Czytaj książkę: «Days Like These: A life cut short by cancer, a love that touched the world»
For Cody Israel and Jakob Judah. It was all for you.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Foreword: A note from Rachel Anderson
1. Let me bring you up to speed
2. Going the distance
3. One of the lucky people
4. Wonderful inconvenience
5. Calling all angels
6. Dead man walking
7. How the light gets in
Epilogue
Picture Section
Thank you
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Copyright
About the Publishers
Foreword
A note from Rachel Anderson
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in
LEONARD COHEN, ‘ANTHEM’
My name is Rachel Anderson and I am Kristian Anderson’s wife. I will not say ‘was’, even though Kristian left this life on 2 January 2012.
Kristian was my husband, the father of our two boys Cody and Jakob, a television editor, musician, man of faith. Through the last two years of his life Kristian did battle with cancer in his bowel and liver. His way of keeping his friends and family updated with what was happening with his cancer battle and in our world was through his blog, How the Light Gets In (http://howthelightgetsin.net). In choosing the name, Kristian was inspired by Leonard Cohen’s lyrics; he said that the words seemed like a good fit for him at that time in his life.
As it turned out, Kristian’s blog was seen by people far beyond the immediate circle of those who loved him. More than a quarter of a million people paid a visit from all around the globe: he had many visitors from Australia, the United States and New Zealand as well as more than 150 other countries. In the week he died, there were over 450,000 hits on the blog.
Through his last months here, Kristian worked on writing a book that he could leave behind for Cody, Jakob and me, drawing on words and photos from his blog. Now that he is gone, it seemed that one way we could honour his memory was to make sure this book came to be.
So here it is. I hope that it will be a blessing to the many who loved and supported Kristian through the time he was with us.
Rachel Anderson
February 2012
1
Let me bring you up to speed
ERASE AND REWIND
Let me bring you up to speed.
I have cancer.
In the bowel and liver.
I am 34 years old.
I have a beautiful wife and two boys under three years of age.
NO NEWS IS GOOD NEWS?
Friday 2 October
After travelling to the USA for a friend’s wedding during the last week of September 2009, I arrived back in Sydney with the usual jetlag associated with a 13-hour flight. I didn’t think much of it and continued on with my work schedule.
Went in to work to tidy up the edit suite. Did a little bit of file archiving. Shut the suite down at the mains, as I was about to start an eight-week contract as one of the editors on Come Dine With Me Australia at another editing facility at Fox Studios.
Saturday 3 October
Headed out to do some demo recordings with a young Newcastle band at The Grove Studios. Tracking was basic but successful and we got what we wanted.
‘YOU GO SEE THE DOCTOR, DAD’
Those were the words of my three-year-old son, Cody. He had asked me if I was OK, as he often does, and I had replied that I had a sore tummy.
Monday 5 October
Public holiday. Woke up at 12 a.m. with what I thought was a nasty stitch in my side. You know, the kind you get when you go out running. Quite a bit of discomfort but just tried to ignore it. No relief by 5 p.m. so off to the doctor’s surgery I go, with a stern but loving sendoff from Rachel and Cody. Went to Warringah Mall Medical Centre and for the first time in 10 years got a doctor who seemed genuinely interested in treating me. Turns out he is taking an online songwriting course at Berklee College of Music in Boston and is a bit of a music/audio nut. We got along great. Doc says I may have deep vein thrombosis due to recent air travel, but since I mentioned I have also been getting a little blood in my bowel movements he refers me to emergency and another specialist.
6 p.m.: I am admitted to Manly Hospital, scans are ordered and by 11 p.m. it is determined I have a blood clot on my lungs. I am given blood-thinning medication immediately and ordered to stay overnight.
D-DAY (DIAGNOSIS DAY)
From here on out everything in our lives has been separated by this day … before diagnosis/after diagnosis. This is a marker we can’t ignore, much as we would like to.
Tuesday 6 October
After a night of almost no sleep (emergency ward, lights on all night) I chat with the nurses who advise me my treatment will be simple, just a daily injection of Warfarin (blood thinner) and a daily blood sample. Six months’ worth should do it. Resign myself to the fact that I will have to do it and decide to discharge myself, against doctor’s wishes.
Q: Why would I discharge myself if the doc said not to?
A: I work for myself and was already missing the first day of an eight-week contract. Not a good look for a new client, even though they were aware of the situation and very understanding.
Tried to check out but then nearly passed out, so was ordered to stay.
Because I tried to leave they gave my room to another patient and now I’m sitting in the corridor. Rachel arrives about an hour later with Jakob in tow; Cody is at kindergarten.
