Since my bladder cancer diagnosis in May, I have found myself clearing my calendar to allow the next steps in my care to unfold. I am trying to prioritize what I need to do and what can be left undone.
Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash
We met with the doctor last week, reviewed my current situation, and mapped out the next steps in treatment. He is still optimistic that he got all the cancer in the first surgery, even though a second surgery is required to make sure.
Along with the surgery comes weeks of recovery tethered to a catheter and its bag o’ urine. Then, there will be six weekly treatments with more scopes and tests.
In the grand scheme of things, these burdens do not seem too great when I think of patients I have cared for over the years as their hospice chaplain. I am not complaining, nor do I feel life is treating me unfairly. This is all part of life.
Things Left Undone
This newfound status as a cancer patient makes me think of some things that really can be left UNDONE.
I canceled a routine appointment with my optometrist last week. My glasses and “readers” both work fine, even though I occasionally rely on a magnifying glass. I do need to look into having cataract surgery, but that will have to be left UNDONE for now.
I’ve already had my last colonoscopy a couple of years ago. Even before my cancer, I had accepted the guidelines that there was no need to screen for something that would not kill me before my life expectancy of ten years. And… oh yeah… that was my life expectancy before my cancer diagnosis. A colonoscopy can be left UNDONE.
As an aside, I found a GeriPal podcast that discusses stopping mammography somewhere between 70 and 75 because there is no benefit for a woman who has no history of breast cancer and who is not expected to live another 10 years.
Things Done
On the other hand, after being diagnosed with bladder cancer, I started a list titled, “Hope for the best, plan for the worst.” I can still work on these items to render them things DONE.
In the immediate future, I will take a road trip to visit my three children and four grands. I have made this trek two or three times a year for several years. I love driving long distances; this one is over 3,000 miles round trip. I will listen to books and podcasts, see my people, and visit friends, some of them going back to the 1970s. I will also visit places that will bring back so many memories. I want to get this DONE.
What will I listen to on this trip? The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddartha Mukherjee. I heard of the 2015 book just this week. I probably would not have been interested in 2015 BC — Before Cancer.
I started a project before Christmas and got stuck. My wife had asked for a bound book of photos chronicling our daughter’s life. I have sorted through hundreds of pictures, but many more remain. This needs to be moved onto the DONE list.
Finally, another kernel of an idea floating in my head is a “life story” in pictures. I wrote a previous blog about the “spiritual autobiography” I gave my family on my 75th birthday last year. So, this would expand the autobiography and incorporate photos I have going back my early days. Get ‘er DONE.
“By what we have done, and by what we have left undone”
These words are familiar to Episcopalians. We recite them every Sunday as part of our confession. It goes, “…we confess that we have sinned against thee in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done, and by what we have left undone.”
Full disclosure: I am more of an “original blessing” guy than “original sin” guy. I give little thought to sin and much appreciation for my blessings. Nonetheless, I borrowed the wording of things “done” and things “left undone” to help me incorporate my cancer diagnosis into the living of these days.
This blog is DONE.
[I explored this same content on a video I posted yesterday on YouTube.]
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Author Chaplain Hank Dunn, MDiv, has sold over 4 million copies of his books Hard Choices for Loving People and Light in the Shadows (also available on Amazon).
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