Work Status Report

This is the email I sent to HR, my supervisor, and a coworker. It explains my current situation pretty well.

I'm making great progress. Energy levels and attitude are greatly improved, but I had a long ways to go. This is a process, and not a quick fix.

FMLA was approved last week. It expires June 6. Short Term Disability is still being decided. There's supposed to be a decision this week. I'm confident it will be approved. If it is approved, it is scheduled for review in July. My oncologist thinks September is a realistic time frame for recovery. He wants to review my status in July, so that is the time frame for the STD claim right now. The review in July will determine if an extension to the STD is requested.

I expect I will have a permanent need to get regular exercise. To return to a normal work schedule, I will have to be able to get an hour of exercise daily in addition to working. I was struggling to stay awake on my 10-minute drive home from work. Going to a gym was completely out of the question.

I'd like to say a special thanks to Drew. Drew said he'd have me in his prayers and I believe it was his prayers that led me to this course of action, which is literally saving my life.

The rest of this is my current condition. From a professional standpoint, it is not vital information, and you may stop reading at this point if you are only interested in the date of my potential return to work.

The first weekend after I took PTO, I was only able to wake up for meals and maybe an hour before or after a meal. That was pretty alarming. One day a weekend had been that way for a while, but not both. That led me to set up unscheduled visits with my cancer specialists. That was difficult on short notice and some "penciled in" appointments didn't work out. I think the extra day of inability to stay awake was God's way of telling me to get some help. Thanks for your prayers, Drew.

The doctors were alarmed. If fatigue and energy levels get worse, cancer fatigue is progressive. Any progression past only waking for meals for an entire weekend is borderline invalid and certainly eliminates the ability to work a normal work week. The progression has the body slowly shutting down and is terminal. I was probably in the range of 3 years of survival and less than a year of being able to attend work. That's "attend" - not perform anything useful.

When I mowed my lawn, I realized my energy levels had deteriorated significantly from last fall. It bordered on "drastic" instead of "significant".

When I first took PTO, I checked how long I could stay awake when not in a work situation. The limit was 5 hours from waking until falling asleep. That's not feeling tired and taking a nap. That's falling asleep and falling out of a chair while trying to do things at a computer. At work, I was getting coffee when I felt that coming on. I was staying awake only from the caffeine. That includes coffee in the afternoons, which kept me awake late at night and added sleep deprivation to everything else going on.

Something I've figured out about cancer fatigue is that no one wants to admit they've got it. Everyone wants to think they're getting better and can handle their situation. Admitting you're fatigued, exhausted, or tired is seen by others as laziness or seeking sympathy for "I had cancer". That leads to denial - and that denial can be the final straw in losing a battle against cancer.

Aetna has me in a wellness program where I get a call from a counselor every two weeks. She checks on my progress and wants to know details of what I'm doing to get the exercise I need. The Mayo Clinic has kept me in their trial studying ginseng as something to add to recovery from cancer fatigue. My primary doc found some hormone levels that need adjustment and affect energy and attitude levels. That is being addressed and showing good results.

Between the Aetna wellness program and the Mayo trial, I have people checking my attitude about once a week. In March I was at about an overall 2 (out of 10). I'm running at about 7 on my overall attitude about things now.