Officially Cured of Cancer

In so many ways, I was never prepared for this moment of my life, and it’s nothing like how I pictured it.

10 years ago, if you had told me that I would be writing a blog post in 2020 about being cured of cancer, I would probably have been grateful, but also slightly horrified about the future developments in store for me.

Five years ago, if you had told me that I would be celebrating my officially being cured of cancer by doing basically nothing because of a global pandemic, I would have thought you were writing some sort of dystopian fan fiction about my life.

When I finished chemo and learned that five years of remission was my new mission, I was convinced that we would celebrate my eventual cure by going out for a big steak dinner like we did when I first received the joyous “No Evidence of Disease” proclamation. We would invite family and friends to join us for the summer backyard party of the century. We would continue the celebration with a trip to Hawaii or some other exotic locale we hadn’t experienced yet.

But none of this is happening. And it doesn’t even matter…Today is a day of joy and gratitude. The wait is over. I am blessed beyond measure. Time to buy some life insurance!

In a way, it’s fitting that the reality of my “cured date” would be as surreal as everything else about the experience of being diagnosed with and treated for cancer. I’ve written elsewhere about how so much of the pandemic social distancing/shelter in place protocols are reminiscent of the lifestyle of a cancer patient. Why shouldn’t this journey toward cured end as strangely as it began?

It’s also fitting that the pandemic has allowed me to spend the majority of my time savoring the greatest blessings of my life–my wife and children–that I am only enjoying because God and modern medicine swooped in to save me from a fatal disease.

There is certainly uncertainty and stress in our day-to-day lives right now, but we are dealing mostly with mere inconveniences and have thus far been spared any real tragedy connected to the pandemic. I am fortunate to be able to work from home (just like when I had cancer!) and we are blessed to be sheltering in our comfortable home and using this time to survive, thrive, and establish the culture of our family with three children aged four and below.

The operative word in the paragraph above is spared. While not the word I embraced when I was first diagnosed or at any of the rougher moments of my treatment, I freely embrace it now, every time I hear about a new cancer patient or the tragic outcome of another cancer victim. I was spared in so many ways with a fully treatable form of lymphoma, stable financial and adaptable occupational situations that were not disrupted by cancerous medical costs, a top-rated oncologist guiding my treatment, few serious side effects, and the ability to have children after chemo–even though my doctor told me it was highly unlikely.

In fact, I was so spared in my cancer experience that the survivor guilt sometimes rides higher than it should. Rather than asking “why me?” as I did at the outset of this rollercoaster, I can find myself asking “why not me?” Why should I have been spared when others with the same disease are not so fortunate? Why should I have been diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma instead of a deadlier form of cancer? I was somehow unaware of this statistic until I saw it on Wikipedia just now, but Hodgkin’s Lymphoma accounts for just 10 percent of all lymphoma cases. 90 percent of cases are the deadlier and more complicated to treat non-Hodgkin’s variety.

These questions are at best useless and at worst self-defeating. And yet they have persisted. Even five years after fighting cancer and being spared, the psychological trauma of facing your impending doom and embarking on a mandatory self-poisoning road to recovery will rear its ugly head in the strangest of ways.

For me, it forces existential questions like the ones posed above. But it also has sewn a disconcerting distrust between my body and my brain. Fool me once, shame on you. Give me cancer, shame on everybody. My brain feels betrayed by my body. What’s stopping that from happening again? My pre-existing hypochondriac condition was aided and abetted by my cancer experience. I have lost count of the number of times I have stress-Googled and diagnosed myself with various maladies, always checking to see if Hodgkin’s survivors are at a greater risk for these perceived new conditions that I’m so sure I’ve contracted.

The freshest–and somewhat laughable–occurrence came at my most recent visit to my oncologist. Since I have been dealing more frequently with bouts of Raynaud Syndrome (this one isn’t in my head…my fingers turn as deadly white as this), my doctor wanted to collect copious amounts of my blood and run a battery of tests for various autoimmune diseases and arthritis. In the few days between the blood draw and the follow-up appointment, I had firmly convinced myself that I would be diagnosed with lupus. You like #DownWithLumpy? You’ll love #DownWithLupus.

