My cancer origin story.

The following is the timeline that I’ve settled on leading up to the cinematic moment I first heard the C-word. I say settled because of course, the mind considers every decision I’ve made back to birth that may have meant I brought this on myself. Truth is, I could have been born with it, maybe I ate one too many bags of gas station pepperoni pretzel Combos, or maybe someone cast a spell on me for juke-moving them on the 101. I don’t waste my energy anymore contemplating the why and I don’t have a conspiracy theory “chemtrails and government vapers” mind to help me pass the buck.**

September 2020

Portland, OR

Getting ready to go out on a solo hike before a day of indulging myself in writing and vegan thai food.

ER Trip #1

Yeah, it’s probably just killer onions and for SURE not cancer.

Driving home from a solo writing weekend in Portland my stomach started to cramp and didn’t stop for 2 full days. It felt like someone was doing a snakebite arm-twist on my guts. I was on the bathroom floor in a ball praying to poop or puke or something to happen to give me relief. On the third day, I was heading to California for work and the cramping came back, so I headed to the ER. They did a blood test and an ultrasound thinking I may have appendicitis. When everything came back a-okay, I was sent home and told I probably ate some contaminated red onion. It took a week, but the pain slowly faded away along with my self-proclaimed moniker of ‘woman with the iron gut’. Foods that never bothered me before now did. Some days all I wanted or could eat was HNC’s (honey-nut cheerios) or rice or other simple foods.

April 2021

Hood River, OR

A happy husband in dope biking gloves celebrating his big day of being a fun biker boy.

In Hood River, OR on our first (nearly) post-pandemic escape from our living room for a bike race with Evan when I started getting the cramping again after dinner our second night there - this time, a little more extreme as I couldn’t stop pooping. I wanted to throw up but that’s not what we Gorman’s do*** so I resisted. No relief came until nearly 5 AM that morning which is when the fever started. I had my Covid thermometer in my purse and at its peak the fever hit 102º. I remember basically saying my goodbyes to Evan that night in case I didn’t break it in the night. I hadn’t had a fever as an adult and was scared. We left that following morning for a long, painful 5-hour drive back to Medford with me in a ball in the passenger seat. I went right back to the ER but when I walked in the place was a zoo. Teenagers crying into their phone, police escorting a patient in a neck brace, the whole waiting area full. I turned around and waited it out, meaning I only ate HNC’s for a few days until the cramping went away. In retrospect, bad idea.

May 2021

Smith Rock in Bend, OR

Hours before getting sick I was climbing the epic Misery Ridge trail in the rain then made a silly Instagram story about my distain for craisins. (which I still stand by)

ER Trip #2.5

Learned I probably have cancer 10 minute before choking down this NG tube. Still the worst medical experience of my life.

Vacation part II, Bend, OR, a redemption from the shitshow in Hood River with another bike race for Evan, and big plans to run at Smith Rock, eat donuts, and lounge at our friends Becky and Jamie’s house. Day 1 of the bike race: check. Smith Rock run: check. Then that night after dinner, the cramping. This time, it came with fear. Something must be wrong. The cramping was acute, intensely painful with zero relief and now, vomiting. Shit. That was the longest night of my life, curled up in a ball on the couch and the bathroom floor scared, sweaty, and knowing that I needed to get some help so far away from home. Evan knew too. It was early when he just started packing bags and cancelling his race plans. I stayed in a ball while the literally life-savers Becky and Jamie (who is a physician) walked me through my symptoms and insisted I go to the ER. Another long drive home in a ball directly to the hospital. When I arrive, I sweat through my clothes in pain waiting to be called back. This time is a blur.

I remember the relief of laying down.

I remember the CT scan.

I remember the doctor coming into the room and telling me they found masses on my colon. That I was going into surgery. That it may be nothing but is very likely cancer.

I remember she left moments after saying cancer and I looked over at Evan.

I remember I felt nothing.

The feeling came later, much later, weeks later, 18 days to be exact from the time I had the 5 days in the hospital, the colectomy to remove the masses that left scars up and down my abdomen, the endless wait for pathology - panicking at every phone ding, the surgeon apologizing compassionately for my cancer when he walked in the room for my standard surgical follow-up thinking we already knew. It was that 18th day sitting outside Whole Foods in Eugene, OR after I’d just gotten my PET scan where my belly glowed with the disease that my brand spanking newly assigned oncologist called to tell me the gritty details of my diagnosis that the feelings came.

I remember totally falling apart.

I remember screaming, weeping, crying out “why?!”

I remember punching the steering wheel.

I remember being so angry. So afraid.

I remember telling Evan we have to go get food inside, otherwise, I won’t be able to move forward and we have to move forward.

I remember wandering the store then leaving the store with nothing.

We cried for two days straight. My husband, Evan, and I couldn’t make eye contact with each other without losing it. Brutal. It wasn’t until we met with the oncologist and heard him say that it will be a long road but this is curable, that if treatment plan A doesn’t work then we’ll go to B, C, D, and on and on that we felt our feet back on the ground. For the most part, they’ve been there ever since.

At the time of writing this, it’s been 72 days since that breaking news in the ER. 72 days. Since then I’ve had another surgery to put a port in my chest and have done two 21-day cycles of chemo. Tomorrow, the first post-treatment PET scan.

Every day feels like a proverbial repeat of that moment walking into Whole Foods. For a few moments each morning, I exist in a liminal space of quiet before I remember WHACK! I have cancer. Sometimes I want to stay in bed punching the steering wheel but I find a way to come to life. Like any 12-step program, it’s one day, one moment at a time. I make a deal with myself. Okay, just get out of bed. That’s all you need to do. Okay, now brush your teeth. Nice, good, alright, now meditation. Now do yoga. Now drink tea. And on and on and on and before long it’s bedtime and I’ve lived a day; some days more alive than others. It doesn’t feel ‘inspiring’ as so many say to me. It just feels like the only choice. It also helps to laugh about the absurdity of it, like using THIS song to giggle my way out of bed when I need it.

Onward.

Arbitrary footnotes:

**Should I be buying more bottled water, you know, just in case? I’m still trying to figure out what to do with all this pandemic pasta I bought.

***First of all, my OG name is Gorman (aka maiden name but I loath that as a term - can we get something better please?!, and like moms use the full first-middle-last name when they’re flustered, I call myself by my OG name when I have a get-your-shit-together-moment. Second, I have a working theory that everyone comes from either a pooping or a puking family. When you get sick, it’s one or the other and if you do the one not associated with your heritage you know there is a real problem.

Animals just know.