy the warmth of the sun on my face.

Reflections

Side effects