I was so dreading the actual test results that they took my blood pressure three times to see if it was really as high as what the machine was showing. It was. When the doctor came in, it might shock you to learn that I did not, in fact, have lupus or any other autoimmune disease. I am in good health and got to hear my oncologist’s (and my) favorite refrain once again: You’re more likely to get hit by a car than to have your cancer come back. That’s music to my ears and the rest of my lupus-free body.

But this is a celebratory post, and as I’ve reiterated in many of my cancer-versary-type posts over the years, the trauma of facing cancer has left many more positives than negatives in my life, so much so that I actually find myself grateful for the experience.

Just so this post can be even more ridiculously long, I’ll close things out with 5 positive outcomes and lessons from my cancer experience.

1. Empathy is important.
   I have an empathy for cancer patients, survivors and their families that can only come with firsthand experience. When someone tells you that they are undergoing chemo, for example, there’s no way for someone who hasn’t experienced that to understand what they will be going through. Even for people with far worse cancers and treatment experiences than me, I have a better glimpse of what their journey looks like. This makes me want to eradicate cancer from the earth and support cancer patients in any way that I can. One way I do so is by raising money for cancer organizations like Imerman Angels and the Anthony Rizzo Family Foundation. Click here to make a donation to my current fundraiser in celebration of my cured status. Thanks to those who have already donated or have donated to previous fundraisers over the years. I am truly grateful.
   
2. Sharing my story was vital.
   This blog was a vital way for me to capture and process my emotions throughout the battle. By meticulously cataloging my experiences, I have also left a raw/emotional/hopefully humorous/complete record for future Hodgkin’s patients to discover as they Google the disease in disbelief and fear after being diagnosed. My blog traffic report frequently shows a small number of visitors viewing a large number of posts–which always means another Hodgkin’s diagnosis has gotten its wings. I could not find a comprehensive account when I was in that position myself, and I have been gratified by those who have read my story and reached out in gratitude. I hope that I have inspired others to be more open about what they’re going through to the extent that they are comfortable with that. I certainly felt more supported and loved by sharing my story. Plus, five years later, I finally found something to host a podcast about!
   
3. Cancer defines me now. I need to let it.
   I will always be a cancer survivor, and that’s never going away. It will always take me longer than you to fill out a medical history form. While I take great pride in being a survivor, there’s also a perpetual awkwardness about how and when to let other people know about this essential detail of my existence. Whenever I make a new friend or coworker, this piece of my puzzle inevitably comes up, and I have to figure out how to present it in a way that doesn’t make them question my current constitution (“No! I’m cured! Don’t look at me like that!”) but also represents the monumental effect this experience had on my life. I’m still working on this.
   
4. Cancer doesn’t define me now. I don’t need to let it.
   Despite all of the above, five years cancer-free sometimes feels like a lifetime. Some of my memories of that time are easily recalled, but in other ways, cancer was an out-of-body experience that feels disconnected from my current stage of life. It helped make me the person that I am today, but it’s not something that I dwell on every day, nor should it be. There should be no guilt associated with getting on with your life–even when that sometimes means that you aren’t being as grateful or compassionate as you should, or that you’re taking things for granted that you swore you never would in the chemo-ridden moments five years ago. Cancer is a touchstone that I can use to reground myself and continually recognize the blessings in my life. I’m still working on this, too.
   
5. Keep paying it forward.
   Five years later, everything about this experience seems so perfectly ordained by God to direct me toward a less selfish, more grateful, more compassionate way of life. These are the greatest lessons of cancer that I never want to forget, no matter how far the experience gets in the rearview mirror. Everyone is fighting a “cancer” of some sort in their life–how can we show up for them and help them with their struggle in same way that so many people willingly showed up for me? It’s OK to ask for help when you need it, it’s OK to accept help when you need it, and it’s absolutely essential to offer help when you can give it. And that can be as simple as a text message, a phone call or a funny meme shared on Facebook. When the stakes are high, the acts of kindness can be simple, and the effects can still be profound. I’m working on this one most of all.

