Sounds dramatic doesn’t it? Also maybe a little contradictory.

Firstly, though, Happy New Year!

I know it hasn’t started the best for some people that I know, and my heart and thoughts go out to them.

For the rest of you, I hope you’ve had a great start. And that you survived the festive period however you chose to celebrate it.

Regardless of what happens or what we do the great wheel of life keeps turning and we have to deal with what it throws at us. From the very best to the very worst of times. It’s a journey we keep walking until it’s our time to shuffle off this planet of ours and start a new journey somewhere over on the other side.

Which leads me onto the second part of the title of this post. Don’t worry though, it’s not all doom and gloom. Be brave, read on and you’ll find out what this is all about.

I’ve had to make friends with death and come to be at peace with him. It was a process but I got there. I’ll explain what I mean in a moment, and it could all get very philosophical.

First though I have to acknowledge the picture which is by DreamWorks Animation. Taken from the second Puss in Boots movie ‘The Last Wish’. If you haven’t seen it you really should. Death disguised as The Big Bad Wolf finally catches up with Puss in Boots and, yeah, well, you’ll have to watch it. It’s relevant though to me, especially the scenes towards the end.

I referred to death as a he, but it could be a she or maybe neither. However, to me, death definitely came to visit as a he. Now don’t panic, I’m not about to die. I don’t have a death sentence but I did have to face death. And it’s an unnerving experience having to face your own mortality. Not comfortable at all.

I can’t speak for other people, only myself, when it comes to this. It’s a strange one this death business. I’ve lost both my parents, other relatives and friends to death. The pain and sorrow that comes with that is something that has to be gone through. I don’t believe you should hide from it. That’s what I think now anyway. I’m not so sure I was so mentally and emotionally able to cope with it when I was younger. But that was then and this is now. It’s inevitable that one day death will tap us all on the shoulder and say “You have to come with me now.” Some of us will be ready for it and some of us won’t. To some it may come as a complete surprise.

For me, I’m ready. I’ve made friends with death and I’m not scared of him. Having said that I’ve no intention of crossing the great divide anytime soon. I’d like another twenty years at least, thank you very much. I’ve got a lot to live for. I want to watch my daughter grow up, spend more time with my beautiful wife Danielle, hang out with family and friends, travel to other parts of the planet that I haven’t seen yet as well as visiting those I’ve been to before. I want to finish writing my novel and hopefully get it published, and I could go on, but I won’t. You get the idea.

Now I may not be scared of death anymore but I still have the utmost respect for him. You have to respect death no matter what guise he comes to you in, or however you choose to perceive him. It is the one thing in life that is guaranteed to come to us all. There is no escape from that eventual tap on the shoulder. It is that certainty that forced me to face my own mortality and to stop running.

Death has helped me to live more in the moment. To try and be present all the time when possible. Yes, I have goals and aspirations as mentioned above but they are only achievable if I focus on today. I can only control the present moment. I can’t change the past and who knows what the future will throw at me. I’ll cross those bridges when I get to them. To influence the future I need to learn from the past, but I can only act in the present moment. What I do now can sometimes shape what happens tomorrow, but not always.

I wasn’t prepared for my cancer diagnosis. Not by any stretch of the imagination. I knew I was ill but I didn’t realise it was going to be that bad. It was a bolt from the blue and I was completely unprepared. At that point I became very scared of death. He had the upper hand and if I’d given in to him I wouldn’t be here now. I think that may happen to some people, they give in and death whisks them away. It’s so important that you don’t give in. I found the more I feared death the closer he got. He hovered on my shoulder asking me if I wanted to go with him. I swear at times I even heard his voice asking me to come home. I was going down hill rapidly, on my way out. Emotionally and mentally I was preparing myself to say goodbye to everybody. I really thought I was going to die.

I cried a lot. Danielle and Kael cried a lot. My family in England were on alert in case they had to come over at short notice. I was going through the swings and roundabouts of haemotology (oncology for blood cancers) appointments, having scans, biopsies, getting results. How bad was it? It was bad. Stage 4 diagnosis is never good. Prognosis was uncertain. That was based on averages. The average was five years, but who knows what that could mean in reality. But I was sick and going downhill fast. Death was standing at my shoulder smiling and waiting.

What treatment plan was I going to do?

Not the mainstream one as I’ve mentioned before because that was only a stay of execution. Yes, if I was lucky I might get fourteen years. That sounds ok when you think about it, until you realise that means I would die at sixty nine. Too young for my liking. At the other end of the scale I might only get a year. Which means I would be dead now. That’s a sobering thought.

