[Spoiler alert, this post contains profanity and a not so shameless plug for an amazing organization: Gilda's Club of Madison.]  

In case you haven't heard I'm still cancer-free and loving remission! I had another follow up scan last month that was clean! I still felt the lingering effects of the chemotherapy though May, but over the past 3 months I'm starting to hit my stride and get back to my true passions and loving all the continued support from my people (aka you)!

I was just looking back through all my posts and in some ways the beginning of 2019 seems so surreal.  I know I was there.  I've see the pictures.  But in some ways I couldn't be fully present.  Maybe it was the brain-mushing chemo + debilitating nausea + bonus-brain-mushing anti-nausea meds. Maybe it is part of a primal defense mechanism buried deep in my lizard brain. Maybe my cancer journey sucked my one lonely ball so fucking badly that I just needed to Elsa up and "Let it go".  I like to think it's because the pre-chemo, intra-chemo and post-chemo me was surrounded by so much goodness there was no room left all that negativity.  It was just squeezed out, a pimple to be popped.

Regardless of the why, rarely do I let myself back to that place;  I was there, but it didn't feel like me.  I couldn't be the dad I wanted to be, I couldn't go to work and take care of my patients, I was too sick to be a partner, a lover, a giver.  It was just my shell.  A hairless, weakened, nauseated Gepner on the outside, but the inside, the good stuff, the stuff that matters, the stuff that makes me me had melted away.  Thankfully though (spoiler-alert) the cancer melted too.

Well.  I'm back now with drive for life that is coming at you like Pope's mint green '56 Old Mobile Super 88, cream interior, windows down, and the FM radio blasting all our favorite songs!  My new gloriously curly hair is blowing in the wind but still looking fantastic thanks to the Coconut Diva Curl hair product on my bathroom counter. 

And now we are celebrating.  All things amazing in life and even the things that aren't so amazing.  And we are remembering.  Remembering that not all of us are so lucky.  Sometimes those cancer cells divide too fast or don't respond  to treatment.  We are lucky because we are alive today and have the power to act and change ourselves and our attitudes when life decides to squat down and take a giant watery shit on us (the worst kind of shit in my opinion, though feel to comment below if you disagree).  

Throughout it all, I have not laughed with or cried with a single person who's life has not been affected by cancer in some way.  During times like these, we often need extra support.  For me and Mandi and our families the outpouring of support was and continues to be incredible.  We tapped in to cancers best kept secret: Gilda's Club of Madison.  

People kept tellings us to go.
I kept wanting to believe that we didn't need more support.  

Then I finally went.
At my sickest and weakest point.  
And wished that I'd gone way earlier.

We went to support groups and social events.  We met people who were struggling on different but similar journeys.  We laughed together, we cried together.  Some of us went in remission.  Some of us, despite everything, had recurrences.  A few of us died.  We saw them.  We saw their families.  And Gilda's was there every step of the way helping people after getting slapped in the face by cancer.  And Gilda's always will be there.  Even when no one else is.  

And it's all free.   

Every service, every meal, every group.  All.  Free.  

Now that I feel like myself again, I want to ensure that all people who are suffering with or because of cancer have the resources that I had.  

So please come support the organization who thanklessly supported me and all my fellow cancer patients and our families and loved ones.  

Join us at Wisconsin Brewing Company on Saturday August 24th 2019 from 5-11 pm.  Suggested donation of $20 also gets you a free beer!  Live music! Food Carts!  Bring the kids.  Bring your friends.  Bring your dog.  All money raised will go to support Gilda's Club of Madison.  

If for some crazy reason you can't come giver (as in give her [cancer] hell), and are in a position to make a monetary donation, please click here!  Mention "Censored Cancer" in the comment section so we can track the money we raise!

I really hope to see you there! 

XO,
Adam

P.S.  If you didn't catch us on Talk Wisconsin, you gotta check it out!  Click here!