Brain cancer is...

...documented in 50 blog posts.

Some of you have asked if Darrell and I find writing this blog therapeutic.  Mostly it feels great that you care enough to read it.  What it does for us, therapeutically, is allow us to decide the meanings we wish to extract or create from each day's experience.  Brain cancer, you're not the boss of us!  We'll tell you what this day means! 

We lead with that intro because today's posting is an example of brain cancer not being the boss of our experience.


Yesterday's posting was number 50.  That makes our blog a quinquagenarian of sorts, if blog years are measured in posts.  When Darrell and I saw that we were completing Post #50 last night, we reflected on just how much life has changed between Blog Post 0 and Blog Post 50.  We made a list of 50 things we have learned as a result of Darrell's Dx.  (There's one lesson for you!  Dx is cancer talk for diagnosis.)  It took very little time to make a listing of 50 things we've learned.  But when we finished, we were sad.  So we decided not to post that list. We're the boss of us!

Instead, for Post #51, we revisit Posting #1 in terms of both content and intent.  In Post #1, we shared the rationale for the "Brain cancer is..." format of the blog.  For the new team members in the house:  We chose our format because, in the hospital, Speech Therapist K asked Darrell to complete the sentence for a number of prompts.  Example:

Therapist K:  Name all the animals you can in one minute.
Big D:  Dragon! [Done.]

He and I thought he did fabulously, with responses were hilariously clever.  It is thus fitting that Post #51 revisits speech therapy and Darrell's humor.  Hurrah!

Darrell saw speech therapist Maureen and speech grad student Shelby today:

Maureen and Shelby are both wonderfully empathetic and fully appreciative of the awesomeness that is Darrell.* For instance, when he occasionally cheated, Maureen complimented him:  "Great use of strategies, Darrell!"  And she gave him cookies.  We'll see Maureen and Shelby every Thursday afternoon for speech fine tuning.

On the way out, it was great to come full circle.  We saw Therapist K in the hallway.  She was genuinely happy to see Darrell's progress.  We didn't say anything about the dragon.

Oh, one last thing:  Maureen asked if Darrell's great laugh was the first reason I fell for him.  Two more very intelligent members added to Team Darrell!


*Darrell objects to this characterization, but Andi wins.