When Surgery is Good News

Hey readers,

So we're going to be going with a relatively short post this day. I suppose it's a good thing, not having that much to report and update you on. Mostly it'll be focused on news with my ankle.

After getting an MRI and some x-rays, I finally managed to get in to see my new ankle specialist. I went through the whole routine of filling out paperwork and running out of room where it says "List all surgeries with approximate dates" and having various nurses and doctors saying "Wow, aren't you a bit young for all this?" and "I'm sorry you had to go through all that." It's funny to see trained medical professionals act with the same stunned uncertainty that I see when "normal" people find out about my medical past and can't figure out how to express their pity and/or sympathy properly. But I did like the doctor, he listened to my opinions (I can't work with doctors that assume I know nothing and won't factor in my suggestions or treat me like an ignorant child), showed me what he saw in the MRIs and x-rays, and freely admitted that this was an extreme case and, rather than go forward assuming he knew best, wanted to get the opinions of some other doctors to see what they thought. I always like that, because I've had more than my fair share of arrogant doctors who think they know best and then turn out to be totally wrong.

The bone spurs are visible just to
the left of the screws

There is some separation of the bones that
is usually associated with older people

Now let's get into the specifics about the ankle. The x-rays and MRIs showed that there are some bone spurs on the inside portion of my left ankle, no real news there. However, he also spotted a stress fracture on the medial malleolus (lower tip of the tibia), which is right above where most of the pain has been located. It might be possible that at least some of the pain comes from this stress fracture. These are all pretty sedate problems for me, things can will either heal on their own or require basic surgery (which I'll discuss shortly) to fix.

The black areas surrounded by white
are where the AVN is most noticeable
(A dove-shaped area above and a
bridge-shaped area directly below that)

However, the MRIs showed a much more serious potential problem in the future. Back in 2010 I had ankle allografts on both ankles (basically removing part of my ankle and replacing it with donor bone) that helped with the damaged portions of my bones caused by AVN (a degenerative bone disease I got as a result of my cancer treatment's treatment, my not so little souvenir I picked up when I had to survive the cure). These donor bones were healthy and over the last few years they've looked very good on x-ray, everyone's been impressed by them. But looking at the MRIs of the ankle, the specialist saw that the AVN was now starting to affect the fresh, healthy bone. The AVN is very pronounced in the lower "knob" of the tibia and also in part of the talus (the part that had been replaced five years ago). Although it probably isn't causing my pain now, since AVN usually only hurts when it reaches the surface of the bone, which it hasn't done yet in the aforementioned areas, it will require additional surgery at some point. It could be years or decades from now, or it could be months, it's hard to say. Basically it'll happen when the pain comes back because of the AVN or if the structure collapses like it did back in 2009, which is what prompted the surgery in the first place.


Fortunately, the AVN is not an immediate problem, but it is something to keep an eye on. The more immediately problem (bone spurs) are a lot easier to fix. My doctor would prefer to be on the cautious side and err toward a minimalistic approach to healing, which I can totally get behind. The plan is to do arthroscopic surgery, which uses a small camera and instruments to see and clean out the damaged areas of the ankle, and then see if that helps sideline the pain for a little bit. Compared to the huge joint replacement surgeries I'm so familiar with, this is far less intrusive and debilitating. After the surgery, the specialist wants to see me every 6-12 months to get images of my ankle so we can check on its progress and catch any further damage early on, before it has a chance to morph into something major. Until the surgery, I've been given orthotics and a brace to help take some of the weight off of my ankle and alleviate the pain as much as possible. And I'll be back to using my cane to take weight off of my ankle. (The doctor felt bad for me, since I would "stick" (terrible pun) out, but told me I could use it to whack people. I think that's the moment I realized how much I liked this guy. Beating people with canes always makes me think of the man who tried to assassinate Andrew Jackson and the 67-year-old president wailed on the guy with his cane). All in all, it feels like this is something that can be taken care of easily and I'll be able to move past it with relative ease. I don't have a date yet for the surgery, but I'm supposed to get a call from the doctor's surgery scheduler to get that sorted out.

