Reluctant Retirement

I am a reluctant retiree, or at least in the process of becoming one. On February 2, 2012 I went to work at a job I love. I was a social worker with the Washington State Children's Administration. I had worked there for thirteen years in a variety of capacities including investigating allegations of child abuse and neglect and providing direct services to children and families. I was very good at my job and I love it. After cancer in 2004 I found that work too stressful and as much as I hated it, I adopted new duties including conducting home studies of relatives for placement of dependent children and facilitating interdisciplinary planning meetings. I grew to love this job as well.

When I went to work on February 2, 2012 I had two meetings scheduled. Both meetings were cancelled by the other parties and I wasn't feeling too good, so I went home. Later that afternoon I finally agreed with my wife and daughter to go to the doctor, who admitted me to the hospital with aspiration pneumonia.

I was hospitalized for twelve days during which time the doctors decided to alter my GTube for a JTube, directly into my small intestine. That means that because of the smaller space, I can no longer feed myself on my schedule, but am attached to a portable pump about twenty hours a day.

I have not been back to work since then and I don't anticipate ever going back. My doctor, who I just love, says I am disabled and unable to perform my job duties. I reluctantly agree with him, but it is a challenge. I am in the process of applying for disability so now it is up to government employees to determine if I am really disabled or not.

In one day I lost my sense of my professional self and my status as a professional in the community. I am no longer a child welfare social worker. People no longer come to me for my opinion or assistance with a particularly challenging case. My days are my own to fill as I can, which at least so far has been easy with all the medical appointments and managing my medical technology with which I have to become accustomed.

This is not at all the way I envisioned my career ending. I wanted to finish out my work life at the same desk I abandonned on February 2, 2012 and walk out the door. I anticipated a retirement party where people would say all manner of nice things about me and I would get the state equivalent of a gold watch, which is probably a fancy ball point pen.
I am trying to adjust and accept my new role. A role

Technology Woes

I had my first significant problems with my enteral pump today. It took a couple of hours of trying to sort it out on my own and a telephone call to the customer service representative to get it working again. It seems like it is working now.

All fo this brings to mind how little I like the idea of being so dependent on technology, even if that technology keeps me sitting upright and sucking air. It seems un-American to be dependent on a machine. It violates my myth of self-reliance and independence.

But all of that is a myth that we collectinvely and individually hold in common. The reality is that we are all dependent on each other and on the technology that surrounds us. We just don't like to admit it. We don't live in isolation from the universe, we inter-be with the universe, including all sentient beings and non-sentient beings.

I realize, again and brand new for today, that I have a choice. Every moment I have choices to make. The truth is that I am the author of every next moment. I may not be able to choose what happens, but I can and do choose how I will inter-be with it.

Remembering Kathy

I have been thinking about my friend Kathy a lot the last few days. When I was first diagnosed with throat cancer one of the first people I knew I had to talk to was Kathy. She was living in Oceanside California and I was in Wenatchee, but we were still very close. Before I could even tell Kathy that I had throat cancer she told me that she had Non Hodgekin's Lymphoma.

Kathy and I literally went through cancer treatment together separated by a lot of miles. We talked, texted, and emailed often. When Kathy relapsed and I was in a good space with my treatment, I visited her for a week. It was one of the best deecisions of my life. Nothing could substitute for being present to and with Kathy.

Kathy and I agreed that when we ever got got better we would meet in Las Vegas so we could go and eat at Mario Battali's restaurant. That never happened and now it never will.

Kathy relapsed again and died. And a little bit of me died too.

I thought about going to Las Vegas and having that meal but I just couldn't bear it without Kathy. It seemed like some kind of betrayal.

And then, I lost the ability to swallow and eat and now I am on a pump about twenty hours a day to get my nutrition. I will never again get to taste food.

I realize now I really needed to go to Mario's restaurant to honor both Kathy and myself. And now it all just seems pointless and I want to go now more than ever.

Tube Guy

I am just out of the hospital after almost two weeks for aspiration pneumonia. I generally get aspiration pneumonia every three or four months and end up being hospitalized. This time the docs decided to swap out my PEG Tube for a JTube. The JTube cannot handle anywhere near the same rate as the PEG tube and consequently, I am on a pump for about twenty hours a day now. I am still learning to negotiate the use of the pump and feel comfortable about it. The good news is that the pump is relatively small and completely portable. I wear it in a small backpack; however, the tube is usually visible so it is not completely hidden from public view. I yearn for the day when my family and friends don't ask me how my health is doing. I yearn for the day when my health is not the major topic of conversation. It is getting better.

I spent the evening last night with really good friends watching "Moneyball." It was good to be in a relaxed setting with friends who didn't feel the need to make my health issues the central topic of the evening.

I'm getting ready to go to Church this morning, where I will do some speaking. Public speaking is a passion of mine and I am looking forward to getting another opportunity to be more "normal."

Hope Feels Good

Seven years ago I was diagnosed with throat cancer and I have and am still dealing with the effects. Most on my mind these days is that I have lost the ability to swallow so I can no longer eat meals. All of my nutrition comes through a tube in my belly.

The worst part is not the not eating. It is the impact on my socializing. I don't go to dinner with friends and don't participate in many social activities because I can't eat and I don't want to be watching everyone else eat and/or making other people uncomfortable because they are eating in front of me.

I've been doing swallowing therapy locally with poor results. But recently I was referred to the University of Washington Medical Center with the idea that possibly they could do something for me.

After an esophagram the swallowing therapist told me something that no one else has said to me. She told me that she expects that with therapy and a esophagus dilation that I will be able to eat again.

Now I don't know if that will ever really happen. But what I am sure did happen is that hope was awakened in me and hope feels good. It feels good to hope.

Happy Father's Day

What a privilege and honor it is to be a father. And more importantly,way an awesome responsibility. It is unlikely that anything else I may do or accomplish in life will have anything approaching the impact and potential to benefit the world that being a father has. When you pause to reflect on fatherhood in this way it is almost enough to frighten anyone. And yet true fathers (as opposed to absentee sperm donors) wouldn't give up fatherhood for anything. Because in addition to having an incredible potential to change the world; fatherhood also has an incredible potential to change the father.

Fatherhood is full time and live. No dress rehearsals or retakes. There is a generous forgiveness for almost any mistake except for the mistake, or choice of not being there. If it is true that 80% of life is showing up it is even more true of fatherhood. And in this instance showing up and being there means more than mere physical prescence. Fathers, in our best moments, show up and are present physically, mentally, and spiritually. Fatherhood is a full time gig that is too important to trust to amateurs.

Father's Day

It is another beautiful day in paradise and tomorrow is Father's Day. My wife and daughter are taking me to the new microbrewery in Wenatchee to celebrate.

Father's Day got me thinking about my relationship with my own father ... and I use the term relationship rather broadly. I cannot think of very many things my father and I ever did together. My father was not very involved, or even interested in me. I felt it then and despite my maturity, I feel it still.

But I have a relationship with my father-in-law, my "Pop," that is wonderful. Mom and Pop stay with us during the summers and head South for the winter (which for them begins mid-August or early September - they take no risks that they will see snow other than on the television, postcards, or in movies). I find that I start eagerly anticipating their getting up here in March and April. And when they get here I just love having them around.

My relationship as a father with my own daughter, who is now 21 has been complicated. At times difficult, but I love seeing how she has matured into a woman who I love and respect. The hardest part for me is that I am not sure she respects me, but that may be a function of her age. I am reminded of Mark Twain's quote about his own father, “When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished by how much he'd learned in seven years.”

I am really looking forward to tomorrow. I have high expectations, but fortunately, I have a lot for which to be thankful.