#it would be reductive for a cure to be bullshit when it matters so much to these two and their relationship

[soyboywenzie]

the porch scene is sooo interesting in the show simply due to two lines.

“because you’re selfish.”

“because i love you.”

it shows both of their mindsets, two mindsets that have riddled the fandom for 12 years. they are both valid and yet so contradictory that one side is pulling up real world doctors to talk about a fictional world’s science and it’s so funny.

joel saved ellie because he loved her, and ellie thinks it’s selfish because she wanted to save the world, or die trying and he took that from her. it’s beautiful. joel is a selfish man and ellie has to know how much she is loved and that’s the center of these two. joel has so much love to give her that he couldn’t give his first and ellie has so much to give away and yet can’t.

[braindamageforbeginners]

Just Eat Your Stupid Vegetables

Day 59

I’d like to begin today’s festivities with a recounting of recent events in my on-going attempt to get more Temodar. For any new readers, this is the chemo drug that all GBM patients are required to take for a year (possibly more)(as I’ve mentioned, the only thing worse than hearing, “We’re extending your treatment” is, “We’re discontinuing your treatment because it’s not working”), and I have been working feverishly to get more of it (and been thwarted by various forms, claims, claims-adjusters, and, most importantly, CVS)(new rule; just as I go out of my way to protect the anonymity of any of my care providers who do me a good turn, I’ll point out the folks who are likely to kill you if you have a serious illness)(and, based on current events, it seems likely that if you wandered into a CVS with an open, dripping wound, they’d call their supervisor and request the proper form before offering you a band-aid). After the most-recent mishap, in which CVS claimed that there was an insurance issue; I found the proper insurance form, forwarded it to the Warlocks’ administrative team, and heard back from one of the nurses that they’d filled it out and sent it on. I got a call the other day from a creepy, automated voice saying that my insurance company had just approved the release of my drugs. There are small children on Christmas who are less joyous than I was at the thought of putting more toxic substances - in higher doses - in my body. In my enthusiasm, I called CVS to see about delivery. You can imagine my confusion when they told me that the hang-up was because there were two prescriptions (Temodar only comes in a few different dosages, so doctors will prescribe you one or two dosages, and give you instructions on how to mix-n-match them to get your exact dosage)(again, you can’t cut these things in half, because they’re basically gel capsules containing mustard gas)(that’s a slight exaggeration, but not by much). After much tearing of hair and rending of teeth, CVS advised me to get in touch with my insurance company about the hold-up. So I called the insurance folks, whilst thinking of being on a beach in the Caribbean. The insurance folks were helpful, and figured out that the obscure authorization form that the Warlocks filled out could be applied to one Temodar prescription (again, I need two); and, after a call to the in-house insurance pharmacist, okayed the second prescription. No screaming or cajoling required. I gave myself an hour off (I had more coffee, when, in retrospect, I should’ve had a martini or two), then called CVS. They eventually agreed to ship me the drugs, after a $130 payment was made. It’s depressing to think that we could put a dollar value on a human life. It’s suicidally-depressing to realize that, apparently, that value at the moment is $130 and 16-ish hours of paperwork and phone calls (we won’t discuss my insurance premiums, which are astronomical). And it’s Bambi’s-mom-died sad to think how many cancer patients with far better prognoses than mine died for far less money. Anyway, I did finally convince CVS to take my filthy, peasant money in exchange for their goods (one feels that Adam Smith might rethink his thesis if he saw the 21st century), and made a mental note to throw a brick through the front window of the next CVS I see (I’m getting a chunk of those 15 hours and $130 back one way or another - CVS can either have my time or my money, but it seems greedy to claim so much of both)(especially when, as Research Coordinator pointed out, Temodar is such a common chemotherapy drug nowadays that it’s quite common for large pharmacies to have a bag or two stashed away). And the chemo drugs arrived this morning, so that’s a form of victory. But that’s not what I want to talk about at the moment.

I would like to share with all of you an interesting revelation I had whilst on vacation from the abyss (I know my father would probably hate that metaphor; sorry, Dad, but it’s a good one, and I’m sticking to it)(I’m about to heap some well-earned praise on him, so I figure it’ll even out). You surface dwellers are aware that there are food sources that you don’t have club to death or process, right? That’s not just a giant squid thing that’s unique to me, is it?

I have ask that because I only this morning starting putting some of the pieces of the puzzle together. Now, the biggest complaint about Temodar is that it causes motility issues (that’s the polite and scientifically-preferred term, I believe), and I suspect that’s been a complaint about the Captain America serum, because the Warlocks recently asked a few times about that issue, or, more specifically, that I didn’t ever seem to have that issue (not in any obvious or nagging way, just a part of me noted, “It seems odd that they’re double-checking that particular question.”). And I only put that together because I recently had to put in a special request to Mother Dearest for various ready-to-eat plant-based items. And only then did it start to occur to me that I’ve been on an ultra-high fiber, ultra-high protein diet.

Although I might jab my father occasionally, it should be noted that he has done a lot in the day-to-day business of keeping me alive. And, when you’re back at home after life knocks you on your ass, you eat what’s in the fridge at home. And my father is almost-obsessive about fruits, vegetables, and fiber. He even eats that horrible bran cereal that is almost-indistinguishable from those food pellets you feed to pet rodents (I really, really hope that’s not the cure for cancer, because I might choose death before that).

