We’re Up all Night to get Leucky

get leuckys

I’m up all night to get blood
I’m up all night to get some
I’m up all night for nurse fun
We’re up all night to get #LEUCKY

The night between the 26th and 27th, my night nurse came in to check my vitals at midnight. I had taken my nightly Ambien (totally necessary to sleep while roiding out on Prednisone) so I was toeing the line of consciousness that exists only if you’ve forced yourself to stay awake for longer than 48 straight hours. I’m talking total misunderstanding of your own ego, the point where you aren’t sure if you are in a dream or if you ever even knew what a dream was to begin with.

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Chemo Hair Loss: Having Fun with the Inevitable.

I am a prissy  little boy and need to shower at least once a day lest I skeev myself out by my own greasy hair. It gets oily, clumpy and grossly unmanageable if I don’t make every effort to fight nature’s cruel desire to make me look like an unkempt homeless person. This is ideally how I like my hair to look:

This is totally a bathroom selfie. JUDGE ME
This is totally a bathroom selfie. JUDGE ME

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Chemo Sesh #2: Chemochic

ChemoSteamo
ChemoSteamo

Bet you never thought chemotherapy could be sexy, right? Well that’s why I’m here, to buttram your preconceived notions of all things Cancer. You can have fun, you can enjoy yourself, you can be sexy as fuck.

The peacock silk scarf appeals to those women out there who enjoy some flash and pizazz in a man- bright tail feathers to catch their attention. The messy unshowered greasy hair is for the bad boy trouble maker that they can’t help but loving, despite their best efforts to remove aloof danger from their lives. Bringing it all together is the come hither glance an slight lip pout. It’s a subtle expression, but more powerful than foot rubs and chocolate ice cream when played correctly.

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My Father’s Example

I’m sure many of you have wondered where I was able to find the motivation to adopt and maintain the – how should I put it – chipper as fuck attitude about a life-threatening cancer diagnosis. I’ve been asking myself the same thing and it didn’t take me long to realize where came from: my father’s example.

dad

My dad, Robert “Bob” Hornyak, died almost exactly a year ago from ALS. If the massive self-inflicted waterboarding campaign for ALS didn’t educate you enough, ALS is a degenerative nerve disease that basically shuts down your brain’s ability to communicate with your body. Essentially you slowly lose the ability to control the movements and functions of your body, both voluntary and involuntary. Eventually your mind becomes a solitary confinement prisoner in the deepest cell of your body’s dungeon where nobody can hear you scream.

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#Leucky

This is the title card from an old HBO show, if you aren't culture savvy.
This is the title card from an old HBO show, if you aren’t culturally savvy.

I want to get #Leucky to trend amongst the cancer community.

Definition: The full spectrum of of luck, from good to bad, that is brought on by having Leukemia.

Obviously it’s easy to see the bad luck that the disease can bring to a person. Ex: “welp, all my eyelashes fell into my cereal this morning, #leucky me!” or “My blood platelet count is lower than my IQ, it’s my #leucky day!”

But to be honest with you, I’ve been using it in a much more positive light, because if you’ve been reading my blog you may have noticed that I have fetishized the disease into a demented positivity. Every time I read through the comments on my donation page I feel like the #lueckiest man alive. When a nurse tells me that my energy has elevated the mood of the entire cancer ward I realize how #leucky I am to be able to help other people just by being myself. When my girlfriend goes way out of her way to make me feel loved despite my #unleucky circumstances, I know that I #leucked out big time.

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Why They Wanna See my Spine, Mommy? AM I GONNA DIE?

Like many of you, the thought of a SPINAL TAP completely freaked me out. We’ve all heard horror stories, we all know the cultural stigma (like a root canal, but so much worse that people don’t even joke about it), and we’ve all heard Ween’s drippingly creepy “Spinal Meningitis.” Well, we probably all haven’t heard that song because it’s completely insane and obscure (which is how I like my musics to be). If you didn’t take the time to listen to it, or just couldn’t get through it because you’re a wimp, it’s sung from the perspective of a little kid who is experiencing the fear of an impending spinal tap.

