L'Shana Tovah! It's the New Year of 5773 on the Hebrew calendar. That puts some perspective on things. But who's counting right? Three days of chemo, 5773 years of Hebrew culture, One Day at a Time. It's all good. New years are good, especially when you're not forced into going out and getting inexplicably drunk. I like the basic idea of just a new beginning.
This past year, each time I was thinking I was about to get ready for a transplant, it always seemed to coincide with some holiday. Thanksgiving, Martin Luther King Day, Valentine's Day. All good holidays. But now the real deal is happening on Rosh Hashana. Newness. In fact, this year, September 21 really falls right in between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. Yom Kippur is considered one of the holiest Jewish holidays. It's a day of repentance and forgiveness and to feel closest to God. It encompasses extremes of feeling. Sorry and forgiven. Sad and relieved. Cloudy and clean.
These Opposites existing all at once could not define my present experience better. I feel well taken care of, but lonely. I feel strong but sick. I feel excited and scared. Positive, yet freaked out. I feel lucky and unlucky. I have extreme faith in a body that has actually failed me. I have extreme faith in a transplant that doesn't always work for everybody. It's a lot to handle all inside one person in one day. But I have to recognize these dichotomies. They are plain as day swirling around me. I'm sitting between a festive new beginning and the heaviness of making that new beginning real. (The idea of how hard a baby has to work just to be born, just to come out into the world, comes to mind. Well my kids didn't work so hard both being c-sections... but you know what I mean...)
I was reading lots of testimonials of transplant survivors this evening. Many spoke of a new lease on life, but that it wasn't easy to get to. They also spoke about what wasn't easy. So I can prepare myself by not being surprised by anything. Yikes? So many things!
When Isaac was little he was really into NASCAR. I took him twice. I know it's the highest-grossing sport in the U.S. but as hard as I tried, it was difficult to embrace! Not just because it's so frickin' loud, but because of the strangeness of it. You sit in the bleachers and watch cars go around and around and around for 500 miles! And then everyone gets up and cheers when a car veers or crashes and you continue standing and watching in this pure rubber-necking kind of way, to see if anyone is hurt, or needs to be towed or have their car fixed, asking, "Are they still in the race?" And all the other cars just keep going around and around and around.
It's like a transplant. Can I rubber-neck my own life! I do chemo. How will I tolerate it? I'll get new cells. How will I tolerate them? I'll wait till they engraft. How will I tolerate them? They'll engraft. How well will they fight leukemia? I'll leave the hospital. How soon till I get my strength back? How soon will it be till I can go back home and kiss my kids? Will I still be in the race? My neck hurts!
L'Shana Tovah,
Dina
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