Beating The Odds And Doctor Death

Hello Death

To think that I was happy, content, and comfortable just a few short years ago, makes me long for the past. When everything changed, it all spiraled pretty fast. And yet, out of all the constant ickyness, somehow the need to survive and fight back hasn't died off in me.

It was two years ago this week that I went to see that first specialist and was rapidly scheduled for a biopsy. We all knew how it was likely going to go. It was going to be cancer, and based off the initial blood test results, it was going to be a bad diagnosis.

And, it was. It was the worst diagnosis that you can get. It was so bad, in fact, that the first two doctors in the line-up of the usual suspects could only say, "I'm sorry."

When a doctor's only thing they can think to say is, "I'm sorry," they end up saying it a lot. I think I heard I'm sorry twenty times in that first few weeks. And that was just from doctors. That's not even counting the number of "I'm so sorrys" I got from friends and family members as I slowly began telling them what was going on.

It's funny, because a little context about how I felt can be seen in this video from the series Your Honor.

200! God, that's nothing. Proving that I didn't know how to do anything small, 200 would have been an improvement. At 329.8 for my very first reading, I would have welcomed 200. That's how they knew so quickly that in all likelihood, I was utterly screwed.

But you go on and get all the testing and see what they can do. Biopsies, scans, blood tests, and more blood tests, to the point you feel like you're going to be a shriveled husk of the man you were before it all started.

Then comes the inevitable meeting with the man I would not-so-affectionately come to call, Dr. Death.

• Dr. Death

Dr. Death is actually Dr. Gus Harb in Davenport Iowa. He's a partner at the Urological Associates in the Quad Cities between Iowa and Illinois. On my very first meeting with him, after the last doctor tells me, "I'm sorry, but you're way outside of my skill level," Dr. Death comes into the office, sits down with me, and puts a reassuring hand on my shoulder.

At first he wanted to know who was there with me. In the bewildered state I was in, finding myself nervous with each progressive appointment, I didn't know what he was looking for. I even asked him if he could see anyone with me. We didn't communicate well in that first few minutes, because when he said no, I was quick to tell him, "Well, we're the only two in the room room, so nobody."

But what he was of course looking for was if I had brought anybody with me to my appointment.

One of the "suckier" parts of being a perrenial bachelor is not having someone to hold your hand when the doctors are dropping bombshells on you like the United States dropping bombs on the middle east. They don't kill you right away, but they make you feel like it's just a matter of time.

Good old Dr. Death was all about the honesty. He repeated himself. He told me how important it was that he be completely honest with me, and then told me I have a very bad cancer.

I'll save you the time. No, there's no good kind of cancer to get.

Three years! That's what Dr. Death tells me I have. Just three years from start to finish.

As I sat there, thinking about that number, fear, anger, denial, self-pity, regret, sorrow, some more fear, and a few other visceral emotions raced through my body.

I was 52 the day I learned I had cancer. Less than three months later, a doctor tells me that I likely wouldn't see 55.

It feels like it's been the blink of an eye, like I was transported through time to today.

But, when I went to see old Dr. Death this week, we had an entirely different discussion. Dr. Death went off his path he usually is on, and tells me that he wants me to see a new Oncologist. He says it's important to not miss any therapies or treatments.

"Why?" I asked. "Why now, after two years, considering you gave me a max of three?"

"Well, you're not doing as bad off as I expected, and well..." he hesitated. "Only god knows for sure."

Translation, Doctors, even the best of them, aren't perfect. And after years of seeing patients who were deep in the hole, Dr. Harb, expected that's where I'd be. He expected it to spread, to be something I couldn't fight, and for me to lose.

He's still holding my beer.

His three years would be up between August and November of this year. And while I'm no where near 100% of what I was, if I die this year, it'll be with cancer, not from cancer.

Odds and Dr. Death, both beaten.