Until then, I'm going to keep chugging along and staying productive.
Ciao

Coming soon:
Keep an eye out for the next blog post, which will throw some hard truths and harsh spotlights on an issue that underlies everything in my life, and in the lives of millions and millions of other cancer patients and survivors.

PS: I don't think this was nearly as short as I thought it would be. Sorry for accidentally lying to you.

Another Milestone Down, Another Surgery Up

G'day errybody!

It has been an extremely hectic month, to say the least. I've been busy trying to sort out all the stuff from the last post and then some! Mostly I've been focused on the memoir and my physical health, although I have also started back up school. I've been able to get enough strength around my knee at physical therapy to avoid knee replacement surgery (yay). However, as I mentioned before, I do have a couple bone spurs in my ankles (boo). I'm going to have an appointment with an ankle specialist (my old one moved to Seattle shortly after I had the double ankle allograft) in a couple weeks to see what the best option is, but I'll likely have surgery to get the bone spurs removed. It's not as bad as it sounds actually. It's relatively minor, so much so that I could probably just do myself by this point. I might as well have the surgeon cut me open, point me in the right direction, and I'll chip the spurs away myself. Otherwise, my health has been rather quiet and uneventful. And you know what? I'll take uneventful with little change, it sure as hell beats the alternative that seems so dreadfully
common with me.

This is kinda how surviving feels

Onto writing news. I have finished the third draft of my memoir (yay)! It's kind of intimidating that I'm getting so close to having my book published. However, I have been getting some very positive feedback from a couple college professors that read the manuscript. I've been reassured that my book is an important part of helping to get awareness up about the many issues that face a cancer survivor. Both acute and chronic, from mental to physical to emotional, there are a great many pitfalls that await those freshly gifted with remission when there doesn't need to be. Lack of information and attention to what can be the most difficult part about cancer has constantly made my attempts to rebuild my life extremely difficult. So I am hoping that with this book and speaking events and the like I can do my part to make survivorship (the part of a cancer patient's tribulation that comes after the cancer is beaten back) just a little bit easier for the millions and millions of survivors and patients out there (which is the reason for starting the Surviving the Cure Facebook page that I'm hoping will gather momentum and help a bit with that awareness. If you feel so inclined, please like it and share it with your friends). Being reminded of my goal and told that this book has great potential to achieve it, well, that's a good vaccine against the anxiety and nerves surrounding the publication. At the moment, Nick and I are reading each other's books and helping to guide the other in the right direction and polish both our manuscripts up. And slim them down so we can cut down on costs when we send our stuff out to the editor.

Of course, even with the books finished we still have the networking and marketing aspect to take care of as well. Luckily, one of Nick's friends is a photographer (a very high-caliber one at that) who took some head shots of us for when we start the marketing campaigns. They turned out really well. I might actually use some for a more personal use. If I ever need eHarmony of something, I'll definitely be putting one of Keshav's pictures up there.

Nick and I | Credit: Keshav Dahiya

In addition to all of that, I've been working on a couple short stories. Plus a whole bunch of ideas that came rushing out of nowhere in a massive creativity dump over the last few days. Not that I'm complaining, I love creativity dumps. I just wish, you know, that they wouldn't be so distracting and alluring. To me, they're like sirens trying to call me away from the memoir and all the other things that need taking care of. I hear them whispering: "Bundy, Bundy, come write us. Write us good!" To which I usually reply: "You mean 'well'! It's 'well', not 'good'!" Then people ask if I'm okay and give me that look reserved for strangers that you can't quite be sure aren't totally insane. I mean maybe I am, but that's more fun than being normal in my mind. Normalcy is uber overrated.

So those short stories. One of them I'm planning to shop around to see if any magazines or something will want to publish it. It's a short mostly non-fiction piece about my dad's summiting of Mount Aconcagua in the Andes (highest peak outside the Himalayas). The other is a more standard short story for me, which I recently posted on my author page on Facebook. I'll start you out with the beginning at the end of this post and if you want to read on, go ahead and check out the rest of it on the Facebook page. While you're there, feel free to like it! I'll be posting excerpts from my memoir and other pieces of writing there from time to time.

Many thanks to you all, have a splendid day/night/dawn/dusk/what-have-you.