The specialist asks to speak with us. Says there’s been a mistake. They use voice recognition software to get the reports done and the software thought it heard ‘blood clot present’ when in actual fact the doctor said ‘no blood clot present’. Sorry about that, but while you’re here, we noticed something unusual at the bottom of the lung scan, on your liver. There are lesions there that concern us and we’d like to do another scan. We’re pretty sure that with the symptoms you’re presenting you have cancer. But we need to check it to be sure.
You know that feeling you got in your stomach when you were young and you got caught doing something naughty, that feeling of impending doom? Yeah, that one. I got it right about here. Rach and I just sit there while Jakob gets into all the things a one-year-old kid loves to get into. So glad he’s oblivious.
If you’ve spent time in hospital you know it involves a lot of waiting around. By the time we get all this info it’s time to get Cody from kindy, so Rach heads out to pick him up. As it turns out, today is the day Rachel’s parents arrive from Auckland. They’re here to compete in the cycling in the Masters Games (which aren’t for a few days yet) so Rach drops Cody off with Nanna and Poppa, and Cody thinks he’s in heaven.
Sitting by yourself in a little hospital waiting room is not fun when there are less serious items on the table, let alone the possibility of cancer. It’s not a good place for me to be by myself and in the eerie soundscape of the ER I begin to pray. I have no eloquent words to use. No lofty prayers to the Almighty. Just two words:
God, help.
They’re ready for me to go in for the next scan so I drink a litre of oral contrast and lie down while they prep the scanner. The phone rings, it’s Rachel’s ringtone (Take On Me by a-ha; I wanted to use I Touch Myself by the Divinyls but she said she would never call me again if I did) and I lose it. I can’t help but be frightened and on the other end of that phone call is my wife. The thought of leaving her and the boys is too much. Trying to keep still for the scan but my body is heaving from the sobs. Finally get it together long enough for the scanner to do its thing and then get wheeled back to my room.
Rachel arrives. More sobbing. Both of us. The sound echoing off the tiny room with high ceilings. Jude, the Scottish doctor, comes in to take my cannula out so I can go home. She knows what’s going on, I can tell by the look in her eyes and by the way she gently touches my arm. Specialists in another room down the hall are gathered around my scans. Various noddings and so on. Doc comes in and says it’s cancer. No primary in the liver, so they’re guessing that one is in the bowel. Go home, rest up, see the surgeon in a few days.
Rachel drives her car home and I get in to mine. Halfway home I lose it again and the road becomes blurry. No subtle prayers, no dignified utterances, no sacred recitals … just weeping … shouting.
God, help.
IN SICKNESS AND IN HEALTH
Rachel and I can’t look at each other without bursting into tears. Trying to keep it together in front of the boys is difficult. We don’t want them to detect any upset because there’s no way we can make them understand the gravity of what’s happening. We went to sleep crying and woke up the same way. I felt Rachel put her arms around me during the night, then I felt her body shaking from the tears.
It’s just not real. This is not our life.
JUST RELAX
I can’t remember the date but we ended up back at the surgeon’s office. He was very matter-of-fact, which I prefer, and told us what we were dealing with: cancer. He orders a colonoscopy and gives me some PicoPrep, which is basically a really fast way to empty my bowel before he jams a camera up my ass and takes a look around.
Any male who is happily heterosexual will understand the cringe factor attached to this procedure. Needless to say I am not looking forward to it.
OH DIGNITY, WHERE ART THOU?
Friday 9 October
Back at Manly Hospital for the dignity-destroying colonoscopy.
9 a.m.: All ready to go, something injected into my arm, oxygen mask on … feeling sleepy.
Close eyes.
Open eyes.
Ask when they’re going to get it over with. Nurse says it’s now 10:30 a.m. and the ‘procedure’ has been completed successfully.
For all I know I was kidnapped by aliens and probed for an hour and a half before being delivered back to the very same position I was in before the kidnapping. I’m not sore at all so I guess they must have been gentle. Anyway, better to not dwell on that one. Anaesthetic wears off and Rach drives me home. Grateful the hospital is only 10 minutes drive, via Manly beach. At least I have nice scenery while I contemplate my ‘probing’.
EVEN THOUGH I WALK THROUGH THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH
We’re back in the surgeon’s office.
Yep, it’s bowel cancer. It’s about 45 cm up my bowel and is about 2 cm in size, wrapped around 75 per cent of the colon. Judging by the size and usual growth times of these sorts of things, it’s been there for about 18 months. This explains why it has been hard to get bowel movements happening of late. It has also spread to the liver, but we knew that.
Wonderful.
I am referred to an oncologist and we go home. Strangely enough, feeling all right.
Even though I walk
through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me
PSALM 23: 4
I now know what it means to walk through the valley of the shadow of death. But the thing about a shadow is that it is vaporised by light.
1 John 1: 5 says:
This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.
