For use: Tuesday, April 16, 2001

mfinley.com: "The Shoe at the Top of the Stairs"

by Michael Finley

Last week I let word slip I was going in for my 6-month MRI scan of my head, and some have asked about the results.

I have been exceptionally lucky over the past couple of years. Every time I have gone in, the scan has come out negative -- no growth of the meningioma perched just inside my left ear.

I have done seven scans in all, and the last few had gotten to feel routine. With all the positive feedback I was starting to feel I was just too good to have an actively growing tumor. Like I had figured out the secret of how not to let tumors get the best of you, which turned out to be such a simple thing, an attitude really. Too bad those other people in the waiting room weren't so deft.

In reality, I was very aware of tempting fate, and half worried my smugness would come back and bite me. This last time, I had a gnawing sense that something might finally be wrong, and I was not alone. Rachel, who usually calls my doctor as soon as the films are dry, put off calling this time. She too had the feeling that we were sliding too casually into the cannon every six months. One of these days, perhaps this week, the cannon -- the scanner is like  a piece of heavy artillery -- would have something to say.

I am pleased to tell you that the scan was another negative. No tumor growth of any kind. Which meant none in two years, which suggests that the tumor is just a bit of clutter now, a sneaker on a staircase, unable to do much harm unless I trip over it.

It was not always thus. In its heyday, in January 1999, that sneaker had enough juice crackling through it to snap a major vein in my head and cause me to have a stroke. I remember the gurgling sounds, and the pain, and thinking I was going to die in the next five minutes. And the shock the next week of finding out a tumor was in there, like a snapping turtle lowered into a crib.

Besides feeling woozy and doomed for the next three months, I had problems with erratic memory, headaches, and floating anxiety. Because my stepfather died of a malignant brain tumor that doctors didn’t properly diagnose until it was too late, I worried that my doctors were blowing my diagnosis, too, and that the tumor that had already munched through some perfectly good blood vessels would eventually sink its teeth into my life.

I didn’t know I was going to die. Mostly I tried getting on with my life. But at least 100 times a day, for a shimmering moment I pictured the shoe getting ready to walk.

Neither did I want to die. But I felt the shadow of Dick's death before me, how it drained family resources, broke the hearts of grown-ups and sent a chill of fear and confusion into the young that they never got over. I saw myself doing that to my family, and it was a heavy burden to bear.

I created a 1-100 Worry Index, which was like a weather metric. It allowed me to tell people how much I wanted them to worry about me on a given day. In the first two months I was way up there in the 60s. Since then it has slowly deflated to 15. Only Superman and Green Lantern are lower than 15.

Lessons learned? I learned how needy and how continuously anxious I can be, despite a generally cheerful demeanor. I tried to slip my tumor into everyone's pocket when they weren't looking, with a sad story or a joke -- anything to get it out of my head and into theirs.

I learned not to do that with my family. They were in this with me up to their ears. If I was soggy newspaper with my friends, I managed to be pretty strong with my wife and kids.

And I reminded myself how I love to blab (write). When you think your brain is about to be devoured is a great time to set your thoughts down. There's a sense in which people have to listen to you, even if you're yanking their chain. We ignore people in trouble if we can, but it's hard to ignore them when they are standing in rush hour traffic, handing out flyers. Even strangers will slow down as they pass, and lower their windows to gawk.

Here's a vital bit of logic I ignored: How could I take two years to write a book about a three month death watch? On some level, I must have known I had time to do twelve drafts.

Anyway, I am more than fine. I am embarrassed to be well, but, otherwise, super.

Thanks everyone. Knock wood, I'll never write about this again.

 Copyright (c) 2001 by Michael Finley

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