"Count yourself lucky"

My husband reminded me today to count myself lucky. Despite all that I've gone through this fall, my health situation is not in the least dire.

Let me explain my husband's perspective. If you've read my about me page, you know that my husband's career has been in grants and contracts. What I don't specifically mention is the area of research for which these grants apply. My husband's work has almost exclusively concerned cancer research.

He works from home 3 days per week, using our landline as his home "office" phone. For the most part, our friends and family no longer call on this line, but reach us by cell phones instead. On the days my husband is home, I only answer this phone for him when he's outside or I know he's in a meeting. On the 2 days he goes in to the downtown office, I do answer the phone, taking messages and trying to be a kind voice for the caller.

One of the cancer research projects he's currently working on is for the vaccine for breast cancer. We get a lot of women (or their spouses) phoning, trying to get help applying for a clinical trial. Today, a woman called who was having trouble with the online application and wanted a live voice to help her. My husband was in the commute home from the downtown office at this time. So I took her name and number and also told her to call back tomorrow. My husband also said he would give her a call and see if he could help her.

Many times, these women have tried absolutely everything else for their cancer with limited help and are desperate to try something, anything. My husband knows that not all of the women who want to try the clinical trial will be approved for it. I have some experience with this scenario. When my mother had exhausted all of the approved treatments for her own breast cancer, she was guided into a clinical trial. In the first phase of the trial, the only qualification for remaining in the trial for the second phase was to have the cancer not progress. My mom's cancer remained stable at that point, so she stayed on for phase two. To stay on for the third phase of the trial, the cancer had to diminish in phase two. My mom's cancer hadn't shrunk or diminished at all, it had only remained stable. She was let go from the clinical trial at that point. I remember how heartbreaking this was for our family. In our minds, if a cancer isn't actively growing, they should have allowed her to stay in the trial. But that's not how these trials tend to work.

So when these women phone and ask my husband for his help in applying or finding a clinical trial, my husband tries to do whatever he can, even though this is not really his primary role. His name and number just happens to pop up on the university cancer research site.

When I discussed today's phone call with my husband, explaining my note, I detected a note of sadness in my husband's voice as he retreated from the kitchen. As he left the room, he simply said to me "count yourself lucky."

My husband is right. I am "lucky". I not only have this Thanksgiving to enjoy with my family, but likely a couple dozen or more Thanksgivings with them.

I thought as Thanksgiving 2023 is just 2 days away, this would be an appropriate story to share with you friends. I actually had something else in mind, but this is what came up and seemed right. For those of you who are leaving Wednesday to join family and friends, have a lovely Thanksgiving. If anyone else is around tomorrow afternoon, I'll post what I had previously had in mind for today. 

Wishing all of you a happy Thanksgiving!