barbed wire canoe

2.

Published by Prior Art Pty Ltd Level 16 379 Collins Street MELBOURNE VIC 3000

© 2010 Rosa Niran Images

© 2010 Rosa Niran Text

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or loading into any information storage and retrieval system, without the permission in writing of the publisher

First Edition 15 July 2010

The moral rights of the author have been asserted.

ISBN 978-1-921625-02-2 (Paperback)

Graphic design by Nicola Hardy, Secret Envelope Productions

Front cover image:

Up yours chemo and cancer!Acrylic, 400 x 400

barbed wire canoe ~ rosa niran

3.

contents

5 introduction

7 1. anticipating the disease

15 2. surgery (the operation)

29 3. radiology

37 4. chemotherapy

51 5. chuck

57 6. distressed

65 7. femara

73 8. london

81 9. on the edge

85 10. suicide

89 11. parallel stresses

99 12. port

103 13. fear of death

109 14. leaving everyone behind

117 15. preparing for death

127 16. post therapy

138 coda

5.

INTRODUCTION

This is an art book that records the feelings and concerns I had during 3 years of cancer treatment. It describes a journey from confusion and fear to some sort of functional peace.

I use paintings to describe feelings I have no words for. When they appear before me I can see them and conquer them. Some times this is easy. Mostly it is hard. The thing I have learnt that once it is out on a drawing, on the canvas, it is outside my mind and I can find temporary peace.

The canvases formed a discussion between myself and Dr Dianne Clifton who helped move me along this journey. In the end I realised that the person who held me back from my greatest feelings of fear was my partner Michael Prior to whom the last section is dedicated. In this section I try to show the sort of support he offers me and the way it is helping me face both living and dying.

Coffin No.1 (top)Acrylic, 560 x 600

I think of myself as dead from cancer and falling to pieces in my coffin.

6.

Coffin No.2 (bottom)

Acrylic, 600 x 700

Will my bones still hurt if I fall to pieces in my grave?

7.

1. ANTICIPATING THE DISEASE

Things are strange in my body. My legs are very painful. It is that deep pain in my bones, my head, my eyes, pain that never stops. I recognise the depth of that pain. It’s cancer again.

This probably means secondaries from beast cancer. Who decided to name cancer after a body part? Metastasis! It sounds an even stranger word. Strikes fear right into your being. I don’t want to face the fact that it is cancer again, but now they will name it after other spots on my body. It’s sure to be new primaries. I have passed the magic 5 years when I am supposed to be clear of any worries.

If I face it, I have to recognise it and then I have it diagnosed. It’s a commitment. It’s a commitment to a prescribed journey, guided by someone who knows better than me. They will be in charge of my life for the foreseeable future. I will have to learn new terms, new medications and a new way of living. I am not prepared yet.

I think I have it in my eye. Is it possible to have it in your eye socket? I can’t face up to seeing a doctor so I think the worst. The world is all tracing paper. I don’t want to tear it away so I can see clearly, but I suppose I must.

The sooner I face it the better it will be. I tell myself, but I don’t believe it. I want to stay wrapped up in the paper, in a suspended state, in a fog and not facing the inevitable. And what if the inevitable is death. How will it feel to be in a coffin?

8.

Coffin No.2 (Top)

Acrylic, 560 x 600

I am completely dead and broken up.

9.

Coffin No.2 (Top)

Acrylic, 600 x 700

In death I will be broken up and destroyed.

11.

Left: Filter of Fear No.1 Acrylic, 400 x 400

Is there a way I can think patiently about my pain without fearing the worst?

Above: Filter of Fear No.2, Filter of Fear No.3, Filter of Fear No.4, Filter of Fear No.5 Acrylic, 400 x 400

Fear clouds my vision and colours all my actions. I cannot face the fact that this pain might be cancer again.

12.

Filter of Fear No.6 Acrylic, 400 x 400

The pain is making everything fall apart for me.

13.

Filter of Fear No.7 Acrylic, 400 x 400

I cannot get past the fear to face the truth.

15.

2. SURGERY (THE OPERATION)

They send me for an x-ray and I carry the results in a big envelope, Should I read it before I see the doctor? It’s my body and my x-ray. I will read the results!

