Well, it all started in december 2001.
I was taking a hot bath when i felt something. What...i didn't know at the time and who would
ever think the worst so totally blank i went to my home doc. I didn't visit her in about 2 years so she had to dig up my file.
She told me it could be a 1000 things without it being cancer. Well they made an echo and i would have to come back 5 days
later.
2 hours later the doc called me and asked me to come and visit her because she had to tell
me something. I asked her to tell me on the phone but no, that was not possible.
The echo showed a mass of 4.5 cm in the left ball. It couldn't be an infection because it
would have shown. From the 1000 things it could be we were coming down to 1. To be sure i was sent to the cancer institute.
There i had many tests. Thorax x-ray, cat scan, mri and bloodwork. Again i had to wait a few days but no, the next day i had
to come back for the results. Again, nothing on the phone.
Sir, we looked at everything and you have cancer. Well what happends when you hear something
like that. I still don't know!!! It was x-mass and i had a big party planned with a lot of people. Well you can cancel that
because it's not going to happen. I had to have an operation within a few days to reduce the chance of the cancer going further
into my system.
The next two days i had all the tests they can give you in a hospital. Some really bad ones
too. Imagine the inject radiation fluid into your tumor. At 5 degrees celcius. At that moment i really thought i would die.
It's like getting kicked between the jewels but about ten times stronger. It was horrible.
Dec. 27 2001
The day of the operation. Had another catscan wich showed my tumor had grown from 4.5 to
7.5 cm. Now i can imagine the doc wanted to operate right away. I was in bed in the hospital and got something to relax. Meen
while. My family flew in because the live in Belgium and Italy. The big x-mass party became a big gathering of family and
friends. Everybody had a bad x-mass that year. In the hospital i said goodbye to my parents and sister and got transported
to the I/O room.
It took 7.5 hours to get all the things that didn't belong there out of my system. They removed
the tumor, ball and some lymphnodes. I woke up with a drain and 7 cuts. I still didn't realize what the hell happend
to me. Everything went so fast and everybody around me cried and tried to comfort me when i was still thinking it would be
nothing. Now, even more 1 year later i still don't realize what happend those 2 horrible weeks.
Well i woke up after 8 hours and was in pain for at least a week. They operated me on one
side so my right shoulder was dead for about 24 hours. Thank god they gave me morfine because when the drugs stopped working
i felt what they had done. I was in the hospital for annother 3 days and i was home at new year. That was the best new year
i ever had. NOT!
I choose for a wait and see protocol because i didn't want any chemo. It was a new methode
so i could choose. It seems it was the right choice because we are now one year further and still nothing came back. I go
to hospital every month for a check up. X-rays, cat scan and a lot of bloodwork does the trick untill now.
One thing is still there. I'm so tired. I know evrybody who reads this can say the same thing.
I takes about 2 years my doctor said for it to go away. But if i see other patients i must put myself in the lucky spot because
i'm still free of cancer.
To celebrate my first cancer free year i went to Koh Phangan Thailand. There the perfect
party was available. The Full Moon Party. Thanks to two great friends Simon and Mark i had the time of my life and we even
had a nice BBQ on the beach on the 22nd of december, the day when they told me i had cancer. If you have to chance.......Go
and visit the FMP because it the wildest party i've ever been. Please read the thailand story on my site.
Well everything is going according to plan. With the help of my friends and family i started
a new life. I moved to another house. Got a new job and i work 4 days a week now because iīm still so tired. Fellow patients
will agree on this issue. Itīs one of the things doctors can not explain. Is it the operation, is it the treatment or is just
the fact of having cancer. I donīt know either but what i do know is allways to take it seriously.
The chances of it returning are 20 - 30%. So i will have to keep my fingers crossed for 4
more years before the chances are so slim that youīll have to go to hospital once a year. My protocol says: first and second
year check up every month, third and fourth year every 2/3 months and the fifth year every 6 months. Itīs one of the
hardest parts of the cancer. The going to the cancer institute breaks me up. When i go there i allways think about the first
time we went there. Laughing about everything because we were so nervious. And then you are in his room waiting for answers
you never imagine getting. Sir, you have cancer and we have to act quickly. Well after we had the appointement
everything was so sure.
If i look at it now i would have done so many things different. Time will heal
a lot of wounds but the thing in my head will never go away again. A good friend Reinier once told me: There will never be
an experience that will top the experience you had. It's so true! That's why you have to be carefull that you keep
paying attention to the little things too. So many thing end up being NOT important. The things i worried about before like
money and what other people think of you just left. Nobody get's me crazy with nothing anymore. I live my own life and people
may join the party if they want. To many things change in your life to worry about the none important things!!!!
The first few months after the i/o were very difficult for me because so many things happen
and there are so many people around you. Friends, family and doctors. And then u get sent home alone and life goes on. Life
goes on for everybody but for you life stands still. The world around you moves and everybody does their thing but you....
You are still in this dream. It took me about a month to wake up from the dream when i had to go to the hospital for
my first big check up.
People around quickly say that you look good and everything is going to be fine. But thatīs
not in your head. In your head the cancer is still in the front part of the brain. When you wake up you stand in front of
the mirror and think "I have cancer". I learned that you can have a lot of support from all your friends and family
but you have to do it all by yourself. Nobody is going to help you. I never thought life would be so different after.
I had a big group of friends, i had a good running business, i had a relaxed life and everything
was going for me but then something like that happends. You lose a lot of friends because they donpīt know how to cope with
it. My business was gone because my partner took the money and left. My relationship ended after 5 years. Not really
because of the disease but it helped and my life turned miserable in a matter of weeks. All that and your disease is a little
bit to much to handle for one mind.
Now, in my third year of being clean i still wonder about many things that happend to me.
Offcourse some things just turned better but the thing is that u wanna step right back into your old self and go on where
u left off. I tried that for 2 years and collapsed because i was fighting myself every day. Now very slowly after 2,5 years
acceptance is strating. I accept i'm not the person i used to be. Now i can accept that there are certain things i cannot
do because of a leg that doesn't want to work anymore. But when i get up in the morning and i look in the mirror i see
myself as a cancer survivor and not Max. That's a thing i will never accept.
Be prepared my dear friends. i hope it will never be something u will have to deal with but
when u do promiss me one thing, Talk Talk talk about it. As much as u can. Like that u can lose a lot of frustration and anger.
Love Max
