“That moment of simultaneous exhilaration and serenity at the peak of the climb.”

I coined that phrase a handful of years ago, after completing the upward climb of a hike and while sitting in reflection at the peak of a mountain. While I sat in that moment [and my spouse chased our goober children away from the edge or off to pee in a bush], I realized that I was experiencing a nagging, yet somehow positive, confliction of emotions and I was not quite sure how to accurately identify it or why it was tugging at me so greatly. There was, first, an exhilarating feeling of accomplishment, success, and excitement of being at the top. The exhilaration was surging through me as I felt the wind, observed the view, and reflected on where I had started the hike and where I now was. However, there was also, simultaneously, an utter sense of calm that accompanied that exhilaration. There was peace and tranquility in the beauty of the surroundings and an overwhelming feeling of mental silence that so often arrives, sometimes only fleetingly, when something of challenge is accomplished. It struck me how two emotions, exhilaration and serenity, that so often are described as antonyms of each other, were merging so succinctly within me at that moment. Upon returning home, I jotted the words onto a piece of scrap paper and attached them to a bulletin board above my desk.

A handful of months later, I completed a pretty intense project that would allow me to add another level of certification to my teaching credentials. As I put the final pages together and closed down the computer in the late hours of the night, I caught myself feeling that nagging, positive, confliction of emotions again. After a moment, it hit me. There, again, was that moment of simultaneous exhilaration and serenity at the peak of the climb. This climb this time, though, wasn’t physical. It was academic. However, it pushed all the same mental limits. It involved all the same twists and turns, easy steps, and challenging jumps. It required the same level of endurance, sometimes quick thinking, sometimes long pauses. And, in the end, it elicited the same emotional yin and yang. There was exhilaration felt in the fact that it was done, yet there was serenity upon reflection of what had been accomplished.

And here I sit tonight, in unexpected quiet [the rest of the family is at hockey practice] and beneath the glow of the Christmas tree, in an otherwise dark room. Today, I completed my twelfth, and final, weekly, toxic, Taxol chemotherapy infusion. Ironically, today is also six months to the day since I received my confirmed diagnosis of breast cancer. The dog is snoring softly in the corner and her gentle repetitions encourage a moment of reflection on this chemo journey. And here, I find it again, that moment of simultaneous exhilaration and serenity at the peak of the climb. 

And, oh boy, what a climb this has been. Without a doubt, I spent these past twelve weeks reaching for branches, cursing as I tripped over roots, and crying out at the unexpected cuts and bruises experienced along the way. However, there were also some unexpected jaw-dropping views encountered along the way and I also met some pretty amazing confidantes and experts along the trail. Perhaps most importantly, when I had to climb the steepest parts and had no choice but to scale the rock face alone, I knew that I could look below me to arms raised to catch me if I fell and could look above me to hands reaching to pull me up.  I could not have gotten through those stretches of the mountain without those limbs of support and for that I am forever grateful.

Although at the peak right now, the climb down must still occur. I have thankfully been cleared from needing radiation, but I will be back in the infusion chair next week for the continuation of my year-long, tri-weekly Herceptin immunotherapy. This treatment is intended to catch any remaining HER2+ cells that may still be roaming and there should be no side effects from this medication that would impact my daily functioning. In the next months, there will be a minimally invasive surgery to remove remaining stage 0 cells and my physical therapy sessions will continue at twice a week. I’ve been able to keep my hair due to the use of cold-capping and will be able to return to using styling products in the next month. I will also begin some mental health work to address the subtle sense of “Well, that happened. Now what?” that I find creeping into my thoughts as I move into this next stage of disease management. I return to my teaching role at the start of January and my work with my amazing special education students and colleagues. Some members of my medical team have concerns about how well established my energy levels will be by then, but I will approach this return with caution.

