Postcards from Andersonville

I've had several texts and comments prom people on the remarks I made last time about my perceptions during chemo. I feel like I'm sending back postcards from anther country, one most people don't ever want to visit but are very curious about.

I just wanted to ad that not all my perceptions have been accurate. Some of them have been incredibly real, but also hilariously off base. For example:

My hair has gotten to be quite long during COVID, and I brush it straight back and tie it, and it reaches almost to the small of my back. My hair is still very thick.

When I brush it, I don't look in the mirror (these days I do that as little as possible), but I can feel my hair as I brush it. To me, it feels like my hair is white. I guess more a whitish-blond color, not pure white. But I have been thinking of myself as a guy with long white hair - something Tom keeps reminded me is not true. Sitting here right now, I can run my hand over my head, and feel my mane of solid white hair - even though when I pull it forward and look at it, it is dark brown with some grey streaks. 

One of the odder perceptions has been happening for a while now. I wear socks when I am in bed, as my feet tend to be colder than they used to. I sometimes wake up with the distinct impression that my toes have started falling off. I can feel my smaller toes rattling around inside the sock, and it feels like they are no longer attached. When I finally pull up my knee and feel my feet, I am always surprised to find my toes are still attached.

The very strangest one happened Sunday night. I was lying on the bed, and I was cold. Then I realized that the air was blowing all around me - on all four sides of my body. I woke up Tom and asked, "Are you awake?" He eventually was, and I asked him "Am I awake?" He said that I was. I told him that I was hovering above the bed, and that there was a breeze blowing around me and keeping me chilly. 

Nothing phases Tom White. I tell him I have become weightless and am drifting a foot above the mattress, and his response is "What do you want me to do?" So I asked him to put his hand on my back and push me down toward the bed, which he did. As soon as my stomach made contact with the bed, the vacuum (or whatever it was) broke, and I was again lying on the mattress. 

I know, it sounds like a dream - but it was an absolutely real sensation. And I was definitely not asleep. 

Chalk it up to chemo brain.

The shifting through time has continued, however, and I continue to have snipped of weird memories come floating up. Last night it was a 1973 Move of the Week I watched with Sue Allen. We must have watched it in 1973, because it was never aired again (it was a horror film so bad that it made us laugh). The movie was called "Dying Room Only" and starred Cloris Leachman and Ross Martin. It was terrible, although (spoiler alert!) the last scene (when the bad guy's babe came to kill our two beloved protagonists and Cloris shoved a lighted highway flare in her eyes) was definitely something to remember. No one could wield a highway flare quite the way Cloris Leachman could. (Maybe that's why the candles were not lit a year later when she carried the candelabra during "Young Frankenstein.")

I suddenly could remember the entire commercial that aired for this piece of tripe, and even hear the voices and music. 

 

Mostly, though, my visit to this strange Chemoworld has been one of exhaustion. My current schedule is jam-packed: this morning, I got up at 8, and had some breakfast and took the various pills I have to take. By 9:30, I was wiped out, went back to bed, and slept until almost noon. I then transitioned to the couch, where I spent most of the afternoon dozing and watching crap on TV. 

By 4, I started to get a little energy, and found I could sit up and even talk. That energy is painfully small, but my dear friend Kathy Smith has advised me not to used it to install flooring or remodel a bathroom, but to try and just sit with it and let it be. I tend to stay awake (thought I sometimes take an hour nap around 7:30) before going to bed at 11. Unlike the old pre-cancer Dmitri, I have no trouble sleeping: at 11, I sleep through the night, getting up to use the bathroom a couple times but immediately falling back to sleep.  

It's a trait in my family that we just don't sleep. For me, if I sleep 6 hours in a night, it feels miraculous. So now, sleeping 12-15 hours a day is completely unfamiliar. I wish I could enjoy it more, but it's not really pleasurable. Still, I'm trying to stay in the moment, and experience what is right before me. Whether I'm watching "Dying Room Only", levitating over my bed or just completely comatose, I'm trying to experience it all.

Is this all boring to anyone who happens to read this? Trust me, it's boring to me too. But in a strange way, it is a fascinating experience. My body has taken charge and has taken me on this trip through starvation and pain and exhaustion and cancer. I'm here,along for the ride, trying to be an observant passenger. 

Maybe the next time I wake up, I'll have more interesting things to say. Hope springs eternal.