MilesLong66's blog post - Living

Thursday, March 5, 2020, 9:35:31 PM

There is nothing like a brush with death to make you realize how much you enjoy living.

When I was younger, I thought that I was immortal and took a lot stupid chances. The kinds of situations where you know that one of the possible outcomes could leave you as an unidentifiable corpse. There have been more than a few times where I could have been killed, but wasn’t and walked, or crawled, away with only a few scars or broken bones. The possibility of dying while being stupid never even entered into the equation. It wasn’t until I lost my dad that I finally figured out that I wasn’t immortal.

A few days after Christmas, I was diagnosed with colon cancer. I am a year younger than my dad was, when he was diagnosed. Colon cancer has been prevalent in my family, hanving taken my dad, two of his sisters and older brother my grandmother, cousins and my mother, I knew that it would, probably, eventually knock on my door, too. Since my dad, I have watched as cancer took other family members and several close friends. Watching, knowing what is coming and that I could do nothing to stop it scared the living shit out of me and I would withdraw, unable to function. My own diagnosis has xxxxxxxxxx me to face it. In a way, it was a relief, because there is reason to be afraid of it anymore. I may not be immortal, but I can beat this shit. It might still get me, in the end, but I’m not going down without a fight.

Since the first of 2020, I have had surgery to remove about a foot of my colon, lost enough blood to cause a heart attack, which requiried having a couple of stents installed, and am now enduring chemotherapy. Make no mistake, this is an endurance test to see if I am strong enough survive the cancer and the treatment, before the chemicals or the disease gets me.

I feel better than I have in a long time. I guess you could say that my game is going into extra innings, but, there is still too much baseball yet to be played before even thinking about taking my bat and going home.

My beat up body

Comments

Others Have Said:

Julieannfringe on 12-Mar-20 13:56:26

Actually, your body looks good for such invasive surgery! And below are my answers to your bucket list. We've done many of the same things.

Play along if you’d like!

Broken Bones - No
Shot a gun - Yes
Driven 100 mph – Yes in England
Ridden in a helicopter - No
Gone zip lining – No but I’d love to
Been to an NFL game – Several including a Super Bowl
Been to Canada – Many times
Visited Florida – Many times
Visited Mexico – Only a few hours in Nogales
Visited Vegas- Yes
Eat alone at a restaurant – Yes, used to waitress
Ability to read music - Yes, piano, banjo and ukulele
Ridden a motorcycle - Yes
Ridden a horse – Yes, but I prefer the motorcycle too
Stayed in a hospital – Yes for childbirth
Donated blood - No
Slept outside – Yes
Driven a stick shift – Yes, still drive a stick shift
Ridden in an 18 wheeler - Nope
Ridden in a police car - No
Driven a boat - Yes
Eaten Escargot - No
Been on a cruise - No
Run out of gas - Yes
Eaten Sushi – Yes, I liked it
Seen a ghost/spirit - No
Been to London – Three times
Been to Central America - No
Been to Alaska - No
Been to Hawaii - Yes
Seen a UFO- No
Been to Europe – Several times
Been to San Francisco - Yes
Been to NYC - Yes
Been to Washington DC - Yes
Been snow skiing – Yes, many times
Been Ice skating – Yes, poorly

Julieannfringe on 12-Mar-20 14:00:49

Sent a Thank-you picture to Miles: Yes - again