The Sacred Mirror

Relationship Dynamics of Androgen Deprivation Therapy

I have reached an exciting time in the process of publishing my book, promoting. I have been on a local daytime talk show called Bloom and a while back I was given the opportunity to ramble for an hour and a half with Joi Brooks for her show, Email and Coffee. But back then, the book was all about prostate cancer and how it affects a relationship. I can tell you that the book is 75% still that, but the climax (you remember those right?😉)... the climax is about something very different, and ladies you are going to be able to relate. The sad fact of the matter is that most women - especially the beautiful and confident kind, like you - have had to deal with men taking advantage of them at one time in their lives. 

When I was young things happened to me and putting them in You Have Arrived was yet another requirement of my small quiet voice. She had been silenced way too long, after all. So, lately, book promotion has looked a tad different for me. Katy Rey, a fellow memoir author and fierce-ass-bitch hosts a podcast called, Not a Great Whisperer. We recorded my segment last Sunday morning in a studio on Clearwater Beach. It was cool. As a requirement for me to appear on her show, I asked her to read my manuscript which she gladly did.  I wanted her to be able to ask pertinent questions. More than that I wanted to see how that tough stuff landed with her, as she is a bad-ass bitch, like me.

Most of the thirty minutes of that interview is a blur to me so I am excited to get the chance to listen back to it. Yikes. Katy really did ask relevant questions, which as a journalist, I appreciated. The one question she asked that I wanted to share with you today is this, "Does your husband support you writing this book?" It was her final question and she uttered those words I took a long, deep breath and said this: "Tony Mekeel. Oh, how I love you," and then I went on to describe the Sacred Mirror.

My complete answer to Katy went something like this... My husband, like a lot of men, went into prostate cancer as a workaholic and a macho, guys' guy. He isn't really great at talking about his feelings, but he is better than most men I have met in my life. He was afraid and he was bottling up all of his emotions and frustrations and not letting me in and that's a big reason that I had to drive away to get support from my mermaids. He wasn't feeling it. His spirit was blocked and strained because he had no testosterone. He thought he was going to lose me and that scared him. Only then was he willing to start to take care of himself and love himself enough to change. I gave him a list of ultimatums and he rose to the occasion. That is permanent self-change and relationship-evolving work and it's exciting! 

Through all of that though, I was worried about him. I knew his darkest fears because he had shared them all with me over the years. That is what good marriages are all about. But now, I felt that he had to face them and to do THE WORK. He couldn't process it, but I know how to process emotion very well. So, I found myself processing the emotional parts of our relationship for him, with him, and through him. It was exhausting and I had to quit my job because of the pressure cooker I was experiencing. 

Then, I was scared and felt guilty about resigning. His family was pissed. I get it. But, my husband rose to the occasion and held me. "I've got you, babe. It's okay." I replied, "But you have cancer, and I want to support you, not make finances more stressful for you. If you've got me, who's got you?"  You know what he said? "I've got me too." That's when I realized that my value as a partner was more about emotional support than financial support. It was a cool realization for me and one I couldn't have come to without my mermaid, my first cousin, Amy Winslow who lives in Pakistan and is a Muslim. There they believe the wife's role to be above any other, as the ultimate spiritual supporter of her husband. That is her value. 

The process of writing my book, the prostate cancer trials... and all the rest of it was part of our healing. Androgen Deprivation Therapy is hard on the wife. It just is. He saw how lost I was because I loved him so much. Then I read him posts from other wives who are members of the Facebook Prostate Wives Support Group (or as I like to refer to it, The Unfortunate Club) and he soon realized that my feelings were similar to so many other wives. So many couples were struggling just like we had in the beginning, so how could he not support me in sharing what we had learned. Sharing with others became a way we could give back together and that's something we both could get behind. And you know what, that too, brought us closer together. 

Then there is the childhood trauma part. Did he support me in sharing that? He knows me and he supports me and if writing it down and exposing evil for what it is serves a greater purpose and helps me heal, he whole-heartedly supports that too. We can all help others by being vulnerable. I promise. YOU HAVE ARRIVED!

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Shannon Joy Mekeel’s first book was inspired by her husband’s prostate cancer diagnosis and androgen deprivation therapy. It is entitled You Have Arrived and will be released in fall 2023 and is now available for pre-sale at ShannonJoyMekeel.com.

The companion documentary, Hurry Back will debut April 2024 at the inaugural Redfish Film Fest in Historic Downtown Panama City. This 12-part series tells the story of her family’s struggles and victories over the past century.