It is not good. Bone cancer in my thighbones, in my ribs, in my eye socket and in my skull. Worse still I have large primaries in my liver. Will I die? It looks bad. I better make my will. Next I talk to my sons about the results and prepare them for the worste. I am not afraid to die. At least the pain will stop. I think about my funeral. I think about leaving everyone. Already I feel distant and separate.

Currently I cannot walk. I cannot. The pain is very bad in my legs. The doctor decides to insert metal rods in my thighbones, as the bones are so thin. I will now be bionic. Strangers lift me. My limbs are not my own. In my effort to walk after the operation I have broken my legs again. The pain dominates. No amount of medication salves it. The opiates simply create a dopey, fractured world.

Left: Fracture Watercolour and pencil, 400 x 400

My body feels like many bodies broken up by the dull continuous pain in my bones.

16.

Surgery No.1, Surgery No.2 , Surgery No.3 Acrylic on paper, 300 x 450

In the strange light I am gently lifted and carried by strangers were ever they want.

17.

Surgery No.4, Surgery No.5, Surgery No.16 Acrylic on paper, 300 x 450

My drugged body is not my own. It is a medical minefield.

18.

Disassociation No.1 Watercolour and pencil on paper, 300 x 450

Nothing is firm and familiar anymore. It falls away at my touch.

19.

Disassociation No.2 Watercolour and pencil on paper, 300 x 450

The surfaces of my skin are unravelling rapidly.

20.

Headache.No1 Watercolour and pencil on paper, 300 x 450

The pain in my head is a violent red.

21.

Headache No.2 Watercolour and pencil on paper, 300 x 450

Huge rocks press on my mind and in my eyes.

22.

Lumpectomy Oil, 600 x 700

I feel like the surgeons have cut into my breast with shards of glass.

23.

Psychology Oil, 600 x 700

“How do you feel, inside” they ask. How do you think I feel!

24.

Dichotomy No 1 Oil, 300x400

All my current plans and thoughts are shattered. My life is on hold.

25.

Dichotomy No 2 Oil, 300x400

I no longer see myself as the same person. My image of my body is fractured.

27.

Left: Dichotomy No 3 Oil, 300x400

Nothing. Nothing stops the pain.

Above: Thigh Oil, 700x600

It’s no longer whole. They are going to hammer steel into my thigh and I am worried.

29.

3. RADIOLOGY

They have made a magic mask for me. It is large and white and made of plastic. It is moulded to my head and neck. I lie down on a narrow metal bed in the Radiology Room. The fine speaking radiologists cheerfully screw this mask to the metal bed. This mask holds me down rigidly to secure my head to the cold steel. No moving. They may irradiate the wrong part of my eye or my skull if I move. The red laser telemetry beams locate me in space. Who would have thought that all those years I used telemetry beams for construction and now they will use it to burn out bad cancers in me.

The mask is a fantastic piece of construction. It is both beautiful and terrifying. It holds my head and eyes still. The rest of the body is strapped down so they can irradiate my ribs and legs

The coloured zap it creates stays in my mind’s eye long after it is over. Great lightening flashes fill my head. Bright blue flashes penetrate everything. The only thing between the lightening and my eyes is this fantastic mask I know it does not screen anything out. I want it to be so large it acts like armour and protects me; I want it to be a huge shield against the blue radiation.

When I lie on that narrow metal shelf they call a bed, strapped between my own personal marks, I am freezing with cold and fear. They irradiate my head and eyes first, then my thighs. They slowly turn the gigantic doughnut of a machine to reach every point. The cheerful radiologists turn the bed at all angles. I am disoriented and dizzy with fear and confusion. Will they fry my hip? Will the bones below my flesh bleach white as the ray tackle the cancer within. I just want to curl up into the smallest ball possible. Sometimes I see myself moving along the light beams into the blue flashing light. I am as light as the beam itself and I float forward to that white doughnut machine that generates the beams. The white doughnut grows and grows and I float towards it and I faint.

Left: Radiotherapy Mask No 1 Oil, 600x700

I cannot hide away behind this frightening mask even if I make myself very small.

30.

Waiting No 1 Oil, 300 x 400

Waiting in the blue- lit radiology room, everything is cold and distorted.

31.

Waiting No 1 Oil, 300 x 400

If I stand up, I cast a black shadow. Is this an omen?

32.

Radiotherapy Mask No 2 Conte, 300 x 400

33.


I crouch like an animal in a small ball. The coloured lights of the radiology room disorient and frighten me.

34.

