I never wanted a tattoo.* Not even a little bit. Not before my diagnosis, and certainly not after. I mean, it took me a decade to commit to getting braces. Getting a permanent tattoo with a terminal diagnosis? Do you…
During my psilocybin trip, I spent hours seeing fractals stretching out into infinity; every window opened up into infinite more windows. Some find glimpsing infinity like this (or even contemplating it by looking at the vast ocean, hiking in a…
I did a thing. Back in January, I tried psilocybin (aka “magic mushrooms”). I wouldn’t ordinarily admit to partaking of an illegal Schedule I substance on a public blog, but in this case, I received the drug legally as a…
I’m often explicitly encouraged by lung cancer advocacy organizations, “tell us when you have a big milestone to celebrate so we can splash it on social media.” So here it is: my youngest child graduated high school last week! I…
As I have mentioned previously, unlike many cancer patients, I make it a point not to mark my “cancerversaries.” The day I was diagnosed was pretty freaking terrible, and I take Deepak Chopra’s caution to heart: “If your attention is…
Traditional Chinese Medicine (“TCM”) associates the lungs with grief, so when too much grief is present, it can weaken the lungs. I don’t necessarily give this philosophy a ton of credence, but I nevertheless worry about how experiencing grief can…
Oh wow, it’s already mid-November — I’m a bit tardy to welcome you to Lung Cancer Awareness Month! The world feels especially bleak these days, and it’s incumbent on each of us to contribute light where we can. So, it’s…
I got braces a couple weeks ago. I still can’t quite wrap my head around it. I’ve known I needed them for years. I was in the midst of treatment for TMJ when I got diagnosed with lung cancer and…
There’s a lot of emphasis in oncology on “staging a patient.” That’s a bit of a misnomer. What the docs really mean when they refer to staging a patient is staging the cancer (how much it has spread), not the…
Oh, hi there. Long time, no chat. Sorry if I caused any one any concern. I know from following fellow cancer patient blogs that when they go silent, I start to worry. So I’ll cut to the chase, Update #27:…
