Chemo at Dawn: Fighting Cancer When the System Fails You

Stage 4, no weed, no protocol—just grit, fire, and the IV drip. This is what cancer looks like when the cavalry doesn’t come.

Tomorrow I sit in a chair while poison drips into my veins.
Not the plan.
Not the path I chose.

I had a protocol. I had a war map.
Ketosis, pressure chambers, cannabinoids as holy oil.
But the system laughed, said no to HBOT, said no to options,
and then quietly backed out the door.

My doctor denied me breath.
The system denied me fire.
And poverty sealed the deal.

Now it’s just me and the machine.
And I’ll fight. I will. I always do.
But don’t call this hope.
Call it surrender in slow motion.
Call it a man watching his own blueprint burn
and still walking forward, bare-handed,
into the fucking fire.

They’ll call this medicine.
But it feels like a trap.
No plant, no pulse, no prayer, just the cold IV
and the clatter of a system too proud to change.

So I’ll fight it metabolically.
Fast. Burn. Starve the cells.
Drink water like it’s holy.
Pretend courage is armor.

But don’t confuse this for optimism.
This is war stripped of beauty.
This is what it looks like when the cavalry doesn’t come.

And still, I show up.
Chemo at dawn.
Middle finger in my pocket.
Hope buried in my gut like a smoldering coal
I dare not let die.