Radiotherapy Machine Acrylic, 400x400

I am held down on the metal table by screws in my mask. The red lasers mark the cancers location. I am immobilised and scared.

35.


Nothing prepared me for the terror of this.

37.

4. CHEMOTHERAPY

I have started my chemotherapy treatment every 3 weeks. No hair loss with this Herceptin and Zameta but plenty of other surprising side effects. It’s amazing what the body will do when it is injected with chemicals to fight the cancer. Things which I never even knew I had in my body, ache. Is it possible to fart more than 120 times a day? Can I feel sick and stoned together? I am angry at the side effects but glad the treatment is free. It must be doing me good. I could not possibly feel this bad. I am angry and want to stick my thumb up at everyone. I am scared because the needle placed inside my hand that delivers the stuff hurts and frightens me.

I look around the room and I look at the people dispassionately. They are just shapes floating in and out of the room while I wait my three or four hours till it is all finished. The nurses are kind and friendly. They wear huge blue coverings to stop then getting a single drop of our chemotherapy poison on themselves. And they smile all the time. It’s totally bizarre. There are so many sick people here really suffering but the sandwiches are delicious.

Left: Chemo Cartoon Acrylic, 400 x 400

Trying in vain to find a vein.

38.

Above: Patient No 1 Acrylic, Patient No 2, Patient No 3, Patient No 4 Acrylic, 400 x 400

Once they connect you to the feeder tubes, we lie there submissively and locked into our own silence.

Right: Patient No 5 Acrylic, 400 x 400

Packing your arm with heat pads supposedly relieves the discomfort.

40.

Above: Patient No 6 Acrylic, 400 x 400

Right: Patient No 1 Acrylic, 400 x 400

The one-breasted woman sleeps peacefully through the whole thing.

42.

Chemo Cartoon No 2 Acrylic, 400 x 400

Alone in my chair I dream of teddy bears

43.


The bald and the beautiful come here.

44.


My heart breaks for the tiny sick girl in the big blue chair.

45.

Chemo Cartoon No 5

Acrylic, 400 x 400

Killing time while they kill the cancer, waiting for it to be all over.

46.


Were ever you look there are drips. There is no getting away from it.

47.


Nothing they do can make you comfortable although they try.

48.

Chemo Cartoon No 8, Chemo Cartoon No 9, Chemo Cartoon No 10, Chemo Cartoon No 11 Acrylic, 400 x 400

Despite all this activity and cheer we are all in our private hell.

49.


The nurses try to make it so inviting.

51.

5. CHUCK

I have a new label. I’m a cancer sufferer. I am a cancer patient. There is no chance I am a cancer survivor, because patients with liver cancer only live a maximum of 5 years. My horizon is 3 weeks. That is the time between infusions. During the first week I feel dreadful. The second week I feel weak and sleepy. The third week it gets better by the second last day. I have two good days and then I celebrate. I feel normal. I eat and laugh and drive around. I visit girlfriends and laugh at the disease.

How do I really feel? I want to chuck. I want to bare my bum at the world. I want to thumb my nose. I want to break out. I want to chuck with frustration

Left: Chuck No 1 Acrylic, 550 x 400

Doubled over like this, the world feels better.

52.

Chuck No 2 Acrylic, 550 x 400

I just want to flip out of here.

Right: Chuck No 3 Acrylic, 550 x 400

This is the best way to do it

54.

Chuck No 1

Acrylic, 550 x 400

Just watch me! It’s not over.

55.

Chuck No 1 Acrylic, 550 x 400

Look! I can be sick on one leg.

57.

6. DISTRESSED

Vision is my main form of communication and now it is under attack. The lightening flashes from Radiology have caused small scars and my sight it quite different. I close my eyes and I see flashes. At night everything looks like a Van Gough painting. The flashes still penetrate my head after the radiology has stopped. Colours appear different. The eye specialist says the floating pieces may disappear, eventually. This is not good enough. I need my eyes.

I am not well and all the pain and the estrangement are crowding in on me. I think I might die from the pain and the constant nausea.

Left: Distressed No 1 Acrylic, 300 x 400

Please stop the light, it hurts me!

58.

Distressed No 2 Acrylic, 300 x 400

Please stop this cancer in my eye socket affecting my vision. I am lost!

59.


What will I do if I don’t get my vision back? I feel the world I know disappearing.

60.


This is getting worse. Colours are distorting and the world is becoming unfamiliar.

