Just blowing off steam (or Why else do I blog?)

You know how sometimes in life you are sailing along just fine, the future looks bright and for once things seem to be going your way... then it happens. Something pops up that just wrecks everything. I have had one of those weeks. The sad thing is... I can't even really talk about it. No... it's not anything related to my diagnosis... or at least it isn't anything that has changed for me health wise with my diagnosis. This is what I guess you can call collateral damage, or how my diagnosis has changed my daily dynamics. And here I am... stuck in the middle of something that is basically a no-win situation. I am not going to get into what is going on,  but I am going to do a little venting.

You know, through this whole ordeal, I have tried to stay positive, stay focused on the path, and work on getting well. I have done what I could to minimize my own stress by giving up a great deal of control in my life. I have kept a lot of my pain and fears to myself because I knew that those around me can't bear to see me hurt. The few times I have opened up and discussed any of my frustrations, stress or fears have turned around to bite me in the butt. And so I started keeping it all inside, stopped confiding in anyone, started shutting myself off. Sure, on the surface I seemed the same, but beneath it, I became distrustful and angry. Then it became resent. Sometimes I just want to shout and scream, but I know that anything I do or say will just be turned around and become something it isn't. No matter what I choice I make, no matter how I try to express myself, I know I will be painted as the bad one, that whatever I say is an attack. So... what do I do? I'll tell you what I am going to do. From this day forward, I am not coddling anyone. I realize that my diagnosis has caused stress for some people, but you know what... get the F*ck over it. I am the one who has a terminal disease. I am the one who is facing my own death.  Right now, I have the right to stop worrying about how my diagnosis impacts anyone else... I need to focus on how it impacts me. I am no longer feeding anyone else's victim complex. That's not to say I plan on changing how I approach this... it's just saying that I will no longer approach this quite so quietly.

Does this mean I plan on playing the poor pitiful me card? No... I don't, because I refuse to be a victim. I am a fighter, and anyone or anything that gets in the way of my positive recovery/remission will be removed from my life.

Radiation and stuff

So... I have been going to get radiation for a little over a week now. My skin is turning pink and feels all tingly, like the beginnings of sunburn, but not extremely uncomfortable. I imagine that after six weeks or more of this I will most likely be hating life and be trying to claw my skin off, but hey... anything is better than cancer, right? As usual, I am still the youngest one there. I love the two ladies who are also scheduled at that time of the morning. They are so cute. We talk about spouses, pets, gardening and yes... the big C. Both of them have been through all of this before and are dealing with recurrence. I make them both laugh as I cover up and then fling my blankets off when I have a hot flash, and they make me smile when they reassure me that this too will pass. It's funny how up until now I haven't really talked to any other patients in treatment. In the chemo room, I fall asleep so quickly there was never a chance to talk, and in the waiting rooms, everyone is kind of wrapped in their own thoughts. I did see a woman about my age at the oncologists office this week. I don't know if she was there for herself or for a family member, but she kept glancing over at me. I smiled at her and took off my hat to show off my pretty new hair and she looked away. It made me wonder about what she saw when she looked at me. Did the hair loss scare her? Or was the new growth encouraging? Was she imagining herself at that point, or just embarrassed that I noticed her looking?

I have been driving myself to radiation! I have been so excited about it... I feel like a kid who just got her license and is being allowed to drive alone for the first time. It has been a while since I have been allowed to drive that far by myself. Also, I walked up to the store the other day. It was awesome! I can't wait to be able to go back to walking to and from work. It finally feels like I am finding my way back to normal life. Every time I get to do something, even doing housework, I get excited. No one should get this excited over mopping. It's just not natural. But for me, the fact that I am physically able to do it, and that I am no longer having to worry as much about having a compromised immune system means that the end of this phase of the madness is in sight. We have even started planning our wedding again.

Oh yeah... the wedding. Well... when they made it legal in NY, we started planning to have a legal ceremony in NY for our 20th anniversary, which is this August. Then came the big C, and we stopped even talking about it. Now that we are getting so breathing space, the planning is back on. I'll have to do a whole other post on that topic, because... well...wedding planning is a whole lot of stuff.

This brings me around to my big thought for the week. No matter what you are doing, whether it is planning a big event or doing the litter boxes, be thankful and excited. Until this happened, I complained about what all I had to do. Now I am grateful that I am here and able to do even the most mundane things. yes, mowing the yard can be a pain... but not being able to do it is much worse.

A week of Blessings

The last couple of weeks have been some of the best since I was diagnosed. With all of the great things that have happened lately, it has been hard to say what exactly was the best of the best, so we will just start from the beginning.

