After the Fall: Trebs Thompson on Cancer, Creativity, and the Will to Live

Scrambled Eggs & Ham Podcast
Host: Bill Clark
Guest: Trebs Thompson

Transcript

Bill Clark:
Good morning. Good morning to you, listeners. My name is Bill Clark, and I'm the host of the Scrambled Eggs & Ham podcast. Welcome back to the Scrambled Eggs & Ham podcast.

This is a very important episode. It's called After the Fall: Trebs Thompson on Cancer, Creativity, and the Will to Live.

Trebs has been on the Scrambled Eggs & Ham podcast before. Her story is important because it reminds us that serious illness can enter a life that is already full, crazy, and complicated.

Trebs is an artist. She's a farmer, a comedy writer, and an improv performer. She has already faced major challenges in her life, including vision loss. Then, after a fall, she learned that she had cancer.

What makes this story powerful is not only how the cancer was discovered. It is what happens when a person who has already had to adapt is asked to adapt again.

This episode is about paying attention to your body, about how one unpredictable event can reveal something much larger, and about refusing to let your diagnosis become your entire identity.

Trebs is still creating. She's still laughing, still thinking deeply about the world, and still moving forward.

That is why her story matters.

This morning, welcome back, Trebs.

Trebs Thompson:
Thank you, Bill. Good to talk to you again.

Bill:
The last time we spoke, you shared your journey with vision loss. I think the abbreviation was MacTel?

Trebs:
Macular telangiectasia type 2. It is a blinding disease, and that was a bitter pill to swallow. But there's been more since.

Bill:
Since then, life has taken another unexpected turn. Take us back to the fall. Can you share a little bit about what happened?

Trebs:
Last summer, I saw these little pantry moths—you know, the kind you get when you have a box of grain that's just been there too long.

I got up on this little footstool and I was digging around up in my baking cupboard. My boyfriend said to me, "Hey, I'm a little taller than you. Let me get up there and find it."

So I went to step off the stool, and it tipped over backward on me.

I'd have probably been okay, but I stepped into the dog's water bowl. It went one way, and I went the other way, and I ended up on the floor.

It was the most searing, god-awful pain in my hip.

I said, "Anthony, I think I've broken my hip."

He got me up and onto the sofa. We put ice on it. I took Tylenol. I waited a few hours. I took Motrin. I put hot water on it. I lay down. I just could not get comfortable.

Around three o'clock in the morning, I said, "I can't stand it. I want to go to the emergency room."

We're sitting at the end of my driveway. We have a couple of options out here, and I was like, "I want to go to the big hospital."

He's like, "We'll be there until tomorrow. It'll take forever."

And I was like, "I know, but I just hear this voice. I want to go to the main emergency room."

So he drove me over there, and they weren't terribly busy. It was amazing.

Immediately this really nice doctor came out and gave me a shot of Toradol. Interestingly enough, after that, the hip never hurt me again.

He said, "We'll get an X-ray."

They took me for the X-ray, and when they came back, he told Anthony, "Her hip is not broken, but I see a shadow I don't like, and we're going to get a scan."

So they sent me back for a scan.

When it came back, he said, "This is my first night in emergency. I'm a new doctor here, but I think you have some kind of tumor, and we're going to admit you right away."

They admitted me. I stayed, I guess, four or five days while they ran a bunch of tests and different specialists came down and looked.

And, yeah, I had a neuroendocrine tumor on my pancreas.

It took several months from that point because I had to have biopsies, and the first biopsy was a little inconclusive. It showed both regular and irregular cells. That was the whole biopsy report.

I thought, "Wow, well, that's useful to no one."

In November, I had what they call a Whipple, where they removed half of my pancreas, half of my stomach, a ton of small bowel, duodenum, my lymph nodes, and a bunch of other stuff.

Bill:
Since they removed those tissues, how has that affected eating?

Trebs:
It's been really, really hard.