However, for tonight, I celebrate that chemo is done and I also settle in and prepare for the impact of the poison on my system for the next week. I laugh as I look out my front door at the “flock of flamingos” that were adorned to my lawn last night in late night stealth-mission by friends. I reflect on the joy my oncology team felt when I presented them with beautiful Painted Pastry cookies today, as a token of my appreciation. I smile as I think back to my eldest son’s hockey team when they (and my hockey family) “pinked the rink” in October for those of us on the team battling and surviving this disease. I recall, and accept, some of the downright terrible moments while living through chemo and I exhale and let them go. And, I quite simply, with great gratitude, get teary as I think back on every token of support, every card, every text, every good wish, every check-in, every ride, every gift, every meal, every child pick-up and play date, every coffee, every frappe, every joke, every book, every single time someone took a moment out of their busy lives to make time for me in my hour of need.  

For tonight, I sit and observe this moment of exhilaration and serenity at the peak of the climb. I made it through chemotherapy.

It’s the second to last Friday of chemo.  That means eleven out of twelve are done. That means that I have made it through eleven, consecutive, progressively worse, Fridays of that can only best be described as the aftershock of my Wednesday chemo sessions.  I recall my very first Friday after chemo. I was home for the day and i’d planned to do the bills. I remember being so shocked at how spacey I felt, how my vision was blurry, how working the numbers in my bank account was like a monumental task. I look back on that day now with desire . . . I had heard it would get worse.  I can now, for a fact, state that it does.

Fridays have become the day that I plan ahead for to do absolutely nothing.  I plan who will pick up the kids after school or who’s house they can go to for a few hours to give me a little more time to rest.  I plan to have nothing that absolutely needs to be done because I can’t trust myself to actually do it or do it effectively. I plan to ignore all emails because my brain is fried and what I’m trying to relay doesn’t make sense.  I plan to minimize my responses to texts because communication is, ridiculously, too much effort. I plan for a shower as the only requirement of the day because I refuse to let chemo win . . . I will not stay in bed all day, but I will stay on the couch.  I plan some silly cabinet or drawer or bin clean-out task to do in the early evening that makes me feel like I’ve done something with my day . . . and then retire back to the couch, exhausted. Each week, too, I plan how to keep my spirits up. Yet, without fail, at some point in the day tears come.  Tears of misery, frustration, and then exasperation. How, week after week, can this still get to me? How can’t I plan for this day so that it just comes and goes and I move on? Why can’t I accept that there is nothing else I can do but let the day come, try to manage the physical symptoms, and allow the poison do its work on my body?

On this second to last Friday, though, I find myself in a different place.  Physically, I’m worse than ever with a sinus infection and chest cough to add to the chemo fun. [Oh, and learning to cough convulsively with a healing set of new boobs is truly a joy . . . if you were wondering.]  Spiritually, I’m low because I’m missing my son’s annual holiday movie night at his school. It’s a night I always look forward to as he cuddles with me in his sleeping bag and jammies in the school gym, with the bowl of popcorn and movie theater boxed candy I’ve packed. But, mentally, I’m in this weird in-between place of “oh my goodness, I’m really almost done” and “oh my goodness, how is it December and where did the time go” and “oh my goodness, where do I go next.”

I mean, my goodness.  I’ve been at this surgery recovery and chemo thing since September.  I’ve been dealing with this diagnosis since July, And here it is in the middle of December. Sometimes, I stare at the calendar in the doctor’s office and just see the timeline of this disease in my life.  I remember writing in the twelve chemo dates on my calendar and thinking how far off December seemed and wondered how I’d really get there. And yet, here I am and as I begin to look forward, I find myself asking the same questions about moving forward after chemo as I did before it began.  When this all started, I didn’t know how I was going to step away from work and manage my life while battling this disease. And now, as I look forward, I find myself wondering how exactly I return back to work, back to my family’s normal routines, to how everything was before, after what I’ve been through.  I don’t quite believe anyone when they say I’ll slowly “return to normal” or “be back to feeling like my old self.” Part of me doesn’t believe them because I’m still so in the thick of the impact of chemo that I really can’t remember what it was like to not feel like this. Part of me doesn’t find relief in their statements because I remember all too well how my autoimmune and chronic fatigue issues from before cancer were already impacting my life.  Part of me also just can’t imagine doing something other than managing my cancer as a full time job. But, for the most part, I don’t believe them because I’m not actually sure if the “normal” or the “old self” is there for me to return to . . and if it is, I’m not quite sure if I want to return to that person. Truth- there is so much misery that comes in fighting this disease. I hope I have never tiptoed around stating that. It is a miserable situation from the start to the finish.  But, with an experience like this, with so many of these insurmountable challenges and changes to face, endure, and persevere through, to come out of it on the other side and return to who one was before doesn’t seem worth it. I’d like to hope I’ve learned something from this, that I’ve grown from it, that my perspective has changed for the better or that I’m a better human because of what I’ve experienced.

