APRIL 7 — As I write this I’m having a little pity party.
It’s been 11 days since I caught an upper respiratory tract infection (URTI) and I have yet to shake it off.
My brain has decided to go on an extended holiday and I am writing this by the power of whichever brain cell did not fit into the suitcase.
So I looked up why I’ve been so ill for so long and apparently thanks to the combo of post-cancer and being on tamoxifen, my immune system is as effective as the new Kelantan airport terminal at keeping motorbike racers out.
It might be years before my immune system gets stronger, and I also found out that another common experience post-cancer is URTIs taking a lot longer to clear.
Well, I guess I am never visiting any country in winter.
It also means that I need to be strict about masking again because it’s been a miserable week with my bedside table looking like a tissue sculpture installation of Mount Fuji.
Will I be well enough to endure the trip to Penang in a few days? We’ll see. At least I’m going by train, I’m not coughing (just leaking enough fluid to float a dinghy) and I still have Vinda tissue.
My housemate and I (this is not an advertisement) use Vinda because cheaper tissues tend to disintegrate when wet and Vinda wet wipes also make excellent mop pad replacements.
You know how wet wipes often dry out because the seal often gets weak? I realised I forgot to close a Vinda wet wipe packet and lo, it was still moist and usable.
In a perfect world, I would use reusable towels but in my heavily immunocompromised world, disposables are the only thing between me and a mountain of pathogens.
My hips, knees and arms still ache. I still approach stairs with caution.
I have recovered enough of my taste buds that my spice tolerance has reduced; I thought I was getting better at eating hot food but no, my cancer treatment had just destroyed the surface of my tongue.
Some days I feel a little more flexible, and it feels less painful to get out of a chair or a car.
Other days all I feel is tiredness and a stiffness that threatens never to leave.
I wish I could give a far rosier picture of my post-cancer life but healing, I’m finding out, is something that will happen on its own schedule and not mine.
When I get to Penang I’ll probably avoid queuing (I had enough of all the lining up in Taipei, as delicious as the end results proved).
Maybe I’ll laze by the pool.
Or I’ll learn to play Pokémon Champions, the new game that I can show to the taxman to prove that I really am competing in e-sports, because it’s probably the only sport I can play without keeling over.
Competing in Pokémon e-sports is like chess...except you choose which pieces you will bring to the board from a whopping 1,028, with hundreds of possible movesets, conditions and strategies.
It’s very hard but maybe pitting virtual monsters at each other might be the kickstart my brain needs because lately I’ve been struggling to remember names and places — seeing them in my mind but the names fail me.
Life is dull and tiring now, especially with the conflict in West Asia as a backdrop, but I will remember again that saying I came across long ago, that the life you’re living might be someone else’s dream.
The least I can do is make mine a good one.
* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.
