If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you...
Rudyard's Kippling's If

For those of you who know the entire poem; the poem epitomizes how I try to live my life. For those who are not familiar with it- Google it, is it a wonderful poem.

Whether you are diagnosed with stage 1 breast cancer, (a cancer that is reasonably treatable), or stage 4 pancreatic cancer (one that is a death sentence), it is very important to make peace with your disease- your diagnosis, your prognosis. This can be especially difficult if you are terminal. The depression, the anxiety, the sense of helplessness can at times be overwhelming and nobody understands this better than I.

I believe it is important to focus on what you have- not what you don't have or are about to lose, no matter how precious it may be, even life itself. Good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to good people. There is often no rhyme nor reason to what happens to us. Call it fate, blind luck or lack thereof.
It is important to be appreciative for what you have, not be unappreciative for what you don't have. Some people wake up, cross the street, get hit by a bus and are killed. They are not afforded the luxury of making peace with those that they love and care for the most.

Those diagnosed with cancer are given that chance, the time to spend time with loved ones. If you are fortunate enough to weather the cancer and beat it, great! Rejoice and continue with your life. For those with a less certain future, those still going through treatment or those who are terminal with mere months or years to live, embrace that time to spend with your loved ones. Thank them for their friendship, their love and, where necessary make peace with those whom one has offended- my personal list is long. If you are fortunate enough to survive the cancer, the renewed friendships, the mended fences will make you a better and richer person. 

By no means am I remotely happy with my diagnosis, my prognosis. If whining, complaining, or moaning would make my cancer disappear I would be the biggest whiner, the biggest complainer that ever lived. But it won't so I don't.

There are days I am exceedingly anxious and, on occasion, depressed. On those days I generally "disappear", not wanting to bother friends or family with my problems. I always try to remember that my best friends have their own children, wives, husbands, families and their own problems- they really don't want to hear about mine. Many of my close friends are amazed by my internal fortitude. I cannot imagine living my life any other way. No matter how deep or broad your support network, it is critical to get professional counseling. Be it a priest, a rabbi, a psychologist or a psychiatrist- you need someone who can be objective, someone emotionally "removed". I will address this further in a future posting.

In the end I want to be remembered for how I lived, not how I died. When one is forced to look into the abyss and there is nothing, that is when a person's true mettle is tested. I want to be remembered as one who understood the fight, took it on, did the best I could and never flinched in the face of adversity.

To say I led a blessed life is an understatement. I had two loving, caring and supportive parents. Parents who were always there when it mattered. I was given the best education that money could buy and my brain could absorb. I also worked for two of the largest and most successful software companies in the world. I earned more than my fair share of money. When I look at my life in it's totality, I have nothing to complain about. Although I did not go the traditional route, get married, have babies and raise a family, my life has been very full and I am amazingly grateful. I have no regrets, no recriminations.

At the end of the day, and at the end of our lives it is the friendships we have built that sustain us to the end. It is not the money, the house, nor all of the other "toys" we may have amassed. In that regard I am amazingly fortunate, many of my best friends, the ones I care for most date back more than 20 years, and, in some cases, more than 30 years. 

I am truly blessed and amazingly fortunate despite my disease.