Why they wanna see my spine mommy?
Why they wanna see my spine?
It’s gonna hurt again mommy
Much worse than last time
Am I gonna see God, mommy?
Am I gonna die?
It really hurts mommy!
Am I gonna die?
I’m feelin’ greasy mommy
Please don’t let me die
Stinky vaseline mommy!
Please don’t let me die

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Control, or Lack Thereof

Everybody who knows me would describe me as a tightly wound anxious control freak. I used to wear this as a badge of honor, citing it as the example why most of our social endeavours end up working out so well. Somebody has to take charge sometimes to plan and organize things or else events will just devolve into people randomly walking into each other and losing their ability to speak English.

I’ve never been a “go with the flow” type. I don’t believe in the phrase. When water initially flows down a piece of land,  physics and gravity guide it into a channel. It isn’t just a random karmic movement of flowing molecules… they are governed by real laws of science until they find the best possible channel down which to flow. I am a type of person that goes out and looks for that channel, and if it doesn’t exist… I dig it. It’s proactive pragmatic situation control… it works wonders in many disciplines of the world.

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The Donation Page

I just read through the comments and was many times moved to tears. Its a very humbling experience to receive money from your friends family and strangers in a time of need.

My amazingly wonderful friend from home (Oneida, NY) started the donation page. Oddly enough Kathryn was the first person I saw immediately after I received the news that my father died almost a year ago today, so she gave me that very important first hug.  Strangely enough I happened to be g-chatting her while my doctors gave me my Leukemia diagnosis, so she was again the first to know. Some might see this as bad luck, I see it as my guardian angel friend being very good at her job. The hug she gave me after this tragedy, however, came with a whole lot of force behind it from the donation page.

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The Best Gift Ever

When you are sick, you get lots of gifts. My small room is overflowing with the physical manifestations of the generosity of my friends.

There are thousands of pages of books ranging from things I actually want to read (like the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series, among many other things) to ironically donated over the top new age self help books. I love to read, so I’m super happy about my new library.

Some good books, Some other books
Some good books, Some other books

There are a few crystals on my windowsill… how Colorado. I’m not one to scoff at the supernatural power of rocks -oh wait, yes I totally am, it’s literally one of my favorite trolls on my Phish message board, but in times like these I will take what I can get when it comes to promises of healing energy.

I think this one wards of placebo energies
I think this one wards of placebo energies

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That Time When my Semen was on Everybody’s Mind

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 It takes a village…

One of the first questions that blurted out of my mouth after my doctor finished telling me I had Leukemia was: “Will I still be able to live a normal life? Can I have kids in the future if I choose to?”

He said “of course you can and I hope you do!”…he must be of my school of thought in that this would would be a far better place if there were several genetic copies of me running around. Basically I owe it to society to procreate, for the common good.

He also mentioned that chemo is going to absolutely nuke my sperm generators… my very own personal “deflate gate” (sorry if you are reading this after Superbowl XLIX and this term means absolutely nothing to you anymore, deal with it). This is where my awesome oncology social workers get to shine!

We got to work immediately. The team consisted of a gorgeous  young RN, my breathtaking social worker, an absolutely stunning endocrinologist and me. The three intimidatingly good looking, talented women stood around me in positions of authority and we discussed the logistics of how many times I could masturbate into how many plastic cups over a certain period of time. Look, I’m not trying to sound like a pig or turn this into a Penthouse Forum or anything, but  it was one of the more surreal moments of my life. It was basically the plot of a porn movie that was written by a 12-year old boy (aren’t they all kind of like that?). And no, I absolutely never made any jokes about “needing a little help” or anything, because A.) I have an amazing girlfriend who is all I will ever need in this regard B.) I have to work with these women, C.) I’m not a pig and D.) talk about low hanging joke fruit… about as low hanging as my fruit will be after chemo.. wah wah waaaaah.

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