CPT Cancer

A journal about the intersection of military life, cancer, and being a single dad.

Tag: hockey

  • Remission 3

    I’m only sort of talking about cancer when I say that– more on that in a minute though. 

    See, when you start to reach a point in your journey where you start to feel like you’re breaking through plateaus, that’s when life starts to feel somewhat normal again. You can do the old things you used to do, sure, but they’re… different. Lately, I’m starting to feel less different in a lot of ways, and it feels good.

    Now, that’s not to say I’m anywhere near an approximation of “old me” in many ways, but there are some notable changes:

    • The quality of volume of my saliva and mucus is starting to improve, and I don’t have to scrub the buildup off of my tongue daily. 
    • My taste is starting to claw back some flavors, or at least essences, even if it is easily the biggest lag of all my treatment side effects so far. 
    • My fatigue hasn’t improved much, but my ability to manage it has. I drink about double the caffeine that pre-cancer me used to, which is an increase of two cups of coffee per day to four or five, and about half the week I’m not waking up to pee three or four times per night. 
    • My short term memory recall is still ass, but I’m getting better about writing things in my Notes app or on a physical notebook.
    • I’ve gained a whopping two pounds. Only fifteen more to go.

    I’m averaging about one hockey game per week, and I am ruthlessly enforcing my limits out there. In beer league there can be a tendency for guys to stay “on shift” (out on the ice) too long, but I am the opposite. Rarely do I lose track of time; if I sense I’m close to two minutes into a shift I look for the first opportunity to climb back over the wall– less if I’ve had to defend a breakaway on that shift. I wish I could get back to being someone who could handle defending multiple rushes per shift, but it’s going to be a while before I’m that guy again.

    I haven’t prioritized going into the woods since the opening weekend of elk archery but tomorrow I’m skipping out on being responsible for a day to try and find a bear in a unit I haven’t visited in a couple years to try my luck in the pouring rain. My intentions are pure– take it easy, be deliberate in all that I do, and do not take anything even resembling a risky decision. The weather will be against me and the Olympic rainforest is absolutely unforgiving in the fall; this is not the time to press my luck. If God decides I’ve been patient enough these last five years maybe my next entry will be written cloaked in a bear skin– or maybe my next entry will be titled, “how to activate your Garmin InReach SOS.” My guess is it will be something in between, given my luck. (Author’s note: This did not happen, I woke up after four hours of sleep, saw it was storming outside, and decided I was going to take a rest day.)

    Speaking of taking risks, it’s time to expand more on the cliffhanger from last week: Sarah.

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    Hoo boy. What a journey. As of this writing it’s been over one calendar month since I decided to pull the trigger on telling Sarah how I felt. Despite the loss of confidence, my body image issues, my emotional baggage, and my extreme desire to not fuck up a good friendship… I decided to go for it.

    The existential crisis that cancer presents you with is different than an acute one like a car accident, combat, or bad fall. Sure, you can walk away from those things with a new outlook on life, especially if they require a long recovery due to injury, or if there was some sort of psychological scarring– but cancer hit me differently than any of those things. I was a hostage in my own body to a very dangerous and unpredictable assailant, and just like is the case in many hostage rescues, the rescuers can do just as much damage as the hostiles.

    I say all of that because when I decided to go for it after two weeks of deliberating, including a couple conversations with my psychologist and cognitive therapist, my calculation of what I decided an acceptable risk was had changed significantly from “old me.” Now the fear of the “what if” and “things left unsaid/undone” is a massively weighted factor in my decision making cycle. I could have five months left, five years, or fifty years– I don’t know. It’s not unlikely that God has fixed the time and place of my death so living like I’m trying to compete against that feels pointless.

    As an Army officer we are conditioned to always plan off of the “most dangerous course of action” so that we are prepared to deal with the less severe “most likely course of action.” This trains your mind to only see the most devastating impacts of being wrong, and does not do much to reinforce a positive mindset that tells you what is at stake if you don’t take that big risk.

    I went from feeling 2025 was going to be the undisputed champion of, “shittiest year of my life” to “wow, life comes at you fast.” The last couple years of being close friends made the transition to “couple” almost effortless and just about completely deleted the courtship phase of the relationship. Now, I still do take her on a date every week, and we are planning out future overnight travels, but we were so comfortable together already that the trust and respect was already pre-positioned– all we had to do was explore the romantic/intimate side of our new situation.

    In a lot of ways, “new me” extends beyond what I physically bring to the table now. There’s also been a massive spiritual, emotional, and moral shift. I’m making big, bold, decisions that were somewhat uncharacteristic of old me. At work life, with my personal life, and with my romantic life. What I mean is, I’m trying to do this the “right way” for once.  She has the advantage of knowing a ton about me already through osmosis and general conversation when we were “just friends” but I committed to being vulnerable right off the bat with her and becoming completely transparent. The good, the bad, the ugly– I disclosed everything over the first week of our new relationship. Get it all out there now, fuck it, nobody can say later I was holding anything back and coming at this without the purest of intentions.

    The flip side to this is that instead of slowly releasing the codes to the bombs, I just dumped them all into her lap. She possesses every key now. But that’s what love is, right? Giving someone the means to destroy you and trusting them not to?

    This blog isn’t primarily focused on relationships, but that is part of the journey. This is part of the journey. She is part of the journey now. She’s expressed a deep regret over not “being there more for you” when I was sick, but she’s also not the first person to say that… and that’s ok. Everyone has their own lives, their own crisis to manage, their own priorities. There’s a very short list of people I’m disappointed in for not showing up for me more, and she’s not on it.

    ============

    There have been a slew of medical occurrences since I last posted an entry. Three times per week I’m receiving physical rehab (strength training and conditioning), once weekly I see a cognitive therapist, once every 3-4 weeks I see an outpatient psychologist, and most recently I did my check-in with the ENT.  ENT, per tradition, scoped me and gave me an ultrasound. Three times each, to be precise. Once was the resident, once the resident and the chief, and once just the chief. 

    You might remember LTC Sierra, chief of ENT at the Army hospital, from earlier in our tale. She’s still there, and as usual she was in to see me after the resident was done with his initial run. Long story short, she thinks I’m fine but wanted to possibly biopsy me again because she doesn’t like the look of the lymph node that was treated when the cancer metastasized. She told me she’d deliberate on it, consult some colleagues, and get back to me. Great. Grand. Wonderful. NO MORE CANCER ON THE BUS.

    That friday she ended up calling me back and told me that she ruled out a biopsy, but wanted to get in touch with Dr Panner (RadOnc) at the cancer center to see if they could order some sort of fancy new blood test to see if it was, you know, cancer again. I haven’t heard back on this in a couple weeks, but I have another PET in a couple weeks, so inshallah, I guess.

    The views and opinions presented herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.

  • Remission 2 – Part 2: The Choice

    (Warning: This is another long entry. There’s a lot to unpack here, so bare with me. Some of it is related to cancer, but skippable if that’s solely what you’re here for.)

    I’m lost, but I know where I’m going.

    This is a continuation of the last entry because things happen in here that pre- and post- date the hunt, but did not fit with that narrative, at least not cohesively, and I thought it important to tell that story as a whole instead of jumbling the absolute mess this entry is going to be. This one is going to be heavy, and you have time to bail now if that’s not the space you’re in right now to be reading it. Sorry, but you’ve been warned.

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    Fuck it, We Ball

    The day after I dropped the kids back off with their mom I went to a drop-in skate (a scrimmage, for those that aren’t wholly familiar with hockey) to see what I was made of on the ice against live competition. 

    I did this once in July and it was a train wreck. I was extremely winded, and didn’t even make it a whole hour before skating to the locker room, going home, and sleeping for ten hours. My goal was to make it at least an hour of the 1:15 session. When I showed up I ran into a bunch of old teammates and friendly faces that were happy to see me out there and giving it a shot. There were some less than stellar moments, but overall I managed to keep my feet under me against far more skilled players.

    I knew at some point I’d be able to play again, but I didn’t expect it to be this soon; I made it to the hour mark thanks to some deep benches and short shifts. I burned through my water at remarkable speed but I expected that. Shifts at drop ins tend to be longer because there are no set lines, just a rotation from the bench, so I could take short (45 second) shifts and rest without guilt knowing some gomer was going to take a four minute shift without a second thought.

    Fast forward two weeks.

    Originally I’d killed and buried the idea of playing in the league at all this season: the cost outweighed the benefits; I could never make enough games to make it worth it. Then the fuckers did it. They released the October league schedule and of course, right on cue, it was actually a makable schedule for me with weeknight and late Sunday games. It took very little encouragement for my old team to start cheerleading me into playing another season, so the night before the first game I could make I signed up.

    The primary rink my league plays games in is less than ten minutes from my house, so it’s not a major logistical movement to get there. I can leave 30 minutes before a game and still have time to get dressed and ready if I don’t waste any time. The locker rooms on one half of the building are comically small though and we were using that sheet of ice (there are two under one roof) so I decided to give myself some cushion and work my way into the room. Some of my old teammates, now on a different team, were playing and they waved at me as I walked down the corridor beside the glass to the rooms. It felt good to be back among friendly faces doing something I love to do.

    My team was composed mostly of new faces this season. Some of the “OGs” were there and were very happy to see me on this side of the dirt, and some of the new people had only heard of me as “the cancer guy.” Either way, I was ecstatic to be there, and a little apprehensive about what the night would bring.

    I’m a defenseman. If you’re not familiar with hockey, it’s basically what it sounds like. When my team is on the offense, I am supposed to prevent the opposition from breaking the puck out by camping on the blue line or being deeper than the deepest cherry-picking dickhead that is hanging out in the neutral zone looking for a cheap breakaway goal. This can involve a “footrace” of sorts where we find out who is faster and confident enough to stop once at terminal velocity, so as you might imagine I was a little worried about having too many footraces in the game from a stamina standpoint.

    Fortunately the team we were playing was roughly our skill level, and the match was tilted evenly enough where I didn’t find myself in a sprint often enough to put a significant dent into my overall fatigue level in-game, and only once did I rotate myself to the end of the bench for extra rest (in league games we have pre-determined lines, I was in the first line of defensive pairing, a “starter” if you will).

    I made a couple bonehead plays, and a couple of really good ones, but on the whole I was having a blast- even when I was doing really stupid shit on the ice like accidentally screening my goalie or leaving someone from the other team alone on the ‘back door’ (the back door is the side of the net that the goalie is not actively defending).

    We ended up winning 5-3 after holding onto our lead, and we bumped fists with everyone on the ice before retiring to the locker room. I was given “defensive player of the game” despite the fact that I think I was -2 or -3 but hey I’ll take a sympathy ballot over nothing, and now I have this Mjolnir hammer that’s colored like a Rainier Beer can in my hockey bag until next week.

    ============

    Let’s go back to Part 1 where I mentioned… her… because she plays a pretty big part in this entry. We’ll call her Sarah for the purposes of this blog out of the interest of her privacy (and mine). Me and Sarah have known each other for a while, and were always strictly platonic friends. We’d started speaking more toward the end of the summer about the trials and tribulations of life, relationships, my recovery, and anything else you can think of.

