SPECIAL SECTION:
A C T I V E LY S E N I O R
Conversations with Maury By Karen Supman Karen Supman was diagnosed with plasmacytoma with amyloid, abnormal plasma cell growth that is cancerous, in 2006. The following piece is a continuation of her healing journey. Karen Supman in 2018.
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fter the chemo and radiation did not work on my tumor (plasmacytoma with amyloid), I went to see a surgeon. Looking at my records, the surgeon informed me that he didn’t want to perform surgery due to the complexity of the procedure, and the radiation I had received before would impact healing. He also said I probably wouldn’t survive. It was at that time, I heard about a Qi Gong Master that assisted cancer patients. I had read an article in the New York Times that Qi Gong helped with pain management. Qi 34
DECEMBER 2020 | ARIZONA JEWISH LIFE
Gong is an ancient Asian practice of movement, breathing and meditation used to balance the “qi” or “life energy.” I found out that the hospital I went to brought in a Qi Gong Master monthly as part of its wellness program for cancer patients, so I made a private appointment. At that first meeting, Master Hong asked me a series of questions and told me that I held a lot of sadness and stress in my body. I started to cry and felt embarrassed. He motioned for me to come and sit next to him. He took a piece of paper and a pencil and started a child-like drawing, creating a stick figure of a woman standing next to a tree. The woman was crying. “I know that you believe in Western medicine and that it is good to talk to doctors about your problems, but I want you to find a tree to talk to every day. I want you to talk to it for 30 minutes and I don’t care if you cry. I want you to talk to it every day and then come back to me,” Master Hong told me. With many trees to choose from near my home, I chose a towering cottonwood tree situated along the man-made lake in front of my condo. Its majestic branches gave refuge to the heron and egrets perching on its massive limbs, as it gently expanded over the duck filled pond, grassy knoll and sidewalk. Grabbing a cup of coffee, cell phone and Zoe, my Maltese, I headed towards the tree and sat down on the boulder next to it. If I was to have an intimate relationship with a tree, I decided it should have a name. I named it Maury. I imagined Maury as a person with a worn-out loose cashmere sweater who was always relaxed. Someone who was always calm and comfortable in his own skin. I noticed Maury was significantly larger and separate from the other cottonwoods that were nestled together. Like the tree, I still felt solitary in dealing with the fact that I was alone in my cancer. I was dealing with the possibility of dying and that you did alone. Looking up through the thick branches of the tree, I observed its massive trunk. It might sway its limbs during an Arizona monsoon, but the sturdy trunk held everything together. I looked at its roots. They, too, were strong, reaching several feet in all directions and toward the water for