And I'm a foodie. I love to eat. I've always been a big girl. This has been on the traumatic side.

I'm down about 80 pounds from the surgery.

It's only been in the last month that I can eat three meals a day, and even that's not guaranteed.

The day before yesterday, I ate something that disagreed with me, and yesterday I had one meal—one tiny cup of tomato soup at bedtime. That was it for the day.

Bill:
What was your favorite food?

Trebs:
Oh my gosh, picking a favorite food is hard.

I love pretty much any ethnic cuisine. I love Mexican, Jamaican, Italian, Chinese, Thai. I love it all.

Bill:
Wow.

Trebs:
Since the surgery, I've had to change the way that I eat. Softer foods are often more my friends. Low fat.

Now, if we go for Chinese, I've got to get the steamed options. If we go out for Mexican, I'm getting more beans or shredded chicken kinds of things.

Bill:
What about fried food?

Trebs:
Fried foods are really hard on me. I take a lot of medication to be able to eat them.

Bill:
You are much more than that diagnosis.

You're an artist. You're a farmer. You're a comedy writer and part of an improv team.

How have those parts of your life helped you deal with cancer and everything that has come with it?

Trebs:
The community of people that I have around me has been amazing. My friends have been so supportive.

People would come. They just sat with me.

I was exhausted for months after this. But five or six weeks after my surgery, I went back onstage for the first night.

Now, I could literally hardly perform. I sat on the stage most of the night, which would be more accurate.

But my troopers were right there with me. When I got up, they were up. Everybody has been super supportive.

I am headed back to Salem Glass College this fall. I'm going to take one class.

They've been super, super supportive in both my vision loss journey and in having not been well.

So I'm hoping for another show next year.

Bill:
That would be wonderful.

You're an art fellow. Is that correct?

Trebs:
Yes. I was an arts fellow for the state of Delaware, and I have a big dream this year.

I'm applying to—I won't say which one—but a particular museum. I am super interested in being one of their residents next year.

Bill:
Oh wow. That's wonderful.

Trebs:
They favor younger people, but I'm hoping they'll take a look at me.

Bill:
I'm pretty sure they will, especially with your experience and these events happening in your life and how you use them.

Speaking about how you use your talents—improv teaches you to respond to whatever comes at you.

And you're a farmer. Farming teaches patience, right?

Trebs:
It teaches patience, and it teaches not being afraid.

Because in farming, you know there's a high likelihood that it's going to fail.

No matter how hard you try, how hard you work, those tomatoes are still going to get some kind of rust, or some kind of bug is going to come.

You learn over time to be patient, to look ahead, and just be like, "Okay, that doesn't work. I'm going to try something else."

Bill:
Wow.

Patience—and to not be afraid.

Trebs:
And to not be afraid.

Bill:
Not to be afraid. Wow.

One of our previous episodes was before you got this diagnosis.

You're also strongly anti-war, and you have clear beliefs about the value of human life.

Has facing cancer changed the way you think about life, conflict, and peace?

Trebs:
I guess I have seen with the cancer that it's yet another in a series of reminders in my life that this life is short.

And you really have to make it count.

I have traveled this year. I've done things with friends.

I really feel like I've done the things that matter.

Bill:
Let's circle back a little bit.

What are you working on right now artistically?

Trebs:
Artistically, I took a break this year.

I closed my first solo show. It was a major show in Philadelphia with 26 pieces last fall.

I closed that two days before I had my cancer surgery.

When I came home, I was exhausted.

Honestly, I slept—just sitting in a recliner, sometimes in my bed—for weeks, months after.

I was in the hospital for a few weeks. You wake up in shock trauma, and they keep you for a few weeks after that.

I had big dreams and big plans, but honestly, just getting through a day, just eating a little bit, was enough.

Bill:
Yeah. That's a lot.

Trebs:
Just getting through a day was enough.

In February, my boyfriend and I went down