    I was in the process of trying to set her up with Thomas when, while trying to sell the idea to him over the course of the hunt, I’d realized that I had actually had strong feelings for her right in front of my face that I’d previously not acknowledged. I’d never thought of her that way before, but it was like the Titanic hitting an iceberg– slowly each compartment of my mind began to spill over with her likeness until I was drowning in turmoil over it.

    Those of you who have fallen hard for someone who was previously a close friend, but you’d never seen as anything but, know that it hits you like a sledgehammer: the stress of the weight of the decision to act… or not. It’s like a stone on your chest that gets heavier with every passing moment.

    For two weeks I’d wrestled with the consequences of telling her. I tried to talk myself out of it, I tried to convince myself that she’d never go for it. After all, I am largely still a broken person– medically speaking– and nobody my age wants to jump into the middle of this renovation project, right? Fatigue, brain fog, drymouth, dietary restrictions, random lightheadedness– I’m a mess! Oh, and if that wasn’t enough, the baby-mama drama is enough around these parts to push anyone away. Right…?

    Well. Maybe not… at least, not as far as God is concerned. Or my psychologist at behavioral health, or my cognitive therapist…

    ============

    Woo Woo Shit: Revisited

    So, for the first time publicly, I’m going to make a huge confession that is probably going to shock the people that have known me well for years: I am making an effort to get right with God. My recent posts have hinted at this a little bit, but I’d made a promise to myself before treatment that if I made it out from the other side of this thing that I was to “get correct with the lord” as it were.

    Over the Labor Day holiday I finally decided to call the only person I’d trusted at the time to help me dip my toes into this world: my uncle.  It was known to me he was getting more involved with the Catholic church recently and it seemed logical to bounce all this off of him and ask his thoughts on how I was to get started down this path.  Religion was largely foreign to me– my parents never raised me in it despite being raised in Catholicism themselves; I had no foundation to build on.

    After talking to him for about an hour, I was completely relieved: he did not try to recruit me, and even told me to make sure I approached this with care. He recommended a Bible podcast and answered all the questions he felt qualified to answer, and I was on my way.

    Shortly thereafter I made contact with the Army chaplain that blessed my throat as mentioned early in this story, and we sat down for lunch one day to discuss how I should move forward. Like my uncle, he agreed that it wasn’t prudent to just whole-ass jump right into it. It would take lots of study and even then, there were still some big milestones I might not ever choose to pursue (within the Catholic faith).

    Me and the chaplain discussed how to reconcile logic, reason, the scientific method, and faith– there was no way I’d be able to approach it any other way. I am a firm believer in science, always have been, always will be, but the gap between what science tries to explain and what is unknown is still too wide for me to just buy into the big bang. Why and how??? “Trust me bro” is basically what science says, which has at least equal footing with the idea that there is a divine spirit engineering this gong show.  

    Deciding to believe in God is how I’ve chosen to rationalize so much of this unknown. Without going too much into it in this entry, he has very much made himself known to me in very plain, very obvious ways lately. I struggle more and more with believing in coincidence, and the further I drift from that, the closer I drift toward the belief that maybe, just maybe, he has big plans for me. Or, at the very least, some sort of plan– to be determined, I’m sure my guardian angel will hold an IPR with the Saints sometime soon to iron out the next quarter of FY26.

    More to follow on this development in a future entry, but that’s where my head is at right now (my atheist/agnostic friends would probably argue my head is firmly up my ass right now, which, ok, fine, but new year new me– you’ll get over it; I’m still gonna send you unhinged shit on Instagram).

    Ironically, I have played hockey with a guy that looks just like this in goal.

    The views and opinions presented herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.

  • Recovery 5

    I’ve been thinking about this entry ever since the previous one. The thing about this blog is it’s semi-anonymous, meaning, those who know me know it exists. There are sure to be some strangers who stumble onto this as they barrel through the internet, but they are probably the minority. When it comes to speaking about cancer-related subjects, my self-censorship is low but never zero, but personal subjects get a more sanitized treatment.

    Why? Three reasons:

    • When you’re a single dad, you have to have a healthy amount of paranoia about what parts of your life are public. What about my digital life can be weaponized against my visitation rights, me, or my wallet in a dispute with the ex? In many places, women are still the default residential parent and aren’t conditioned to have to look over their shoulders like many men are. But hey, that must be some more of that “privilege” I’ve heard so much about.
    • As I opened this blog with several months ago, I’m an active duty Army officer (and Public Affairs Officer to boot). There are no shortage of people out there that wish to do my career, or me, harm because of what I do for a living or because of opinions I express that don’t align with theirs. A couple years ago I made the choice to no longer participate in many online discussion forums for this reason, and have muted my online presence to a decently high degree to prevent such a witch-hunt.
    • You want to get something off your chest, but don’t want to discuss it further with anyone, so you avoid saying certain things to avoid that hassle of reliving these thoughts over text/phone/in-person.

    Why do I bring this up?

    It stunts me from treating this as a true unfiltered journal, and while there are a wealth of subjects I have a lot of nuanced thoughts on, at the end of the day most of them would only serve to harm me in some form or fashion- so we’re going to try and stick to the script here and keep this about the things on the title page of this blog.

    Obviously this is the first time I’ve written anything in a while. Not for lack of interest- I have thoughts all the time that I think, “Oh, I should add that to the blog.” However, they get lost in the fog of fatigue and life as it happens around me, and they rarely make it in. A lot has happened, most of it positive in some way, but I am far from normal and my body isn’t shy of reminding me of that fact.

    After an extended Father’s Day weekend with the kids they were back to their mother’s for the first half of summer break. I’m fortunate that I have the second half of summer with them this year specifically, given everything that’s transpired, but it doesn’t make it easier not having them around for so long. Now my contact is relegated to whenever their mother feels like answering the phone and acting like an adult that’s capable of communicating respectfully when she can’t, which has been challenging already.

    I actually went to take them back to the exchange point after this last visit, despite only being able to drive part of the distance before my eyes started to act up from either the strain or some kind of mystery allergy. I’ve heard that chemo wipes out your allergies, but I am starting to think it’s just reddit bullshit from people who, like me, were shut in during allergy season and spared their normal seasonal allergies. Sneezing is just about the most painful thing in the world for someone like me, and I’ve had to try and hold in many to avoid the pain it causes in my throat.

    A couple days after dropping the kids off my mom departed. I had gained enough medical clearance, and physical independence to do basic things for myself like nutrition, driving to appointments, and walking without any assistance. With the kids not needing to be picked up anymore until later in the summer, it was finally time for her to leave and return to her life in Florida where she and her husband are semi-retired. I was getting antsy to be back on my own prior to this, but I’m glad she hung on as long as she did; at times I’ve needed more help than I’m willing to admit.

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    With my newfound independence I knew I had to redevelop routines long lost to the annals of time. I came up with a feeding routine that needed to accommodate my still very irritable throat with my caloric needs, and I mostly have. It started with just calorie shakes, oily and fluffy scrambled eggs, and ramen noodles but I’ve expanded the aperture of my diet slightly since starting that dietary regimen. Now I’m able to introduce finely shredded meats (think canned meats like tuna/salmon/chicken) as well as canned fruits like pear halves and peaches.  All fruit products that have a lot of juice content, like canned fruits and apple sauce, still sting after a while because of the acidic nature of it, but it’s the only real way for me to get fiber and the vitamins that they offer in a way that doesn’t hammer my throat.  I tried clam chowder for a while, but the potatoes just became too much. I’ve found I can make and eat runny instant mashed potatoes with generous amounts of gravy, but solid potatoes are very much a bridge too far.

    I’ve gained five pounds for all this trouble and have seemed to hit a plateau. The nutritionist at the cancer center said one way over the hump would be to introduce exercise, but all I’m really cleared to do is go on walks for as long as I can tolerate. So I walk. I walk every morning, usually to the University of Puget Sound, a small college a little over a mile and a half from my house. I wake up, check my messages, and I walk. This route usually takes me about an hour. When I get home, I eat my eggs, do the dishes, and sit down to watch the morning news. Shortly after I try and do some sort of task or chore, if I don’t, it won’t get done until I’m done dozing off between breakfast and lunch.  Speaking of, lunch is typically a pack or two of ramen and a can of fruit, and sometimes a boost calorie shake. Then back to vegging out, as now it’s the heat of the day here in the Pacific Northwest and going outside is hazardous to the skin on my neck without taking a bunch of precautions I just don’t feel like taking unless it’s necessary. That and it will increase my water intake, which is already over four liters per day due to my dry mouth and activity.

    And let me tell you about fuckin water. There was a huge problem at the end of my treatment with not getting enough hydration, which is essential for the body to heal things like radiation burns inside your throat. I was doing my daily hydration appointments to get even a quarter of what I really needed, in fact, that was probably just keeping me alive at that point. It wasn’t until the feeding tube episode that I really began to turn my hydration around. Now that I’m drinking obscene amounts of water I am constantly on the other end of the equation, peeing multiple times an hour. Not little piddly streams either, these are grown man pees, and they happen all night long too. I wake up no fewer than three times per night to pee. I’m getting a taste of elderly life I think, and now I can understand why some of them are so goddamn angry all the time.

    I also can’t go anywhere without water. It’s a literal showstopper to the point where I keep a case in my trunk not just for life/death emergencies like any other supply, but for when I rush out of the house without the only water bottle I have that fits in the cupholder of my car. I’ve become dependent on access to water like some people get chemically addicted to controlled substances.  I can take morphine for days on end and have no withdrawals or cravings for it, but if I got more than 10 minutes without a sip of water it feels like I’m back in Iraq and the convoy just went black on water. (Note for civilians: “going black” means you’ve run out of some class of supply)

    The author dying of thirst in Iraq circa 2006.

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    So aside from being constantly tired, unable to gain any meaningful weight, always having to pee, being lightheaded when I stand up, and not being able to hear shit, I’m doing ok. My doctors are content-to-pleased with my progress and are keeping an eye on me regularly. I get my hearing aids next month, and I’m told they have bluetooth, which is exciting. Now when the kids are watching a movie on the tablet in the backseat I’ll have something other than road noise to keep me company. I’m sort of burying the lede on this whole update though: I got the feeding tube out.

    After meeting with my oncologist in the middle of last week, I made a compelling case to finally get the tube out. It was absolutely priority number one for me going into that appointment, and I was keen on delivering that to myself. He put in the referral and later that day interventional radiation called me to schedule a removal for the next afternoon!  I had no idea what it would entail or how I would feel during and immediately after, but I figured however it felt would be worth the cost of not having it in my body anymore. Nothing destroys your confidence like having a PEG tube hanging out of your abdomen. The weird bulge in the shirt, the discharge, the maintenance, all of it had to go. All and all it was a very smooth deal. The IR nurse had it out before I even knew what was going on! They said it would partially heal in 24-72 hours with a full heal taking about two weeks. So now I have a gunshot looking wound in my abdomen, but now I can roll around freely in my sleep and have a little more self-confidence. It’s not like it’s advisable for me to get laid right now, but I like having the possibility on the table. Tell your lady friends I’m back on the market. The clearance rack, but, still… the market.

