A shameless act of self promotion: my brush with death

“Champagne!” I said.

February 22, 2008

I figured I might have to have some time off work with one thing or another and felt obliged to tell the Chairman of the Board of the health service I worked for just what was going on. If things did go pear shaped - and let me hasten to add they may not - this sharing of information was a first step in succession planning.

But maybe this all just another example of me getting a little ahead of myself. It is hard to say as I have never been diagnosed with any form of cancer before.

The Chairman of my Board is a nice guy and a fellow Rotarian. I felt comfortable letting him know what was going on. I saw him before I got to the office. It was a pleasant exchange and I felt better for telling him. We talked a little about the matter at hand. I told him the lay of the land and he was, not surprisingly, genuinely empathetic.

I told him I had not spoken to the kids as yet; we have four of them; two girls and two boys. It was too soon and there were too many unanswered questions. I had felt that talking to them would be the hardest part of the entire exercise.

Protecting my children and just how I can do that has never really kept me awake at night until now. Protecting them from what ever I could has always been my raison d'être. It has always been what I do. If I had my choice, and I am being perfectly frank here, it is what I would like to do almost to the exclusion of all else. It has always been within my capability. The prospect of that state of affairs changing leaves me feeling very cold indeed. I know I cannot protect them from this new information but I know I would if I could.

But there I go again, getting ahead of myself. Do other people fell this way? I wonder?

Clearly I am not unique and maybe this way of thinking is what a lot of people go through when told they have cancer in one of its many manifestations. I don’t know. But for someone who either has always known the answers, or to be more honest has always pretended to know the answers I am deep into un-chartered waters. All this represents a new adventure and I feel very uncomfortable indeed.

March 5, 2008 - Melanoma Clinic 4th Floor: The Alfred Hospital Melbourne

It is 8.45am. My wife and I are at the designated place at the designated time waiting to see the specialist(s).

The waiting room is at the cross roads of a set of parallel corridors intersected by another leading to a place called the “Main Wards” indicated by a sign hanging from the ceiling. Similar signs tell me the waiting room is also the waiting room for physiotherapy services, prosthesis, orthotics, speech pathology and the ear, nose and throat services. The Melanoma Clinic has no sign.

The television above my head is tuned into whatever program Kerry Anne Kennelly hosts. Time is passing slowly and my new book is more for show than a distraction. The seats are far from comfortable and I find the whole waiting thing a monumental pain in the backside. My wife senses something is wrong. She knows me too well.

“Are you getting angry?” she asks