I’d like to believe that I’ve learned how to look at it right.

I don’t care what your excuses have been. I also value every one of them because we are all too busy all of the time, I know.  But go get your damn mammogram. Now. If you live on Boston’s North Shore, let me refer you to a pretty amazing facility. I repeat: If you are a female, and haven’t had your mammogram this year, schedule the appointment. Now. My writing is pretty important, I know, but you can scroll back to me any time. Perhaps while in the mammogram waiting room? Eh, see what I did there?

Sometimes, deep down, there is a part of me that just wishes I didn’t know. I was going along just fine. [Well, maybe some room for improvement.] I was not whistling Dixie, but wondering if I had breast cancer was nowhere on my agenda.  Skin cancer, maybe. Breast cancer, not at all. And that mammogram machine is most definitely a painful form of torture and they should prepare us all better for that. But, many of us have also given birth. It’s a stupidly designed machine if it causes that much pain, but you can handle the 45 seconds of “don’t breathe” while being squeezed.  Childbirth was worse.

So, I’m not sure why you’re still reading this if you haven’t had your mammogram.  But, I’ll say this. Not knowing you have breast cancer doesn’t mean you don’t have breast cancer.  

Read that again, and again if necessary.  It does make sense. Your mammogram is going to identify if you do or do not have breast cancer. If you do have breast cancer, you need to take care of it.  Not knowing that you have breast cancer does not take care of anything.

That mammogram just may have saved my life . . . if I look at it right.

I’ve been bored with the length of my hair for over a year now.  Each time I have an appointment with my hairdresser, I go in all prepared to chop it off.  However, each time I sit in the chair, I remember how hard I worked to grow it out, how much effort it took to get it to a point where it all stays up in a pony tail. [Honestly, I’m the only person in the world who can’t figure out the pony tail. I’m absolutely inept when it comes to hair. Honestly.] And so, I enter the salon with the expectation of change and leave with beautifully styled hair that is only about an inch or two shorter.

So when this cancer came along, the thought of losing my hair was, of course, unnerving.  However, it was also finally an opportunity to end this battle with my long hair. There was no longer a choice.  The hair was going. The decision was made for me. There was relief, actually. At first.

Sometimes, I feel like being bald will just be an announcement, “Hey, people, I’m dealing with some serious shit right now.  Give me a break. Take some perspective. Accept that I’m not on my game.” At other times, I worry that being bald with just be a constant reminder, “Oh, look at me, I have cancer.  Oh, my head is cold or sore or raw because I’m poisoning myself to save myself.” And then there are other times when vanity just gets the best of me, “What the hell is my head going to look like?  I’m so pale, anyhow. Do I have bumps and divets in my scalp?”  

But then there is also the acceptance.  It’s going to happen regardless. No amount of worry is going to change it.  So, just get on the bald bus and move through it. It’s temporary. It will grow back.

Then, I learn that there is this process called “cold capping.”  There is a [very expensive] cap that is worn prior to, during, and following treatment that causes the hair follicles to basically, but not exactly, freeze.  In so doing, when the chemotherapy is moving through the body and attacking all reproducing cells, the hair cells are not impacted because they are in a sort of dormant state.  Crazy, right? But, it also makes a lot of sense. It’s science! Cold capping is new to the United States, but is not a new technology. There are a few different companies, but the one my hospital uses is called the Paxman.  Its use will add a few hours onto my treatment and I’ll also have to abstain from use of any styling products, excessive washing or combing, and will be limited to occasional blow drying using only the cool setting. This last part throws me for a loop.

