Shrinkage, by Bryan Bishop

So, I am a little backed up on my book blogging - so tonight is a double post.  After finishing 61 Hours, by Lee Child, the Husband gave me Shrinkage by Bryan Bishop.  This is another of the books that he thinks will give me an insight into him and his life.  I started Shrinkage on February 1 and finished it this morning, February 21.  The Husband has given me a few other books to read that he thinks give me insight into who he is:  The Fault In Our Stars, Angry Black White Boy, and now Shrinkage.

The Husband is a huge fan of Adam Carolla, and Bryan Bishop (aka Bald Bryan) is a part of Carolla's podcast.  Bishop is also a cancer fighter/survivor just like the Husband.  The Husband is a 3-time cancer survivor, and is very involved in patient advocacy and the cancer world (he is a facilitator for a local young adult cancer support group for cancer fighters and caregivers).  He gives a lot of his time and energy to this cause, and thought this book could give me some additional insight into his life's story and how/why he behaves and reacts certain ways in certain situations.

Bishop has brain cancer - a tumor - that greatly impacted his life.  This book details the trials and travails of his ordeal - all while he is in the process of marrying the love of his life, Christie.  You hear about cancer all the time, but these first person narratives of how life really is when dealing with cancer are all the more insightful.  I think non-cancer-affected people think they can imagine how horrible an ordeal it is, but they (and me) have no idea of what it is really like.  Bishop does a great job of detailing (yes, all of the gory details - including crapping himself and having Christie clean him up) everything - the good, the bad, the hopeless, the miraculous.

Cancer fucking sucks - I am hard pressed to think of anyone that I know who hasn't been touched by cancer in some way (whether as a person diagnosed with cancer or as a caregiver or as a friend or relative of someone who has or had cancer).  Too many people have had to deal with this disease and the devastation it can leave in its wake.  Thankfully (THANKFULLY), the Husband is happy and healthy now, and thankfully my dad survived his cancer, thankfully my good friend K. survived her cancer.  New people are diagnosed every single day.  I learned recently via FaceBook that an acquaintance who is basically my age was just diagnosed with cervical cancer.  It is everywhere.

But what do we, as non-cancer diagnosed people really know about what it is like to go through this ordeal?  We know nothing.  I think it is difficult for those with a cancer diagnosis to really talk about it - they lived it, and probably don't want to relive it by talking about it all the time.  So books like Bishop's can really help us gain more insight into the hell and torture people have gone through.  A few times when I talked with my friend K. about her cancer, she ended up in tears, and never really opened up about anything, not that I really expected her to.  The last time this happened was about a year or so ago and we were out to dinner to catch up.  K. and I used to work together and see each other regularly - but through job changes, divorces, marriages, and moves, we didn't see each other quite so often.  At this meeting, over dinner we were catching up and talking about things.  She asked how the Husband was and I mentioned that he was going to a summer camp for young adult cancer fighters and survivors for kayaking, I asked if she was interested in anything like that or if she had sought out any support groups or anything when she was going through treatment.  She hadn't.  I told her she deserved to have an outlet to talk about things with like-minded people - at this point she cried a little.  I told her it seemed to me that she went through treatment without really going through treatment - she worked the whole time, didn't take a day off.  She went through life like nothing was wrong.  Of course, that is her prerogative, but it seems to me that going through something like that, that you might need a little help and that there are a lot of places that could help her.  She agreed, and then we promptly dropped the subject.  K. is a very strong woman working in a male-dominated field and I think she feels she can't show her vulnerabilities out of fear of being seen as weak.

Bishop details the help he needed throughout his book - as his treatment went on (radiation and chemotherapy), his life steadily went downhill - his walking suffered, his speech suffered, he was exhausted, he needed full time care and couldn't be left alone. At one point he couldn't walk, he was a fall risk, and could barely speak.  This was humbling for him because he relied on Christie 100% to help him with literally everything.  His treatment was rough, and his recovery from treatment was even rougher.  Caring for Bishop was extremely difficult for Christie as well - she ended up hospitalized for several days with colitis induced by exhaustion and stress.

In one particular chapter, Bishop wrote about how his cancer and treatment affected his relationship with his parents.  This gave me a lot of insight into the Husband's relationship with his parents, and also with me.  Bishop wrote about how he had to filter what he told his parents about his treatments, his doctor appointments, his test results, and his recovery.  He didn't outright lie to them, but also wasn't 100% honest with him either.  This has been something that the Husband and I have talked about a lot relative to his doctor appointments and his health.  He doesn't want to tell me anything until there is something to tell because he doesn't want me to worry.  I don't want to be kept in the dark unless I am completely left in the dark.  I know that may not make complete sense - here's an example.  If the Husband tells me he has a doctor appointment to check on one thing or the other, and then when I ask him about the appointment and he is vague in his response, I know he is keeping something from me and want to know what it is.  He'll be evasive and non-specific in how he answers my questions about the test result or follow-up, then I know or imagine something is worse then he is telling me.  So when I say it would be better for me to be completely in the dark - I mean that if he is having an appointment for something then if he can't or won't share it all with me then I'd want him to share nothing with me (not even tell me about the appointment) until there is something to share - like a clean bill of health or something wrong.  This is an ongoing discussion we have - how much he should tell me and when.  It is a fine line between outright lying to me and keeping me in the dark until there is something to tell.

