Stage 4 Thor

You may have noticed in some of my pictures that I have a bump on my chest. This bump, or port, is how they have administered chemotherapy and checked my blood over the past 3 years. While it might look painful it is actually a luxury to have one. The number of pokes in the arm that they would have to do over the years while receiving various treatments would be far too many, and my veins would eventually be damaged.  It is painful to have put in and removed, but the alternative was 1000 pokes.  The port connects a direct line through my chest up to the main artery in my neck.  Literally a direct line! Yesterday I had it taken out.  I was awake for the procedure both times. Both when it went in and yesterday when it came out. While you are numb and the doctors do everything they can to make it painless, there is this tug in your neck.  It feels awkward and you know they are pulling on some pretty important stuff in there but ultimately no pain.  Just pressu...

As I have mentioned in the past, our emotions are based on our thoughts which are based on our beliefs, experiences, values, etc.  Emotions are difficult to control, so I am not going to suggest that you simply “get over it” or “snap out of it”.  Emotions feel very real to us, and therefore are real.  What you CAN control are the thoughts that propagate those feelings.   I know many self-help professionals focus on emotional discipline and control, but what I am trying to do is acknowledge that your emotion(s) are absolutely real, but I also want to challenge the thought that triggers it/them. Our thoughts are in our domain of control. Most of us make critical thinking errors every day, which cloud our emotions and hurt us. Worse still, can lead to bad decisions. Some of these decisions can be more costly than others, but if you are in any decision-making business, it is vital that you operate on all the information available. When you have a bad feeling wr...