Ultimately, I decided to try to save my hair. It was a combination of Z expressing some nervousness about me being bald and my own interest in the cold capping concept from a science standpoint.  Have we really begun to figure out how to combat the balding side effects of chemo? Could I contribute to making this a more easy and routine process for others in the future?

And so, I purchase the cap.  I cut my hair (and love it) to hopefully make it easier to manage without product. And, each week, I don that cap, freeze my head, keep my hair, and marvel at all these wonders of science. The medical community has figured out how to find the cancer, identify its type, assign a specific chemotherapy and immunotherapy cocktail, combat the side effects, and, now, has made beginning steps to prevent hair loss. 

And every week, without fail, as I prepare my hair for chemotherapy, I hear Doc Brown yelling, “It’s a science experiment, Marty!”

In the strangest of places . . .

So, like, is blogging even cool anymore?  I am some outdated Gen Xer who hasn’t figured out that the best way to communicate is in a post with just three phrases?  Does anyone even read this? [And, totally off topic, but who was Doogie Houser writing to?] I don’t know, but I do know that I spent my teenage to early adult years journaling and it was as therapeutic then in those pretty journals with certain pens as it is on the screen in front of me now with my chosen font and background colors.  So, I don’t know, I guess I’m old. I’m 40, almost 41. I blog. I intermittently use 2 or 1 spaces after punctuation. I have breast cancer. I sometimes run to the store in purple sweatpants . . . and may or may not have on a bra [new, perky boobs, folks!].  And I keep finding myself realizing that I don’t really care what any of it looks like to others. I’ve always admired my “older” friends and colleagues for the wisdom and perspective they bring. Age and experience can make you wiser. (It can make you a lot of other things, too, along the way, but I’d like to believe that if you play life right, it really can just make you wiser.)  This cancer has already changed me physically. It has changed me emotionally. And I can feel it changing me in. . . eh, I don’t have the word for exactly what it is . . . I can just feel it happening. It’s not just that I’d like to believe I will gain perspective from this experience, but that I already know I have.

But there are some days, when I’m down and out and damaged by this disease, and I’m just angry, that I find myself just being frustrated that I am so, medically speaking, “young” for this disease.  Like, all the women in the cancer brochures have beautiful graying hair and husbands who belt and tuck in striped polo shirts. And I get angry because sometimes I just wish I had that age, that wisdom, that experience, to tell me that I know how to get through this, know how to be gentle with myself, know how to look back on my life and see how this experience will be one of all the other waves I’ve ridden.  Instead, I’m 40, with a ten- and eight year-old, running from work to hockey practice to school events to scheduling a playdate to the bills to finding the Halloween costumes to when is that orthodontist appointment to when can I push my career to the next level to OMG! What is for dinner?! It’s just that I’m so in the thick of this “This is 40” period of my life with kids and family and a career, how in the world is there room for cancer in it.  And really, forget about making room for the cancer treatment and surgeries and appointments. How do I make room for the emotional time-suck of this disease. I hadn’t figured out how to handle my emotional pre-cancer self. I was just barely finding myself more productively reacting to life’s situations with more grace and wisdom [lol, from my perspective, anyhow] before this cancer. Sometimes I’m just angry that this couldn’t have all come on in another ten years.  Just ten more years of figuring myself out before having to figure this out.  

But then again, I guess, who knows what the next ten years will bring.  Maybe riding this wave now will make a future tsunami less overwhelming. Maybe everything really does happen for a reason.

Maybe it’s just a matter of looking at it right.

