Dealing with a Chronic Illness

Thinking about having a chronic illness and how I cope made me think of this:

"Sir!"
"Yes helmsman?"
"We need to abandon ship!"
"What's wrong?"
"The rust on the hull has caused a crack, the electrical system is frayed and worn, the engine is burning oil faster than we can replace it and..."
"And?"
"And we are boxed in by icebergs in a mined corridor."
"How far are we from home?"
"A day... maybe two."
"Then all is not lost, is it? Full speed ahead!"

-what having a chronic illness feels like, the trick is to not panic.

It's Been a While

I'm sorry I have not posted in a few months but here is a recap.

I had my colon removed on July 27th at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, by the next day I had been told that it weighted about 10 pounds which pretty much means that there is no way it could have been saved, barring a major miracle. I'm cool with that. What happened a few days later I'm still not cool with. My surgeon came in and told me that pathology of the colon was in and that there were three tumors all malignant and none which had been detected in June when I had last been scoped. Not surprising considering that due to the amount of inflammation in the colon they could easily hide. Two were stage one and one was stage three, thankfully none penetrated the muscle wall and only one out of forty one lymph nodes came up as having cancer. What that means is that I am currently undergoing chemo and will be finished, barring any problems, in May or so of 2012. That also means that I won't be having anymore surgery until after the chemo is over. Which sets back the third and final surgery until the fall meaning that I will have a bag for a year or so. Not too bad. And hopefully there will be no problems or complications.

On a plus side I finally got a girlfriend, she's an old friend that I finally reconnected with and hopefully things will work out, only the future will tell.