    However, the bad comes with the good, and I was told that the port had to stay until next year, after my one year PET scan. It wouldn’t limit me from doing anything that I want to get back to doing, but there is maintenance involved and wearing some backpacks can be uncomfortable if the straps are positioned wrong. It will be something I have to navigate or figure out workarounds for, but probably not a showstopper for when I start to resume the hobbies that bring me joy like hiking, hunting, and hockey.

    ============

    Nobody talks about the mental battle involved in all of this, at least, it’s not well-discussed. Granted, the physical impacts of every single step of this journey are known to a degree and shouldn’t be downplayed, but the mental part would be absolutely devastating if I hadn’t been through micro-doses of hell leading up to this whole scenario.

    I’ve always been a bit of an independent spirit, content in my aloneness. Ever since I was young I was fine, or even preferred, playing alone at times and as I matured into an awkward teenager with poor social skills I didn’t accumulate a penchant for being in groups of peers all the time. Today this is called a “social battery” but mostly I just needed space to think. My psychologist said I’m a ‘thinker’ and I think he’s onto something. Now, I can adapt and survive to and with almost any social setting, but ever since I moved into my own place in late 2023 I have fiercely guarded my peace and independence within the limits of my ability to do so. Here’s where the dichotomy comes in: having cancer is a fundamentally lonely experience.

    Yes, I was supported by my amazing mom throughout treatment and the early part of my recovery, and I had dozens of friends and family send care packages and check in on me in person and telephonically. My coworkers visited me during hospital appointments at the Army hospital, and a hodge podge of each member of a community I’m part of showed up at my bell ringing during my last radiation session. But, at the end of the day you go through this alone. Only other patients and survivors actually know what you’re going through. There’s no other way to experience this other than going through it. You can have empathy, understanding, and be supportive of someone going through this, but you can’t know the psychological toll it takes on them. (Note: I swear the next person that tries to relate to me with their story of losing their taste buds during COVID is going to get me arrested)

    Now amplify this with two children under ten, a co-parent that does not always act logically or rationally, being a commissioned Army officer in the current domestic and geopolitical climate, relationship woes, and any other stressor you can imagine… and remember that while all this is going on you are a hostage in your own body and have harsh limitations on what is safe or prudent to do. My cortisol levels have probably been off the charts since December.

    Why do I bring this up? If I act recklessly, I could return to my old self almost immediately, at least within the limits of my ability to do so. It would almost certainly result in a complication or setback, or possibly even a potentially fatal accident as I’d be effectively burning the candle at both ends. If I act on the guidance of my doctors and medical team, sure I’ll likely survive through the end of the first part of recovery, but the amount of joy I experience daily is cut down 95%.  Let me expand below.

    I played video games a lot as a kid and young man, but I started to grow out of it in my mid-20s and had fully grown out of it by the time I turned 30. Not counting deployments, I’d have spurts here and there where I’d go down the rabbit hole on a game, but by and large my dopamine rushes came from being present with my kids and spending time outdoors. I have played a lot of video games during this experience and in the last 3-4 weeks I can barely be bothered to look at the TV. When I made hockey a part of my life right as my marriage was beginning to end, it really took over my life in the best way.  It’s sunny and nice out now, this is the time of year when I should be scouting every weekend and playing summer league hockey and getting circles skated around me at drop-ins. Instead, aside from taking my morning walks, I sit inside making up chores to do in between naps and meals. I’m so burned out on video games, the news cycle, and the same uninteresting movies/shows on streaming apps. I can’t take any more screen-based stimulation.

    This whole mental state is undoubtedly exacerbated by the fact that I don’t have kids right now and haven’t since father’s day. I am not allowed to have pets, so a dog would’ve been a great solution, but this place I rent is too good for me to throw it away rashly for what I plan on being a temporary condition. Being a single father is not only all-consuming during visitation, but they are frequently on my mind on days and evenings I don’t have them. To add to this, their mother has been less cooperative with facilitating our video calls lately and it’s been wearing me out emotionally.

    I have a great tribe of people here I’ve developed over the last couple years since my marriage ended. My ex was never comfortable around “my people” and often made excuses to not go out, not wanting to have someone watch the kids, or would generally just insist I go alone. This made building a community challenging as the dynamic was such that staying home was better than going to spend time with peers, because what would be happening on the other side of my phone ended up not being worth the stress. 

    That tribe, however, has moved on like the rest of the world while I’ve been treading water. I’m a bit of a social burden: nobody knows what I can eat, what I can do, and what I’m capable of. I don’t blame that mindset whatsoever, because in large part yes- I cannot do big sexy hiking trips, or enjoy a barbeque banquet, or spend a huge amount of time in the sun (without getting extraordinarily tired and having to pee every 15 minutes). I probably feel like this because the first person that wasn’t my mom or Thomas came by to see me this afternoon: Rena.  She told me about her recent scan (if you’ll recall from earlier posts, she had cancer in her 20s and has to get semiannual PETs), the logistical headaches of managing the ladies hockey league, local politics, and some of the characters we both know. It was nice to just have an uninterrupted conversation with a fresh face. When she left I took a nap and then ate dinner, watched the news, and began to finish this entry that has taken me four different sit-downs to finish and weeks of thinking to put together.

    This isn’t the end of this journey, and I will have a lot more to say over the next two months. This is, however, the end of this entry because I could keep at this all night at the rate at which my mind is moving.

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    The views and opinions presented herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.

  • Treatment Part 4

    Cut Down

    When this whole thing kicked off I had these daydreams about how I was going to approach treatment and recovery methodically, with military discipline and the attitude of a winner. I wasn’t going to allow myself to get down or despair, but it didn’t fully register with me until this week that that mindset only works in specific circumstances and specific treatments. My type of cancer isn’t something you “fight” or “beat”: it’s something you survive. I am not fighting for my life. I’m not taking aggressive measures to defeat cancer like it were some sort of adversary: I am merely trying to endure and survive the experience. The fight comes after… if I manage to hold on long enough to be “in recovery” in the first place.

    Immediately following my second round of chemo I felt ok. I mean, as ok as I could feel. No headache or caffeine withdrawal from last time meant that this time would be slightly easier, right? WRONG. Kyle, you stupid bitch, fucking wrong.

    I was devastated. No energy, no stamina, extreme nausea, no appetite, no will to live. For the first three days after chemo I was maxing out at two cartons of formula per day, which is roughly 750 calories. I’d dropped 8 pounds in a week come time for my weekly visit with Dr. Panner. If this was a fight, I was purely on the defensive, I was merely surviving the onslaught.

    The only bright spot in the entire week was the pair of sores that had developed by my molars had healed somehow, either from the pre-infusion steroids or from mouthwash maintenance, so I could speak somewhat normally. That was it. That was the bright spot.

    My nausea finally manifested itself into vomiting during treatment week four. First with some puking into a puke bag in the car on the way to proton therapy, then once in the evening in between periods of a hockey game I had some emotional investment in, and then every evening when I brushed my teeth. Aside from brushing with a pasteless brush and swearing off of all mouth rinses, I’m at a total loss on how to fix this. I cannot not keep my mouth in good order: it’s medically necessary to preserve my teeth and my general health since the radiation is nuking my ability to keep a balanced environment. The one positive takeaway from not being able to swallow much, besides small sips of water, is that I’m not introducing a lot of foreign bacteria into my mouth.

    This weekend I’d traded away my visitation with the kids to the ex in exchange for the previous weekend. I knew after chemo number one that having the kids the weekend after chemo was a non-starter, but didn’t know how right I would be. Now, this isn’t something I’m happy about having to do and I miss having them but it was a necessary sacrifice. I did manage to facetime with them which helped a little, despite my degraded physical and mental state, so I’ll take the small wins in lieu of having any big ones on that front for the foreseeable future.

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    The Circle

    When big ugly traumatic things happen to you, you find out who your people are. You find out who the people that actually show up for you are, the people that mean what they say and are sincere. During my divorce this became evident and after my cancer diagnosis it was almost overwhelming. I received a major outpouring of support in material goods, supplies, and money to help kick this journey off and it hasn’t fallen off.

    I made a big deal about being able to mow my grass a couple entries ago. This benign chore was something I was proud to still be able to do because it meant I was functioning like a normal person. I knew under my new tube–fed reality that that portion of normalcy was being hung up for the time being. Fortunately I was able to call on Thomas to help me out.

    Me and Thomas go way back to when we were both over-caffeinated E-4s in Hawaii and Iraq, addicted to blowing money on women, things that went fast, and booze… as a normal 20 year old soldier does pretty much everywhere in the U.S. Army since 1775. After we moved on we keep in touch through social media and eventually reconnected when I was reassigned to Washington, where he had gotten out of the Army and begun a career. Thomas has been one of the cornerstones of my post-divorce life. He was there for me during all the tough times and is still there for me now. There’s nothing I’ll be able to do to ever fully repay him for being one of the pillars in my support network during two massive crisis’ in my life.

    Continental soldier and his stripper girlfriend in a Ford Mustang (circa 1777) – Craiyon AI

    Another part of my circle came in to provide me some support this past weekend but from way out of town and way in my past, Ang. Me and Ang go back to freshman year of high school in rural west Michigan, where she was a sophomore cheerleader when I was on the freshman football team. We ran in some of the same friend circles because of these overlapping sports and usually had at least one class together- we even went to prom together one year before she graduated and I ran off to enlist in the Army. We’ve always stayed in touch and she always managed to send me a Christmas card of her and her daughter (who is now in college… Jesus… where did the time go?) 

    For a little while those two had been talking about coming out to see Seattle and visit with me and right before I announced to people I had cancer she told me she’d booked a weekend trip up this way. Of course I had to tell her what was going to be going on right in the middle of the trip and how that part of it was moot, but decided we’d play it by ear. As the day got closer I knew traveling to meet anywhere was going to be a non-starter between my health and wanting to stay vigilant at avoiding public places.

    Fortunately we were able to connect before her flight out Sunday. Given she’d been traveling and in very public places all weekend we went “full COVID protocol” and my mother masked her and sat her down in the opposite end of my living room from me. Despite my increased difficulties speaking we were able to have a fun reunion for a couple hours, and when I was too busy fighting off some sort of nausea spell my mom would pick up the conversational slack. I know it wasn’t my fault, but I did feel bad regardless for being in such a worthless state when she’s one of the few non-family people who have ever come to see me when I’ve been living elsewhere in the Army. Like I said, things like this help you find out who your people are.

    Rena re-enters our story right about this time as well. Yesterday she came over to drop off flowers for my mom (who also got a bunch from Ang) and a get-well card from my hockey team. Of anyone in my circle, she is one of the few that have any idea what I’m enduring right now. She checks on me, and understands that I just don’t want to talk about it most of the time now in a way many people do not. Anyone going through this needs a Rena-esque figure to remind them that everything they are feeling is rational and that your aren’t going fucking crazy.

    This is entering a phase that mirrors the low point in a deployment, psychologically. Every day is Groundhog’s Day where the pattern remains the same but there is no measurable progress. Everyone I know is moving right along with their lives while I mark time. I don’t leave the house other than to go to a medical appointment, I am rarely out of my bed, recliner, or passenger seat other than to move between them or perform some kind of hygiene-related activity. I have difficulty speaking so passing the time with conversations on the phone is a non-starter. I am truly just existing on this plain of reality until I, ostensibly, start recovery phase. After proton treatment this afternoon I have 13 more to go, and one chemo session, plus surviving the two weeks of residual effects of radiation and chemo, and then hopefully a scan or pathology report that says no cancer is detected. Then the long road to recovery begins, whatever that looks like.