Probably one of the hardest parts of this whole diagnosis was having to give up my exercise routine.  Now, I’m not a gym rat and I don’t run for fun in 5Ks or whatever, but I like to set exercise goals for myself. I’ve learned over the years, and especially over the past year, that the benefits I gain from exercising have little to do with what it says on the scale and so much more to do with what it says in my head.  I am, perhaps, the only person in the world who loves treadmill running. I mean, I love it. I roll out of bed. I throw on a sports bra and some shorts [And if there aren’t any clean, there have been times that underwear has sufficed! Whatever, get it done!] and lace up the sneakers. I pull my hair back in any which way, quickly brush the teeth, grab my phone, and hop on the machine.  I control the pace. I set the time. I choose the music. Other than oversleeping, there are no excuses to keep me from the run. Back in January of 2017, I decided to challenge myself to run every Saturday of the year. I did pretty well and got in around 46 Saturday runs. I also added a Beachbody routine to the challenge in May of 2017 and that became a daily, life-changing habit. I developed muscle and core strength, my back issues improved, my stomach developed a little bit of definition, and I just felt, overall, strong. Push-ups, sit-ups, planks, etc were all things I just did on a regular basis.  I kept up with, and actually improved, my runs on Saturdays and followed those with a yoga session. I also still ate chips on the couch at night and enjoyed cheese fries on a regular basis, so, I mean, there was still a nice balance to it all. In 2018, I continued with the Beachbody workouts, keeping a routine of six workouts a week and continued with my Saturday run challenge. By July of 2018, halfway through the year, I hadn’t yet missed a Saturday run and that felt awesome. I tracked my workouts and runs on a calendar and seeing all the dates circled was so rewarding. And then I got breast cancer.

The biopsy in July impacted my workouts, but I could continue to hit the treadmill with a fast paced walk and therefore keep up my Saturday challenge. The lumpectomy in August ended my workouts, but I replaced them with a daily treadmill walk/slight jog.  I couldn’t figure out, though, how to manage with the mastectomy. On Friday, September 7th, I woke up to prep for surgery. While in the shower, I realized that I would miss my first Saturday run of 2018 the next day. So, I turned off the shower, dried off quickly, donned the exercise clothes, [confused my husband], clocked a mile on the treadmill, got back in the shower, and went to the surgery.  Who cares if it wasn’t Saturday, I’d got it done a day early. In the following week of recovery, I woke each morning and did 10 “laps” through my house, slow and steady with the dog at my heels, or briefly walked B to meet up with friends for his walk to school, and then retired to the couch for the day and slept off the impact of the meds and the pain. Suddenly, it was Saturday again and I was faced, again, with what to do about my Saturday treadmill challenge. I was awake that day before everyone in the house, the sun was peeking through the curtains, and everything was still and dry outside.  So, I pulled on whatever sweatshirts and pants fit, laced up my sneakers with trepidation, grabbed my phone, and left the house. I’d walk the neighborhood. I’d do it slowly. I’d practice posture. I’d practice breathing. And I’d watch for skunks, because there was definitely a faint hint in the air.  

And therein began my daily neighborhood walks, which have now become my most favorite time of the day [except for the fear of skunks].  Sometimes I laugh at anyone who may have a morning coffee-window routine and watch me walk by each day. I wonder if they’ve noticed how my steps went from slow and gingerly to more fast paced.  I wonder if they’ve seen that my arms, once required to stay at my sides, have a pumping movement to them now. I wonder if they notice that my sweatshirts aren’t big and covering my no-longer present drains. I wonder if they saw that my hair, once long and tied back haphazardly is short and tucked under a cap.  I wonder if they’ve seen, as I’ve felt this week, that the strength I had gained back while healing is now decreasing as I battle the chemo fatigue. What I really wonder, though, is if they can see the energy that I FEEL so greatly from within shining out as I trek through the neighborhood.  

