Healthy Living by Willow Creek Springs
A podcast about practices to promote healthy lives featuring experts, businesses, and clients: we gather to share our stories about success, failure, exploration, and so much more. Our subscription episodes feature some personal and vulnerable, real-life stories that are sensitive to some of the general public.
Healthy Living by Willow Creek Springs
Gratitude in the Darkest Hours: A Survivor's Perspective
This episode is only available to subscribers.
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Welcome to Subscriber-Only Edition
Speaker 1Well, hello and welcome back to the Healthy Living Podcast. I'm your host, joe Grumbine, and today we've returned to a special subscriber-only edition, and I apologize. It's been a while since I've done one of these and I've been thinking about it a lot as to how to move forward with these. How to move forward with these, because up until this point I've really been sort of going deep into my cancer journey and I realized that, you know, it's kind of hard to listen to. It's rough, it's ugly, it shows me a really weak state and after a while I don't know if anybody wants to listen to that. And so I thought about it. I says you know, I've got people supporting the show and you know I appreciate that a lot. It actually allows me to produce the show without an additional expense and I'm able to bring all these great guests we've been doing to light and I think we're really building a great community. I think it's done a lot of good. I mean, it has helped me.
Post-Chemo Struggles Begin
Speaker 1But, um, you know, to listen to somebody going through misery over and over again doesn't sound like something that I would want to come back for more and more and more. And I thought about it. It's like what can I offer that can make this valuable? And you know, in the past I've done probably 15 to 30 minute episodes and kind of laid out my journey and hey, there's some great episodes and you're able to go back and listen to those. You'll get to see under the hood of what really happened. And I'm going to sort of finish that thought today. I think who knows, I mean you know this is an ongoing journey. I think who knows? I mean you know this is an ongoing journey. But I think I'm going to start sharing tidbits of truths that I'm experiencing. And the reality is I've accomplished a lot in my life and I've failed a lot in my life and I think the value of these subscriber episodes is going to be to be very clear and honest about those things, both good and bad. And I know a lot of times in my life my candor has gotten me lost. Friends, gotten people upset at me, and you know I've been told how I should do this more than that, and you know it. Friends, gotten people upset at me, and you know I've been told how I should do this more than that, and you know it is what it is. I'm always going to do my thing and I will, you know, succeed or fail. Based on that. I own my own life. I take full responsibility for all my actions. And here we are, I'm going to share that with you. Responsibility for all my actions. And here we are, I'm going to share that with you. Um, right now I'm really kind of going through the worst I've gone through in a while. Since the beginning of this journey.
Speaker 1I completed six rounds of chemo with three drugs uh, dosataxel, cisplatin and five-thirty urac and it's a hard cocktail. The doctor's actually been very impressed that I survived it so well. But it seems that there's an accumulative effect with this and I have a really bad habit of pushing myself when I feel good, because who wouldn't? I want to get out there and do stuff. I don't want to feel hobbled. But just like the doctor watches my blood, I have to watch things like my weight and the state of my mouth and my ability to eat, my nausea, that sort of thing, and really look at what is providing energy and allowing me to do certain things and taking into consideration my immune system and where it's likely at. And this Friday I got my last, got the fluoruracil pump out, so I finished that Then they give me the last of the cisplatin and and I go home I'm feeling pretty good.
Managing Treatment Side Effects
Speaker 1Saturday I had some company over and did a lot. Really, it seemed like my mouth was doing all right and the nausea was mild and I actually, you know, ate some things. Maybe I shouldn't have, because I was able to, and I took my enzyme and I'm fine with it. But it was sort of a sign that said well, I'm doing well. And then Sunday come along and I had my granddaughter came out, I spent time with her and we had a volunteer come out and I think I'll be talking more about the gardens of hope and willow creek springs with this as well, because I really don't spend nearly enough time on that and now that we're having a lot more guests, I don't have as much one-on-one time with you guys, and I think we'll we'll slide that over here to the subscriber side more than more than everything.
Speaker 1Um, anyways, come monday I woke up and I was destroyed. Where nasha was horrible. I really couldn't even consider eating anything. I ended up puking water and then coffee and um, just, I just felt lousy and so I rested most of the day, and for me that's hard. I mean, I'm not listening to the radio, I'm not watching TV, I'm getting up just enough to do a little bit of reading or summon the energy to do an interview or something like that, but then rest for hours after that and even a phone call. And even a phone call. It seemed to be able to rise to the occasion. But then when it's done, I just fall into a spiral.
Finding Gratitude During Suffering
Speaker 1So today I woke up, I slept and I went to bed probably 8.30, got out of bed probably after 6, so I mean I'm sleeping hours and hours. I'm sleeping probably half the day Trying to drink as much water as I can, because that cisplatin can really go after your kidneys and I'm trying to keep that from happening. I'm trying to switch my mouth all I can with the saline solution because my mouth has gotten really raw from the effects of that. And today things have been a little better. I was able to get down a little bit of food and some coffee with the medical food in it and haven't puked yet today. So I'm trying to manage it. Kind of an interesting thing and kind of an interesting thing.
Speaker 1Donna Corby, who passed away a few years ago, had given me some of her last harvest that she did of cannabis, and you know, in the past that would have disappeared so quickly because I, you know, smoked a lot, but I lost track of it, I forgot. I was even there and it was wrapped up in a vacuum seal bag and I opened it a few months ago, you know, when I was starting going through the chemo treatment, and I was surprised at how fresh and flavorful and potent it still was. And then just yesterday I pulled out another piece of it and you know it's still in that bag, but not sealed anymore, but wrapped up, trying to keep it as protected as I can. And it's really fresh. I can't help but think that maybe somehow Donna's out there, wherever she is, and she's kind of like putting her head on mine and saying it's okay, joe, here, we'll keep this nice for you.
Future Plans for Subscriber Episodes
Speaker 1And I'm really grateful and I think gratitude is a big part of what makes things work. Even when you're suffering, even when things aren't good, even when it seems like everything's terrible, find something to be grateful for. You know, I think that's where God really shines in your life is when you are grateful. Shines in your life is when you're when you are grateful and um, so, anyways, I think we'll be doing little little episodes like this, maybe 5 to 15 minutes, and I'll share some thoughts and I'll try to articulate a little better than I am today, a little bit wandering, but I'm doing my best and at least it's important to me to provide some kind of good content for those of you who have taken the care and the expense to subscribe to this podcast. So thank you very much and I will get back to it and continue my work.
