would you be mine? could you be mine?

While this post may seem to bounce from point to point, be assured, in my chemo addled mind there is cohesion.

The plan, as of now, is I will have one more chemo treatment, after I return from vacation at the end of the month, and then scans. Those scans, those nerve wrecking, nausea inducing, anxiety ridden scans. I'm not feeling too positive about the scan. We've covered that ground before.

I'm a friggin emotional wreck right now. Sometimes I think my surgeon removed my testicles when he took half of my lower intestines. But, as it is, I'm bigger than most of you, except for Chris, so if you give me grief for crying like a little girl, I'll kick ya butt.

Thanks to all of you for your notes, I love hearing from you. I would like to say though, that in my last post I was not complaining about meeting women. Relationships are not on the menu right now (we'll get back to that in a second). I was actually perplexed by women, which is par for the course. And did anyone read the second post from that day? All of you wrote me about the first piece, telling me to man up and stride unto the breach, but nobody commented on my moment of perfection. People, people! I write these things for you, not just because I like the sound of my own fingers on the keyboard.

One subject I have not touched upon while sharing with you my dance with the disease, is relationships. I've talked about my family, and my friends, and interaction with other cancer patients, but I have, until this point, steered clear of any discussion involving a significant other, a girlfriend. Currently I am single. While I certainly have more pressing issues on my mind, somewhere in the back of the grey matter I am trying to deal with the concept of being sick and maintaining a relationship. For that brief while when I was in remission (that word just snakes out of the corner of my mouth with bitterness) I dated a lovely young lady, but it did not work out. At this time, and it's anyone's guess as to how long "this time" is going to last, I need to be selfish. I need to focus my energy on me, on winning, on recovering. It would be unfair to any woman for me to enter into a relationship without being able to offer her the attention, affection, and time required of a relationship. At the very least, I'm, at times, a useless lump who can do no more than sink into the couch and stare mindlessly at the tv. When I do have more energy, I still tend to nest. During the chemo, there are brief times when I'm physically able or willing to be an active and involved person. Certainly, love and affection can see past these mere inconveniences, but they are just some of the issues. My mind and soul need to assign themselves to myself, to the millions of ideas running through my mind, to the torrent of synapses in my brain. Sure, this is basically me in a nutshell to begin with, but the added 2 x 4 of this beat down drive with a tumor at the wheel makes me even more me. What woman deserves that?? I often wonder what this whole experience would be like if I was involved with someone when I first got sick. I'm not so sure I would be able to handle it. Actually, I KNOW I can't, that's the whole point here isn't it? Moving forward, I have many issues to deal with as well. The cancer isn't going away. I'm not ever going to be rid of it, I'll live with it, until I won't. There will be more chemos, maybe more surgeries. How's that for baggage? How do you bring that into a relationship? Damned if I know. Surely life and death are a part of any relationship, but with me it's going to be a more tangible aspect. I've never really thought about having a family, I always believed that if it happened that would be wonderful, but if not I was still a happy man. Now, I need to face that there is a very real chance that I will never have children. The chemo has, more than likely, left me with dead swimmers. And, if some of them happen to survive my poisoned cure, I have to grapple with the idea that I will pass this disease onto my children. I wouldn't wish this experience on anyone, and I am not about to thrust it upon my own offspring. I still believe that I don't need to have children or a family to make me happy, but they will be a blessing if they come. However, I'm a little pissed off that my choices are limited. It's a control thing.