|
From chapter one of Slapped
Awake.
As the weeks moved into the autumn, I was
increasingly aware that breast cancer was forcing upon me an
unexpected education. One of the early lessons of cancer as my
teacher was the crazy paradox of the disease as both the scariest
thing that had ever happened to me and a blessing of being slapped
fully awake. The keen awareness of the possibility of losing
everything I knew heightened my senses and rattled my soul. I
felt as though my "receivers" were all wide open, almost
to the point of pain, exquisitely tuned and scanning, scanning.
In the Early Days of Cancer
These days a bogeyman lurks in every closet.
With each cough
each headache
each skeletal twinge
I wonder if metastatic tendrils
are insinuating their way into my vitals,
or are these turncoat cells
as smitten as my newly wakened soul
by the softness of my child's cheek in sleep --
the sweetness of the stars?
(from Slapped Awake,
Westview Publishing, copyright Deborah Lang Hampton 2007)
From Chapter Three of Slapped
Awake.
I am the oldest child in my family. I'm probably
a textbook picture of the firstborn, the prototype for overachievement
and an Olympic-grade competitor in being the "good girl."
Slap on top of all that an alcoholic family and a father who
prized success as an unerring measure of worth and by my mid-30's,
I was an emotional train wreck just waiting to happen. I can
testify from my own experience and from observing others that
the "perfect" life and all the control that goes with
being hyper-responsible and super-compliant takes a tremendous
toll. It's just exhausting. By my late 30's, I found myself depressed
and despairing. Even my journals from that time eerily portend
something serious coming. In one entry in the late 1980's, I
sensed something happening on some undetectable level but I didn't
know what. I wrote, "I feel like I am dying by millimeters."
Now I was nearly a year into my cancer diagnosis, having walked
what I thought was going to be an impossible road. With my treatments
over, the questions about what I wanted out of life rang insistently
in my ears. I didn't know much, but I knew that I had to make
some fundamental changes. I hadn't come through all that hell
for nothing, just to drift back complacently into a life that
was sucking me dry from the inside out.
(from Chapter 3)
(from Slapped Awake,
Westview Publishing, copyright Deborah Lang Hampton 2007)
From chapter ten of Slapped
Awake.
On my first day of radiation treatment, I
arrived and got into my hospital gown. The technician led me
into the treatment room where she had me lie down on a narrow
metal platform that must have been precooled to about 36 degrees.
She opened my gown to expose three-quarters of my chest and then
asked me to relax and not move. I needed to lie there like a
sack of flour and let her position my body to line me up with
the laser crosshairs projected across my chest. My head was stabilized
in a little, hard, uncomfortable headrest. I thought of scenes
from Shogun, with the hardy Japanese lying on mats on
the floor with a block for a pillow. Maybe Samurai warrior imagery
was a good thing to hang onto.
As the tech left the room, she said, "We're
taking an X-ray first. A light on the wall will go on. Lie still.
After the X-ray, you'll see the light go on again for your treatment.
I'll come back in and we'll change positions to get the next
area treated, too."
She left the room and I heard the big lead
door shut. I really had no idea what to expect. I knew that everything
was carefully programmed into a computer, but this was an exercise
in trust, for sure. I saw the little light saying "Beam
is On" blink for a fraction of a second as my chest X-ray
was taken. Then about a minute later, the light went back on,
and stayed on. There was no feeling and not much sound, except
the hum of the machine and the lighted sign on the wall. I counted
to 45. Finally, it went off.
Radiation Therapy
I am carefully wedged into position
on the gantry
Paperweighted down by lead blocks
that define the bad and protect the good,
Creating a bordered target for the rays of radiation
shielding the essentials, like my heart,
From cosmic sizzle.
Positioned carefully
by degrees and millimeters,
I am locked in place.
The techs scurry for safety
and slam the ponderous door.
I am sealed in, secure as a bank vault,
My only companion
The eerie hum of the linear accelerator
and the light saying
Radiation on... on... on.
I count the seconds
and hope they got it right.
(from Slapped Awake,
Westview Publishing, copyright Deborah Lang Hampton 2007)
|
 Now
Available!
Slapped Awake
Living with Breast Cancer:
A Journey in Poetry and Prose
...and read Debbi's
Post Book Essays for the continuing story.
|
