4 days ago
Cancer Diaries: Where I almost fall off an escalator and get reminded I'm a fall risk
JULY 16 — I almost fell off an escalator the other day and it made me so angry.
Yes, I know someone reading this assumed perhaps I was careless, inattentive, staring at my phone or somehow distracted.
My phone was in my bag. I was staring straight ahead.
One arm gripping the handrail, both feet planted firmly on the step.
Yet for a brief moment I felt disoriented all of a sudden and I swayed backward.
If I hadn't been holding on tightly the back of my head would have met the floor; it was terrifying as I held on trying to right myself.
This, despite when I'm walking on level ground always having to fight my body trying to hunch over like Gollum.
I hate being reminded about how much more fragile I am but at the same time I now get why people will avoid the stairs/escalators and choose the lift.
The only reason I was out and about was because I needed cat food and my picky tabby only likes a specific type — no mousse, no jelly, no chicken, only soupy or with gravy and I'd forgotten to order some online.
Not that I'm not getting better.
It doesn't hurt sitting down getting into a car now though getting out is another story.
Some days I still get disoriented at odd times — I found myself doing a 360 degree turn in the bathroom, like my head couldn't quite grasp where I was until I spun around.
Still I'm very conscious that besides my near-bald head I don't look sick so I'm sure people get judgy about the way I walk or my hasty shuffle into an MRT lift.
Being hyper-vigilant is exhausting, though.
I continue to lightly tread on my mini-trampoline, no energetic jumps just stepping in place or to the side, occasionally incorporating arm boxing movements and pacing myself.
When I first got it I couldn't even stand being on it for more than a couple of minutes. I got too winded.
Now I regularly do the bounce for at least 10 minutes after meals and my resting heart rate has improved.
Still, my near-fall is a reminder that all I can do is try and cross my fingers.
On social media Malaysians grumble a lot seeing our politicians happily post photos of themselves doing walkabouts in foreign countries that would not be possible here.
Sure, someone wrote, Malaysia is very walkable if you have no fear for your life!
I would just like everywhere to be walkable because even our hospitals are not exactly wheelchair-friendly, despite their nature.
Having taken the walking paths around KL General Hospital I note how uneven some pavements are and the crossings that would be difficult to navigate if I was solo in a wheelchair.
Meanwhile the woman I'm quietly stalking on Threads had given up on trying to get zakat to fund her medication.
She was told that she needed to redo her application, after she had followed up with not one but two offices to ask if they needed anything else from her.
It's harrowing to see the hoops people need to jump just to survive.
There is plenty of zakat money — why is it so hard to access for those who need it? What is this gatekeeping from what zakat was meant for?
Having to go to a third zakat office after the first two gave her the runaround, I know she must be so tired.
No one should struggle this hard to afford life saving medication and treatments.
Fortunately by the time I finished drafting this column, her application had been re-assessed and approved.
The road to the end of my treatment is within sight, coincidentally around my birthday next year.
For other people like this woman the future is still uncertain and a long, expensive road full of trials such as bureaucratic red tape awaits them.
Depressingly, instead of making treatment more accessible, we now have a new paid tier for public healthcare.
One doctor said on X, now patients are going to grumble at us saying they paid extra, why aren't they getting seen faster?
The problem: too few doctors, too many patients.
The solution, apparently, is to give the people the option to pay more to get seen first.
I am not sure what problem this solution solves but I hope people get angry enough to make their dissatisfaction over this, the government's problem.
