Paying--Too Much--Attention

I can get a little crazy in the land of Love and Cancer. There can be such a thing, I think, as too much intimacy: When John goes to the bathroom in the early morning I listen. I try not to but I do. Oh yuck, I know, but true.

I am paying attention to the sounds. Does he take a long time? diarrhea? constipation? I listen and gauge. I’m worried about his colon. The part he’s missing and the part he still has. When we are making love and my face is inches from his scrotum and I see the small patch of brown skin I wonder. “How long has that been there? melanoma? testicular cancer? His cough in the morning; normal? allergy? lung cancer?

Saint Paul said, “I die daily”, and he meant surrender. I kill John daily, and that means the sad vigilance of cancer and caregiving.

What the Body Says

Yesterday even I was too aware of the constant fear and checking with myself to see if this is the whole of it. It’s not but it is too much I think. The proportions are off. There was so much good on vacation and so much good a lot of the time. One of the very good parts and the unexpected—No the American Cancer Society will still not talk of this—the sex is wonderful. I keep reading all these “sex isn’t everything and intimacy is more than sex” articles but really. We live in these “skin bags” as the Buddhists call them, and the mind body connection is real. So sex is not just of the body. Can’t have it both ways. As a dancer and athlete I know the power of what can both be stored in and accessed through the body. We can access our past, memory, emotion and self knowledge through the human body. It is that powerful. And then at the last minute we pull back and say, “Well sex isn’t all that important? Is that prudery? self-consciousness? American reticence or just another kind of fear?

I’m not immune. When I consider this relationship I think, “Too much sex?” and “Too much emphasis on sex?” Is it compensation for something else? But again I come back to the body. “The body does not lie” Jung wrote and Marion Woodman says “when in doubt ask the body.” But sometimes we need a translator for the body’s language.

Mind Body

Last week I met a man on the train to New York City. One of those “I hope he doesn’t try to talk to me” moments and then I noticed that he was reading a Kindle and I blurted out, “You have a Kindle!” So then all hope was lost for trying to stay cool and aloof and send “leave me alone” vibes. So Kindle always leads to, “What do you read/are you reading?” and an hour later we were talking about the mind-body connection and Candace Pert’s work on neurophysiology. Well, he was talking and I was taking notes.

I finished the book last night and in addition to making me want to try meditation again I really want to try not scaring myself to death all the time. I see—from this neurophysicist’s point of view-- what I am doing to my body when I terrorize myself. All thru John’s cancer and even now as I unpack and repack this relationship—I go straight to fear. That’s not new; it’s a lifelong habit. But what that adrenaline and coritisol are doing to my body. …well, I guess now I am interested in saving my body too. Yeah, I’m feeling like it’s time to take care of me.

This week I’m not sure where we are going or if we are going, but I am going forward in any case.