61.


I am enraged and angry. This should not happen to me.

62.


Help! I am afraid of the not seeing in the night. It is all so unpredictable.

63.

Distressed No 7Acrylic, 300 x 400

My eyes are everything. Make me deaf not blind!

65.

7. FEMARA

What will they think of next? They have given me Femara, which damps down hormones because my cancer is hormone sensitive. I am hormone sensitive also and don’t like the idea of my cancer getting better service that me

I carefully read the side effects ‘ May cause changes to your vagina’! What does this mean? Will it look different? Work differently? I am determined to find out. I strip off and find a mirror and put it on the floor. I stand over the mirror. I crouch over the mirror. I cannot detect any changes. Where are these changes? This sentence haunts me. I ring the cancer advisory line “ Can you tell me if I should see the changes to my vagina from Femara. What should I use to see the changes?” The nurse is quiet. Gosh this is serious. Then I hear her laugh. “I don’t know ‘she says ‘ No one has ever asked”

‘Look.’ I say ‘this is important to me. I don’t want to lose my sex life. Ring me back please.” I try the mirror trick again. Can’t see anything. Probably need more light. I will have to wait till morning.

Vagina Dialogue No.1 Acrylic, 550 x400

Can I see any changes in my vagina?

67.

Left: Vagina Dialogue No.2 Acrylic, 550 x400

I lie here on the bed and look at the mirror. Can I see my vagina any clearer?

Above: Vagina Dialogue No.3 Acrylic, 550 x400

This is the only way I can tell what is going on. I don’t know what to look for.

68.

Above: Vagina Dialogue No.4 Acrylic, 550 x400

Off to the gynaecologist, what can she see?

Right: Vagina Dialogue No.5Acrylic, 550 x 400

What about the oncologist? What does he think?

70.

Vagina Dialogue No 6Acrylic, 550 x 400

If I photograph it I can compare it to vaginas on the internet.

73.

8. LONDON

We have gone to London for a holiday. We have a wonderful flat in Kensington but it has two major problems. Stairs and Baths I still find it difficult to climb down stairs with out getting dizzy and without my legs hurting. Secondly I cannot climb into a bath. The sides are far too high and there is no shower.

The stairs are simply a nightmare because I am slow and the snow on them make them slippery. If I hang on tight and recite Christopher Robin, I can just manage them.

The bath is a major challenge. I have tried falling into the bath like a duck dive and flooded the bathroom. I sit on the edge and roll in like a wounded soldier. That is fine as an entry, but I cannot get up from that position. The whole thing defies my ingenuity. I put a chair next to the bath and one in the bath and then slide across. I manage to wash my feet and flood the bathroom. We are going to be here 3 weeks and I will not be able to wash myself. Only top and tail from the basin.

I dream about having warm baths. I float in them across the North Sea protected by the lovely warm water. In fact I flood the bathroom. The towels and chairs that assist me, just float in the mess.

Vagina Dialogue No 7 Acrylic, 550 x 400

I think the danger of side effects is over. Now I can relax and enjoy my holiday.

74.

Above: Riser and Tread No 1 Acrylic, 550 x 400

Mounting the stairs is a Herculean effort. I have to do it slowly and alone.

Right: Riser and Tread No 2, Riser and Tread No 3, Riser and Tread No 4 Acrylic, 550 x 400

All my movements are stiff and slow. I am unsure of myself whenever I mount the stairs. I move like an old woman and it makes me very sad.

76.

Hot bath No. 1 Oil and Conte, 300 x 400

My bath is like a little boat. I take this journey alone.

77.


If I get up and rock the boat my journey will be treacherous.

78.


If I accept the uncharted journey and enjoy the moment it could be plain sailing.

79.

Hot bath No. 4

Oil and Conte, 300 x 400

I only need to picture how good it can be and I can sail anywhere I like.

81.

9. ON THE EDGE

I keep dreaming that I am walking along a narrow ledge with just fine rope to keep me from falling off the ledge into the abyss. I wake up and I realize the dream is accurate. This is exactly how I feel. Any moment I could just go over the edge. I am worn out, sick and tired, and most of all, terribly fed up. Nothing functions normally. My bowels are my enemy. One inaccurate move and my bones ache for hours. I am tired, bone tired all the time. I am fed up.