Catfishing

Sitting outside, Myles realized that his plan to flush out the potential catfish was severely flawed. Sure, it probably wasn’t an old guy, but just because some girl sounded hot didn’t necessarily mean she was. “Dammit! Please, God, let her be hot. I’d give anything for her to be the hot, funny, wonderful girl she claims to be.” Maybe it was God, or maybe it was his subconscious, a little cocaine-snorting Freud sitting next to an empty couch who spoke, but the answer came to him either way: Only one way to find out.

The house was small, boring, unassuming. It didn’t fit into his picture of where such a stunning and special person like her would live. Though he couldn’t exactly figure out what that picture was, he at least knew this wasn’t it. Myles heard his friend Zachary’s voice whispering “Catfish” in the back of his mind. Try as he might to shoo it away, he could not quite rid himself of that treasonous doubt. With a sigh and a stomach full of writhing creatures, Myles stepped out of the car and closed the door, absently locking his car as he frowned at the driveway. It looked no different from any other driveway in America. What was he expecting? A driveway made of red carpet? “Go Myles,” he muttered under his breath. He couldn’t. Instead, he found himself rooted to the spot, paralyzed by the possibility that Zachary was right, that he’d been duped. But he’d seen her picture, heard her voice, how could she be anyone but who she claimed to be?

To see if Myles gets the girl or if Zachary is right and he gets the hook, read on at: https://www.facebook.com/andrewbundybooks

Gathering Momentum

Hello faithful readers!

I am happy to say that it has been an incredibly busy few weeks, and not in a bad way (mostly)! I've made a lot of progress along many different fronts and am trying to keep that momentum going and going and going. I think I can, I think I can, I think I can, I KNOW I can! Shall we begin?

First and foremost, I am beyond ecstatic to announce the end of the second draft of my memoir! I managed to take out a rather large chunk of useless tangents (put in the rough draft mostly to take the edge off the agonizing task of remembering the things I spent years trying to forget) and am that much closer to being finished with this whole project. In the near future, I'll be able to submit the work to an editor that Nick and I have settled on and from that point on I think it'll be a bit more work and then we can safely put this whole memoir thing behind us. Quite frankly, as important as I think my book is (I can't afford modesty at this point), the allure of fiction is always the siren song trying to pull me off track. I'll admit, I have done some work on some side projects, but the goal is to publish the memoir before I ramp up my efforts for the next major project (which I've already decided on and I giddy as all get out to plow straight into). I do find the fiction to be a nice release, especially from the more challenging parts of the memoir, but it's a constant battle to keep myself from sliding so easily back into my preferred genre. On a side note: I wrote a short story that I really liked. It's nice, I haven't finished a short story in quite some time, so you can imagine how satisfying that is to work on something so fun and familiar.

To learn more about the memoirs Nick and I are working on, you can read the article in the Poway magazine 92064 called Memoirs Recount Challenges Faced by Two Poway High School Graduates

The other major mark of progress is my work at physical therapy. As mentioned in my last post, I've been strengthening the muscles in my legs to compensate for what could be further degeneration in the bones or some other issue that has yet to be fully diagnosed. I know that the ankle pain in my left ankle is caused by a bone spur (see right) that I'll probably have to do something about soon. But over the last few months the pain has been getting progressively worse. However, because of all the work at PT, I've been able to slow down a lot of the pain's progression and even prevent it from getting worse at all in some instances. I'm definitely a lot stronger than I have been in years, with the full compliment of joints replaced and feeling somewhat like I did before this journey of mine began more than eight years ago. It's amazing to me how long it's been. I can no longer remember what it's like to be a healthy person, what having hair is like, dealing with the issues that once seemed all-consuming in high school and now seem infinitely petty after the long Odyssey.

I've also been doing my best to prevent myself from pulling away again. Although I have not updated the blog in a while, I've been on other social media outlets for short bursts of time and have been trying to get out to see friends and get out of the house on occasion. I finally put up the Facebook page as my "official" author page (whatever it's called), which I will post a brand new short story (see above) if I manage to get 50 likes by the end of August. I will also be pulling my collection of short stories On The Fringes of Awareness by the end of the year as I switch from Amazon to another company that will allow me more control over my works.