After reading books like Bishop's, I think I might "get it" a tiny little bit more.  I also think I have a tiny bit more of an understanding of how and why the Husband is the way he is, about why he panics a little before every appointment with his doctors, about why he is diligent with his health maintenance, and about why he might want to keep me in the dark.  Cancer is a big, evil, scary, terror-inducing thing, and why expose more people than absolutely necessary to how horrific it really is?  But from a caregiver / loved-one point of view, we just want to make things a little nicer, easier, less horrific for those dealing with it.  I think it is a double-edged sword and a lose-lose situation - the person with cancer doesn't want to inflict their hell on anyone else so retreats into their own private hell.  And loved ones want to ease the situation for the person with cancer so they smother the person with love and attention.  As you can imagine, things can spiral downhill from there.

Where is the happy medium?  I think that after reading Bishop's book and knowing the Husband and his history, those in the loved-one / care giver role need to take direction from the person with cancer - let that person tell you what they need, how and when they need it, and when they need you to leave them alone.  I imagine there is a tremendous amount of contemplation and thought processing going on and they need space to do it in.  They know we love them and are there for them, but they need to be in the driver's seat and steer the car towards what they need at that particular time and place.  We have no real idea of what they are going through so we need to leave it to them to tell us in their own way and in their own time.  Easier said then done.

This book is funny and sad, insightful and honest.  I'm glad I read it, and I'm glad the Husband shared it with me.  When I finished it this morning, we had a short talk about the book and what I took away from it.  Then we kissed and got up to start our day.  

ps - after the Husband read this before I published it, he pulled out his phone and told me about his dentist appointment next week, his bi-annual skin check in April, all with a sly little grin and laugh on his face.  I still love him.

61 Hours, by Lee Child

So, after finishing How to Teach Filthy Rich Girls, by Zoey Dean, I started the next book in the Jack Reacher series by Lee Child, 61 Hours, on January 8.  I finished it on January 24.  What can I say about the Reacher books - they are highly entertaining.  They follow a certain recipe.  They are action packed.  They usually have a twist or 2.  He usually gets the girl.  Then he rides off into the sunset in search of the next small town where he can save the day in some way, shape, or form.  I still don't get the casting decision of Tom Cruise in this role - he is decidedly NOT Jack Reacher.

So, 61 Hours begins with Jack Reacher on a tour bus filled with old people making its way to Mount Rushmore in the dead of winter.  He isn't dressed appropriately (i.e. he does not have a warm coat or anything that a normal person would wear in a snowstorm).  He's asleep in the back of the bus, trying to not stand out, to not blend in, to be invisible.  He never stays that way for long.  The bus crashes in the middle of nowhere in the middle of a gigantic blizzard, and he is fearful that the passengers, and he along with them, will freeze to death if they don't get help.  Some law enforcement people from a nearby small South Dakota town come and help them - they send a bus (a prison bus to be exact) to move the passengers to the town, and the townsfolk volunteer to host the old people until the weather clears, they get a new tour bus, and are able to continue with their tour.

Reacher is immediately eyed suspiciously by the chief of police and his second in command.  He eventually learns that there is an older lady in town who is the main witness in a trial of suspected drug dealers, and the local police is on protective duty to keep her alive until she can testify.  There are "sinister forces" at work threatening the life of this lady, and the police will stop at nothing to protect her.  To a point.  There is a new federal prison in town, and one of the agreements the local police had to make in order to get a ton of funding for the force is that if there is a riot at the prison, EVERY cop has to drop everything and high tail it to the prison until the riot has subsided.  This includes leaving the witness.

Well, you guessed it - a riot happens.  The police head to the prison.  The witness is left alone.  Reacher protects her - she comes out unscathed, this time.  The police "hire" Reacher as a consultant to protect the witness and help them figure out what is going on and who the "bad guys" are.  Reacher uses some of his old army contacts to help figure out what an old government compound is (that is currently being used by suspected drug dealers).  He regularly talks to a woman, Susan Turner, who holds Reacher's old post - there is an immediate chemistry between Reacher and this woman.  I suspected that Susan would be the girl that Reacher gets.

I obviously don't want to spoil the various twists and turns of this book - but this is one book where Reacher doesn't get the girl.  I really thought he would get the girl - but he doesn't.  Things don't get completely wrapped up with a big red bow like they do in some of the other Reacher novels.  But, by the end of the book, most things get figured out, most things resolve, and Reacher moves on - just like clock work.  

This book is an easy read, highly entertaining, and I really enjoyed it.  As always, I look forward to the next adventures of Jack Reacher.