In the fall of 2009 I was diagnosed with a particularly nasty case of thyroid cancer. I blogged the experience. I also made some audio from the experience. I wanted a proper archive of it somewhere on the web. Although the blog lives on in other forms, it’s hard to follow from beginning to end. So I have created this site as a living archive. It will continue to grow inasmuch as I continue to write and make art about cancer.

How to use this site:

“The story” is simply a chronological listing of all my blog entries related to the cancer experience. On the right is a link to the recordings as an album on bandcamp. If you hit “play” they will stream as you read. I’d say “enjoy!” but it’s not that kind of thing. The audio runs about 30 minutes.

If you’d rather read posts one-by-one, click on “the serial.”  If you want audio in the background, open it in another window.

If you’d rather just listen to the audio, click on “audio.”

Please note–there may be a glitch or two in the posts since I had to restore them after getting hacked.  If you notice anything funny, please email me.

“But you’re fine now, right?”

I think this is probably a request for narrative closure, to know that everything will be ok.  If you mean “am I in danger of dying from thyroid cancer anytime soon?” the answer is no.  But “fine” is a little complicated.  Currently, my doctors and I believe that I have slow-growing metastatic thyroid cancer in my lungs.  I do expect that something else will kill me in the end.  In late October 2014, I had another dose of radioactive iodine, combined with lithium, in hopes that the thyroid cancer cells in my lungs will take in the iodine and die. That didn’t work.

I also have a permanently paralyzed vocal cord.  Most of the time it’s not noticeable thanks to the wonders of plastic surgery (which I require every 18 months or so), but it does make it more difficult for me to talk or swallow.

Full details can be found within.

Credits:

Thanks to Carrie, my doctors, my cancer friends, my regular friends, the members of the now-defunct “thryvors” listserv and the adv-thyca listserv, and the various readers and listeners who will come and go over time.

This website runs on a modified version of the Thesis theme, and the members of the DIYThemes support forum were very helpful with some design questions.

Cancerscapes audio was mastered by Bob Macc at Subvert Central Mastering.

This website is hosted on Koumbit.