Life is Beautiful

Everything right now just feels so totally amazing. Why is it that we have to go through such pain in order to truly experience the beauty of life. I guess it’s that old thing of dualities. It’s like I have to go through all that with my body in order to really see – to actually experience – quite how incredible the body is.

Chemo was a bit of a whack on Day 1. I’ll set the scene from the beginning of the day. Kate’s glands were up so she couldn’t come with me so Hazel came…and what totally gorgeous company she was. We set off early and arrived in Brighton and went to a wee café for tea before we went to the ward. Surprisingly, nerves weren’t too bad and I had this feeling of acceptance that stuck with me through the process...just about. I’ll explain in a sec how that was nearly sabotaged. It was like, “here I am, this is what I’ve decided to do and this is what I need” kind of feeling – for those of you that know about my mind’s inclinations over the past 6 months it was significant for me to have that acceptance and ease going in to the process.

I’d been to a hypnotherapy appointment the day before – it’s not hypnotherapy as we know it from the TV where they get you doing an involuntary chicken dance or something. It’s more of going through a deep relaxation process.

This is something that I’ve been going through over recent weeks anyway, but I talked through with Jan, the hypnotherapist, who has been through breast cancer herself, the importance of getting your mind into that deeply relaxed state, as often as possible, but especially during treatment. Then the body can get on and do what it needs to help itself. Jan’s story is amazing. If you’re interested check out how she got through her treatment and managed to minimise side effects: http://www.hypnotherapyforliving.co.uk/

It makes sense really, when we’re stressed and contracted we get sore backs, RSI, you name it. When we’re relaxed, we’re expanded, things flow and cells can get on and do what they’re meant to without restriction. So that was my aim and that continues to be my aim day in day out. Maintaining that relaxed state was a challenge to say the least though as the chemotherapy injections got closer and closer and then as they began.

I went to a conference once in Auckland on clustering in business – how businesses within and across industries can work together to maximise profit and resources. It was a fascinating conference. The workshops and presentations covered clustering at an inter-national level right through to clustering within ones own mind. Klaus Haasis presented my favourite workshop that I’ll never forget. It was on the “inner team”. We’ve all got one. It’s that team of characters inside our head that all play different roles at different points in our days, interactions, decision-making processes etc. We might have one that’s bold perhaps, one that’s shy, one that’s money conscious and one that loves to spend, one that’s angry, one that likes to giggle. You get the gist. Some of the characters are dominant and others remain in the background and only pipe up every now and then. It’s the dynamic of that team and the strength of each of those characters in each situation that governs how we react and respond in different situations. Through my yoga I’ve learnt to practice sitting back, observing those characters, trying not to get involved. This was especially important as a riot was about to break out.

As I was heading towards that blue wipe-down arm chair in the ward and the injections were being prepared two main characters piped up for war. One was that of relaxation that was dominating when Hazel and I were in the café, that had gone through the deep relaxation with Jan, that knows how important it is to be relaxed. The other was that of fear that triggers a crazy pounding heart, adrenalin, sweats and contraction. I’d practiced my routine for chemotherapy quite a bit before the session began so I had the yoga nidra (deep relaxation) and visualisation that I was going to do during it and a play list of chanting and kirtan as well. But there was no way of practicing for the warfare that was about to begin in my head.

It was such an interesting experience and it wasn’t easy to sit back, watch and not get involved, and try and settle the fear. But with my utmost determination and willpower, that terror that was trying to sabotage the process for me died away and I went on my way with my meditations throughout the process and welcomed the chemotherapy into my body so that it could do the best job that’s it’s capable of doing, of mopping up any cancer cells that remain.

So despite the attempted warfare, the session itself was fine. In fact, the chemotherapy ward that I described in my last blog post was nothing like I perceived it last time either. I mean, I was in my own little meditative world but quite aware of the amazing representation of society in that room, each person with their own coping mechanisms: a gay guy behind me that had flowers, chocolates, the whole shebang. Vistors every 10 minutes entering the room, accompanied with intermittent roars of laughter; a gorgeous woman a similar age to me next to me who said she had a 2 year-old, also at her first chemo session. She was also sat there with a smiley sister. Then a middle-aged woman across from me sat quietly on her own getting on with it all.  There was something rather comforting, I felt, about that whole scene. Not sure exactly what. Maybe it was the diversity in the room – that we’re all going through cancer, whatever ‘shape’, ‘size’ or ‘type’ we are and we’re all getting through in our own way…

Hazey and I went for a little picnic on Brighton beach and ‘debriefed’ on our experience before heading back home.

The rest of that afternoon and evening was hell to say the least – the anti-sickness stuff that they gave me didn’t quite work for me. Not an experience that I’d want to re-live. So we called a duty doctor that night to come and give me another anti-sickness injection and that did the trick…and there’s been nothing like that since. Energy levels have been up and down but generally it’s all been ok.

One of the hardest things so far I guess is learning how to let go. Not having any expectation of what I’ll do next or how I’ll feel because I just don’t know, and just learning to be with what ‘is’. That, along with the change in my sensory experiences I suppose. My sense of taste and smell changed drastically for the first few days after chemo. Everything tasted and smelt gross. The smell thing isn’t too hard to deal with. I just made sure I didn’t go anywhere near anything that had a fragrance. But the taste thing is harder to deal with. It governs your gag reflex and your desire to eat. Slightly tricky when you’re hungry but you know that the food has to pass through your mouth first in order to satisfy that hunger. It’s part of the letting go thing I guess. Having no choice but to give in to the fact that eating and drinking at that point is not for pleasure but for sustenance. I was kind of going through a bit of a grieving process with all that, when unexpectedly my pleasurable sensory experiences returned after about Day 4.

I just find it so incredible – that innate ability of the body to rebalance. I’m experiencing it first-hand. It’s unfolding in front of my own eyes. I’m doing everything in my capacity to help my body recover, protect itself and recooperate and it’s doing it. I’m not saying I have any idea how the rest of the process will unfold, but right now it’s in a process of rebalance. From limited energy to more energy, from sensory changes back to normal senses, from constipation to normal bowel movements, from groggy mornings that I wasn’t able to do my yoga practices to mornings now that I feel normal and am able to. Kate and I went out to a Turkish restaurant last night to celebrate, after I’d been to a totally gorgeous young women’s breast cancer support group at the Olive Tree in Crawley. Gees, food…and life…have never tasted better. Life is B…E…A…U…T…I…F…U…L.