So I chose another route, which you’ll know from reading previous posts. It’s a longer route as it could take a couple of years or more before I’m cancer free. But the main thing is I’m still alive. Still living life in the moment and still keeping one eye on my goals.

This other route only came about though because of the actions of others. As death was getting very close to holding my hand something amazing happened. People came out of nowhere and started offering information. Whether it was directly to me or whether it was to Danielle. Friends and strangers recommended books to read. Books I’d never heard of and probably still wouldn’t if it wasn’t for the diagnosis. Websites to check out, videos to watch, practitioners who could maybe help. Information about people who had survived terminal prognoses without going down the mainstream route. I even met one. An incredible lady who’d been given two weeks to live. Nearly two years later she’s still alive.

Something changed inside of me. I got a new lease of life. There was an alternative to death, but I still needed to confront him and eventually make friends with him.

I stoped running, turned around and faced my own mortality. I think maybe you can only do this when you are put in a life and death situation. I was in one. Either I found a way to overcome cancer or I was going to die.

Like most people, until I got my diagnosis, I didn’t think too much about death. Yes, I’d lost people and yes that changed me but I’d never been the one with death at my shoulder. Now I was, so I turned around.

I overcame my fear of death. I turned around, faced my mortality, and embraced death. It’s very hard to put into words how I did this. There was a lot of soul searching, meditating, talking to death, talking to God. I felt at times that I was hovering in that world somewhere between life and death, wandering what it was all about. Until I looked death squarely in the eyes and said “I’m not coming yet. You can’t have me. I’ve been scared of you but now I’m not. But I’m not going to run away from you either. I know you’re there, you always will be and one day I’ll come home with you. But not today. I’m going to get better and I’m going to live a longer life. You can have me one day, but that day will be a long way into the future. Can we come to an agreement on that?”

Since that moment a massive weight has lifted from my shoulders. I feel alive and I live without fear. I still have common sense but I’ve let go of the fear. Fear serves no purpose other than to drag me down. Fear I realised is the enemy, not death. Death doesn’t intentionally instil fear in us. We do that to ourselves. Death just has a job to do, which is to let us know when it’s time to cross over to the other side. You can decide whether you want to be scared of him or not. I choose not to be afraid anymore. I now look on death as an old friend who comes into my life to ask me if I want to come home. One day I will take him up on the offer but just not yet.

Did I reach an agreement with him? Well I’m not sure. I don’t know if you can bargain with death but I tried. Maybe it worked maybe it didn’t. I’ve tried to make a deal with God and death. It’s like asking “What do you want from me in exchange for a longer life?” The biggest answer I got was “Be yourself 100%. Be the real you.” Now you might think that’s easy, but it’s not. First you have to look at yourself and find the real you. Do you really know who you are? Really, truly? How often do you compromise who you are for others? But more importantly; how often do you compromise who you are for yourself? Think about that for a moment.

If you’d like a deeper insight into this there’s a book that’s well worth reading by Anita Moorjani called “Dying to Be Me”. She had Hodgkins Lymphoma that was diagnosed as stage two but progressed, over four years, to stage four. Stage four is the worst you can be, until death comes along. I won’t say anymore, just read the book. Don’t pre-judge it when you see what it’s about. Just go in with an open mind. You might actually benefit from it.

I will keep discovering the real me and will live life to the best of my ability. I know what I need to do and as long as I do it then life goes on. I’ll keep to my treatment plan until I’m told it needs to change, I’ll keep writing until I’m told to stop and I’ll keep living life to the best of my ability.

That’s the best advice I could give anyone. Live life to the best of your ability. Dig deep and never give up. Love and allow yourself to be loved. Smile, have fun. Live in the moment but at the same time make goals for the future. Most importantly don’t be scared of death as you have no control when he’s going to tap you on the shoulder. Overcome the fear and live. Discover yourself. Who are you? Who’s the real you?

Like I said I’ve tried to make an agreement with death and God. I can only try, that’s all anyone can do. Will I get the twenty years or longer that I would like? I don’t know. I’m planning on it, I’m working towards it and I’ve got the mindset to achieve it. At the end of the day though if death decides time’s up then so be it. I don’t feel him as close to my shoulder as I did just over a year ago, which is a relief, so I’ll keep going. One day at a time. Days turn into weeks, weeks turn into months and months turn into years. One foot in front of the other. Just keep going and enjoy the journey as much as is possible. Just be me. Oh, and you, just be you.

So, I’ve made friends with death. He no longer stands at my shoulder. He’s not an enemy to be feared but an old friend to be embraced. After all one day he will lead me home and when that time comes I will be ready. Just not yet. Now go and watch the Puss in Boots movie ‘The Last Wish’. It may just surprise you.

Love, Jon