Boogie Too

Early last fall, as we were preparing to begin Roger’s bone marrow transplant, we went searching the internet for information. We had heard from the doctors and scientists, but we wanted to know the personal stories of survivors.  What tips and techniques had they used that might work for us?  Search results were grim.  We found a few blogs on the topic, all focused on fear, powerlessness, and illness.  Decidedly, not helpful.

We had counted Roger as a survivor from the very beginning and it was vitally important that we maintain that confidence.  The scarcity of positive personal stories led me to the decision to write one myself.  A conscious effort to get into a positive frame of mind, as well as the daily discipline of writing and staying connected has been as important to me as it is to friends and family who depend on it for word of Roger’s progress.  I imagined Roger’s fight accompanied by music, the soundtrack of our lives.  At times, it has been a sentimental dip into lyrics that lift us and at times an emotional slide into opera, but most frequently it has been a ballsy and energetic boogie - the Rock and Roll music we grew up with.  Google makes it so easy to establish a blog; it’s possible to set it up and title it on an impulse.  And so, The Bone Marrow Boogie began.

 

In my apprehension about beginning this new phase of our life and my eagerness to do everything right (a silly notion in this upside down world), I failed to do the simple Google search that would have told me the title Bone Marrow Boogie was already in use.  Mortified, I discovered that fact a few weeks later.  I ordered the book online and contacted the author to confess.  Janie Starr generously granted her permission for me to go on using the title. 

 

Janie’s book tells the story of her journey, not through leukemia, but through lymphoma, a decade earlier. She had stepped from good health into a new reality created by disease and took an affirmative and accountable approach to her health.  It is the positive message I’d been searching for and had not found.  Janie has graciously offered to share her perspective now as a survivor.  You’ll see it posted here tomorrow.  It is a small world, indeed.

Boogie on.