What a month! Sixteen months after trying to reach Pittsburgh, when I had a seizure at the Airport and later found I had a brain tumor, I finally made it there!
It is hard to express with words how happy I was to see again all the friends I left when I lived there. The expression of happyness in everyone's face as they saw me is simply impossible to describe. All the prayers sent my way when I was diagnosed and every smile given to me when I arrived mean a lot to me and I will be eternally grateful for the friendships I cultivated in my 10 years there.
Getting in a plane and arriving at Pittsburgh was an enormous mental barrier, I have always asked myself if I would ever make it back and I was so happy to land there, the first mental barrier was gone.
Arriving at my former work place and watching my old peers smiles as I surprised them without advanced notice was priceless, it was hard to contain myself and not cry but I did, mental barrier number two gone.
Biking with my former cycling buddies from the Mount Lebanon Caffeine and Cycling Club was the last mental barrier I overcame at Pittsburgh. After all these months I would always find myself worrying if I would ever be able to keep up with the group and climb Mount Washington again. Mental barrier number three gone.
Yesterday I went to pick up my chemo drugs at the Public Pharmacy where the drugs are distributed and a system crash that would normally drive me nuts did not. I am now on a cycle where literally my drugs are released on the same day I have to start my chemo cycle. Without the system the pharmacy workers cannot confirm my drug prescription and therefore release my drugs. I sat there for 7 hours waiting for my Temodar do be released and started talking to other people that were like me waiting for their or their relatives' prescribed drugs to be released.
My first encounter was with a guy that was there to pick up his grand-mother's insulin. He was lucky and arrived early and left with his drugs in four hours.
As time passed I left to grab lunch since it was clear that I had enough time to do that. I came back and the system would simply not recover. As in an act of God I looked at one of the guys that worked there and decided to talk to him to see what was happening.
As I explained to him my situation and that of others, he calmed me down and shared that everyone in there was at an emergency situation but that nonetheless the drugs could not be released. I asked him what would happen if the system did not recover and he said that nothing could be done. I asked him if those in life or death situations would simply die and with the certainty of an angel he explained why he worked there he that no one would die.
He was a very young guy named Marcelo. He had a degree in publicity that had previously worked in IT. He shared that the Health Department IT system was the best in the country and it would come back fast. He also gifted me with his amazing story. He was diagnosed with a pancreatic condition that would shoot his amylase enzimes to deadly levels, a condition that killed his dad on the same day he was diagnosed. After several months of treatment his doctor asked him if he believed in God. He said that his faith was the only thing that carried him throughout the treatment and the doctor, who confessed being an atheist, shared that Marcelo's God must be a very good God. He was cured, something that he had never heard of before. He decided to dedicate his life to the public health system that had saved him and started to work dispensing drugs at the Public Pharmacy to help others in need. The most amazing thing he shared was that when he was cured he did not know what to do with his life. He was so ready to die that he felt disoriented when he realized that he just got his life back. I was overwhelmed with how he felt and how well he was using his life.
As I returned to my chair overwhelmed with such an amazing story a person behind me asked if it would take long for things to be back to normal. I shared that no one knew but that we should sit there and wait. I shared my story and after he consoled me with a brain tumor survival story I asked him what he was there for. His name was Daniel and he was there to pick up diapers for his 18 years-old daughter who had cerebral pausing. I was humbled by how blessed my life is and how lucky I was to meet these incredibly good people.
Daniel shared that at one point he was returning home and could simply not find consolation for the life he had. He started walking in the opposite direction to his house for hours and then decided to go back and take care of his daughter as best as he could. He shared with me the same line I've shared right after I was diagnosed - we do not choose many of the things that happen in our life but we always choose how we react to them. He shared that the cure for his mental barrier was to always look at the positive side of things with humor and optimism.
I have to confess that yesterday was not an easy day for me, probably the first time since I rebounded from my diagnostic, that I was not very positive. As if in anticipation for my first stomach sickness since I started on chemo - I stupidly did not take my anti-nausea mediaction with my chemo drugs as in my last cycle I did not in my last day and did not get sick - I was feeling a little down. After learning these incredible stories, as if God had created this day especially to pick me up, I am back to being my positive person.
There are essentially two ways of looking at the world. The first choice is to believe that God is always on your side and that whatever happens to you has a good reason to be. The second choice is to believe that the world is conspiring against you and that no matter how hard you work and how faithful you are you always or will eventually get dealt a bad card.
When I was working at my first full-time job I was feeling frustrated and my father as usual gave me a great book and the following story hand-written in it to help me understand my situation (I hope I did not butcher the story, this is what I recall):
Phidias, Greece's most famous sculptor, was hired to sculpt a statue of Zeus at the top of the Parthenon. After months working on it he was finishing the work by sculpting the back of the statue. Greece's king approached him and asked why he was investing so much time on the statue's back, in his eyes the work was done since no one could see the staue's back from the ground. Phidias then replied "The Gods can see it".
When I face a mental barrier my cure is to always believe that things are happening for a reason. It is hard to have Job's patience but any time I face adversity I try to think of Job. When we put things in the right perspective we can always pick ourselves from the ground, so pick yourself up when you are down and see the good side of your life's events. Things will always end well, if you are not well the end has not arrived.
