Aside from the cyber screaming of this blog, on a few rare occasions I have had the privilege to offer live thoughts or insights to folks struggling with their own cancer concerns.
I recently discovered that a work colleague had a sibling who was wrestling through their own battle with Multiple Myeloma (MM). The work colleague approached me having learned through the grapevine that I too was an MM soldier - a survivor of the conflict. The sibling had gone through a fairly protracted series of chemo treatments and was now ready for the next step - Stem Cell Transplant. It was evident to me that the work colleague was very concerned about the sibling and concerned/nervous about the Transplant. Having studied a great deal about the procedure online, they still felt unprepared for themselves (how best to offer their loving support) and for their sibling (about the process, recovery and anticipated results).
Without sugar-coating the steps leading up to and during the Transplant, yet not scaring the work colleague beyond the bounds of reasonably expected issues, I satisfied their curiosity and laid out all of the steps of the procedure itself. Then I tried to share as many insights as I could about that uncertain roughly three-week period after Day Zero (the first day after the transplant happens - the essential beginning of the new immune system), and until I was released to go home. I cautioned that this was what MY experience was like, and that each patient is different, but that my path unfolded almost exactly as the pattern was explained to me by my Onc team.
After outlining the discomforts, challenges, likely attitude and expected recovery trajectory that the sibling was going to encounter, I ended the conversation with the thought: your sibling is the Before and here I am - the After. My life now, after the Stem Cell Transplant, is what your sibling, and you, and your family have to look forward to. The work colleague felt better about the whole pending experience, and I felt valuable having been able to use my story to help someone else. Making lemonade out of the lemons of my MM - and existing in a living state of after-life.