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Thank you for supporting me over the last five years. I am so grateful to have reached this milestone and for the people with whom I get to share my wonderful life.

I’M DONE WITH LUMPY!

9/11 Never Really Goes Away…Nor Should It.

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The hashtag #NeverForget, a seemingly cliche sentiment that is trotted out every September 11th without fail, is also just a truthful description of my feelings about that fateful day.

I will never forget. Even if I wanted to, I can’t forget.

Having spent the past few days in New York City for the first time and staying in a hotel that was about a block from the 9/11 Memorial, my memories of and emotions about the events of that devastating Tuesday were more palpable than they usually have been in the subsequent 16 years.

For my work with Catholic Extension, I was traveling to the Big Apple with a group of about 35 religious sisters. Even in a city that’s seen it all, many people stopped to take photos of our caravan as we roamed the streets of New York.

I arrived a day before the sisters and explored the neighborhood surrounding my hotel, which included all of the new World Trade Center structures and the memorial. As I walked the streets, I wondered how many of the businesses I passed were there in 2001. How many of the people walking and working around me had experienced those acts of terrorism firsthand or knew someone who had died? How did they even begin the physical cleanup process, much less the emotional one?

I have read so many accounts of the chaos in the streets after the planes hit — as the buildings swayed precariously and bodies fell from the sky. I have seen hundreds of photos and video of everything covered in dust — including people who walked around in an astounded, confused daze after their workday or New York vacation had taken a turn for the horrific.

I had nightmares about the attacks and the haunting images of people jumping from the burning buildings for months after September 11th — and I had no direct connection to anyone who lived through or died from the experience. I can’t imagine what it was like for the people who did…or what it continues to be like.

The effects of 9/11 continue to rear their ugly head to this day. Even while I was in New York, there was a headline about a ferry captain who saved hundreds who just died of cancer related to the toxins released by the collapse of the buildings — like so many others who lived through the experience only to tragically die from it years later.

The memorial itself is beautiful and moving. Two separate square fountains take up the footprint of the twin towers, with water flowing endlessly downward into a square hole in the middle of the base of the structures. The outer edges of the squares are enscribed with the names of everyone who perished: office workers, firefighters, police officers, tourists — I even saw a reference to the unborn child of one of the victims who was pregnant. Loved ones commemorate the birthday of their beloved deceased by placing white flowers on their name. There were several flowers on display yesterday.

The sisters — all from Latin American countries — prayed a rosary next to one of the memorial fountains. A young sister from Puerto Rico — who couldn’t have been very old when 9/11 occurred — seemed particularly moved by the experience and led a beautiful prayer asking for God’s grace on the victims and their families and for mercy for the people who commited the atrocity.

Of all the exciting attractions that I wanted to experience in New York, this was one place to which I always felt called to make a pilgrimage. The experience reminded me anew of why I will never forget — and why we can’t.

Processing A Hoax

A few months ago, my wife was taking our daughter for a walk in her stroller and accidentally left the garage door open. When she returned, the door in the garage that led into our house was also open. She couldn’t find her house keys, car keys and wallet — which usually hung on a hook just inside that strangely ajar interior garage door. It was freaky.

She made sure no one was in the house, retraced her steps, and tore the house apart looking for the keys and wallet. Since there had been quite a few recent incidents of people stealing unlocked cars and intruding into unlocked homes in the middle of the night — even in our very safe neighborhood — we decided to file a police report. The cops recommended that, if we couldn’t find the keys, we change the locks the next day. As an added precaution, we ended up sleeping at my parents’ house that night. My wife got the locks changed the next morning, but soon after doing so, she found the keys under a random flap on my daughter’s stroller. All turned out to be OK, but not without some tense moments of losing all sense of security that we had moments earlier completely taken for granted.

