And your point is?

A couple of months ago, I mentioned to a friend that this blog started out as a way to keep my friends and co-workers up to speed with what was going on with me and Elaine and my treatment.

It was an off-shoot of the original blog that still exists in an abandoned, older sibling sort of way on this very site.

Since that time, things have shifted some.

Somewhere along the line in my treatment, I decided I wanted to document what was happening with me because when I went online right after my diagnosis, all I got was a shit load of dire information and it got me more and more freaked out.
I wanted to talk about how it was as I was doing it so that other ovarian cancer patients might be able to read this blog and have some sense of how it works (at least, how it worked in my case.)
Standing at the starting line of the ovarian cancer race is daunting.
I am not going to tell you it has been a picnic going through all this, but I sure don’t miss the early days of horror and confusion and all around overwhelming panic.
Once I was actually in it, I thought I should be yelling back over my shoulder for anyone who was looking on, wondering how it went.

And I also wanted to say thanks along the way to all the people who helped me, from my girlfriend to my G.P., to my former co-workers, to my current co-workers, to my oncologist, to my surgeon, to the crazy folks in Alberta who I have never met but who helped us out so much, to my future in-laws, to my good friends, to my cats, to the folks at my gym, to the people who helped us take the vacations, to the clinical trials nurse, to the friends who paid for my plane ticket, to the friends who stayed in touch and let me know they were there for me, to the people who helped us eat organically, to the guy who worked on my truck while I was sick, to the drag kings who performed at Lick, to VWL and other people who arranged fund-raisers, to my ex-gf who took care of the details while I was sick, to the cancer survivors who helped me keep the faith along the way…
Damn… the list goes on and on and on, and the danger with starting it is that I am doomed to have it be incomplete.
This list actually isn’t intended to be a comprehensive thank you list.
My point is, I was trying use the blog to say thanks to those people, you people, along the way.

And then it also, recently, began a small networking opportunity for me.
For me, a little online support community has sprung up between hooking up with Louise and Cancerbaby and Limbodacious and reading what J’s daughter has to say about her mom’s ovarian cancer.

It’s not a disease I would wish on anyone.

And if I could guarantee that none of us would ever have to deal with ovarian cancer or any of its offshoot annoyances, I would jump right on that.
But I certainly do appreciate the sense of community.
The ability to talk about how it is right now, and how it might be in the future, with some pretty razor sharp women has been a real relief for me.
See, ovarian cancer tends to hit women who are about 20 years older than me.
And, you may not understand this, but someone like me, talking about my ailing girl parts, doesn’t make a good fit in those OVCA chat rooms.
Tends to frighten the locals.

I really appreciate that these women are out here blogging.

But that isn’t really what I came here to talk about
I came here to talk about blogging in a larger sense.
I read this article about “blogging from your sickbed” (ghastly title, by the way) and thought people ought to read it
(though you may have to sign up for a subscription if you are reading this any time time after it is still steaming in its freshness from being posted.)
I think this blogging we are doing is actually really interesting and ultimately really important.
Maybe it’s the dormant anthropologist in me, but I think these stories are going to go a long way towards changing how other people experience similar situations.
That’s what I think.