Life comes at you fast

I’ve been telling people recently that this whole experience has been like a Nationwide Insurance commercial. Their slogan is “Life comes at you fast”, and the commercials, including the one with K-fed as a fry cook, make up an excellent and very funny campaign. And the analogy here is perfect, because there is no way the average guy who thinks the pituitary gland resides in your underarm is going to have plenty of advance notice that he’ll be getting intimate with a neurosurgeon and his staff any time soon. The news came out of nowhere. Even though I had the warning sign of the deteriorating vision, I still had absolutely no clue what that indicated. “You might have a tumor,” “You’re going to need surgery,” “How’s next Tuesday for you?”  Boom, boom, boom.

It also comes at you fast with less life threatening events. For example, this cold that I’ve managed to fully adopt since the weekend camping trip. Boom – you have a cold, your eye is watering non-stop, your mucous levels are increasing instead of what you’ve been working so hard for the past 5 weeks to have decreased, and you’re sneezing. And sneezing, by the way, although not as torturous as it would have been a few weeks ago, is not currently on my list of favorite activities. To put it eloquently, sneezing even weeks after sinus-invasive surgery sucks.

But things also sneak up on you way out of left field that really slam you. I could have predicted that camping in the spring when you’re allergic to pollen might bring something less than outstanding health. But what happened yesterday really came out of nowhere.

I had the opportunity to browse the ComedySportz (CSz) national forum online for the first time in a few years. For those who don’t know, this is the improv troupe with which I am currently involved and have been since 1996, with the exception of my recent several-year hiatus. It is a national improv troupe, with locations in over 20 cities nationwide and even one in the UK. (See the link on the left of my main page.) This national forum is a private internet bulletin board where players and managers from all the cities can chat about anything from shows to marketing to Grey’s Anatomy.

Before my surgery, a good friend of mine from the Philadelphia CSz asked me if what I had was a Craniopharyngioma, because that was what Mike Young had. Although I did not know Mike well, I have met him at national CSz tournaments several times over the years, and he was a very talented improviser, and was very loved by many in Philly and in the league. Note the use of past tense here. To make a long story short, Mike’s tumor caused significant difficulties that eventually led to his death last July at the way too early age of 38, leaving behind his wife and very young son. Indeed, my deepest fear lurking behind this entire ordeal.
When she asked me this, I put up one of the quickest walls ever erected in the name of psychological blocks, even though her intent was certainly in the name of making sure that if the physical circumstances were the same, then we could move forward with the benefits of the lessons learned through Mike’s ordeal. Regardless, it just wasn’t a path that my mind wanted to let me go down, even one tiny step. And anyway, a craniopharyngioma is NEAR the pituitary gland, not actually ON it. Way different, right? Right.

I thought I had successfully repressed this story. In fact, I hadn’t even given the comparison any thought in weeks. But yesterday, when browsing that CSz forum, I came upon the thread with the simple title: “Mike Young.” I knew exactly what it was, but felt the need to click on the thread any way. It was the announcement from last July of his passing, and the sad reactions from many players nationwide.

The hardest part, however, was what was in that announcement. Apparently, friends of Mike’s had set up a blog early in the process for him to post updates and for friends to post jokes and humorous rants of support. A blog to work through it. Suddenly, my delusion that I was the first genius to come up with THAT idea was shot. Not that I really thought that, as I know that if you do a google search for blogs by people working through illnesses you’ll probably find more than you could ever read. But this was shattering my safety a bit. One more parallel between me and Mike.

And of course, I couldn’t stop there. Included in that post was a link to the blog. Almost as if in a trance, I clicked on it. It’s like passing an accident – you know it didn’t end well, but you just can’t help rubbernecking to see more.

The blog is very current, and kept up to date by Mike’s widow Danna. I read some of the recent posts, about how she is trying to move on not quite a year later. I read a post recapping Mike’s deteriorating memory and mental state, and Danna’s feelings of helplessness as it unfolded. I went to the archives and read the posts by Mike early on that were quite similar to what I do with this blog – recaps of what the doctors have said and how he was feeling. And of course, I had to go to the posts from Danna and their friend during the final moments of Mike’s decline and finally his death. And I followed a link to an explanation of craniopharyngiomas, and found that ordinarily, there is an excellent prognosis for recovery. That was the kicker – it was supposed to be okay.

I can’t even describe how many things I felt at once. I teared up, as the faces of Danna and Baxter in my mind were being played by those of Terry and Jasper. I felt like a voyeur, having absolutely no business reading something this personal about someone that I really didn’t know. I felt like I had absolutely no reason to be working on my own blog, because compared to Mike’s ordeal, things have been going so well. And I felt like the safety net had just been ripped away from under me, because the complications that arose from Mike’s surgery could have just as easily happened with me, and still could, since Mike had even had a period of feeling great post-surgery and nonetheless it still went downhill. Mike had surgery that seemed successful, and yet he still went downhill.

I know everyone is different. I know we had different types of tumors. I know that his story doesn’t change a thing about my recovery. But all of the encouraging words of support in the world can’t change the facts that 1. that still could have been me, and 2. my heart is now completely broken for Danna and Baxter, two people whom I’ve never met. I’m still wrestling with this, and I imagine I will for quite some time. It really drives home that my fear of death is not in wondering what will happen to me, but in the grief it would bring my family. And Jasper is 8, well into the age where he would take it very, very hard.

Danna’s blog is now chronicling her grief and the process of moving forward. I had considered posting a link here, but the more I think about it, the more I feel I would be violating the privacy of her family and close friends. It felt odd enough for me to read it, even though I had permission as a CSz player. It just doesn’t make sense for me to send other people even more removed from their family to see all of the intimate details of their most difficult ordeal. And I can’t even tell if I’ll go back and read more, or if I’ll do my best to put up another wall and pretend like that blog really doesn’t exist. Right now, I’d put money on the latter.

Life comes at you fast. I can only hope the next head-spinner is a multi-million dollar lottery win. Because honestly, the tumors and the reality checks suck.

Especially if you have a cold.