In the 7 weeks since I was diagnosed as having a Grade 4 brain tumour and being told, “This is it”! Essentially, “this is the end for you”…
In these past 7 weeks, I have gone through all of the emotions I ever thought I could. I have had to endure my mind being completely uncomprehending of the fact that I am facing death, only to realise that in fact, I am facing life. To endure life whilst fearing death, this is what I have had to overcome these past 7 weeks.
Come to think of it, I have had to endure a whole month of uncertainty prior to finding out the truth about what this abnormality was inside my brain!
So as you may well gather from this first paragraph, I have felt at the lowest and highest points of my life in a very short period of time, yet still, everything for me is still uncertain!
Fortunately, I remain positive.
I am drawn to the memory of what it was like for me prior to finding out my condition. I am drawn to that memory of finally finding myself living as I felt I wanted to. I had a beautiful girlfriend, my work life was becoming more and more enjoyable. My family life was becoming closer and less broken. I was finally doing alright for the first time in my life.
I cannot comprehend now, why it took me so long to find out what I wanted to do, but for some strange reason, when you meet someone who understands you and who knows your past and loves you anyway. When you find that enjoyment in the work you do and you literally find enjoyment in every facet of what you do at work. Then, one day, you find yourself becoming ill within your body and that starts interrupting the flow of your daily routine of enjoyment in love, work and family. You find that you start being forced to sacrifice these things and lose a special part of yourself. The part of you that has longings for the future.
These things that I longed for, now seem a distant choice, one that may yet be lost to me. I dreamed of making a family with my partner, of finding our own house to live in where I could bring my work home with me and enjoy the beauty in flowers and gardening, growing our own vegetables and keeping our own flock of sheep. The humble life and the “good life” that is so endearing and true! Having the security in knowing that I would be financially stable and able to look after my very own family.
I feel that right now, in this space where I reside, my dream has to remain just that, a dream… not lost but just not here… in this present moment…
Right now, my main focus has to be on righting the wrong within my brain. To put all of my willpower, resolve and integrity in just “healing me”! Only then can I make my dreams come true and live in happiness and joy.
Each day. Every waking moment, is full of a routine that I am tired of, but yet, I know that I must endure! I must continue, I must persist.
Each day I wake up and I do a blood glucose test. A prick on my finger with a small lancet and a drop of blood on a blood meter reader. I have to endure this three times a day, two of these times, I have to do a Ketone blood test as-well. So that means two holes in different fingers. Two different readings. I have to time these readings, upon waking, two hours after lunch and two hours after dinner.
Three times a day I must take a variety of supplements with my food, the fatty, (healthy and fatty food) and each time I eat I have to take 100% MCT (medium chain triglycerides) which is an oil that is beneficial in conjunction with the oxygen and the Ketogenic diet. This is now my normal day. One that I have had to get used to.
Alongside this, there are the daily task of going and spending a lot of money on buying organic produce from the local organic food store. My partner has the wonderful job of driving us around. She is fantastic and keeps on soldiering on no matter what. I find it fascinating!
I also, (and the list is going to continue), have to go to two different therapies three times a week. One is acupuncture. The other is hyperbaric oxygen. I have to arrange everything above around these appointments. I will soon be on another therapy called Craniosacral Osteopathy. I hope to fit this in and around all my other schedules.
I feel like a robot that cannot miscalculate its day or risk ending up being taken out of production. Thankfully I have someone who does the calculations for me and keeps me in the production line.
I could complain, but I don’t need to. This is everything I must endure in order to bring about a change in my body to incur healing within my mind.
What I felt at first to be something that ruins my day, something I needed to sacrifice, I now find to be quite productive and conducive to my healing journey. I even enjoy the routine.
Knowing that I “NEED” these things to continue living keeps me in a singular mind. A mindfulness that tells me to rise like the phoenix, from the ashes just to be reborn in each new moment, into something more than I once was.
This symbol of the phoenix, is a constant reminder to me to know that we live and die in each moment. Every moment is this exact experience. Rebirth!
Much love and abundance to you all,
Pablo Isaiah Kelly
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