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Bubbling over
Tag: bills
Nobody told me about the guilt!
I had no idea just how much guilt comes with chronic disease. This may not be true for everyone, but it is definitely true for me. I just can’t seem to balance the whole “just concentrate on getting better” side of me with the side that is worried about everybody else, my business, other people’s schedules, my patients, and just generally letting people down with all of my limitations. Sometimes I think it takes me more time and energy to process all the guilt and worrying than it would just to be sick. I get it. That sounds ridiculous, but it is the truth for me. It is just a tough balance for me.
You know what I think would be a good idea? We should sit patient’s down, after they have had a chance to digest the news of their new diagnosis, and hook them up with a mentor or counsellor to sit them down and help them start to wade through and plan for all the other complications and stuff that comes with any chronic illness. It might make it less overwhelming than just having everything smack you in the face as it comes, while you are busy trying to “just concentrate on getting better.” I get that some cancer patients have patient navigators, but the main role of these individuals is to keep the patient on track in terms of appointments, tests, and treatments. This is useful to be sure, but the real trick is managing all the outside life stuff that is on top of the tests, etc. I say we start offering life navigators too because, in most cases, the damage that is done with all the life fails, failed relationships, missed work, and unpaid bills far exceeds whatever damage the cancer inflicted.
Dr. Katz
Bye Bye Gourmet Dinners..or…how are these mofos gonna make it without me?
Now remember, this is just for fun….
I can see it already. The countdown to chemo has started. 5 days from now I will receive my first 5 hour installment of a combination of poisons and immunotherapy. Yippee! Bring on the side effects! Let’s get this show on the road! One step closer to a cure!( I hope) Bring on the easter egg look! Now we are really getting somewhere! Finally moving in a positive direction!
It all sounds “good” doesn’t it? Just what I have been anxiously waiting for all these months with all the delays etc. Feeling weirdly nervouscited, terrified, and good about it all at once. But then, I flashed back to the conversation that my chemo nurse had with my husband at our last visit. He was trying to be funny and made a silly remark about how my the quality of dinners at our house has really elevated since I have been home so much and that at least there was one benefit of me having cancer. The nurse kind of glared at him and said, “Mister, you can kiss those gourmet meals goodbye for now because I can guarantee that she won’t have the energy to do it.” He looked kind of stunned. Literally that thought had not occurred to him until that exact moment…lol I could see his wheels spinning; No more chicken cordon bleu. No more baked ribeye with a parmesan crust. OMG! I couldn’t help myself. I started laughing. Seriously dude? Last time I checked, more than one person in our house knew how to cook. Someone else can run frantically home at lunch and throw something in the oven with the timer for later. I started to visualize the mounds of take out containers in the filthy kitchen of unwashed dishes. I started hearing the pitiful whining of human beings wasting away. Then I realized that gourmet dinners were not the only thing that was going to go the way of the dodo. OMG! I was going to have to concentrate on myself and getting rest and not taking care of everything for everybody. Oh my lord who was going to keep track of everybody’s schedules without me nagging all the time? Were they going to have to be responsible for making it to their own appointments? Find their own rides? Was my daughter going to have to finally get her long overdue driver’s license? Were the dogs ever going to be let out to go to the bathroom? Was the house just going to be awash in filth all the time? Were any bills ever going to be paid on time? Oh man! I really started snowballing. I was in charge of a lot more than I ever stopped to consider. Mind you, I had already started the family on my own version of achieve your independence boot camp, but was it going to be enough? Lol….I guess we will have to wait and see. I’ll get back to you.
Dr. Katz