Every step of that morning walk is a reminder to me that I am getting out there, that I am living, that I am working at being healthy, and that I am doing this cancer thing the best I can. I long for the push-ups and the 10 lb weights. I want to hear the swoosh of the treadmill and the thump of my feet hitting the roller. I can feel the stretch of downward dog in my shoulders and my neck and my back.  And I miss it all. But, what I feel in that crisp morning air, how I blink as rays of light seem to shine right on me, almost illuminating some sort of path, and what I hear in the morning stillness [or is it the skunks, seriously] around me surrounds me with an energetic peace I absolutely knew existed, just rarely took the time to see. I certainly wouldn’t choose cancer, if I had the choice, but I’m not sure that I’d choose to miss these morning walks, either. 

And there it is, again, in the strangest of places, if you look at it right.

At some point along the way with this disease, you come to accept its presence in your life.  You carry cancer along with you in your new day-to-day norms without thinking much about the annoyance of having it there.  You schedule treatments and appointments, side effects and rest periods, in the same way you schedule orthodontic appointments and oil changes, the way you remember to do the groceries or pay the bills, the way you plan for upcoming events and holidays.  Cancer just becomes a part of you. At all times, of course, you have your eyes on the prize, which is the end goal of remission. However, you don’t fight that it’s there or that it happened to you. Instead, you fight the disease in your body. Your energy is precious.  You learn to use it wisely.

Ultimately, you learn to live with cancer. You learn how to battle the tough days by looking ahead to when this will all have passed, or by looking back to what you’ve already endured.  You check off treatments in the same way you counted down the days until Christmas as a child. You look ahead, forward, beyond . . . anywhere but in that miserable moment, to get yourself through, because you know that, ultimately, this is temporary.  You hold Winston Churchill’s words sacred, “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” And you laugh at all the other times in your life you thought you needed that quote to get through. You also scare yourself a little because you know how fast your children are growing up before your eyes, and wishing away this present time feels like you’re only inevitably speeding up that precious process.  But still, you look forward, manage the present, accept the diagnosis, and live your life . . . with cancer. You also continue to remind yourself that it could still be so much worse.

So, perhaps it shouldn’t have been surprising to have been hit, so very, very hard this morning, with the realization that at one point, I lived without cancer.  Life was busy and frenetic and filled and eventful, but it was also absent from cancer. And that time wasn’t so long ago. Really, only a season has passed since I got the diagnosis. But that season feels more like a lifetime.  It hit me today in a way I couldn’t have planned for.  

It’s almost the end of October.  Halloween is around the corner. Frost is in the air. And my kids are still pulling tees and shorts out of their drawers each morning to dress for school.  It’s time to switch out the summer and fall clothes, figure out what fits, replace the drawer of swimsuits with sweatshirts and settle in for the winter months.  It’s the bi-annual chore I hate the most, and never get any help with, but all the same must get done. So, I bumbled into the boys’ room today, ready to attack with all my limited mobility, and began, as I always do, with the pajama drawers.  Shorts pajamas went away, long-sleeved and fluffy fleece bottoms filled the drawers, and the Christmas PJs were hidden carefully in the closet to be pulled out after Thanksgiving. Next, I tackled the swimsuit drawer. This is usually a simple task, as the suits get packed in a bag that is easily accessible from the back of the closet, for when random indoor pool days occur during the winter.  As I was thumbing through the suits, I pulled out a few I had forgotten about that still had tags on them. “Oh, that’s right,” I said aloud to myself. “I’d found those on sale before I had cancer and tucked them away in case B grew out of his other suits.”   

And then I stood there, swimsuits in hand, frozen in mid-pose. What did I just say? Before I had cancer?  Before I had cancer. The phrase echoed through my mind. I continued to stand there and then I looked up and saw a family picture taken the day we adopted our dog back in May.  Before I had cancer.  And then, I realized, the last time I sorted through all of these clothes was also last spring. Before I had cancer. I had sorted and organized and put all these clothes in place for the summer not knowing that I was only weeks away from learning that I had cancer. And then everything in the room, in that moment, in my mind, became tagged as before cancer or not.  