Left: The Edge No 1 Acrylic and Oil crayon, 400 x 550

My days are held together by medical visits and chemotherapy. These appointments bind me like ropes.

82.

The Edge No 2, The Edge No 3, The Edge No 4, The Edge No 5 Acrylic and Oil crayon, 400 x 550

The medication, chemotherapy and pain have all combined to push me into a treacherous place. Should I stop everything and just let the cancer take over. Fighting alone tests my sanity and my endurance. There is no alternative but to go right through it.

Right: The Edge No 6 Acrylic and Oil crayon, 400 x 550

Sleep and meditation are the only way to break the debilitating hold the sickness has on me. What will I do if it does not work?

85.

10. SUICIDE

I feel sick and worn down. I have visited a friend in a hospice and I don’t want to end up there. My last days are not allowed to be so pitiful. I would rather go by my own hand so I am not an emotional load on my family. The question is how would I go about it. I ponder this question and try out few scenarios. Poison? Suffocation? Car accident? The empirical idea is more attractive than the reality, which is sordid.

Left: Suicide Scenarios No 1 Acrylic and oil crayon, 400 x 550

In theory, I like the idea of a quick death rather than lingering in a hospice with everyone watching.

Suicide Scenarios No 2 Acrylic and oil crayon 400 x 400

86.

Suicide Scenarios No 3 Acrylic and oil crayon, 400 x 400

I imagine that death is a black pit and I am poised between immersing myself and clinging to life.

87.

Suicide Scenarios No 4 Acrylic and oil crayon, 400 x 400

The black pit of death calls to me; every pain and worry will be over if you lower yourself in.

89.

11. PARALLEL STRESSES

The beauty of a family is the total lack of support and consideration they can show especially when I am tired and vulnerable. They double their drug taking despite my grandchildren. On my way to chemotherapy I meet one of my in-laws who is in the midst of a drunken accident writing off her car and another girls car. Where are my grandchildren in all this? I am shocked and angry.

Left: Rage No 1 Acrylic, 600 x 700

Coping with my in-laws are as difficult as running underwater in my best high-heeled shoes.

90.

Rage No 2 Acrylic, 600 x 700

Listen! There is no getting out of it. It’s you or me!

91.


What you have done is like tipping a pot of shit over my head.

92.


Hey Mike! Let’s hide in the shower. They wont find us.

93.


I tear up the screen. There is no point in hiding. Its time to find a solution to my anger.

94.


With my prognoses, I may as well shoot myself to settle it.

95.


Just don’t come near me with any more problems. I am prepared to shoot anyone.

96.

My crutches are the only things holding me up. Otherwise…Acrylic, 600 x 700

97.


That’s it! Bang!

99.

12. PORT

After three years of chemotherapy I got to a point were my veins would not take an injection. The sensible solution is that they insert a ‘port’. This is a medical term for a plughole. Just below the skin they insert a rubber plug, which the needle can penetrate and get directly into a vein. Insensitively they choose a point just above the right breast. They make and incision about half as long as your hand and under aesthetic they insert this rubber plug.

The overall effect is painful and ugly. How can this construction and excavation enhance my décolletage? Who wants to look at my cleavage decorated by war wounds and scars? There is not much in this treatment that could be described as sexy or adding to a girls sex appeal. I wonder if its design has been influenced by the current rage for demons and vampires. My chest is a do it yourself blood bar complete with a simple “port’ for easy access.

Left: Port Ahoy! No 1 Oil, 300x 400

The surgery on my chest has turned me into a vampire’s victim with easy access to my veins.

100.

Port Ahoy! No 2 Oil, 300x 400

101.

Port Ahoy! No 3 Oil, 300x 400

Nothing about this operation is attractive. My neckline is no longer my attractive part. Instead it is the scene of my most recent carnage.

103.

13. FEAR OF DEATH

My pain continues and my oncologist thinks it is time for a heart to heart His view is they are treating the cancer with all the medicines and they are holding the spread. They have given me medicine to calm my unruly bowels and stomach, the problems is in my head. Time to see a psychiatrist I think he is right

Mike and I go to the Shrink. We have very different views of my illness I am quite comfortable with the idea that I might die pretty soon. Mike is in terrible grief. We decide to go for separate treatment.