This story played out on a grander scale today at Northwestern University, my beloved alma mater. The stakes were obviously much higher: Evanston police received a call from someone claiming to have killed his girlfriend in a Northwestern graduate residence building. Northwestern’s emergency communications protocol swung into action, sending texts and making calls to all students, faculty and staff to alert them of the situation and urging them to take cover in a safe place.

It was more than an hour before the official “All Clear” message was released, and the incident was revealed to be a hoax. The call had come from somewhere near Rockford and the woman referenced was unharmed and in no danger, according to police. While this is probably the best possible outcome for a harrowing situation like this, the incident still caused a university-wide panic.

While for many people following the news, this was simply a moment of relief from “what might have been,” to me it was so much more than that.

Having studied and worked at Northwestern for more than 13 years, this was the equivalent of a home invasion for me. I also spent six years working in the office tasked with handling emergency communications (and was there for some tough stuff), which made receiving the news of today’s events particularly jarring.

I had just turned my phone back on after landing in Dallas on my way back to Chicago, when it immediately blew up with text message. Several other former University Relations coworkers were trading what little details were available via text and pondering what must be happening at our former office in these moments. Another former coworker and a fellow alum were sending me several tweets related to the situation.

Most importantly, my Mom texted me to say that my youngest brother — a current junior — was not on campus when the alert went out and was safe.

Scanning my Facebook and Twitter feeds — filled with posts from students I had taught and staff and faculty I had worked with — painted a horrifying picture of the terror that gripped the place that was my home as a student for 5 years and as a staff member for 8 years. There’s a photo of 18 students huddled on the floor of a professor’s tiny office. There’s a photo of a classroom door with all of the chairs and desks stacked against the door. There are accounts of students running to closets and other hidden away areas of the student center upon receiving the emergency alerts.

While the shooting might have been a hoax, everything else that happened this afternoon was for real: the emergency texts, the police activity, the chaos, the uncertainty and the immediate coverage of little old Northwestern by national media outlets. It prompted visions of an alternate reality in which NU joined the statistics of all the other recent shootings in schools and public places.

Even though I wasn’t there to experience it in person, I feel that with today’s developments, the long shadow of gun violence in our country has finally touched me on a more personal level. I don’t pretend to have the political answers or perfect gun control policy changes, but something’s got to give. The value of human life is too sacred and our safety is too important for us to allow these kinds of things to happen so easily.

The reason that a hoax had to be taken so seriously today is because current events remind us that this is so often not a hoax. It is our sad new reality — a reality in which I can get on a plane for an hour and land to the news of violence and terror engulfing the people I love in a place that I love.

I’m praying a little bit harder tonight for all of the victims of the many violent incidents that resulted in far more than fear and false alarms. May their pain and loss be a constant reminder to us of the dignity of human life and the need to care for one another.

 

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Four Years in Our House

Four years ago today, I moved into my house. In that time, it’s safe to say that I have fulfilled the cliche and turned this house into a home. 

I remember the first time I pulled up to it — back when it was still just a house. It was one of those fluffy snowy days in Chicago when the flakes are falling furiously and beautifully and the accumulation is swift. My then-future in-laws had endured the weather to drive up from southern Indiana to check out this house’s potential to be a home for me and their daughter. We weren’t yet engaged, and I already owned a condo in another suburb. My longterm visions had us getting married eventually and her moving into the condo with me, where we would save for a house and move out whenever the timing worked.

But when a family friend offered me a once-in-a-lifetime deal on a house in the suburb where I grew up — 10 minutes from my parents’ house — it was too good not to investigate the possibility. The friend was not listing the house, so I hadn’t even seen any prettified, wide-angle real estate photos of the interior, just the Google Street View exteriors, via my limited Internet stalking of the property.

