Essays
My Essays
Bracing for the tsunami
I was barely awake when the doctor phoned. I had fed the cat her breakfast and stumbled back to bed following another night of sleep scarcity. I didn’t want to be awake, I wasn't ready for the day to start. But when the phone buzzed I knew I had to take it. He...
Hold or Fold
Fight or give up. I was always amazed when I heard someone decided against treatment for cancer, decided to just do nothing. Why would you not fight? Why not continue clawing your way to life? Life is so good, exciting, invigorating and filled with adventure,...
Free from matter
Matter, noun Be of consequence, have meaning, implies something, has influence and considered of value. Substance - what physical objects consists of are composed of Surbarance I will do nothing, there is nothing I have to do about it. It will only matter if we...
The lies fear tells
Fruit salad. Emotion fuelled thoughts become chopped up and fragmented, layered in a haphazard spectrum of extremes and moderation. Some thinking you do on purpose and some thinking happens to you. The thinking you do on purpose you can keep measured and guided,...
Day Seventeen
"That's when it gets real." The doctor was explaining the side effects of chemotherapy and we got to the question of losing hair. As if the numerous, brutal and unrelenting effects that chemo inflicts on your body and mind hasn't made it real yet. Chemo is about...
How chemo is
I don't suppose there is a right way to react the first time a doctor uses the word chemotherapy, if there is I have not been read in. You can't write about cancer without using some clichés. So, here's one: nothing prepares you for hearing any of it. Hearing that...
The Gift of Cancer
One of the first things a friend said to me after cancer number one showed up was that cancer will teach you who your real friends are. It's cliched, it's passe, but unfortunately, it's determinedly and unmistakably true. I understood the sentiment but wasn't...
Of doctors, healers and medical engineers
Doctors and a lot of the medical profession have changed, care is no longer what the principles of oath intended. Not only has care become commercialised but also more strictly technical, which is expected with the gains in technological solutions over the past few...