    There isn’t a lot of upside in my life right now, and I know that this won’t, hopefully, won’t be forever, but it’s hard to see the end when you’re in the middle of anything.

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    The views and opinions presented herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.

  • Treatment 3: So It Begins

    The start of my third week of treatment was marked by optimism. My mouth had begun to stabilize somewhat, with dry mouth getting a little better, albeit with all of my taste having retreated almost completely. Now all that remained was hints of “sweet” otherwise everything was bland and tasteless. My swallowing function was still going strong with no detectable soreness, and my skin was still fighting the good fight.

    I made it to proton treatment number ten, which means the bar chart on my dry erase calendar could have one more bar filled in and the visual representation of being roughly one third of the way treatment now existed in a physical space. This is an important psychological barrier for me to be able to see.

    As the week went on I honestly felt good, like I was beating the odds of side effects. I began to have hope, something I rarely let myself possess, because hope is not a planning factor.

    Thursday came and went and while I had the hint of a sore throat, it wasn’t anything I felt I needed to be concerned about. I meet with Dr. Panner and my assigned RadOnc nurse, Angel, every Thursday before or after proton treatment just to see how I’m fairing. Although I was in a very energetic mood and was unbothered by my tinge of sore throat, we agreed it was better safe than sorry to prescribe me some kind of oral numbing agent- a lidocaine gel similar to what a dentist might use or prescribe. This was possibly the last day of somewhat normal existence.

    ============

    Welcome to the suck.

    Thursday night into Friday morning I slept fairly normal. Normal sleep for me now consists of waking up no fewer than three times to pee because of the extreme lengths I was going to to hydrate myself. When I woke up in the morning my entire world had changed though. The back of my mouth was sore on both sides by my molars and my little ting of sore throat had become a full blown sore throat. I felt right away as if the side effects had caught up and violently overtook me. I was warned that three weeks with no side effects was reserved for a small group of people and my time with that small group was now over.

    Everything sucked. Eating, drinking, swallowing, talking. All unpleasant at best, painful and frustrating at worst. This is probably my new reality for the foreseeable future.

    Despite this, I went through with taking the kids because that’s the only thing left if my life that brings me joy. My daughter had her final hockey game of the season and afterward was invited to an all-girls hockey event afterward. She is getting so much better at skating and playing and the feeling I get watching her is always brought down by the knowledge that one day she will have to stop. The Army will move me sometime next summer, and because she lives in the middle of nowhere with her mother, that’s the end of hockey for her unless some miracle happens and I become the full time custodial parent.

    It was a beautiful weekend and we all went into my backyard after to pull weeds out of the planter boxes and preparing them to plant new seeds. I ran out of energy fairly quickly, however, and I told her we’d have to plant the seeds at her next visit. She was a little disappointed but she knows dad is sick and there are times where I just have to sit down for a while.

    Unfortunately that visit won’t be for two weeks because I swapped next weekend for this one, being that I didn’t think it was wise for me to have the kids after chemo, given how the effects from the last round didn’t cease until the end of the weekend. I never don’t want to have them, but fortunately she is always asking me for swaps to accommodate her schedule so I am able to do the same hassle-free.

    She only gets them one weekend per month, the first full weekend, which was part of the informal agreement we made to allow her to move out of state later codified in a temporary then final “parenting plan” in court. Knowing what I know now, I’d have never allowed her to move in the first place without very steep concessions, but we only get one play-through of this life and the lessons I learned during my divorce proceedings will never have to be repeated, but those thoughts are for a different entry.

    ============

    Tubular

    Starting week four I knew that this was the end of me eating food like a normal person.  I spent some time discussing how miserable of an experience I had having my “G Tube” (aka feeding tube) installed but now is when it was going to enter my life as a critical component of my well-being.

    I made the decision to start tube feeding Sunday night, to commence Monday morning. Tylenol was taking the edge off the sores near my molars, but wasn’t lasting as long as I needed it to and swallowing two pills every six hours was testing my throat.

    Come Monday morning I tried to drink a yogurt-based banana shake but I felt extreme discomfort that was akin to when I tried to eat an actual banana Friday morning; it was akin to suffocating. We decided then and there that banana-anything was a non-starter as it irritated my throat to no end in a way nothing else had. I was able to sip on a Chobani drink throughout the morning, but tube feeding was imminent. There was just no way I’d be able to get the calories I needed orally at this point.

    After we returned from my 14th proton therapy treatment I sat in my chair with a catheter-tipped 50 ml syringe and a bottle of Nestle-branded unflavored liquid that measured 375 calories.  Foolishly, I just pulled the plunger out of the syringe and dumped the liquid in to the 50ml mark. Why was this foolish you might ask? Like most milk-based drinks they need to be aggressively shaken to break up clumps in the bottom.  On the fourth pour a couple big clumps blocked the tip and slowed the gravity feed down to trickle. I tried a warm rag at first, but that did nothing so I carefully tilted the syringe down several times (at least as much as I could without spilling) and that finally did the trick.

    I was feeling bold and knew I was running a major caloric deficit so I went ahead and gave myself as second serving. It went down easier than the first and I started to solve the problem.

    I’m a very active person by my age and peer group. Playing hockey up to four times a week, hiking distances of up to 18-19 miles per weekend day during the summer, lifting weights three times a week, and driving close to a thousand miles per week because of my custody and work obligations. When I was diagnosed I snuck in one morning of stick and puck (think of a public skate, but for hockey) with the boys and since then the most athletic thing I’ve done is walk on a beach with the kids or mowing my grass. The rest of the time I’m basically an active vegetable.  I don’t wear any kind of fitness tracker or count calories because that’s never been a concern of mine with my self-control/awareness, vanity, and activity level.  However it’s basically been a focal part of my life since I started this adventure. I got up to 204, and while those had slowly been coming off over the last three weeks of treatment, I was determined to maintain a healthy weight despite my treatment and all the stories I’d heard of people becoming emaciated from lack of intake.  

    So it becomes a math problem.  The average American, who is probably overweight, eats like shit, and doesn’t exercise enough if we are being honest, needs 2,000-2,500 a day if food labels are to be believed.  That means I need a minimum of 6 cartons of the Nestle tube food per day. I can “eat” two in one sitting comfortably, possibly more depending on how much I choose to experiment. I can feed every two hours if I take two at a time, or an hour on and and hour off if I split them up. What sucks though is the act of feeding itself in that it’s takes focus and arm stamina to hold the syringe upright.

    Following the advice of Trevor, who you might remember from an earlier post as the other active duty Soldier I’d connected with that had a similar cancer and treatment plan, I pulled the trigger on an IV stand and 1000 ml bags to gravity feed myself unassisted. They weren’t cheap, but they are allegedly reusable. I’ll report back when I’ve had a chance to use them.

    And that’s it for this entry. I am writing it as I receive 1000 ml of IV fluid and medications at the Army hospital while I prepare to receive my second round of Cisplatin chemotherapy today.  I’ll see you on the other side.

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    The views and opinions presented herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.

  • Treatment Part 2

    Everyday an Adventure

    Chemotherapy is in the top five weirdest enduring experiences I’ve ever lived through right up there with deployments, foreign travel and the entirety of 2016.

    Everyone is familiar with the usual tropes of chemo: hair loss and nausea, but there are less discussed and less experienced versions of this facet of chemotherapy that I’ve experienced as direct effects or secondary/tertiary effects.

    In my last post I put the blurb about Cisplatin, the chemo agent, from Wikipedia and it isn’t wrong. While hair loss hasn’t hit me… yet… the nausea I experienced last week was very strong and enduring. Fortunately, the medicines we have to combat nausea in the modern age are very good at what they do assuming you don’t miss one of your doses. With the help of my mother keeping me on a pill regimen, an electro-shock wristband from my uncle’s family, and intelligently managing my activity levels I remain relatively unaffected aside from the general feeling of nausea- no barfing from either end during the first full week following my infusion.

    What did happen, however, was the amplification of my service-connected tinnitus and some high-end hearing loss. This was widely broadcasted by my doctors as a very likely side effect, but unfortunately there is no way to mitigate it. It’s very likely by the time I’m done with my third (and hopefully final) course of chemo at the end of April that I will need hearing aids. The upshot of this is that I’m told they have bluetooth now, so I won’t have to burden myself with using (read: remember to bring) earbuds anymore at the gym ever again.

    In an effort to get in front of the unbearably short term effects of Cisplatin like nausea, and anticipating allergic reactions, you are given anti-nausea meds, steroids, and stool-softeners. The anti-nausea comes in a short course of one daily pill that takes you through the worst of it, but is supplemented by shorter-acting longer-term meds that are taken during intervals or as-needed. One side effect of these medicines that no one told me to expect was hiccups. Good lord the fucking hiccups. Hiccups are frustrating for a normal, healthy person, and absolutely maddening for someone undergoing cancer treatment. Dr. Farrell, my MedOnc, checked up on me the next day telephonically to see how I was doing and when I mentioned the hiccups I got an, “Oh, yeah, a lot of people experience that from the nausea meds.”

    I am a lot of people.

    ============

    Week 2

    By Sunday I was starting to feel better. Not 100%, but much better than “nauseated semi-vegetable.” The skin on the right side of my neck was starting to regularly peel, but nothing worse than someone in the last throes of sunburn recovery might experience. Otherwise, all systems were nominal.

    Monday was when I began to experience something like a normal feeling. I woke up to a call that my proton radiation therapy was cancelled because the machine was undergoing maintenance. On the one hand, this was a relief because I didn’t have to endure a drive to and from north Seattle, but a bit of a letdown because it was one more day added onto the back end of my treatment.

    Tuesday, now Tuesday I began to feel like a real person again. I woke up to an unseasonably nice day and decided that in lieu of a daily walk around the block I’d attempt at mowing my grass. If you’ve lived in the northwest, you’ll observe that once the fall rains come, many people just give up on maintaining their lawns until summer because of how hard waterlogged grass is to maintain. The end result is come spring, most yards have grass that comes up to your calves. Now my little electric 40v mower is a stud, but tall damp grass takes considerable effort and battery charge to tame. I mowed about a 12’x12’ square before I broke a bead of sweat, and decided I didn’t want to push my body’s luck. I went inside and started pounding water and racked out in my easy chair. The fatigue and electrolyte loss that chemo induces is absolutely real.

    Half-mowed lawns are proof of life at my house now.

    It was around this time my skin started to go haywire. My skin began to get tremendously oily and I started to have small breakouts on my face, scalp, and back. They weren’t painful, just unsightly and another blow to my already crippled self-confidence. Apparently this is a delayed side effect of the steroids I was on the previous week to get in front of potential allergic reactions, but they haven’t subsided much so I am beginning to think this is another fun chemo experience.

