Diagnosis: Afterparty

Today I had to cut an alarming amount of my hair from the brush roll of my vacuum cleaner. Today I also found out that a former colleague of mine passed away from pancreatic cancer. And while I’m hyper-aware of the differences between cancer types and how much more aggressive pancreatic cancer is than colorectal, today still felt very heavy. I probably shouldn’t have vacuumed today.

Dan was such a genuinely good person: the type who made you want to be a better person too. He was diagnosed right around the time I was, and while we hadn’t directly spoken in a few years, people who regularly talked to both of us kept us updated on how the other was doing. We were both cheering each other on.

While I was getting my chemo pump taken down on Friday, my dad called to let me know Dan was nearing the end. Again, I knew pancreatic cancer was aggressive, but my heart sank at just how quickly it was progressing. Dan, on his deathbed, took the time to make sure I got one last message of encouragement. In some of his final moments on this earth, he was still optimistically rooting for me. That’s the kind of thought and prayer you don’t take lightly.

I was mostly numb to it all for much of the day, even as I read through the flood of tributes to Dan in my work email. It wasn’t until I started vacuuming and noticed a burning smell that I flipped the vacuum over and discovered roughly two handfuls of my own hair wrapped around the brush roll. It wasn’t until then that the weight of all of this—both my own cancer and Dan’s—finally caught up with me.

Because this cancer thing is hard. Harder than I usually allow it to be.

Most days I can keep moving, keep planning, keep joking, keep looking ahead. But it’s always there, waiting to remind you that none of this is easy.

However, it’s times like these that remind me how much it means to have people in your corner. If his loss can leave a hole this big in the lives of people like me, I can’t imagine the space it’s left in the lives of those who loved him most. The people who love us carry this alongside us. So we keep fighting.

For Dan.