I talk to my shrink and I tell her my story “ When I thought I was going to die and there was no help, I prepared myself to go. I bid everyone farewell and cleaned up all my mess. I felt my house was put in order. Now, I am not going to die so soon. Now I am in trouble. HOW AM I GOING TO LIVE? I am not prepared for life to continue. If I live I need to make it worthwhile. At least I should contribute positively to those around me. I should live a life of gentle, good deeds. But I cannot. I am just too self centred and shallow. I keep thinking about myself and my needs and not anyone else’s. Everyone says look after yourself and do what you want to but I have done what I want to all my life. Now I am not really well enough to travel everywhere except in the time between chemotherapy treatments. Three weeks is hardly time to walk the Camino or between the 88 temples in Japan. I really don’t now how to live as an invalid

All my life I have done exactly what I want. I have written books, travelled everywhere, studied, married, and divorced. On and On Now I have these restrictions imposed on me by physical things I cannot ignore. In accepting them, I have to accept a restricted life but quite a good life. Having money means I do not have to worry about expensive treatment or horrible housework. I have wealth and leisure but not the same passion for life. I feel I should be doing something worthwhile but I get too tired to do anything consistently but paint and sculpt.

My art lets me put my feelings outside my mind to examine and then let go. I don’t have to hold them inside. After I let them go I am much freer and calmer and have patience for others.

Left: How am I going to live? No. 1Oil, 300 x 400

I focus on all the things that place limits on my current life; chemo, medical appointments therapy. They are like mortar.

104.

How am I going to live? No. 2Oil, 300 x 400

I need a new career for my new life. May be I can become a floozy Madame.

105.


I go to meditation. May be I will find inner peace and acceptance.

106.


I put my emotions outside my minds. I float in them bewildered. Inside, I contemplate death.

109.

14. LEAVING EVERYONE BEHIND

I am struggling with the idea of leaving everyone behind. At one level I feel very separate because my life is so different. I have a ‘use by date’. This makes everything different. Most sunlight is sweeter. Feelings are raw. Everything takes on a special light because it can be the last time . And if it is the last time only I think this. Their life will continue well past my use by date. I want to hold on to things and I want them just to run through my fingers like pearls. I am filled with a strange anger. I thought I have settled all my debates and problems but one thing still eats me up. I have not settled with my mother and not with J. Neither want to settle so they wont let go. I am sick of fighting them. Their grip is too painful and I just want to move away.

Inheritance No 1 Oil and Acrylic, 300 x400

Is all I am going to leave behind is my money?

111.

Left: Inheritance No 2 Oil and Acrylic, 300 x400

Looking into the mirror I see my death looming

Above: Inheritance No 3 Oil and Acrylic, 300 x400

Over all this hangs the shadow of my mother’s anger that even my cancer can not modify.

112.

Inheritance No 4

Oil and Acrylic, 300 x600

Inheritance No 5, Inheritance No 6, Inheritance No 7

Oil and Acrylic 300 x400

Mixed up with the confusion of emotions I feel about leaving everyone is the feeling that I will find some sort of inner peace.

113.


The cracks in my emotional stability are the unresolved family things. I wish they were as easy as sanding to fill up

114.


My mothers anger and indifference pulls me back and holds me in its vice like grip

115.


J. steals the lifeblood from me and gobbles it up with her desperate needs.

117.

15. PREPARING FOR DEATH

How should I prepare for death? I feel secretly strangely relieved to think about it. All the uncertainty and the pain will stop. I can just move away from everything. No more chores. Routines. Taxation, GST returns and other silly responsibilities. Everything feels remote. I feel like I have left my family. There is this large distance between us. The will is written. I have made my peace with everyone. My partner is unhappy and startled. I am ruminating about my funeral. This feels like the only thing that is important: a big pre funeral party at Attica and then a cremation. No one is to come to the cremation. Drop my ashes off St kilda pier on a windy day.

My bionic legs give me a great deal of pain. Pain is such an unfriendly feeling. The painkillers just make me sleepy and hurt my stomach. The pain is always with me. It cuts through my days and shatters me. I want to scream. I scream inside. A silent scream is the only one that is appropriate. Who wants to know how endless this feeling really is?

Left: Passport photos No 1 Oil, 300 x 400

I am 18 and on my first my trip the great big outside world. I am full of anticipation.

118.

Passport photos No 2 Oil, 300 x 400

I am 22 and full of myself I can do no wrong. The future is mine.

119.


Now I am 27 and a mother of two. The future is all laid out.

120.


At 35, I now travel overseas for business. This is now my new way.