    The ex asked me if I wanted to take on the kids mid-week to make up for the previous lost weekend, as they were on spring break, and I jumped at the opportunity (that and it saves us on childcare costs as she wasn’t taking off work). My mother had her reservations, but ultimately supported me in this endeavor. I arranged a ride from one of my work mentors to radiation on Wednesday and she took my car to go pick them up.

    ============

    Quality Time

    Having the kids around again took a tremendous amount of stress off of my shoulders. I pride myself on being as active in their lives as I am allowed to be, and being a rock of normalcy for them to lean on during the uncertainty of the last couple years. That said, they are still kids and they are exhausted even when I’m a healthy man. With my mom on hand, I went from doing zone parenting to man parenting, however, and was able to spend quality time one-on-one with them as best I could.

    By Thursday, I felt recovered enough to drive myself to treatment, so I took my seven year old daughter with me and for her it was just another adventure with dad. The cancer center front desk gave her a Nintendo Switch to play with and she was happy as a clam playing that while I received my treatment. The next day she wanted to work on one of their puzzles and play Uno. I’d imagine for her these excursions were just more daddy-daughter time where she got to do fun activities in new places, and if that’s what she pulls out of this experience then I can live with that.

    The downside of this time was I finally lost all remaining taste buds and my dry mouth has started to ramp up. It hit me sharply on Wednesday, following the loss of my taste buds, and has not remained consistent, which I’ve taken as a good thing. Through nutrition, hydration, and medical maintenance, I am doing remarkably well in tolerating the radiation so far.

    I returned to full on COVID-rules mode on Saturday, my first excursion into a place that is high-threat to immune systems even in good times: the hockey rink. My daughter has her games on most Saturdays and the undersized, under-sanitized, and overcrowded locker rooms full of kids are not friendly for someone with a degraded immune response. For her though, I was going to roll the dice. Hockey is the only part of her old life that’s remained consistent and I will protect it at a high cost. I masked up, put the hand sanitizer in my pocket, and got there early enough to get into the far corner of the locker room before it filled up with people.

    After we returned the weather was fantastic so I set out to do more of the lawn. The 12×12 was already starting to look shaggy so I went back over it, and managed to mow the rest on as much as a full charge would allow me. Normally a full charge will last me the entire front and back yard, but with so tall and still slightly damp grass it netted me about 80% of the backyard before I transitioned to the weed wacker to finish the back. The front will have to wait until I can work up the energy on another cooperative weather day.

    I made somewhat of an error in judgement on Sunday, however. In an effort to give my mom a break from driving, I convinced her I was well enough to execute the return trip with the kids on my own. The first hour went fine, but after my eyes started to bother me and my nose began to drain in what I can only assume is spring allergies, unless this is another delayed chemo response. Despite sucking down a ton of water, which is basically an everyday occurrence for me as part of the chemo management, I was miserable and tired.

    Miserable and tired should have been the title for last week’s entry.

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    The views and opinions presented herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.

  • Prologue Part 9: We Are Legion.

    Treading Water.

    I have a long history with being in the water. In high school I was coaxed into joining the varsity swim team by the JV football head coach who was, not surprisingly, the coach of the boy’s swim program at my school. He was passionate about coaching, but unforgiving as a designer of practice routines. Treading water was a favorite of his. It’s also a big part of the Army’s combat water survival test.

    Treading water is the act of staying in one place and remaining above the water upright without floating. This means remaining stationary by kicking your feet while pointing them straight down and paddling your arms in small motions so you don’t inadvertently float on your front or back. There are different techniques to do this to conserve energy, but when done for long enough, especially after a taxing swim, it can quickly turn into a slow descent to hell if floating on your back isn’t an option. Exhaustion slowly consumes you until you just want to swim over to the edge of the pool and endure whatever verbal abuse awaits you for wanting a break.

    The week started off simple enough with a mid-morning appointment to speech therapy, with an afternoon appointment with the geneticist. Now I don’t have a speech impediment or learning disability, at least diagnosed, but the speech therapist is all-things mouth and throat muscles. One of the wonderful potential side effects of radiation therapy is long term difficulty swallowing, and they needed to get a baseline measurement of basic mouth muscle function to assess where I am at post-treatment so a rehab plan can be constructed when I make it to the other side of this thing.

    The speech therapist had been doing this since I was born, quite literally, and was a very charming older woman that took literal measurements of my mouth and throat, and observed me drinking water and eating crackers to see if I looked… normal? I actually have no idea, but it passed the common sense test so I didn’t ask what she was looking for specifically other than knowing whatever tests I was given were passed without issue.

    After some “empathetic listening” to my tale of woe, she offered to pass my information on to another active duty soldier that she regularly saw as he rehabbed from his own head/neck cancer that received similar treatment to mine. I was absolutely craving to talk to someone with firsthand experience of what I am about to endure and jumped at the opportunity.

    Later that day I stopped into the place where the geneticist hides out; I only mean that in slight jest as the hospital directory makes no mention of their office and they are buried deep inside a pediatric care clinic. The reason? She mostly serves to perform genetic testing for parents that might be passing on spicy DNA to their newborns such as chronic diseases and other ailments. In my case, MAJ Rafferty saw enough family history of cancer in my family to auto-refer me to this office. After a pleasant talk with the geneticist, she didn’t believe my cancer warranted any immediate genetic testing since its markers were not genetic in nature and it didn’t present itself elsewhere in my family. She did agree though that it would be worth it to come back in after treatment and discuss a test to see if I’d passed on any other cancer markers to my kids. I might just take her up on that offer.

    The next day I made my way to the audiology clinic because one of the often overlooked side effects of cisplatin chemotherapy is hearing loss, with the best case being amplified tinnitus (just about everyone in the military, especially the GWOT generation like me, has tinnitus) and some sort of higher-frequency loss. The audiologist, as in THE audiologist- not a tech, was there to perform a higher level of hearing exam than your standard “press the button when you hear the beep.” I underwent a comprehensive exam to establish my baseline because, in reality, hearing aids are likely going to be part of “new me” when I get on the other side of this.

    IYKYK

    The hearing exam itself isn’t invasive, but it does take a while and involves not just headphones and buttons, but other diagnostic tools and even speaking back words that you hear. Overall my hearing is, somehow, in decent shape at the moment- perhaps the biggest surprise of the week up to this point.

    This brings us to Thursday, and my second consultation with Dr. Ferrell at MedOnc. This was a replay of our first meeting with more questions and explanations of the side effects of cisplatin, the chemo agent, as my proposed course of treatment.  We discussed my pending appointment with the civilian cancer center at the University of Washington to discuss my candidacy for a newer type of radiation, and what impacts that might have on my treatment plan.  Ultimately, I signed the chemo treatment consent form and scheduled a “chemo class” for the next week so I could, like any other part of the military, be trained on how to prepare for my two to three rounds of four-hour chemo treatments.

    Finally, Friday, TGIF, no medical appointments… but still relevant medical news. Dr. Shannon, the ENT oncologist from the local civilian hospital, called me back with the results of their own tumor board first thing in the morning after he left it; they concurred with my Army hospital team’s treatment plan with the exact same conclusions about my variety of cancer. In a way this was a relief: now I knew that surgery was off the table altogether (for now) and I could focus on the sure-fire treatment plan of radiation and chemotherapy.

    Now, I realize that was a dry list of appointment summaries, but that is my daily existence. Medical appointments, preparing my home for the next few months, flushing my feeding tube, showering (which is its own laborious process when you have medical shit sticking out of your body), and corresponding with people.

    ============

    There are dozens of us, dozens!

    Friday morning I met with the gentleman (we’ll call him Trevor) that the speech therapist put me in touch with, and we met at a local Starbucks to swap tales of woe.

    He was diagnosed with a different flavor of head & neck cancer in 2023 and was about a year into his recovery; he had been seen by civilian cancer treatment providers at a hospital center south of the Army installation because, at the time, the Army hospital was short staffed. The only overlap we had in providers was the speech therapist, one of the ENTs we both see now, and the nurse case manager. We weren’t there to talk about that though: this was basically a gentle interrogation; I absolutely grilled him on treatment and side effects.

    Trevor painted a grim picture. Neuropathy that made hiking on anything but a flat surface very difficult, limited range of motion in his neck, and he’d only recovered 50% of his stamina in the last year. This man works in special operations and his pre-cancer hobbies were mountain endurance races and long distance road biking; if anyone was going to recover quickly it would be him and the fact that he wasn’t scared the hell out of me.

    He had to modify the trigger on his rifle so that he could feel himself pulling it, and he didn’t trust himself walking anywhere other than flat ground. He told me how he got severe infections and feeding tube failures that caused a few overnight hospital stays. He told me how he gets throat dilated because it isn’t healing correctly. What. The. Fuck.

    No thanks, I’ll just die.

    Trevor’s story wasn’t one of hope to me: it was one of survival. Like Hugh Glass scratching and clawing his way back to civilization. My morale was crushed.

    I had a hunting trip that ended like this once.

    Everyone I spoke to later that day tried to talk me back down to Earth and tell me things I already knew: Everyone’s cancer is different, everyone’s treatment is different, everyone’s response to treatment is different, and everyone’s recovery is different.  I know all of these things, but, still… Jesus Christ man.

    One of the silver linings from my discussions with Trevor was he began to dump resources into our text chat that I didn’t know about- different programs that might help speed recovery along if I can manage to get the Army to pay for it, or at the very least, approve the time off. Something to look forward to trying, at the very least.

    ============

    The Salvation Army

    During the week covered in this entry I finally lit the beacons: I posted on Facebook ways people could help. Those that know me best know how difficult for me this was. I am typically a private person, at least digitally, and asking for any kind of financial help is almost unheard of.  In fact, outside of my divorce, I can think of maybe only 1-2 times in my entire life I asked someone to borrow a significant amount of money.

    Yes, I’m a Captain and, on paper, make good money, but I get absolutely butt-fucked by child support, alimony, childcare, and other divorce-related debt. So I still live on cherry lieutenant money at best. Couple that with living in a high cost of living area, and having to take on a live-in caretaker, and making large diet and lifestyle changes with little warning, and financial turbulence follows.

    I decided to act, and made an Amazon “cancer wish list” for supplies I knew I’d need, or at the very least would make life easier during treatment and recovery. The response from my family, friends, and acquaintances was overwhelming and immediate. Within minutes the list started getting exhausted, and over the next week I was getting body-slammed by the post office, UPS, and FedEx. The amount of support people showed was surprising, and touching. People I hadn’t heard from in months, or even years, came out of the woodwork to send something I needed like the adhesive patches needed to take a shower with a feeding tube, or things to make my life more comfortable like a heated blanket. 

    If you’re reading this blog, and you want to help out, I would appreciate it if you made a donation to one of these organizations so that we can find better ways to prevent, treat, and cure cancer:

    American Cancer Society (4 Stars on Charity Navigator)

    American Association for Cancer Research (4 stars on Charity Navigator)

    Western Michigan University (my alma mater) Homer Stryker School of Medicine

    ============

    The Open Road.

    After meeting with Trevor I hit the road. I travel 158 miles to and from a Walmart in Oregon almost every Friday and Sunday to collect my kids from their mother, with few exceptions. The drive itself is manageable. Typically I listen to audiobooks, music, or catch up on the phone with people. Collectively in the winter time, it’s probably the largest chunk of time I have when I’m awake and alone in a given week. This is amplified now that my mom is living with me for the next few months while I navigate this chapter of my life.