I had that really bad visit with the radiologist. Mind you, he was not my doctor, but was a doctor at the clinic who had been handed my file that morning because my regualr doctor had an emergency to deal with. He scared the crap out of me, I won't lie... but we had another PET scan. The results came back. Bear with me while I quote:
" PET CT scan was performed from the skull bas to the mid thighs. No abnormal metabolic activity in the supraclavicular neck. Left chest wall Port A Cath is seen in place. Post surgical changes status post right mastectomy. Postsurgical changes post right axillary node dissection. I do not identify any abnormal metabolic activity at these sites. No abnormal metabolic activity is identified within the abdomen or pelvis. No abnormal aortic aneurysm, No bowel obstruction or interperitoneal free air. Review of the CT lung windows does not reveal any suspicious pulmonary masslesions. No Pleural effusions. small amount of bilateral lower lobe linear atelectasis. IMPRESSION: Post surgical changes status post right mastectomy and right axillary node dissection. No abnormal metabolic activity to suggest residual or metastatic breast carcinoma."

I know... what the heck does that mean?... well... it means that the radiologist was wrong. Yes... I still have cancer, but I am not dying any time soon. My doctors are all very happy with the scans. So we started Radiation two days ago.

Doofy me, I burned myself with a heating pad. It's really gross. But everyone needs to be proud of me. I went to the doctor without being forced to do it and I am treating it just like I am supposed to. Second degree burns, right in the area where I am being radiated. All I can say is thank goodness I can't feel anything in the area where I did it because that is right where the mastectomy scars are. Yep... mastectomy scars, second degree burns and radiation all in the same spot... Could I possibly make things any harder on myself?

Me and My sister

My sister came to visit. It was so awesome having her here with me. My poor sister is battling her own health issues, so we both sat around and chattered, ate junk and did arts and crafts with mom. Mom taught her how to cross stitch. We went to the mummy exhibit at discovery place and played with all the interactive exhibits. It made me miss all the time we lost being sisters growing up, especially when we were up in bed still talking long after mom sent us to bed. I kept expecting her to come down the hall to ground us. I miss her so much when she is away. When she is here, I just can't seem to contain how happy I am just to sit with her, even if we are just reading in the sun. Thank you so much, God, for letting me find her again. I never realized how much love I would feel for my sister until I found her again, and now every time I think of her, I just can't believe how lucky I am that she is my sister.

Me and my sister at Discovery Place

Michele and I went to the movies yesterday. Do you know... for two whole hours, I didn't even once think about cancer. For two hours, I sat in the theatre, eating popcorn and candy, snuggled up to my sweetie and was just a girl out on a date with the person she loves most in the world. It wasn't for a whole hour afterwards that I started to cry ( not sad tears... happy ones) because for the past week, I have had so many times that I forgot completely about the Big C. One more reason to give thanks.


Thank you so much God, for this wonderful week. Thank you for all my blessings. Thank you for every day (even the bad ones... but You know... I prefer the happy ones... just sayin'). I am truly blessed

Very Quick update...

Well, Avid Readers.... I am sorry I have been a little behind this week, but my sister came to visit, and as much as I enjoy pouring out my thoughts here, it's more fun pouring out my thoughts to my sister. Of course there was the usual joy of doctor visits, but all in all, it was an awesome week.

The radiation doctor sent me for a PET scan, which must have come back fairly okay, because he seemed optimistic when I saw him. We didn't talk much because they were actually just getting me lined up for my new tattoos. No... not like fun tattoos... but marks for where I will be radiated for the next 6 and 1/2 weeks. Yep... he added an extra 4 days for some reason. As soon as I get my groovy new tattoos, I'll post some pictures. I hope they aren't as big as the sharpie marks they put all over me when they mapped me, but if they are, I will just have a contest to design me a tattoo to incorporate the marks into something that looks less like a dart board.

My Bulb came out finally. God bless my sister who went with me for that visit. I don't know if I squeezed her hand off or not, but after two xanax and an oxycodone, I really didn't know a whole lot of anything.

I had my first BEER since last year!!! Oh... Beer... how I missed you!

I did real yard work today... I weeded a flower bed and raked up under my trees. Of course now I have these piles of waste all over the yard, but for my first day being semi normal, I think I did pretty darn good.

That was my brief update. I will get in depth tomorrow. For now, I am going to go take a BATH. Yep... a whole body immersion bath. I have a gothic romance novel, some ice cream and my bath pillow. I fully intend to be there for the next couple of hours, so don't wait up.