ABSTRACT
After the fourth chemotherapy treatment my psyche joins my body in its state of rebellion. I cannot do it again. I thought it would get easier as the body adjusted to the onslaught, but this last treatment was utterly unbearable. As I begin to recover enough to take stock, I list the symptoms to myself: the vomiting has gone on longer than usual; diarrhoea now accompanies it; the fingers and toes have lost almost all feeling; the few stray eyebrow hairs have fallen; the tinnitus is becoming deafening as I lie awake at night. The accumulation of side-effects suggests a body that has reached its limit, a frame stretched to breaking point. This body is in serious revolt; its functions have gone haywire; its surfaces are no longer familiar. Just as my bodily flows have gone into reverse, so my will-power has finally changed direction. Without my noticing, I have become unable to imagine subjecting myself to the final treatment. I know I am supposed to repeat the performance just one more time, but something in me resists the inevitability of the prescribed course of five doses. Previously I had felt confident in my endless supply of stamina for physical endurance, but I now find myself drained of it. Even anger fails to energise.