    This was going to be the weekend I told my oldest daughter about what was happening, within the limits of her ability to understand it, and I thought it was important that her mother was part of the conversation.  After talking it over further, however, we decided to give it another week. The trick here was I had to explain to them that “dad has an ouchie on his stomach and you have to be careful.” Fortunately, that was the limit of their curiosity for the moment.

    My daughter plays hockey every Saturday morning. It’s one of the few staples of normalcy she gets to cling to from her old life when her parents were still together.  With my mom here this presents an opportunity for her to enjoy this time even more because now I can be more of an active participant in it.  See, her brother is a ball of destructive energy that requires constant supervision or he will do something to kill himself or others through his acts of daring. This means instead of watching her play, I have to follow him around the rink to ensure he’s not causing a major incident or earning himself a trip to the ER. Enter grandma.

    My mom has been a saint for this entire episode and the fringe benefit this early into the journey is some help with the kids. When you’re a single parent you are playing zone defense most of the time when multiple kids are involved, so it’s nice being able to play “man” and devote attention to one at a time. My son stayed home with his grandma and I was able to give my daughter the attention she needs and deserves from her dad in this setting. 

    In fact, because the rink staff is terminally shorthanded, I volunteered as one of the bench coaches for her game. At her level of hockey this means that I make sure everyone is taking turns as a goalie, they are getting in and out of the bench area on time, drinking water, gear is on correctly, and keep them from doing dangerous stuff on the bench. My daughter was thrilled to not only have me able to watch more than 10% of her play, but she could actually talk to me between shifts and be able to hear me give her feedback on the ice. Thanks mom!

    I had a good weekend with the kids. I even got to take my oldest to the local junior league game thanks to a donation from a hockey family we know, and my daughter had the best time. She gets to watch hockey, talk to people, dance every few minutes, and hang out with dad. I get to watch hockey and watch her have a great time; you can’t ask for a better dad/daughter date.

    (Author’s note: I don’t know if this is the penultimate prologue entry, or if there are more to come due to a recent development in my treatment plan that might throw a wrench into the timeline. Stay tuned, I guess?)

    The views and opinions presented herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.

  • Prologue Part 8: The End of the Beginning

    (Author’s Note: This is almost the end of what I call “The Prologue” as this entry will bring us one post closer to the present and what I’ll call the “Treatment” entries. Everything after will be as close to the present as I can manage.)

    You’re Young Enough.

    Trying to go to sleep the first evening back from the hospital was a chore. I’m not someone that can easily fall asleep on my back, and rarely on my actual side. Typically I sleep as if I’m in the prone unsupported position with a pillow under my arm to combat a pre-existing nerve condition I’ve been battling over a year called ulnar tunnel syndrome. On my stomach was a non-starter with the fresh tube hanging out of me, and the pillow was going to dig right into it. Fuck! On top of all the other jarring changes I just underwent, now I had to change how I slept, too.

    “Basic Prone Unsupported Firing Position. This firing position (Figure 4-22) offers another stable firing platform for engaging targets. To assume this position, the soldier faces his target, spreads his feet a comfortable distance apart, and drops to his knees. Using the butt of the rifle as a pivot, the firer rolls onto his nonfiring side, placing the nonfiring elbow close to the side of the magazine. He places the rifle butt in the pocket formed by the firing shoulder, grasps the pistol grip with his firing hand, and lowers the firing elbow to the ground. The rifle rests in the V formed by the thumb and fingers of the non-firing hand. The soldier adjusts the position of his firing elbow until his shoulders are about level, and pulls back firmly on the rifle with both hands. To complete the position, he obtains a stock weld and relaxes, keeping his heels close to the ground.” – U.S. Army Field Manual 3-22.9 “Rifle Marksmanship

    My exhaustion overcame me and I managed to fall asleep listed to my side like I was back in the hospital bed. My abs were still weak and would remind me of the new hole in them whenever I did anything resembling sudden movement, so I wasn’t terribly worried about rolling around.  It wasn’t a very restful sleep; there was a lot of tossing and turning, but eventually this wreck of the Cancer Fitzgerald sunk into the bed long enough to have sleep that was unbroken by vitals checks and vomiting.

    There was no rest for me, however, as I had referrals to go to the next day. First up was with the ENT Oncologist, a civilian specialist at a nearby civilian hospital. Despite the recommended treatment from the tumor board at the Army hospital, they hinged it on, “but still go see Dr. Shannon, we want to know what he thinks.”  So here I was, crouched over my Army hospital-grade walker in the frozen parking garage of the hospital with my mom, inching my way toward a second opinion.

    Dr. Shannon’s office was unremarkable… with the notable exception of my presence in the waiting room. Every other patient in the room was old enough to have one foot in the grave, and all of them stared at me at one point. Me in my walker just waiting to be called back; I could feel their bewilderment. This was as close to feeling like Rosa Parks in the wrong bus section as a young white guy can get.

    After being called back I scooched my way into the exam room and sat in the upright padded exam chair for what I knew was going to likely happen here: another scoping.

    When you get scoped, it means they are shoving a camera into one of your orifices to do a visual inspection. In my case, this involved taking a camera on a flexible metal hose, a little smaller in diameter than a soda straw, and sliding it up my nose and into the back of my throat to take a look at the tumor (see this post for an example of what a scope sees).

    I was correct. Dr. Shannon scoped me, did an exam on my neck, and asked me some questions. He’d already seen all of my imagery from the Army hospital, and had spoken to Dr. Sierra about my case. What he thought about this was not only going to be factored into my care team’s decision making process, but my own, as he was a regarded specialist by them.

    He recommended against surgery. Whew? I guess this is the part where I started to repair my battered trust in the medical establishment after the last 48 hours: This guy had nothing to gain by recommending I not do the very thing he and his hospital profited from. My ENTs were not certified to do this surgery, so it would have fallen to him, and he knew that. Yet, he agreed with their treatment plan to the letter, and explained why. In this world, professional ethics are under siege across society, and this man held the line. Bravo, Dr. Shannon, bravo. (I suppose it also didn’t hurt that one of my colleagues’ wife is his colleague and name-dropped me prior to the appointment.  Hooray for serendipity.)

    Next up was a ride to the Army hospital for my first meeting with the Medical Oncologist (Med Onc) chief, Dr. Ferrell. Dr. Ferrell was very highly regarded by everyone on the Army medical staff so far that mentioned his name. A “made man” of sorts, because not only had he been doing his job in the hospital for a long time as an oncologist, but he was also a full bird Colonel in the Army Reserve in the same capacity.

    I once again sat in waiting room with my mother, where everyone else was 35+ years my senior and clearly had spent a lifetime around loud noises, as the two men talking to each other next to us demonstrated with their loud voices and the constant use of “WHAT?” I was again viewed with a curious eye as I plopped into the seat from my walker.

    The Army is, culturally, a strange place. Army hospitals are not exempt from this. We have expensive, complicated, digital systems that store all of our information from clothing issue records, to administrative files, promotions, and yes, medical data. Despite this, either out of habit or convenience, many of these offices require paper forms to be filled out that force you to recall all of the information that could be pulled up in a few mouse clicks with the proper permissions.  I was just about at the end of my rope with this. 

    I took one look at the very poorly photocopied forms and started to get into a bad mood, either from stress, frustration, sleep deprivation, pain, or some combination. I filled out the administrative data and wrote on them, “All of this information is visible in my digital record” and turned the forms in. One of two things then happened: either the clerk at the desk stuck the forms into some folder that will never see the light of day, or less likely, they understood they were just going through the motions with this practice and my small act of medical disobedience was understandable.

    Dr. Ferrell came to greet us and walked us back to his office. He had the air of someone who was quietly, calmly, confident, but was ready to be proven wrong- my kind of guy. We talked through his role in my treatment: he was to oversee the administration of my chemotherapy treatment.

    I absolutely hammered him with questions. This was the guy I really wanted to talk to since this whole thing kicked off and he was able to answer all of my questions, or at least satisfy my curiosity. He went over the treatment plan and told me I was going to get the most aggressive treatment for my cancer, because, “you’re young enough to handle it, and it’s unlikely we will damage your kidneys.”

    I am so tired of hearing about how young I am.

    ============

    America, Tkachuk Yeah!

    Cisplatin was the name of the drug I was prescribed in my treatment plan for chemotherapy, and I was prescribed the maximum dosage to work in concert with my radiation. Potential side effects: hearing loss, kidney damage, immune system degradation, hair loss, and sterilization. Another fun grab bag of side effects to mirror the hellscape that radiation therapy also presented. 

    It was at this time that the possibility began to creep into my mind that this cancer wasn’t just trying to kill me, it was trying to kill my Army career. Some of the side effects from the treatment of this condition are career-enders, in either a medical “chapter” (discharge) or medical retirement, and that wasn’t an outcome I’d considered until I had some time to piece that together in my mind.

    Take one brick of stress off, replace it with ten more.

    The next day, however, radiology oncology (Rad Onc) techs started to second guess some of the worst of the aforementioned side effects based on their experience when mapping me. They told me that a number of their head and neck patients kept their hair, and told me not to shave mine down preemptively like I’d planned, because it would screw up the mapping process later.

    Mapping involved a few interesting experiences. I showed up, again with my mother who by this time was amassing a phonebook-sized folder of medical paperwork to tote with me to each appointment, and was called back by the two Rad Onc techs that would be handling my treatments. The only previous instructions I’d received were, “be clean shaven for mapping, and each of your treatments” and while I mourned the loss of my mustache, it was for a greater good.

    I had to make a mouthpiece first. Anyone who has made a mouthpiece for contact-sports knows that this involves heating up a piece of solid mouthpiece-shaped rubber and then softly biting into it until it cools around teeth to ensure proper fit when you need to wear it. The second part of mapping was having a giant head and shoulder soft cast made from a pliable mesh material that also was heated up… to make a mouthpiece-type impression of my upper body. This process was very thorough, as this mask had to hold my head perfectly still each time at each treatment. Any margins or gaps would mean having to have the mask re-made and I’d have to be remapped. The mouthpiece I’d just made was clipped into the mask perfectly, and they tested the fitment of the whole system with a fancy machine that was similar to a CT in many ways. Last I was punched with a tiny tattoo of infrared ink on my chest for the laser to read each time, and that was it. Rounds complete: I was a ‘go’ at this station.

    One thing I’m really glad the techs did prior to leaving was offer me a tour of the radiation therapy suite. I took them up on this and was guided into a room that looked like some sort of chamber from the Death Star. I suppose this is oddly appropriate since the cancer will likely view this the same way. There’s a flat table that a machine revolves around and shoots radiation in photon beams into the tumor. The whole process is supposed to last only a few minutes; you spend more time in prep and tear-down than you do actually getting zapped.

    The next day I went on a date with Addison to our local junior league team and she’d gotten us seats just two rows up from the penalty boxes, which was a fun experience given how much fighting goes on at the lower levels of hockey. As previously mentioned, Addison is Canadian by birth and had a rooting interest in the “4 Nations Faceoff” tournament as Canada and the U.S. were playing while we were at this game. 