When did I become so adept at living with cancer that I forgot there was a time when I didn’t live with cancer.  I know that seems crazy to think, but I’d honestly forgotten, or just wasn’t consciously attending to, the fact that cancer hadn’t always been by my side.  There had been a time when I fell asleep at night without cancer in my body. There was a time when I could move or jump unexpectedly without experiencing pain. There had been a time when my fatigue was the result of my lifestyle, not my disease. There had been a time when I planned ahead because it was efficient, not because it was necessary to be prepared.  There had been a time when I just lived day to day, sometimes not so successfully, but either way, it was just daily living.

There had been a whole time of “before cancer” in my life.  And right now I was in the midst of the “having cancer” while living my life. And in the future, there would be the time of “after cancer” in my life.  There will be a before, during, and after of my cancer. When else in life do we have these moments of such clear definition of time? It isn’t usually until in retrospect that we can define when those times begin or end.  Yet, here I am. So clearly, shockingly actually, able to see that there was a before, and that now I am in the middle, and that the thing truly keeping me going is knowing that there will be an end. And, to be honest, the thing that knocks me down the hardest is each time that projected “end” changes by another procedure, an additional treatment, or another step.  But still, there will be an end and that is something to be so truly thankful for. There will be another season of sorting these damned clothes.

Even in the swimsuit drawer, if you look at it right.

There are days that are just plain miserable. And it doesn’t matter what type of positive thinking, Jedi mind tricks, internal mantras, or forward vision you try to employ.  It doesn’t matter how much love and support you see around you, how many tools you have at the ready to help you through, or how many medicinal options are at the ready. The misery is just there. It is a total mind-body breakdown and it just overtakes you.  The absolute exhaustion. The inability to get warm. The mouth sores, The hunger and thirst, but the inability to quench either. The exhaustion. The irritability. The skin issues. The blurred vision. The aches. The exhaustion. And the anger. The absolute anger that just has to be felt, exhaled, yelled, cried, shouted.  Why? Why! Why?  

You know you are one of the lucky ones.  You know you will get through this. You hear yourself cheering you along, “This too, shall pass.”  “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” “At some point, this will all be a memory.”  “You are stronger than you believe.” And you believe every single one of those statements and you have used them to get through many of the hard moments before this.  But, not on this day. The misery is too strong. The anger too great. The despair too intense. The exhaustion too deep.

You miss your life.  You want to be a parent, not a patient.  You want to be exhausted by your everyday life, not fatigued by your chemo life.  You want to call friends and just get together, not get support. You want to work.  You want to feel accomplished. You want to pick up you sons and hug and cuddle and goof around like you used to, not carefully try to embrace them without grimacing in pain.  You want your life back. Not in twelve weeks, not in twelve months. Right now. Right this very instant. You want it to be Friday night of the World Series with a drink in your hand, friends at your side, kids on the floor in front of the TV, and energy at the ready to devote to cheering on your home team.  You want anything other than cancer.

And it just absolutely overwhelms you because there is nothing you can do to wish it away.  You know you can manage it away with positive thinking, but you’re tired of that, too. You are just angry.  And tired. And sick. And sick and tired of being angry and sick and tired and in pain. And you just cry. Because you just need to.  You release heavy, hard sobs. You know eventually you will go to bed. Eventually you will sleep. Eventually you will wake up. Eventually it will be a new day and with that a new perspective. And eventually the impacts of this round of chemo will wear off.  You know that in the depths of your being. But in this moment, you just feel the anger, exhale the violent, unrelenting tears, and just wallow in the misery. Because all of this is miserable. It just is. And sometimes you just have to allow that.

You just don’t stay there too long.  At some point, you get up and find the light.  

And then the shizzle got real.  Like, really real, real fast. The portacath, four days in, still isn’t settling into my skin.  It hurts. A lot. It needs to be looked at and I’ve been told to call the doctor and leave a message.  Also, the nausea that I was warned about has begun. All of my paperwork tells me to take a certain prescription the minute that starts, so I do, at 8:00, right before my morning walk and before I realize I’m going to have an all out, all day, knock down reaction to the medication. 

