Little things.

On fighting for your life....

It’s always the little things.

Several weeks ago, when I shared my diagnosis with a friend he said, “Nothing breaks you. You just… don’t break.”

In the aggregate, he’s right. I’ve had my fair share of shitty things happen in my life and they have surely brought me to my knees. But as Cher sings, “I can take it/I’ll be back up on my feet.”

Today, I got out of the shower and my head was cold. There’s no hair on it to keep it warm so this tracks. I reached for my special little hair towel that I bought to protect my unruly, curly hair. Before I put it on, I pushed my (non-existent) hair all the way over my head and bent over.

This tiny action – I caught myself before I even completed it – brought me to my knees. I put the towel back on the little track and immediately crawled into bed, wrapped my arms around a small stuffed elephant that I adopted a few days before my last chemo session, and wept.

Wept is too elegant a word.

I wailed/sobbed/coughed/dry heaved a little for I don’t know how long.

It’s never the big thing that breaks you.

I’ve cried plenty throughout this process. And I’ve pissed and moaned and complained but today was the first time I had the very real thought, “I can’t do this.”

About ten years ago, I checked myself into a psychiatric hospital. I wanted to kill myself. I don’t just mean that I kind of was like, “Ugh, maybe a bus will hit me today.” I had a plan. I had means and access. I wrote notes and spent time planning where to do it. Seemed rude to do it my shower or something – who would clean up after me?

I made a joke to a friend who wisely didn’t just let it go. She told a different friend and he drove me to the ER and sat with me until they admitted me. I stayed for six days.

I think about that time a lot these days.

What would that version of me think of this current version of me? Would she be glad for the diagnosis? Would she have refused treatment despite “Matty’s” very curable prognosis? Would it have changed how she felt?

It’s not that I wanted to die. And it’s not like I thought people would be better off without me. I knew the pain it would cause. But I also knew the pain I was in and the thought of going on while carrying it around was unfathomable.

“I can’t do this,” I thought then too.

But I did.

I did. I went to the hospital. And when I got out of the hospital, I told my friends. I built a community. And then I kept asking them for help. I slept on their couches when I wanted to die and I went home when I wanted to die less. On days that I really couldn’t get my shit together, I just focused on feeding my cats. Who would feed them if I wasn’t there? My flesh would only last so long.

And then one day, I didn’t want to kill myself anymore. I can’t tell you what changed except everything. I went to therapy and I took my medicine and I wrote things that other people found helpful which in turn helped me. And I shared my story, often and in detail. I did this so that people would know that they weren’t alone. I’m proud of my story. And I’m proud of every person who has ever reached out to me to share their own, even when it doesn’t turn out like mine. We are brave souls walking the Earth carrying this weight. I will always, always hold my friends in that particular fight closely.

When I write about that time or about suicidal ideation in general, I always say this: I cannot tell you when it will get better. I can only tell you that it will change. Everything moves eventually. Everything.

Cancer (and suicidal depression, come to think of it) is a street fight. One of those nasty fuckers where you’re just grabbing at each other and sometimes you miss the punch and sometimes you take it in the neck when your opponent meant to get you in the eye. And you try to land a kick, but they get out of the way so you fall on your ass and pee your pants a little bit. And they take the chance to kick you right in the face, but at the last second you grab their leg and twist it just right and they go down screaming like a little baby so you climb on top of them and jam the heel of your hand right into their nose and break that bitch.

Sometimes you break cancer’s nose and sometimes cancer breaks yours and there’s no telling who’s coming out on top on any given day.

Today, cancer got me.  My (metaphorical) nose is bleeding everywhere.

Why am I fighting so hard for my life when I was so casual about it just a few short years ago? The pain is still here. I still carry it. And it didn’t get any lighter, especially with cancer throwing her can’t-take-no-for-an-answer ass on the pile. So why I am willing to carry it now? Correction, why am I fucking begging to carry it?

The little things.

I have cancer and I don’t have my hair and I’m in near constant physical pain and the other night I spent seven hours in the ER with a blood clot and also I get to put my face in my cat’s belly and it’s warm and his fur is soft. A stranger smiled at me at the coffee shop this morning. On social media I saw that two people I enjoy but don’t know very well fell in love in a hopeless place (the picket line). The cute shoes I’ve been coveting for a year finally went on sale. There’s a new season of Vanderpump Rules on the horizon. I have a script to finish and if I die before it’s done, I’ll be so mortified.

Everything moves. Everything changes. I want to see what happens next. Even if it’s bad.

I can’t do this.

I don’t want to do this.  I don’t want to fight with cancer. I don’t want to have to kick her ugly, selfish, stupid, rancid, disrespectful ass. But I will. Because my friend was right.

I don’t break. I bend. I fall. I take to my bed. I cry and rend my garments and I buy things I don’t need and drink too much soda and weep into the stuffed elephant I bought a few days before my last chemo treatment.

But, as my queen says, “This is far from over.” Everything moves. Everything changes.

(P.S. If you know Cher and you don’t introduce me, I’m going to assume you are Team Cancer.)