The scariest thing about having terminal cancer is never  knowing the exact path one's cancer might take. My oncologist, Dr. Darren Feldman, is a world class oncologist, working at a world class institution, Memorial Sloan Kettering Hospital.  He is completely trustworthy.  Dr. Feldman's knowledge is based on years and years of education, seeing hundreds if not thousands of patients, and a compilation of studies based on past cancer patients. Some patients are alive but many are dead, a fact that  is rather disquieting in itself. He is giving me his best estimate. I fully appreciate the limitations of my doctors and their inability to provide me with a medical certainty.  If we were talking about anything other than my life, I would smile and shrug it off. But we aren't, it is my life.  The fact that we are dealing with my very existence demands certainy, it insists on exact, precise, medical certainty.

Not that I want to know the exact date I am going to die, although if I did I could make sure my apartment was spotless, not a dish in the sink, etc.,  and I could say my proper good-byes and make sure that all of my affairs were in order.

The thought that my days are numbered always rattles around in my head, it is impossible to shake off completely. Sometimes it is deeper in the recesses of my mind, other times it slips in the forefront. Often I will be walking down Broadway in upper Manhattan and see a parent with an infant and it hits me- by the time that infant is in kindergarten, I will be dead. It is a thought that I can never completely evade.  The reminder is constant since Manhattan is filled with young families.

February 8th marks the 2nd anniversary of my diagnosis and my anxiety level is much higher.  The changes of the seasons use to be loved and welcomed, now they are but a reminder that another three months have slipped away.

I lost a friend last September to cancer, she too had stage 4 cancer and was deemed terminal.  The really scary thing is how quickly she went down hill. A year before she died, she was skiing in Vermont.  In the spring she was sailing in Bermuda and off the coast of Italy.  Six months later she was dead. To see her amazingly quick demise at times shakes me to the core and I often wonder when it will be my time to see a more serious decline in my health. I will be writing a separate detailed posting on Nyla, dedicating the posting to her within the next 60 days.

In my last post I mentioned that this post was going to be short .  Time has been spent adding to the "Resource Guide".  There are additional hospitals, a list of Clinical Trials, as well as links to The Cancer Center Resource Guide.  Additional links on both Nutrition and Alternative Medicine will follow in the coming weeks.