I can still remember exploring the largely empty rooms for the first time with my girlfriend — what an odd word to use for her now — trying to picture a future together in rooms that have since been filled with our furniture, our thoughts, our feelings, our offspring and four years’ worth of memories. As I wandered around the basement, growing more fond of the house itself and my imagined version of that future, I remember praying that my Mr. Fix-It father-in-law wouldn’t find any devastating structural dealbreakers. I also remember being silently grateful for my Can’t-Fix-A-Thing self that the house was recently flipped with a new paint job and new appliances. I liked this house.

The house ultimately passed the test and has been silent witness to so many momentous and mundane moments of my life ever since. I asked my wife to marry me in the living room. I jokingly carried her through the front doorway on our wedding night.

We have played countless board games in our dining room. We have watched hours of television and worked through countless fights on the living room couch. We have hosted outdoor parties and built a shed in our backyard

I slept off the effects of chemotherapy in our bedroom and spent six months working remotely from the confines of this house. We keep adding new mementos to our Chicago Cubs bathroom. We have hung wedding photos and baby photos everywhere.

We have passionate debates about if or when we should knock out the wall between the living room and the kitchen.

Our guest bedroom turned into a nursery where I rock my daughter to sleep every night. My Northwestern University-themed office room turned into the guest bedroom. The office-turned-guest-bedroom is now transforming into another nursery, where I’ll rock my son to sleep. The house is constantly evolving to meet the needs of our home.

Our unfinished basement holds memories of our past stacked against the walls. It stores our bikes during the winter. It hides some still unused wedding presents. Most excitingly, it holds the promise of the future evolution of our family. There are new rooms still to be created that will be the setting for even more memories to come.

We’ve crammed so much life into this house in four years.

It’s our home.

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In Praise of Longer Days

When you live in Chicago, Mother Nature wages a winter-long competition between cold and darkness to see which can break you first.

While I despise the cold, I know that my real enemy is the darkness. You can always warm yourself up eventually, but there’s no way to make the sun emerge during Chicago’s winter hallmark: endless weeks of dreary gray skies. There comes a point each year, as I trudge to the train station in frigid darkness after work, that I wonder if it will ever be 80 degrees and sunny again — and realize with despair that we are still at least four solid months away from that warm reality. Seasonal Affective Disorder is a real thing, even if you only have a mild case of it.

But then there are days like today — a random Tuesday in late February — when cold and darkness both stay their hands. We are graced with unnatural 60-degree temperatures and an even more important reminder that spring is on its way: sunlight that lasts beyond 6 p.m.

There is something indescribably important about leaving work before it’s dark outside. Since childhood summers, the dying of the light has always represented a sort of sadness — the day is over, the fun has ended, it’s time to go inside. When you end your workday without the opportunity to see the sun setting in the sky, it feels more like your life in the cubicle has robbed you of a day you’ll never get back. If there’s at least a shred of daylight left when you emerge from your occupational cocoon, you’ve won.

I love these brief weeks before our clocks even do us the favor of “springing ahead,” when the sun lingers in the sky and ends its workday along with me. This evening I strolled through the beautiful streets of downtown Chicago with a spring in my step that matched the spring in the air.

The majestic Second City skyscrapers are extra magical when the sun has slipped down below their massive height — so the tops of the buildings are still brightly illuminated and reflecting the dying embers, but the street below is cast in shadow with an orange glow burning brightly above it. I board my train, and the sun and I race home together. The orb creeps ever closer to the horizon as I speed toward my evening plans.

As I arrive home in the gloaming — which has lasted a bit longer each day this week — I can feel the page turning. Soon the days will stretch and the warmth will increase to allow me to come home and eat dinner outside on my back patio, or go for a well-lit run, or take my daughter to the playground down the block.

The mere thought of it begins the annual healing process of the scar tissue earned from shoveling the driveway and scraping windshields and walking in the darkness.

The days are getting longer. Every day, there is more day to seize.

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