In addition, and more importantly, I've started the Surviving the Cure page on Facebook as well. Its goal is something I've talked about semi-regularly on this blog, and indirectly focused on for the entirety of it, to spotlight post-cancer issues that cancer survivors must face after they are in remission and trying to rebuild their lives (the life lived after diagnosis and beyond is called survivorship). Anybody who has read at least a couple posts on here knows that surviving cancer is way more than just surviving cancer. It's trying to put your life back together after so many trials and tribulations and finding that the journey is only just beginning. It varies from person to person, and undoubtedly I'm an extreme case, but perhaps that's why I'm able to speak from experience about the multitude of challenges that survivors have to face after they escape cancer's grasp. If you go to the Facebook page for Surviving the Cure, there's a detailed mission statement and, similar to the author page, if 50 people like the page, I'll be putting an excerpt from my memoir up as a thank you for helping get the word out there about the difficulties involved with surviving and rebuilding a life left in tatters from the scorched Earth war against cancer.

What I'm trying to do is get the message out there, so if you would be so inclined to share not only the Facebook page, but also this blog, with your friends and the like, it would be a good first step toward helping spread awareness about how difficult life can be when you're cancer-free. (Damn that's catchy, if somewhat dark). It's a subject rarely discussed, even with oncologists treating you for your cancer, and as a result there is substantially less support in place for survivors. Many are forced to tread water and figure out how to cope and fix the side effects from the treatments, on top of the after-effects of the cancer itself, used to save their life. Whether those side effects be physical, mental, or emotional, there needs to be a better system of support in place to ease survivors' transition back into society and a semi-normal life. My hope is that the farther this message gets spread and the more people learn about just how painful and difficult picking up the pieces can be, in some instances its even harder than the cancer itself, we can be that ray of knowledge that pierces the dark clouds of ignorance about one of the hardest challenges any survivor will ever have to face. (I'll admit, I just added that last part to justify putting the picture in. I needed to compensate for the lack of cute little animals that I normally put in because that's what people like to see. Here, tell you what...

You're welcome)

Thank you in advance for sharing,
Andrew

"That Cancer Guy"

I've had an interesting week. (Side note: the white space that used to be here was bothering my editorial side, so I added this note to compensate for that and make me feel a little better.)

There's been lots of forward progress in terms of both Nick and I's book. Nick and mine? Mine and Nick's? My and Nick's? None of those sound right when I say them out loud. Weird. It's probably a poor way to structure the sentence, but I'm too lazy to do that. Because, you know, writing all this extra stuff out here is less work than fixing a few words. Oh well. Nick and I have met three times this week. On Monday we got together, discussed some aspects of Nick's memoir, then went to a meeting of the San Diego Writers/Editors Guild. Great idea on Nick's part, just utter genius. We'll get to that thought. On Wednesday we went over the non-writing aspects of our book: how much of our budget we want to spend on x, y, z, what makes sense to focus on first, what we need to look for in an editor, in a graphic artist, etc. Today we're meeting up to work on the actual writing and editing process. I think with everything that's happened this week, both Nick and I feel like we're on solid ground a little more. We have a very tangible sense of forward progress and confidence that this is an achievable goal (whereas prior to this both of us were in a bit of a quagmire, albeit for different reasons), and are more and more excited about getting our books published in the near-ish future.

The San Diego Writers/Editors Guild was such a fun experience for both of us. Although almost everyone in the room was at least twice our age, neither of us felt acutely uncomfortable. In fact, it was refreshing to be around them, because so many of them were in fact writers and had been published. The speaker for the night was, appropriately, a woman who talked about how to write the memoir of your life (although it was more geared toward an older crowd, us pups gleaned some useful information from the lecture/talk/thingy-ma-jig. We managed to make several new contacts, passing out business cards and collecting them from some of the people in the meeting. It gave us a good taste of what we might expect from similar events and are almost certainly going to try to make the next meeting at the end of July. Who knows, maybe we'll even join! Baby steps though, baby steps.

