Dear Multiple Myeloma:

Do you remember me?

I am the poor sap that you decided to terrorize during Thanksgiving week of 2008.

Although it was five years ago, I well remember the cool and crisp weather of that late November and how the changing leaves painted a stunningly beautiful backdrop across the forests, the rolling hills, and the sunken hollows of the Ozarks.

I also recall that as my family began to plan our annual Thanksgiving festivities, you brutishly interrupted our designs by dragging me down into the depths of your mad, mad world.

I first became aware of my duel with you innocently enough. A little twinge in the middle of my back grew more painful day by day, and before I could mount a defense, you had laid claim to my blood and to my bones.

Little did I know that for years you had been fiendishly working away in my marrow.

It wasn’t enough for you to trouble just me – you also had to hurt my wife and children. You see, my suffering was their suffering. That is what love is.

Instead of being together with our kids during that fateful Thanksgiving week in 2008, my wife and I had to travel several hours away to a medical facility created chiefly to treat people tormented by you.

To our great surprise, I was admitted to a ward for severely ill myeloma patients on the very first day of what was to be three days of diagnostic testing.

Doctors quickly confirmed that you, Multiple Myeloma, were the source of my immense and mysterious pain.

Their consensus was that my situation was grave. They told my wife that they couldn’t understand how I could walk with so many fractures, particularly with collapsed vertebrae. They soberly encouraged me to seek immediate treatment, even if it wasn’t with them at their hospital.

So instead of being able to look forward to donning my flannel pajamas and curling up on the couch next to my wife and kids on Thanksgiving morning, specifically to watch the marching bands, the massive floats, and helium-filled cartoon balloons of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, I was forced to contemplate my situation in a hospital room wearing a decidedly drafty open-backed gown.

Instead of hoping to kick back and enjoy a game (or three) of good, old Thanksgiving Day football on television with my buddies, I was subjected to PET scans and MRIs and tests of various descriptions.

And instead of helping to put the mother of all jigsaw puzzles together in the family room, I was the puzzle that the dedicated docs were trying to figure out how to put back together.

Although I was not able to eat because of my pain and overwhelming nausea, I nonetheless thought about the veritable cornucopia of food that would be lovingly and masterfully prepared for the late afternoon feast.

I thought about the joining of hands with friends and family at the dinner table as we would bless the meal and give thanks for the goodness showered upon us throughout the year.

But what I would miss more than anything, more than I imagined possible, were my five- and eleven-year-old daughters.

I thought about how they would peer out of the windows at the November sky, and with fingers crossed, would hope that fluffy snow clouds would magically appear and proceed to blanket everything in a brilliant winter white.

I pictured them cheering as Mom carried in the turkey. I pictured them fighting over the wishbone. I pictured them falling asleep in my arms as the day wore on and the tryptophan took hold.

I even pictured my dogs begging for scraps on the greatest scrap day of the year.

As that Monday in the hospital turned into Tuesday, and Tuesday into Wednesday, and Wednesday into Thanksgiving Day, we learned that a major question on the table was whether we should first lessen the tumor burden in my body with chemotherapy and then try to reconstruct my damaged vertebrae or whether I should undergo major back surgery first and then hit the cancer with chemo.

The prevailing opinion, eventually offered late on Wednesday, was that we consider shrinking the tumors first and then undergo surgery to fix the spinal issues later.

I asked the doctors when we should begin chemotherapy, and they said that the following Monday would be ideal.

I then shocked them and said that as it was Thanksgiving Day, I was going home to be with my children. And against the consulting team’s advice, that’s what we did.

My doc stepped forward and gave me strict instructions about how to travel, what to do if I got into trouble, and how to contact him day or night. Little did I know how important he would become to my wife and to me over the ensuing years.

So we packed up the van, securely wrapped me head-to-toe in pillows and blankets, and headed the four hours home to be with our kids and friends on Thanksgiving Day.

But all of that is just background. What I really want to tell you, Multiple Myeloma, is this:

Even though these last five years have been more than difficult, horrible in some ways, you have not succeeded in dampening my spirits, crushing my faith, or driving away the joy and laughter and love in my life.

I realize that I may succumb to the ravages of your craftwork, but you will never win my soul.

I will continue to encourage others whom you are trying destroy, just as they continue to encourage me.

I will always recognize that if it weren’t for the brilliant efforts of countless people through the years, I would not be here today.

I will continue to pray and believe that you, and those of your ilk, will someday be vanquished.

And I am sorry, Multiple Myeloma, despite your efforts, I am still here to celebrate Thanksgiving!