    I’d fully planned on leaving it alone, figuring Canada’s absolute star-studded roster would roll through every other team, so no shit talking would’ve bore any fruit, but once Canada went up 1-0 she couldn’t help but start in on how, “The U.S. needs to be humbled.” This coming from a citizen of a country that wins 75%+ of international hockey tournaments and still provides the plurality of NHL players was rich, so when the U.S. took the lead off of Dylan Larkin’s unassisted goal and then hit the empty-netter at the end to win, I let her have it. It wasn’t until after the game ended that the highlights rolled into my phone of USA’s Tkachuk brothers being two thirds of the fights in the first nine seconds of the game. USA, USA, USA! I let her have it the rest of the evening, and the following day, as Instagram put forth some wonderful reels equating them to the Smash Brothers from The Mighty Ducks franchise. 

    It was a critical morale boost as I began to truly contemplate what future me would look like.

    The views and opinions presented herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.

  • Prologue Part 5: Eat. Pray. Puck.

    Woo-woo shit.

    There are going to be topics we circle back and revisit out of order from time to time, because when you don’t decide to write a cancer blog until eight weeks after first detection, things are lost in the whirlwind of activity that happens during the opening salvo of medical intervention.

    Rewind to 1 February. In Ireland, and places with other strong Irish-Catholic communities, there is the “St. Brigid’s Eve” tradition.

    “St. Brigid’s Eve, celebrated on the night of February 1st, which is the eve of the Feast of St. Brigid. In Irish folklore, St. Brigid is considered one of the patron saints of Ireland, and her feast day marks the beginning of spring and the Celtic festival of Imbolc, which celebrates the coming of the lighter, warmer days.

    One of the customs associated with St. Brigid’s Eve involves hanging cloth or rags on a tree branch or a bush. This is often done as part of a ritual to honor the saint and invoke her blessings for the year ahead. The act of hanging the cloth is meant to symbolize the blessing of the home and protection from illness and misfortune, as well as a way of asking for a bountiful year.

    St. Brigid herself is often associated with healing and fertility, so people believed that by hanging cloth on the branch, they were invoking her powers for good health and protection. In some variations of the custom, people also would tie pieces of cloth to the branches and leave them for the night.” -ChatGPT

    One such place that this tradition is celebrated is Newfoundland, Canada, where Addison is from. We were walking into my house the evening prior to the Vancouver visit and she said, “Shit, I almost forgot.” and proceeded to take off her cloth wristband and tie it to one of the shrubs in front of my house.

    Me, puzzled, “What are you doing?”

    “It’s Saint Brigid’s Day, we are going to leave it on this bush tonight and in the morning you are going to wear it for the rest of the year to bring you healing. It’s Newfie Irish-Catholic woo-woo shit,” she said, matter of factly.

    In the morning, as we headed out the door to go on our trip, she took it off the shrub and put it on my wrist.  I figured at this point I’d take all the help I can get and, if nothing else, it would make her feel better.

    Fast forward a day. 3 February was like most other Mondays where I roll into the office and get hammering on whatever task I was dealt for the week. My boss had already begun to slide things off of my plate and had all but cancelled my two-week trip overseas happening later in the month, so my task list was shrinking with every new piece of medical information coming to me. I kept chipping away at my inbox when I got a text from my mom: a link to some sort of Catholic site describing Saint Blaise Day.

    Mind you, just prior I’d found out my official diagnosis and biopsy results, so I’m fully invested in getting as much help from every dimension possible, including the spiritual one. I clicked the link and uttered, “No fuckin’ shit?” when I noticed that this day, 3 February, was Saint Blaise’s Day.

    “St. Blaise’s Day is celebrated on February 3rd and honors St. Blaise, an early Christian bishop and martyr who is the patron saint of throat ailments. He is also associated with protection from diseases of the throat, and his feast day is marked by a special blessing known as the Blessing of the Throats.” -ChatGPT

    I knew what I had to do: I had to embrace the woo-woo and unknown mysteries of the universe. The coincidence was too real for me at this point, I was on a mission from God.

    I walked to the staff duty desk and asked where the command Chaplain’s office was. It was just across the parking lot in the basement of another building. Much of the “Special Staff” in my unit exist in such circumstances, and the man with the connection to The Man was apparently no different in this regard. The only Chaplain in the office that late morning was The Command Chaplain. As in, a full-bird Colonel, but he’s a Chaplain, and like most, very affable despite our rank disparity.

    I knocked, and with a big smile he welcomed me into his office.  I gave him the elevator speech about my cancer, the holiday, and that I needed to find a Catholic Chaplain by close of business (COB) today.

    Understanding the serendipity of this encounter, COL Chaplain went to work tracking down a Catholic Chaplain. About an hour later I get a text from an unsaved number:

    “Kyle, this is Father Houseman, COL Chaplain sent me your number. I’m sorry to hear about your cancer! What times work best to meet?”

    God may not always be responsive, but his staff sure is. We worked out a time to meet that afternoon to perform the blessing at the Main Post Chapel.

    Something God’s staff also does particularly well is physical security. Every fucking door on that chapel was locked at 1630. I found a door that was open in the office wing of the chapel, however, and roamed the halls of the empty wing of God’s cubicle farm before finding the main hall with the rows of pews, pulpit, altar, the whole shebang.  It was eerily quiet. I expected my presence would draw out Arnold Scwarzenegger like it was the last scene from End of Days.

    See, I’ve always, at best, had a rocky relationship with the almighty. Unknowable things have never really sat right with me and I always treated the religion with a high degree of suspicion. Like, if this dude really exists why doesn’t he show himself? What is he hiding? What’s he have to lose by making it obvious to us that he exists? This skepticism has served me generally well in life, but the older I get the less other explanations previously thought more plausible by my scientific mind start to make sense. My relationship with spiritual things now can best be described as, “Hey, listen, there are a lot of things we can’t explain, will likely never be able to explain, and however you interpret that is fine so long as you aren’t infringing on the rights of others to believe what they like.” That’s how I’ve sort of found peace and balance with what some call spirituality.

    I digress. Father Houseman entered the building from… somewhere, perhaps he materialized like the nun from Blues Brothers; I’m not sure- I didn’t ask how he got in. I approached him and we got right to chatting. One of the first things I noticed was his age: He was incredibly young. Easily ten years my junior. It was sort of odd calling this man Father, but I understood the assignment.

    He pulled out the candles, the appropriate literature, and uniform items needed to make St. Blaise’s throat blessing a “Go” at this station. We got down to business and he instructed me on when I needed to speak and what I needed to say. He completed the ritual and we chatted some more. I walked out of the chapel feeling like I did one of the few things I could do without the help of a doctor to fight this thing: I enlisted the entire might of the Roman Catholic church through St. Brigid and St. Blaise. Fuck yeah, winning.

    ============

    The Tube.

    Continuing from the end of the last entry, MAJ Rafferty wasn’t quite done grinding my view of the phrase “quality of life” into dust by explaining the back-end of long term consequences of the chemo & radiation tag team.

    “So, because we don’t like to operate on you while you’re being treated due to the risk of bleeding, we’re recommending you get your chemo port and feeding tube placed immediately,” he said, looking at me to gauge my response.

    My. WHAT?

    Because my throat is going to turn into a fiery red hellscape of pain and misery, they were concerned I’d stop being able to eat by mouth and lose a tremendous amount of weight, an unhealthy, dangerous amount that would significantly lengthen recovery. A feeding tube, pre-installed, would nip this in the bud by cutting out the middleman (my mouth/throat) and giving me life while simultaneously destroying my will to live, because if you are 38 years old with a feeding tube, the plan you had for your life has gone horribly wrong.

    They explained the feeding tube was only temporary, probably, and I’d be able to get it removed early in recovery if I managed to maintain my weight through and after treatment.

    Alright boys, fucking bet, challenge accepted. Feeding tube is up there with a colostomy bag on the checklist of shit-gone-wrong that would cause me to volunteer for the Ukrainian Army. I will maintain my weight so hard.

    I walked out of that meeting with a parade of referrals to schedule, and a horrifying outlook on life. Life before, during, and after treatment was going to be radically different and I had four days to live my best life.

    I spent three hours of that time wandering around the hospital scheduling referrals. See, when you are an active duty cancer patient, appointment hotlines and long wait times don’t exist. You can walk into any office, announce you have cancer, and shit all over the plebs with routine illnesses. You’re the king shit of hospital mountain. It was so backwards from anything I’ve experienced with medical scheduling in my entire military career up to this point, and it was glorious.

    I went back to the office after that because my coworkers had, to my complete pretend-surprise, barfed Party City all over my desk and coaxed me back into the office long enough to sing happy birthday to me and feed me cake. I don’t even like cake or most baked goods, but it’s bulking season, remember? They’re good people, so I played my part with a smile, even though my soul had been absolutely dismantled that morning after the Tumor Board.

    Oh yeah, I forgot to mention. My birthday was also that weekend. Whoo, party. #lastbirthday?

    ============

    Like a sheet of glass.

    After leaving the office party, I hit the road to get my kids. I travel about 700 miles per week, almost every week, to get them from their mother in Oregon. Why this is the arrangement is for another day, but we tolerate it pretty well, so it is what it is for now.

    My tube and port installation was scheduled for the following Tuesday morning, 11 February, so I knew this would be the last of the fully-normal Dad time they’d be getting. 

    As I drove down Friday I spoke with my mom on the phone, who is another hero of this story up to this point. She said she was coming out to take care of me and help with the kids during my treatment, the only question was when she was coming out.  We deliberated and decided it would be best if she flew in on Sunday or Monday so she could join me for the installation, recovery, and battery of pre-treatment appointments leading up to that time. She booked a one way flight to Portland on Sunday evening so I could get her on my way back to Washington.

    The kids were still blissfully unaware of anything at this point, not dads illness, not grandma spending a few months with him, nothing. At the time of this writing, they still don’t, but that time is quickly approaching.

    I was able to get them an hour earlier than normal so we got home in time to do their normal bedtime routine and prepare for the next day. On Saturdays my daughter has hockey, so we woke up and went out to that as we always do.

    By this point the word was out to my extended circles. I was wrangling my toddler son, talking with friends about my condition, and watching my daughter play (watching her skate out there is the joy of my life). I was starting to experience some fatigue talking about it again, for what felt like the 50th time in two days, so I started to isolate myself in the corner of the rink to watch my daughter. 

    Curiosity and concern are very natural human conditions, so I don’t blame the people close to me for wanting to know more, but it does get taxing having to have these conversations over and over again after having just lived them. Now I live in this weird space of, “how can I show this person I appreciate their concern without having to make this stump speech again?”

    After getting home my daughter baked some cookies, as has sort of been a little tradition of ours every few weeks, and we played the tic-tac-toe bean bag toss game in the living room. Some friends of ours hosted us for an hour or so that afternoon so I could get the kids some outside-the-house social interaction, and since these friends had already heard the cancer spiel and knew I wouldn’t talk about it in front of the kids, I knew that was a space of time I was safe from having to think too much about it.

