Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Gaaaahhhh!

It has a been a rough week. I had a chemo treatment a week ago and am starting to feel like I'm just crummy all the time. I have these stupid side-effects with me every day, like so many yippy dogs nipping my ankles and barking that it's-not-even-a-bark little noise. They won't do any permanent damage but they can irritate the bejeebers out of me.

Meanwhile, Husband is having a rough go. I think he hoped (as did I!) that moving away from our old congregation would provide nearly instant relief from the pain we felt there. It didn't. It's starting to look like we might need to organize our entire lives around getting well for a few months. I'm physically ill, he's emotionally/spiritually ill. It's very, very, very hard to acknowledge that we are profoundly limited right now.

I happened upon a little book about cancer and skimmed it for interesting bits. The author described someone's experience with cancer and noted that he thinks "toxic stress" in the patient's life contributed to the development of cancer.

I'm pretty sure the author is not a physician, and I think he's just musing there, but it planted the idea in my mind that perhaps I would not have developed cancer if I'd not been under severe stress. That is, "Did sr. pastor give me cancer?"

Gaaaaahhhhhh!

Of course I have no idea and it's kind of a stupid thing to ponder, but every few weeks I discover new layers of anger over his incredibly, stunningly self-centered behavior. I had so few conversations with him and all of them were about him. What is that? How does that happen? Someone told me that the definition of narcissism is thinking that everything you say or do is right because you are the one saying or doing it. I cannot fathom seeing the world that way.

1 comment:

  1. It surprises me how many people who have cancer at young ages will develop it on the heels of a time of high stress.

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for using this space to share your encouraging words.