Cancer and Termites

There are a lot of analogies in life where two dissimilar things or events turn out to be comparable. Sometimes I call this "same only different."

I've taken on a project to replace all the windows in my house. I'm doing it pretty much one window at a time -- tear one out, replace and finish, then move on to the next. This approach is the slowest because the windows have to be custom ordered and it takes a month from the order date until the delivery date. Of course, another reason not to bite off too much at one time is that the replacement windows take up a lot of storage space and there is always the possibility a window pane could come in contact with an accidentally misguided missile. I may speed things up a bit later on when I come to windows that are framed identically. My house has brick walls on three sides. The windows I am doing first are in the brick walls. Since the window size is dictated by the brick opening, there is some variability from one window to the next which necessitates customized ordering.

The current window slated for replacement is the south facing bedroom window. A month or so ago, we noticed some little indentions on the wall adjacent to the left side of the south window. We feared it might be water damage or something. I even thought it might be paint blistering. We didn't dare mention the "T" word. We figured it was something simple and wasn't doing any harm so we left it alone for cosmetic reasons.

When I began tearing the framing away from the window, it became instantly obvious we had a termite problem. There is the "T" word. It was undeniable. The framing on the bottom and left was riddled with termite trails and covered in crusty red termite mud. The right side had no damage but did have signs of termite wanderings.

The little indentions in the wall were places where ravenous termites ate the paper off the sheet rock. They left the paint and the gypsum alone which left a void everywhere they went. And believe me when I say they DO like to wander around seemingly aimlessly. There was a trail from the ceiling to the baseboard. I went outside and found a termite tunnel on the foundation outside opposite the damage inside. I immediately removed the tunnel, mixed some termite poison, and poured the poison in the termite tunnel where it emerged from the ground and in the surrounding area. I also checked it several days later to make sure they didn't rebuild while I had my back turned.

Now, you might be wondering to yourself, "how could cancer possibly be related to this termite problem of yours?" Well, if you are wondering, think of the similarities. Obviously, I was not inspecting my foundation thoroughly enough or I would have found the termite tunnel early on and eradicated the problem. We had the problem for a long time before symptoms emerged. When symptoms did emerge, we rationalized and denied the real problem and tried to find an easy explanation. The termites were permitted to do their damage secretly over a long period of time. Fortunately, in this case all the damage was repaired as good as new.

Cancer is an insidious (having a gradual and cumulative effect, developing so gradually as to be well established before becoming apparent - Webster) disease. It is also a patient disease. People often (but not always as in the case of acute myeloid leukemia) have it for ten or fifteen years before symptoms begin to display in their forties, fifties, and sixties. Often, when there are symptoms, doctors and patients are caught up in a denial/rationalization syndrome that looks for simple explanations because, "Cancer can't be happening to me." Often, cancer is the last thing we suspect after the obvious damage is discovered too late.

And finally, the moral of the story is, be vigilant (alertly watchful especially to avoid danger - Webster). As in the example above, regular examinations are the first line of defense against cancer (in addition to some preventative measures like smoking cessation). If you are a female (and even some men - don't laugh), have (and/or do) regular breast examinations. Also, females only, get an annual PAP test. If you are a male, get an annual prostrate exam which includes blood work to determine your PSA level. If you are at least fifty years old, have a lower intestinal examination otherwise known as a colonoscophy done every five years. And last but not least, go to your doctor for an annual physical exam which includes some of the aforementioned items and blood work which includes a complete blood count (CBC), comprehensive metabolic panel (CMP), and lipid profile at least once a year (and maybe twice a year if you are over fifty).

I realize this is a lot of stuff that most folks would rather skip and not think about and many folks do. But, in the words of a friend I knew many years ago whose wife died from breast cancer, "What you don't know could hurt you." And above all, train yourself not to deny the possibility of cancer and rationalize the symptoms into the simplest explanation - constant pain doesn't get better, doesn't get worse, doesn't go away with standard treatment... it's past time to get a second opinion, MRI, catscan, second opinion again, not necessarily in that order.