There were several amusing anecdotes gained throughout the night, but three of them really stuck out to me. Here we go:

1. That's NORMAL?!: Near the beginning of the talk, a woman sitting directly in front of us raised a hand as the speaker spoke about drafts and forming a story. "Excuse me," she said politely. "Before I even write a single word, I spin the idea around several different times in my head and make sure to look at it from several angles until it's perfect. Then I'll do about 25 drafts." Nick and I exchanged a glance, this lady was intense. The speaker nodded and told the woman that having so many drafts was, and I quote "completely normal." The glance we shared mutated into a mask of horror. If we did 25 drafts of our book, we'd both die of old age before we got even halfway through that many drafts at the rate we're doing it. I whispered to Nick that I think we should probably not do 25 drafts. He agreed quite readily.
2. I Just Sit Down and Write: Toward the end of the talk, an older gentleman by the name of Bill raised his hand. The speaker was discussing how to get around writer's blocks and that it sometimes requires lots of planning and outlining first when Bill interjected. "I don't bother with all that. I just sit down and write for six hours a day, seven days a week. Then I publish it." I wanted to applaud the man, because I've got little use for outlines, they never really fit that well with how the story ends up. I almost stood up and raised my fist with a cry of "Right on!", but quickly realized that maybe a meeting full of 60-90 year-old white people from San Diego was not the ideal place to pull a move associated with the Black Panthers. Perhaps one of the better uses of my barely touched mental filter I've had in my whole life.
3. That Cancer Guy: When the meeting began, Nick and I introduced ourselves and told the group about ourselves. Nick talked about his ultrarunning, and I talked about my experiences writing and a very brief synopsis of my condition (I almost went ahead and bet that I had more joint replacements than the whole room put together, but I suspect I wouldn't have won that bet, though it would certainly be close. I've had nine, so if a third of the room had one joint replaced, I wouldn't have won. But if I'd gone head-to-head against any one of them, I think I'd have an easy shot at winning). After the meeting, when Nick and I went around talking to people and introducing ourselves, I met a man selling a book he'd put together featuring the letters of a private in the Union Army during the Civil War. He signed my book and a couple other men came over and we started chatting. One of them brought up running and asked me how I could do such crazy races. I corrected him and directed his question to Nick. The guy said he thought I was the "running guy" because I had sneakers on and Nick was wearing these pseudo-cowboy boots. I told him that Nick was the running guy, not me. "Which guy are you?" the man who'd signed his book asked. Explaining I'd been the one with cancer, he frowned for a moment and then realization dawned on him. "Oh you're that cancer guy!" I imagined myself as a door to door salesman asking if people wanted to buy cancer (it was as weird in my head as I'm sure it is in yours). As we were leaving, Nick said to me: "You know that's probably what everyone will know you for if our books get big, right?" Another image popped into my head, people on the street passing by and recognizing me with a quick "Oh hey! You're that cancer guy!" I suppose that's me, I'm just that kinda (cancer) guy.

Yes, I'm that cancer guy.

We'll do some brief updates and then I'll let you get on with your day (or whatever you'll be doing after you read this far):

• For the last two months I'd been working on what was originally a short story. It ended up being three times longer than the longest short story I've ever written (Exhibit, which is one of the short stories in my book of short stories). The exact same thing happened when I was writing the second draft of Road to Refuge. It expanded more than TEN TIMES in length, very odd. So I guess this new story, whose title still eludes me because none of the ones I come up with really click with me, is actually a novella. Rough draft done, very pleased with it. This is the first major project I've finished (sort of) since I wrote the rough draft of my memoir. Yay.
• I was attacked by some sort of demonic superbug. I had several itchy bites on my lower legs on Monday, and by Tuesday morning they'd turned into massive sores almost ten times bigger (sounds familiar)! They're finally starting to get better now, but I swear I briefly thought I had leprosy.
• I survived the diagnosversary (see previous post). I hated it, definitely not one of the good years. But I did make it through, so that has to count for something.
• I'm back in physical therapy to try to strengthen my legs and specifically my knees so I can attempt to avoid having surgery in September. Fingers, toes, eyes, arms, and legs crossed.

That should do it for today. Have a good weekend everybody! Even if you're reading this on Monday, have a good weekend, whichever weekend is coming up soonest for you. There, that should take care of anybody reading this in the future. You're welcome.

Ciao now brown cow