Available Light

A photo I took when walking into the hospital on my first day of treatment .  I was diagnosed with prostate cancer in April 2008, more than 11 years ago. After a radical prostatectomy and a lengthy period of radiotherapy we found that the cancer hadn't gone and that I had stage 4 of a particularly virulent variety of the disease. A radical change of diet, a renewed commitment to meditation and some excellent medical advice meant that I beat the odds, and instead of the expected short sharp decline I have, since then, lived the best 11 years of my life. But I knew the cancer hadn't gone away. We were using some pretty effective tools to keep it at bay but down there somewhere the disease was lurking and waiting. Last year it seems that the cunning little bastard had found a way around my best defences and, although still small, it was going for gold, making an impressive near vertical acceleration on the chart which measures its presence. On the advice of the medics I ...

The good thing about going to Hospital outpatients is that you get a parking permit for the hospital carpark. It saves $2! Woohoo! Who would NOT have cancer when you can get deals like that? I got my $2 worth yesterday. I was there at 8:00 am bright eyed and bushy tailed, well maybe bushy is not the word. There's details about bowel preparation I will spare you. I changed into one of those hospital gowns that someone has spent an entire post graduate design degree on getting to look as unflattering and to fasten as puzzlingly as possible. Then, with my human clothes in a plastic bag, I went into the waiting room. A waiting room is a waiting room is a waiting room. They all have a look about them: neat rows of chairs bought from a catalogue; cheery posters on the walls advising you in 3 languages to get a mole map done; and magazines. Piles of magazines. I read the only two copies of Classic Car in the heap and then reflected that there were 33 more visits to go and only Women...

I had a CT scan today. I had to be up early to drink dye (two delicious cupfuls) and report to the hospital at 8:30. I was asked to change into one of those gowns that do up at the back, and which are branded Property of Otago District Health Board against the truly absurd possibility that someone will want to nick one. A shunt was put into my arm. I'm good at shunts. I've had a few of them lately so I was able to comment positively on the nurse's technique as she poked it in and flushed it with salty water. This one was for more dye, which was pumped in by a mechanical injector, just like the one they used in Dead Man Walking - made me feel quite the movie star. Then I was passed through a large circular machine which spoke to me in an elevator voice, telling me when to hold my breath and when to breathe out (I was going to write "expire" , but thought it in bad taste, even if it was witty and opened up a whole gamut of dark cancer type humour. See how gentle I...

I'm still catching up on Sunday. I went to church for the first time in ages: the 1662 service at 8:00 am suited me just fine even thought here was snow on the ground and the heaters in the church had not quite yet achieved the upper hand. In the afternoon I took part in a prayer service for a greatly respected friend, and afterward Clemency and I hosted those present to afternoon tea. Or at least Clemency hosted and I sat regally on the couch looking pale and interesting. There was a large open fire in our drawing room while the wind and rain grimaced angrily through the windows at the warmth inside. All of the 9 people present were intelligent, well read, accomplished and interested in each other. Some were part of an interdisciplinary group which gathers at the University of Otago to research the interface of spirituality, consciousness and science. There was good coffee and a rather delicious tea cake with ginger and raisins.I couldn't have designed a more congenial, sti...

Hello all, Catherine Wright here writing on behalf of one whom because of his current position, cannot make contact himself. After many weeks in a state of limbo, yesterday morning my father had the surgery which would remove his troublesome prostate and make sure we will have him round for a few years yet. My mother and I drove him to the hospital at around 9am where he was promptly fitted with an attractive gown and special leggings to prevent blood clots. All he was lacking was a pair of heels and he would have given Liza Minnelli a run for her money. At 10am he was given a pill to make him drowsy before he was given anaesthetic. He told us all that these sort of medications never work on his alert personality and was promptly snoring within five minutes. A little after 11 a team of very kind nurses wheeled him into theatre where he was nipped and tucked for about four and a half hours. During this time Mum and I had a quiet lunch at a lovely cafe by the beach then sat in the famil...

I'm ready to go. I've seen the surgeon and the anaesthetist. I've had my drink of fleet (DON"T ask. But let me assure you it works very well indeed). I've packed my bag - all the important things: * Bible * Cellphone charger * Ipod charger * PDA charger * Bits of gear to attach to the above * Pajamas, Dressing gown and slippers * Toothbrush and shaver and all that stuff Now the tricky part. What books to take? It's only 4 days or so and I'm going to be unconscious for one of them and queasy for the rest, so let's not go overboard. * A couple of New Scientists (thanks Alan) * Playing God (a book of poems by Kapiti Coast doctor and poet Glenn Colquhoun.) * Love Poems From God. Twelve Sacred Voices From East and West (Spiritual poems from a variety of religious traditions) * All Shall Be Well. .. (a novel by Tod Wodicka) Poems you can give as much time to or not as you please. Let them make you think or just appreciate the...

I've had two pieces of news in the past 24 hours. One is a date for my operation: Saturday June 21. The odds are that they'll whip out the prostate and, apart from the possibility of some embarrassing and, I hope, temporary side effects, I should be good to go for another couple of decades at least. The other news is that I am sick. I have a piece of paper, signed by an actual doctor, which tells me so. Of course I already knew this but now, it's official and I am on sick leave not study leave. I'm an invalid, not a scholar. I marked my new found decrepitude by getting over -well, almost - the hacking cough which I've had for almost 3 weeks and by going for a long vigorous walk and taking some photographs. It's odd how different I felt walking out of the doctor's office with my envelope in my hand. I was free not to sit with my tricky books. I was free to think about this illness, and what the rest of my life might bring, and how I might reshape my lifes...

Today I made a phone call I had been procrastinating about for days, the one to the travel agent. There's no question that it had to be made, but to pick up the phone and ask for her to cancel our tickets was a final and complete admission that no, after all this planning and all this anticipation we were not going after all. Another little step. Another little loss. I know about operations. I know what to expect: the kind people who will put me on one of those odd, movable beds, put a mask on my face and wake me 15 seconds later with a furnace burning in my belly and tubes sticking into my arms. I know about this and I'm apprehensive but not frightened. The real grief of illness is over an accumulation of small losses and some not so small: Travel of course; privacy; dignity;freedom of movement; physical fitness; the belief in the indestructibility of my body; My sense of infallibility. Some losses loom threateningly just over the horizon, too bewildering to contemplate in t...

Back in 2001 I had a burst appendix which required a week in hospital and some recuperation time. The experience was a far better learning for pastoral care than anything I was ever given in my theological college. I learned, for example that a 40 minute hospital chapel service was way too long, and that 20 or even 10 would have suited me far better. The best pastoral visit I received, also for example, was from my colleague David Crooke. David arrived at my bedside in his clerical blacks. He didn't ask me to talk - at that stage I was more or less incapable of it anyway - and he didn't give me any pre-packaged words of advice. He expressed his sympathy, held my hand, said a prayer and left, all within 5 minutes. Perfect. He didn't need to fix me. He didn't need to appear useful. He didn't have any of his own issues about illness or death to work through by ministering to me. He respected where I was and he was present, which was enough. And his lack of drama ...