121.


I’m 40 and life is good. I am going to live forever!

122.

Passport photos No 6Oil, 300 x 400

At 45 nothing can stop me. The way ahead is clear

123.


Having breast cancer at 55. Didn’t even slow me down

124.


Having cancer again in my 60’s.

This is not the journey I wanted to take.

125.


This is the passport for my final journey. The route is clear. I just need to fill in the date for the journey.

127.

16. POST THERAPY

Dr Clifton explains to me that the universal fear is the fear of death. It pervades all cultures and all nations. Literature, even in the earliest times, faced this ancient problem. Philosophers felt it was their job to assist people to face death with equanimity.

She feels that I am finally acknowledging my death fear and this overwhelming fear colours my actions and my thinking. “Go home and draw what you are thinking about this subject’ she says

I go home and at first I do not want to face this fear. I hide my face and my thoughts from myself and from everyone.

Then I start to examine my fear. Where does it all come from this feeling at the base of my stomach? It is the fear of my mother? When I was a child she tried to kill me and I feel this tangible memory of fear. Is it this threat from the past that casts a shadow over my life?

If I look below this fear it is really much more peaceful. Death is this sea that I slip into very easily. Life is a rich complex tapestry that I am part of, totally involved and integrated. What holds me back from the desire to slip into the sea of death is Mike. While he is here his strength and optimism hold me back from the water even though I am on the edge. It’s very pleasant at the shoreline. The sea just laps at the edge and it is not frightening.

Left:

Acknowledgement No 1 Acknowledgement No 2 Acknowledgement No 3 Oil 300 x 300

Hide your face. Don’t face the fear of death looming at every point.

128.

Love No 1 Pen and ink, 300 x400

No matter how bad it gets Michael is there to support me and talk with me.

129.

Love No 2 Pen and ink. 300 x400

Michael stops me going over the edge with gentle humour.

130.

Love No 3 Pen and ink, 300 x400

He keeps me steady despite my anxiety.

134.

Past fears Acrylic and Conte No 1, 300 x 400

Feeling and experiences with my mother reach out over the years.

135.

Past fears Acrylic and Conte No 2, 300 x 400

My mother’s violence still grips me from my past more real than any other fear.

136.

The River Styx No 1 Acrylic and ink, 300 x 400

At the shoreline I see death as the Greeks did. It is just a peaceful river to cross as long as you can pay the ferryman.

137.

The River Styx No 2 Acrylic and ink, 300 x 400

I have put my toe into the water and do not want to go any further just yet. Life is still so full of pleasure. It is so fruitful and abundant.

138.

CODA

If you have come to this page you have probably looked at the paintings and followed part of my journey through cancer. I have used the paintings to picture my frustration, puzzlement, anger and complete fatigue. This is only a small part of the journey in the Barbed Wire Canoe.

Most of the journey has been funny and pleasant. I shock people when I say cancer is the best thing that has ever happened to me. This is the truth. It has taught me to take great joy in even the smallest thing and enjoy every moment as precious. It has taught me consideration and compassion for others in the same position. It has shown me just how caring the medical staff can be. It has demonstrated many times how transient life is and this delights me.

For all the wonderful people who have cared enough to look at my paintings and laugh with me at my bowel obsession I give truly deep thanks. For all the professionals who have helped me so cheerfully, I am eternally grateful

Most of all, I am grateful to Michael my partner who has laughed and cried with me through everything.

140.

From being diagnosed with breast cancer 10 years ago to having extensive metastasize identified three years ago, Rosa Niran has had a rollicking time.

The book is a collection of painting and drawings that relate to the Barbed Wire Canoe, which is traveling up the mythical creek that is the cancer journey. Certainly it has been a rocky ride without paddles and without a map.

The uncharted waters of chemotherapy every 4 weeks have lead to a large gamut of emotions that the paintings examine. Putting the emotions outside the mind ready to be dissected and discussed so they can be released.

The drawings and paintings cover the emotions over a forty-month period and provide an insight to those sorts of feelings that are rarely discussed outside the psychiatrist’s rooms. They are angry, fearful, lonely and funny and provide a personal story of the ride in the Barbed Wire Canoe.

Photograph of Rosa Niran by Michael Prior

barbed wire canoe

Documents

beast cancer

years of cancer treatment

new way of living

greatest feelings of

new medications

new terms

new primaries

fear of death109