Normally, columnist Dan Barry at The New York Times travels around the country and writes fascinating, insightful stories about regular people.
But this week, Barry turns his pen upon himself to discuss one of the least-discussed and least-understood — outside of cancer survivor circles, that is — side-effects of chemotherapy.
It’s called “chemo brain.”
There’s an old saw that Barry quotes in his column about how “cancer tends to focus the mind.” Well, chemotherapy tends to unfocus it. Those powerful, hateful chemicals that are surging through the body, meant to track down and vanquish killer cancer cells, also have the tendency to fog the mind. Once dismissed as side-effects of patient age or fatigue, the American Cancer Society reports that studies show some of those chemicals do have an effect on the brain.
In his very personal remembrance of two rounds of chemotherapy, Barry talks about the brain fog many patients experience after chemo, and maybe never go away. But for his part, Barry found he thought clearer during chemo, was able to prioritize, to focus sharply on things that mattered — to let go, as he described, and quit worrying about who got the last of the Vienna Fingers.
Perhaps the most important lesson he learned from his two bouts with cancer had little to do with the disease itself, Barry ultimately realizes. It was this clarity, this sense of perspective, that he took away from the extra lucidity chemotherapy afforded him.
That’s something the doctors couldn’t have predicted, and a reminder that even with the most advanced and carefully studied medical techniques, there remain some mysteries to be discovered.