Living with MCL

I hate Mondays. Monday is a day off for me. A day off from work, and a day off from riding.

I did have a golf game lined up in Industry Hills this morning, but golf just hasn’t excited me as of late, so I passed. I also could have gone for a bike ride, but I put in over 900 miles last month, and I think my body could do with a little R&R. Besides it was foggy this morning, and that never makes for a pleasant or fun ride.

So what did I do instead? I got up (after a lousy nights sleep), surfed the internet for interesting stuff (which there wasn’t much of), watched some news and early morning talk shows on TV, and then just got depressed.

The ever bleak and gloomy picture[s] being painted by many economic experts is disheartening at best, and the continual bickering and infighting by our elected representatives, and others, repeating the same old rhetoric over and over again, is enough to make a grown man cry.

I really need to put a stop to this!

Work might have even been more enjoyable, if it weren’t for the damn 80 mile drive.

I think I’ll just go for a walk! At this point anything would be better than sitting in front of this computer any longer.

That sure doesn’t sound like such a long time, does it? Heck, the typical home mortgage is 180 to 360 months. Even some car loans are in the range of 84 to 120 months.

But when you’re talking about cancer survival it’s an entirely different story. It is a long time. And I should know, because that’s how long it’s been since that fateful blood test that led to my diagnosis of mantle cell lymphoma (MCL).

That’s 100 months of living with a terminal illness, 100 months of blood tests (121 total) watching my numbers gradually degrade, and 100 months of stress, waiting for the next shoe to drop.

But when I read the results of trials, which consider remissions of 6, 12 or 24 month as being good results, along with the numerous problems and complications experienced by others, I can’t help but also think of 100 months as being a milestone. Especially considering I haven’t had any treatment, and still feel like I’m in pretty damn good shape. I even rode my bike 70 miles this morning, and managed not to get dropped [until the very end], despite a pretty rapid pace. Of course I am pretty tired right about now.

I know I’ve obsessed over this before, but I can’t stop wondering how I’ve managed to be so fortunate. Like I’ve said many times before, if I didn’t know I was sick, I wouldn’t know I was sick. And I doubt many others would think so either.

I haven’t been very philosophical in a great awhile, but a recent conversation with one of my wine drinking buddies has compelled me to do so now.

We were discussing a recent 60 Minutes segment about people choosing to walk away from their mortgages, and allowing their homes to fall into foreclosure, because the value of their homes had fallen well below the amount they currently owed, despite the fact, in many cases, they could still afford the monthly mortgage payment.

The conversation got a little heated, when I said I could understand the reasoning behind the decision. It’s purely a financial one. Why continue to pay [and pay] for something that’s no longer worth what you paid for it, or even what you owe? Why keep throwing good money after bad, especially when it’s cheaper to just stop paying? There has to be a time when it’s best to just cut your losses and run [so to speak].

But my buddy felt, if you could afford it, you were morally obligated to continue making the payments. If you entered into a contract, you were obligated to fulfill that obligation regardless of the financial implications. He likened it to borrowing money from a friend to purchase a car, but later found out the car was defective. Would you then refuse to pay your friend back, he asked?

First off, I don’t see there being any moral considerations when making financial decisions, and how can you compare a house worth several hundred thousand dollars with a car worth a few thousand dollars?

And how can you compare a friend to a bank, especially a bank that understands the risks involved in lending money for a home loan? Why else would they retain title to the home, until the borrower paid it off?

I was then reminded of the controversy surrounding the decision by John Edwards to continue seeking the Democratic Presidential nomination, in 2008, after his wife was diagnosed with cancer. There was a lot of name calling, and people condemning Edward’s decision to continue the campaign, and not giving up everything to stand by his wife’s side while she fought her disease, all the while professing to know the moral thing to do, and how they would have reacted in the same situation.

Well, it’s the same for both cases.

In this case, my friend is retired, living on a nice pension (with health insurance), in a very comfortable home worth over a million dollars, with very little if any mortgage. How can he possibly think he knows what he would do if his house was worth half what he owed.

My point is he can’t. Nobody can know. And we definitely shouldn’t be passing judgment. Until you’ve walked in the shoes of someone faced with a tough decision or in a no win situation, there is no way anyone can ever know how they will react.

Not only is it naive to think otherwise, it’s down right arrogant.

Well, I think I’ve managed to recover somewhat this morning, but that’s exactly how I felt at the end of yesterdays bike ride.

While it was only a 55 mile bike ride, there was 2775 feet of climbing (which is a lot more than normal), but the real problem was me being the weakest rider in the group, forcing me to step it up a notch so as not to embarrass myself too badly.

The ride didn’t start out that way, but after the first climb, about half of the original 20 or so riders who started the ride, many of whom I consider to be of comparable ability to myself, decided to cut the ride short, leaving me alone with the much stronger riders. I guess I could have cut the ride short as well, but then what fun would that have been.

As it was, aided by a few short cuts, and the fact the group didn’t push the pace as hard as they could have, I think I made a decent showing, not finding myself too far behind at any point. But that extra effort did take its toll.

I spent the last 15 miles of the ride on the verge of bonking (despite having an energy bar at the top of the last hill), essentially running on fumes, hanging on for dear life at the back of the pack, so as not to lose the draft, and leave myself alone to fight the usual head winds encountered on the way home, making the ride even more difficult.

I just hope all that effort wasn’t for naught! After all isn’t it true what the say,

what doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger