Reflection on Mortality

When I was in kindergarten, I thought about what primary school would be like, then secondary, then university, then work, then death, and the blanketing darkness that came after. I was excited about primary school, unsure of secondary school, and well, death didn’t bother me a lot. (Death to me was probably just a noun — ) not an unusual musing, but just one of the many natural ponderings by the mind; many of my friends have deliberated pondered  on this as well. But like any musings, it is soon lost.

My diagnosis came in my thirteenth, or fourteenth, summer. Like everyone, I had a fever that wouldn’t break; I, lost all my strength and , couldn’t even walk for more than ten minutes at a time. At the clinic, I cried, because I was so overwhelmed and tired from walking the stairs. 

My parents hid my diagnosis from me at first. I felt something was wrong, but I didn’t have the energy to think. So the feeling persisted at the back of my mind, and remained lingering as a faint thought. We took a taxi to A&E. Wow, A&E was so scary. I saw someone holding a towel streaked with fresh blood, a granny was screaming. I forgot why - , maybe she was having her dressing changed.

My mom said she was sorry. I didn’t know what for. But she was crying, so I comforted her and cried too. My dad, as always, did not cry, but that day, his frame was sullen. Every parent wants the best for their children. It is hard not to take the offense of (the disease) personally. Now, I understand know, it is purely by chance. No one knows what caused it. So on a bad day, someone stepped on dogshit, I got the diagnosis. 

For the entirety of the treatment, the fact that I had leukaemia never sank in. I memorised the drugs, the treatment duration, the side effects. I intellectually knew I had cancer.  (Much to my mother’s discomfort, I held my pinkie up and told her there are cancer cells in my pinkie bone). I knew the survival rate was (70%-80%). The data was old, my doctor told me it is above 80% now. Every year, (7 kids get the illness, one of them would die, resulting in a survival rate around 85.7%. )  Nonetheless, I responded intellectually, but not emotionally. I am not sure why. I just took everything in stride and did not feel , anything. 

After my recovery and school started, I had a chilling realisation, that if I had died in my sleep, I would know nothing of it. I would be gone, without my conscious acknowledgement. In a state of complete oblivion, my life would no longer be mine. In the first week of diagnosis, I spent my days sleeping, soundly. I was completely blind and deaf to the world around me. I could not stay awake for more than five minutes. The sleep was dreamless. 

In fact, that sleep probably felt a lot like death. My body was deteriorating rapidly (walking to the toilet was a triumph!). And that realisation was deeply disturbing. Death had felt tangible. How do you plan for the future when you might die tomorrow? Obviously, I was already cured— Do I really want to spend my days cramming for tests? I have to though. So what do I do? My belated panic came delayed, a year and a half after the diagnosis. The danger felt near only after it had passed. 

Now, the older me could make sense of it all, but the younger me was deeply disturbed, not understanding where the disturbance even came from. My emotions were entangled in a mess, yet I did not even know what triggered them After all, how can one act when one does not understand the root cause?

But thank god, my family and friends are nice. They gave me the safe space and comfort to let out my panic and worries while everything else was taken care of.  

For now, the bone- chilling feeling has passed. I live knowing, with a 99.9% chance, I will live to see tomorrow. So, I am more comfortable with planning for the future. Still, knowing my time is somewhat borrowed, I do not spend it insincerely. I hope to feel a little more love, to feel a little more deeply, and, if situation allows, do it happily, contentedly. People sometimes don’t live through whatever is thrust upon them. We see people dying everyday, from illness, from war, from suicide. Some children had PTSD after radiotherapy. I guess what I’m trying to say is cancer runs deeper than unfortunate mutations, they are as emotional as physical, and manoeuvring that is just as challenging as completing finishing the treatment. For some, the treatment itself is traumatizing; for some, the disability one acquires uproots their daily routine. Yeah, some chemo drugs damage the heart. Children with sarcoma had their entire long bone removed. Some loses their ability to communicate. 

I don’t think anyone walked out of the ward as themselves, or even as the better version of themselves. We all weaved some sorrow, anxiety, inferiority and anger into the fabric of our souls.