Daily Archives: April 30, 2020

I have always been about quantity when it came to life. More, more, more, more, more.

And I recognized that I might learn something from current circumstances, I just could not have anticipated what that might actually be.

Quality, my friends. Quality of life.

I never met a side effect that I couldn’t overcome before. But then again, I have never met said side effect while also experiencing the social isolation and general deprivation that is part and parcel of a pandemic.

In two weeks I shall have scans again. I have already decided that if there is not some compelling reason to continue this treatment regimen, I am out. Mucositis sucks more than I could have imagined. To the point that I would rather be sleeping than awake. Morphine has become one of my best friends. And that’s not a life of quality.

If there is something else to try with more tolerable side effects, I shall consider it. But I am also thinking—for the first time ever—that this might be a good time to bow out gracefully.

And that is part of my lesson. That just being alive is not necessarily enough. That sometimes the price you pay might just be too high.

Quality. The essential nature of being.