to a friend i haven't met yet

A couple of days ago, a friend told me that her sister was just diagnosed with lung cancer, and that she's going in for a lobectomy the end of August, the same surgery I had about a month ago.

I don't know this woman. I know nothing about her except that we both have the same type of cancer, us and tens of thousands of other people. Still, I feel a connection with her because of our shared... um, let's call it a challenge because anything else sounds fatalistic and self-pitying.

Maybe it's like the connection made by men (okay, women too) who go to war. I know a few Viet Nam vets and they are brothers because of shared experience. They speak the same language. They know things about each other because of where they have been and what they have been through. Their experience changed them, and no one else gets it, unless they've been in Nam.

Cancer is like that, like finding yourself in the middle of a war that you never signed up to fight (hell, you never even got a chance to dodge the draft). There is this bond among cancer survivors. We know stuff that no one else knows unless they've faced cancer. So, this woman is where I was six months ago, newly diagnosed and facing surgery, and in my head I'm talking to her like she's someone I've known all my life. Carrie isn't her name, but let's say it is.

Carrie, you lucked out getting Dr. Ken Evans as a surgeon. He's a wizard with the scalpel and you'll be so pleased when you discover that your incision doesn't have any staples, or even stitches, just a taped-on dressing that may be abandoned after just a couple of days because it heals so quickly. It heals smoothly, without the bumps and puckers that are typical of stitched and stapled incisions.

Carrie, I'd like to tell you about mistakes I made so you can avoid them. You'll probably make a few of your own, but at least I can give you a heads-up on a few that you don't need to subject yourself to:

1. Do not log on to YouTube and watch the videos of lobectomies. They are graphic, gory and absolutely terrifying. They are meant for medical students, not sensitive human beings like you and I. No one needs to see, in full colour, what the inside of their lung looks like.

2. Do not try to be a hero by scrimping on your pain medication. Narcotics are your friend, and there is no danger of addiction when you're taking them for legitimate pain. Further, by not taking them, you risk slowing down your recovery.

3. On the subject of narcotics, be sure to ask for medication to counteract the constipation they will cause. Don't wait until it's a problem because, if you do, then... well, it's a problem. Drink lots of water and don't eat the cheddar cheese you'll find on your lunch tray every day.

4. You'll wake up to find a little clip on your finger (it measures the oxygen saturation in your blood). Do not remove it. If you do, your computer monitor will immediately begin sounding all kinds of alarms and this will just annoy your neighbour patients and the nurse who must rush over to see if you've died.

5. Your visitors may try to make you feel better by telling you a funny story or a joke. They mean well, of course, but this is a mean thing to do to you. Laughing hurts. Tell them to talk only about serious topics, maybe the price of gas or forest fires in the Interior.

6. Your visitors may get bored so, to help them pass the time in a more interesting way, send them out to get coffee for you at Starbucks and one of those delicious sandwiches at the little shop across the street. There's also a Subway at the corner if you're really hungry. They'll appreciate the Vancouver scenery and you'll get a break from hospital food.

7. Be sure to bring your own pyjamas and slippers. You just can't say enough about how bad hospital gowns are for one's morale.

Carrie, that's the really important stuff you need to know to get through this as comfortably as possible. They say a lobectomy is a major surgery, right up there with open-heart, but in fact you'll not find it that hard. Why? Because you'll be so stoned you won't know and won't care what you've been through.

You'll go home with prescriptions for pain medication, and at least for the first week, you'll want to take them regularly. This is fine, but you'll forget what you came into the kitchen for, you'll forget the first chapter of the book you're reading by the time you get to the second chapter, and you'll forget just about everything that anyone's said to you. Make sure you explain to your friends and family that you're not really suddenly stupid, you're just under the influence of some high-powered drugs.

After you stop taking the pain medication, you'll forget that you're recovering from surgery, and you'll absent-mindedly reach for something you dropped on the floor or stretch to get something from a top shelf in a cupboard... and then you'll scream in pain. After a few times of doing this to yourself, you'll pay more attention.

Plan to sleep either in a recliner chair or propped up with lots of pillows in bed. At first, lying flat in bed is not only painful but it's damned near impossible to get back up. Under no circumstances should you get in the bath tub; you risk being stuck there for a couple of weeks at least.

You will likely develop an annoying little cough. They never mentioned this in the hospital, but I've since learned that it's quite normal and it does go away. This little cough isn't painful, but sneezing certainly is, much like it would be if you had broken ribs. It's an excellent excuse to avoid all dusting and vacuuming.
 
For me, the hardest part is the slowness of the recovery. Three weeks would have been a piece of cake, but supposedly it will be three months until I'm back to some semblance of normal. The best part is looking back and realizing that, every day, I'm getting better. And you will too.