Immersed in a Bleak History

Saturday - December 8, 2012

I have regained my reading focus in the last few days.  Is a case of "chemo brain" waning?  Am I feeling more settled and therefore more focused?  Whatever the impetus, I have rediscovered an activity that had been lost to me these last many months.  "New Yorker"  articles kept me stimulated in this interval but I really was only focused enough to dip into books briefly, to cull out a nugget before I found my mind drifting.  Now I have torn through two novels in the last few days and have completely lost myself in "The Emperor of All Maladies" today.  No more bouncing between the index and the text, no more sifting out some paragraphs before finding diversion elsewhere; I found that I could finally read linearly, page following page, absorbing information as the author intended.  This amazing book's message is even more pointed when the text is read properly:  cancer treatment remains in a nascent stage.  Causation and efficacy of treatment options continue to be mysteries.  So many unknowns, so much professional disagreement, balanced against the tremendous commitment and passion among researchers and clinicians.  Oncology has come leaps and bounds over the course of my lifetime but clearly it is a field that is still at the threshold of understanding and progress. I am greatly relieved to be facing lymphoma now rather than prior to 1997 when Rituxan's game-changing attributes were approved for NHL but still - I have to wonder - what advances will provide the next breakthrough in this still-evolving, still-fresh "war" over the next decade?