I bring this up because it contrasts a bit from me, in the initial part of my treatment. I’d been a pescovegetarian for eleven years - count ‘em, folks - prior to the diagnosis. Heart disease runs in the family, and I thought I might avoid that disease (once you start to think about all the weird, crazy paradoxes and hypocrisies in your life, you go a little mad). After I was told I had a terrible disease, one of my initial thoughts was, “Clearly, vegetarianism is bullshit.” 

Reader, you may be familiar with the word “relapse” as it pertains to addiction. Well, for those first few weeks, that was pretty much me; the crazed, blood-soaked carnivore who refused to eat anything unless it did move. Dad did point out that it wouldn’t do to survive brain cancer to die of heart disease or malnutrition; and that I wasn’t going to win the “Most Eligible Bachelor” award if I continued eating live chickens where the general public could see me. My memory of this conversation suggests that I responded in a less-than-graceful manner (a note to the family and friends of cancer patients; even the nicest, kindest person on the world won’t be very nice or kind for the first month or two after the diagnosis). Instead of smothering me in my sleep (again, that could make him a candidate for canonization), Dad just kind of kept chipping away and, either due to me seeing light, or the exhaustion wearing down my stubbornness, I eventually started eating more plant-based matter (and, eventually, that turned into a lot of plant-based matter, once I learned that vegetables and fruits are actually pretty tasty)(of course, this was all going on while I was chugging Gatorade, and, stacked up next to that, cough syrup doesn’t taste too bad). And, because I’m into weight training and I’ve been told by my neurofeedback guy that protein is good for neurological injury, I increased my protein intake (mostly from those awful protein shakes, which are only slightly better than Gatorade). And I went to the gym, every day (well, at least 5 days out of the week - that Captain America serum is tough on the body). The point is, I have been living - completely accidentally, as it turns out - an extremely healthy lifestyle, as of late. The fact that this was occurring to me as I was literally being torn apart on a molecular level, poisoned, and used as a guinea pig in a mad science experiment (this is a dramatically reductive but not-inaccurate description of cancer treatment) is one of those little ironies that drives me as a writer.

To get to the larger point, at every stage in the process, everyone - from the radiation techs to the Warlocks - has commented on how exceptionally well I’ve tolerated the treatment. I usually shot them a dirty look, because I felt like hell - and, now that I’ve recovered a little, I now realize that I was utterly physically miserable the whole time (it’s just like when I started taking melatonin and sleeping through the night that I realized how many years I must have spent half-asleep and utterly exhausted). Still, in all fairness, the Warlocks and everyone were, in retrospect, right - I was miserable, but I was never completely bed-ridden, apart from two or three mornings here and there. Which makes me wonder, if a large part of that wasn’t due to lifestyle choices on my part; which I’ve been able to contrast with life outside of the abyss. And you people seem almost fearful of anything that isn’t carved from an animal and deep-fried (to be fair, I love bacon-wrapped, beer-battered veal as much as the next guy - probably moreso, since I’m still making up for lost time).

Now, this is not to say that fruits, vegetables, and stair-steppers (or bench-presses, in my case) are going to cure me. If I survive this thing - and that’s still a big “if” (I realize that seems pessimistic, but I’ve realized that, just as positive outlook is important, it does not do to ignore the dark probabilities of life), it’ll be because my surgeon went orienteering in my skull; Radiation Oncologist nuked me; and the Warlocks dosed me with massive quantities of strange and dangerous substances, and then I begged all of them to do it again and again. But, at the same time, maybe there’s something to be said for healthy lifestyle as a complementary treatment to being scalped, microwaved, and poisoned.

Again, this is absolutely not an endorsement of “alternative” medicine (my go-to quote on that matter is from Tim Minchin, who wrote, “Do you know what they call alternative medicine that’s been proven to work? Medicine.”). There is no secret cure “they” don’t want you to know (I love the medical industry, but it simply isn’t competent enough to suppress that type of immediately-profitable information), and if there is, “they” don’t want you to know about it because it’s unsafe or unreliable (or, in my case, being tested for safety)(Mother Dearest once summarized it best when she said, “They could cure cancer, HIV, and Ebola tomorrow if they didn’t have to worry about the patient surviving.”). But, at the same time, there might be a lot to be said for complementary medicine, which, apparently, includes spending time in the gym and large quantities of tasteless fiber. And even then, it’s not like it’s some major constriction on your day-to-day existence (I’m sure Laura, Dan, and Julie are out there reading this and saying, “He wasn’t on any sort of diet I noticed” - and I wasn’t, either, until I got out, and realized Dad had quietly been slipping more plant life into my diet than I was comfortable with). Again, I wouldn’t even have noticed it all until I remembered the Warlocks’ specific questioning about my lack of GI chemo side-effects, and then realizing that I’d been eating far more than the average amount of veggies (if you’re downing gallons of hateful Gatorade and taking dreaded Temodar on a nightly basis, as well as being microwaved every day, extra helpings of brussel sprouts and an extra half-hour in the gym on a daily basis tend to go unnoticed). So, maybe, perhaps, if you plan on being seriously ill, a healthy lifestyle change at the same time might help you out. Maybe,. Possibly. Again, I’m just one person, statistically, I can’t prove or disprove anything.