    Me and the ex agreed to meet outside PDX at a later time so the kids could see Grandma for a little bit and I’d be able to spend some quality time with them on a Sunday at my place beforehand. See, Sundays are normally a, “ok, get up, eat, get ready, go somewhere like a playground for an hour or two, then hit the road by lunch” routine, so it was nice to be able to relax and eat lunch at our house here before getting on the road.

    The kids were elated to see Grandma for the first time since the summer, when she stayed with us for two weeks to help me not have to find childcare for my block of summer break visitation. We wandered around the Target right outside PDX for almost an hour waiting for their mom and it was relatively stress free- it was Super Bowl Sunday and Target was a ghost town. I could let them run wild in the store and not be that parent because there was simply no one else there to be bothered by it.

    I knew I had less than 48 hours of freedom when we returned to my house on Sunday evening, and I intended to do the one thing I knew I’d miss doing the most: play hockey.  I found that my local rink would be having a “stick and puck” (open skate specifically for hockey players) session Monday morning and I hit up my team’s group chat asking who was in for the “last skate” before I started treatment. In reality this will likely have been my last skate until well after recovery begins due to the ramifications of this specific treatment regimen.

    Monday morning rolled around and I drank my last cup of coffee for a few days, grabbed my bag, my sticks, and went to the rink. Four of my teammates showed up and something fantastic happened: No one else was there. We had the whole sheet to ourselves. What’s more, the rink staff actually cut the ice the night prior. It was smooth as glass and ready to be carved up. No divots, no cracks, no grooves in sight.

    Me and the boys dumped a crate of pucks and began fucking around with skating, shooting, handling, and eventually they started to indulge me by letting me 1 v 1 and 3 v 2 them on defense (I primarily play defense). It was going to be the best hour of my week, which sounds great… but the week had just started.

    The views and opinions presented herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.

  • Prologue Part 4: The Gang Gets Booed in Canada

    Referral-ception.

    I’ve not gotten nauseated by the (now) two times I’ve been under general anesthesia, but I sure do get dizzy as shit when I stand. Rena was able to get me into her small SUV with the help of a volunteer at the hospital, but getting from the street to my house took a little more of a coordinated effort. My frame dwarfs hers and it was like one guy trying to move a large box that barely fits through a doorway solo: technically possible, but not advisable if it can be avoided.

    She put me into bed and started a medicine journal for me. After some dozing, I joined her on the couch and we started watching “American Manhunt: OJ Simpson” on Netflix.  I vividly remember the OJ Simpson trial as a kid in the 90s: the courtroom drama, the main cast of witnesses and their tabloid exploits, and of course the white bronco. Sadly, this was the one part I wanted to see the most and I managed to doze off for only that episode.  Not doing anything besides being put to sleep and cut open is absolutely exhausting.

    Eventually Rena passed me off to someone we’ll call Addison for now. Addison and I had just started dating and despite everything going on with me, she was still subscribing to the idea that I might be worth trauma bonding with over this experience. She even shopped with me the night before the procedure to make sure I had throat-friendly foods to survive off of for at least a few days, and kept me from buying more than one thing that were poor investments to this end.

    Addison kept up the maintenance of my medicine schedule and kept vigil until the evening. Because of my prolific napping during the day, I’d managed to stay up well beyond my normal bedtime but eventually managed to go to sleep.

    Rena once again escorted me back to the hospital for a follow-on ENT appointment two days later with LTC Sierra. She basically reaffirmed she had no reason to change her opinion on the findings despite Pathology not having completed the biopsy yet, and began to run down the complete cast of characters I was about to see in the coming weeks through referrals and referrals from my referrals. 

    We need to go deeper.

    ============

    Your average law enforcement interaction.

    In preparation for the eventual official diagnosis I made plans to go to Canada with Addison. See, she’s actually Canadian and was floored that I’d never been, what with having spent so much of my life in states bordering the great white north. My Detroit Red Wings were on their western North America road trip and this was as good of time as any to go see them. Hell, for all I knew it was the last time I was going to get to see them. I found us reasonably priced tickets, and she was going to be my chaperone as we made our way to Vancouver (she likes to joke that this was actually the second time I’d been in Canada).

    Fortunately, I made the call Saturday that I was feeling well enough to travel because my sore throat was just about gone and I was able to choke down (bland) solid foods. Mother nature gave us her best shot as we braved significant snowfall all the way up I-5 in her seasoned RAV4, but we made it to the border where Canada was rolling out the red carpet on the heels of the Trump tariff announcement.

    I handed the Canadian border guard our passports, answered the line of questions your average American would expect from law enforcement, and went on our way. 

    Addison immediately turned to me and said, “Wow, I’m sorry she was so extra; that’s more aggressive than anything I’ve experienced before.”

    Me, visibly confused, “What do you mean? That is about what I expected…”

    Addison explained to me that what I found to be a very standard law enforcement interaction was, in fact, incredibly unusual and that I was treated with undue hostility.  I was still amazed that we were the only car at the gate for the entire interaction and that no one was visiting Canada or even returning home on a Sunday afternoon.

    We had an absolutely amazing time checking out the Grandville Island district, checking to see if the rumors were true about Canadian Costco carrying bulk hockey gear (fake news), and heading into the arena.

    Something you need to understand about hockey, if you’re unfamiliar, is that both anthems, Star Spangled Banner and Oh Canada, are played if one of the teams is from the other country. This is fairly standard practice across both nations, and the crowd sings, or is at least respectful of, both anthems. Because of the tariff announcement, two Canada games from the previous night involved the crowd booing the U.S. anthem. This is almost unprecedented, as there are even documented instances of both anthems being sung by the opposite crowd when PA systems fail. You have to understand and appreciate hockey culture to really understand how fucking angry fans have to get to break with this tradition. This is peak hockey civil disobedience.

    Vancouver fans are generally the rowdiest of Canadian fanbases, and they had a whole 24 hour sports news cycle to soak this up. I was expecting boos during the anthem, but Jesus Christ. It was loud, it was uncomfortable, but I held my hand over my heart and my lips shut and stood respectfully silent for both anthems. I mean, I get it, they have a right to be upset and symbolically voice their distaste. Of all forms of protest, this was pretty innocuous if the other end of the scale is blocking an interstate highway.

    Fortunately, it was a fairly standard hockey crowd and even leaned, perhaps, at least 20% Red Wings fans. Despite dealing with the stress of an overtime game as an “away” fan in my weakened state, it was an overall good experience and I’d go back.

    We eventually made our way back south, and got caught in the throng of Americans returning home for the weekend where we experienced a very cheery, albeit short staffed, American border crossing guard that lightly roasted Addison for admitting she didn’t buy me anything.

    The next day I was officially diagnosed with cancer.

    ============

    My tumor has more civil rights than the average North Korean citizen.

    I saw the pathology report in Genesis the moment before LTC Sierra called me. It confirmed everything she’d hypothesised up to that point: oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma with p16 marker, meaning HPV related. Congrats on being one of the fewer than 30,000 people, overwhelmingly men, that get this a year, Kyle! The good news, if it can be called that, was that because I wasn’t a smoker or drinker, my flavor of cancer was much more responsive to treatment.

    What does that mean? I was being referred to the following for evaluations and preparation to find out:

    • Radiology Oncology
    • Medical Oncology
    • Speech Therapy
    • Nuclear Medicine
    • ENT Oncology at a nearby civilian hospital
    • Nutritionist
    • Behavioral Health
    • Social Worker
    • Case Manager
    • Genetics

    I could hear the appointment wait line music start to play in my head.

    “All of these people will call you, you shouldn’t have to chase anyone down,” she said as visions of appointments danced in my head.

    The tentative treatment plan would be surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy but the “Tumor Board” (this is not a euphemism for the chain of command board in the company HQ, as PFC Cancer would have cracked a joke about earlier in his Army career) would convene on Friday to “stage” me and formally recommend treatment. This would all hinge on the results of my “PET scan,” which was a type of scan designed to see if the cancer had spread to any other parts of my body.  Cancer in other parts of the body = Fire up the John Cena tracker.

    The Tumor Board is all the heads of state of the relevant departments; in my case ENT, Radiology, Radiology Oncology, Medical Oncology, and Pathology coming together and voting on a plan to present to me for approval. There’s even meeting minutes, of sorts, in my Genesis records.

    They presented their plan to me immediately following the meeting, at my previously scheduled onboarding appointment at radiation oncology: No surgery was being recommended, but still to see the ENT Oncology civilian expert to get his opinion. I was being told radiation and chemo were my path forward, but that I was free to ask Medical Oncology their thoughts next week on immunotherapy. The silver lining, of sorts, was that the PET Scan didn’t reveal anything but some, probably, unrelated scarring on my lungs and a mass in my liver that was probably a benign rogue blood vessel, but I’d need a separate MRI of that just to be sure.

    Let me backup and explain the PET Scan real quick, with the help of our friends at ChatGPT:

    “A PET scan (Positron Emission Tomography) is a type of medical imaging that helps doctors see how your body is working, rather than just what it looks like.

    Here’s how it works in simple terms:

    1. A special substance (called a tracer) is injected into your body. This tracer contains a small amount of radioactive material that can be tracked.
    2. The tracer moves through your body, and certain parts of your body (like organs or tissues) use it. The tracer gives off tiny particles called positrons.
    3. A scanner detects the positrons as they are released, creating images of where the tracer has gone. This helps doctors see areas with changes in activity, such as tumors, infections, or problems in the heart or brain.

    In short, a PET scan helps doctors look at how things are working inside your body, not just the structure, by using a special tracer and detecting the energy it gives off.”

    What happens in reality is you show up to Nuclear Medicine after 24 hours of only being allowed to eat plain meat or solid plain cheese and water, in your comfy clothes, get an IV placed into your arm and brought into a room with dim lights, no sound, and a warm blanket. The rationale here is that a stimulated brain and shivering muscles will absorb the radioactive material you are getting injected with, which is universally seen as bad.

    Just in case you glossed over the first few mentions: you are literally getting injected with radioactive sugars. The tech brought it into the waiting room in a lead-lined case, in a lead-lined syringe and injected it into my IV. Awesome, at least if I have cancer I also may develop superpowers for a short time as a result.

    Then you lay in yet another MRI-esque scanning tube to get your PET and another round of CT with contrast. After the CT with contrast my face had a reaction to the contrast, which was a slightly itchy face and the slight look and feel of being sunburned. I am just glad I didn’t get actually cooked by the scan- it would be a real bummer to have cancer and radioactive blood to go along with a sunburned face.

    Fast forward back to Radiology Oncology.

    Radiology Oncology itself is quite possibly the scariest appointment I’ve been to to date. Everything being described by the Dr, a jovial fellow we’ll call MAJ Rafferty, was horrific to my non-medical mind.

    After every disturbing side effect of radiation and chemo was listed, it was always capped off with, “…but your type of tumor will just melt away by the end.” 

    Fortunately, he did place a referral to the nearby highly regarded cancer center called “Fred Hutch” to see if a different kind of radiation might fit the bill better, one generally given to pediatric patients but, once again, because of my age, I may be a candidate for.  The perks of being “the youngest we’ve seen” I suppose.

    The next entry of this journal will be somewhat delayed, the reasons for which will be covered in the next journal entry.

    The views and opinions presented herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Defense or the U.S. Army.