Go Panthers
Today is a very big day for me.
I’ve been approved to be listed for a liver transplant at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, one of the top transplant centers in the world. In fact— it’s where the liver transplant was pioneered. Even though the surgery itself could be months away, the magnitude of this decision is one of the most impactful of my life. It is the news I’ve been waiting for, praying for, since June.
A transplant is my only option for a long term cure. There is no Plan B. Without a transplant, I would only have a couple years to live. But because I already had this kind of cancer, and because I already had most of my liver removed in 2016, my preternatural anatomy and the risks involved present a very complex case. Not just any center would agree to do this, and until I could find one that would, I hung in the balance.
Waiting for this news everyday felt like waiting to hear whether I would live or die. I dealt with this period sleepwalking through severe depression and desperation and terror, then fighting with rage and indignation against my instinct to curl up. I knew what I was made of, but I fought for my life with such ferocity that I barely recognized myself.
To put it crudely, the Summer of 2022 saw me go a bit crazy. Probably crazier than a season has seen me since 2004. Oh, the games the mind can play when your life is in someone else’s hands:
“What if I don’t hear what I want to hear? No, I will not go there. But I can’t help but go there. Do I email the transplant nurse to see if she has any news? I’ve written her an email but I can’t bring myself to send it. I’m sitting here staring at it. If it’s bad, there will forever be a before and after. And as much as I want to know the truth to eradicate the uncertainty, I’m holding onto the ‘before,’ the not knowing— which includes hope— for as long as I can.”
None of this has anything to do with reality. It’s magical thinking, bargaining.
About a month ago, I dreamt I had a bunch of animals that lived in a barn. This included several cats, and birds which lived in their own cage within the barn. They were beautiful, exotic, tropical birds— just gorgeous colors. But I entered the barn one day and the birds were close to death, could barely lift their heads off the ground. I realized this was because I hadn’t been feeding them. I lifted one of the birds into my hand, trying to nurse it back to health, but then one of the cats got a hold of it. It was this tug-of-war, back and forth, trying to get the birds back from the cats so I could save them. A conflicted dream. Parts of the self at war with one another. Exhausting.
The birds were parts of me that were on the decline: joyous, colorful, funny, free. They were not getting fed. The cats represented my basest animal instinct, my evolutionary brain. The cats in me have been so scared, so intent on survival that they’ve been attacking my ability to experience joy.
When in this kind of heightened state, where the only voice in your head is the one yelling: “LIVE GODDAMMIT. DO WHATEVER IT TAKES,” time drags and goes by without even knowing it. I cannot believe it’s almost September because I haven’t even been aware that it’s summer. When not at chemotherapy, I’m in my apartment mostly because I have two biliary drains hanging out of my stomach and they often leak bile. (I know, lovely right?) But my view has been even narrower than that in this tunnel of survival. I could only see so much.
I am surprised that I bore the unbearable? Yeah, there were moments when I thought the anguish and psychological torture would kill me before anything else. But also no, because I know my strength. And because, well, here I am.
I’m told that the Panthers play in Pittsburgh. Basketball? Football? Who the F knows but go Panthers . I know I will get through this. I can see myself clearly on the other side: standing on stage, singing in a club, on skis at the top of the Rocky Mountains, volunteering— so I can help others walk through the same dark woods from which I’ve just emerged the way that you have helped me. At some point, I’ll have some sort of gathering in NYC so I can say a face-to-face thank you for all of your love and support. For every message, card, gift basket, phone call. I’m telling you, I wouldn’t not have gotten through this without you. You know who you are, and if you’re reading this, it’s you.