While on my walk, I almost have to stop at a neighbor’s house because my calves are cramping up.  By the time I’m home, my breathing is shallow. I take a call from the port doctor and numbly schedule an appointment for the afternoon.  I hang up and begin sobbing, uncontrollably, irrationally, borderline out of my mind. I can’t get control. I can’t figure out what to do. I cannot stop crying. Thirty minutes in, and still crying, I call my husband to try to talk me down.  I try making breakfast and tea, something to absorb the medication, and I’m nervous to be operating a stove and toaster oven. I land on the couch, the sobbing semi-controlled, my head now feeling at least a thousand pounds. I look at the floor and contemplate just laying down on it, fetal position, giving up.  I don’t, because it will hurt, but I contemplate it. For awhile. I can’t sit still, though. I also can’t move. My thirst is unmanageable. I get water. I see an orange in the fridge. I’ll slice up the orange and some American cheese (a weird snack I eat when I’m sick with a head cold). I open the cheese drawer and I break into uncontrollable laughter.  I’m in hysterics. My family had told me that somehow we ended up with five different one pound bags of American cheese with my last Instacart order. [I cannot figure out that online system!] Well, there they are. Five full pounds of Land O’ Lakes American Cheese, sliced thin! I can’t stop laughing. Like, how did that happen? I make the snack. I head to the couch.  I eat it. The laughter has calmed me down. I call my chemo nurse, as clearly something isn’t right. I leave a message. My voice doesn’t even sound like my own. For the next two hours I sleep, sit, watch, stare, drink, ache, cry, repeat. My head continues to be at least a thousand pounds and the blur that surrounds everything I do won’t disappear.

It’s now 1:00.  My nurse has called back and confirmed that I’m having some sort of reaction.  She’ll be in touch with a new medication and wants me to keep the appointment with the port doctor for 2:30 today.  There’s no way I can drive, so I call on some friends to pick up Z from school. B is planning to ride his bike home.  Dave has left work to be home when both boys arrive because my appointment is right smack in the middle of the dismissal times.  I hop an Uber and trek to the hospital, baseball cap pulled down, dazed and watching the world from the backseat window. I hear myself thinking, “The shit just got real.”  The Uber driver has a music station on that is basically playing the soundtrack from every visit I ever made to Boston Billiards in my early 20s, and as each song plays on the 20 minute ride, I’m hit with a different memory and each time find myself thinking, “I had no idea then that I’d end up with cancer.”  I’m lost in that thought pattern for a bit, and then I zone in on the present day around me, people going about their lives, doing their day to day. It’s the start of Columbus Day weekend and I think back to times I’ve been running around, trying to pack up for a weekend away. I think back to the times I used this weekend to catch up on the crazy start to the school year.  I realize that I’ve usually gotten pumpkins by now, enjoyed some apple picking, visited a park. 

We’ve now hit a bit of traffic and there’s a part of me that starts to grab for my phone to check the time and see if I’m late for the appointment.  I stop, though, both because I don’t have the energy and because it doesn’t matter what time it is. The Uber driver is on his way. There is no way to control or change the traffic.  And I can rest assured knowing that I’ve done everything in my incapacitated state to get to this appointment. I think in that moment of all the times I’ve been infuriated by traffic, by being late, by just, ugh, there’s never enough time! And then it hits me that for all the things I’ve dealt with in life, this cancer thing is just a whole new deal, a whole new thing to manage. And, yet, here I am, ubering around town, dazed and confused, in pain, running the household while managing disease, and struggling through a really tough day. At that point, the traffic starts to move.  I feel a twinge of pain as the car lurches forward and gasp with both the shock and the symbolism. This is all really painful, everything about this cancer and what it is doing to my body and my life is painful, but all I can do is move forward. Maybe some days it will be a lurch forward, maybe others a crawl, maybe on others it will be with strength, and maybe on some days, like today, it will be in a daze. Either way, though, it will be forward. It’s really the only way. 

In the absolute strangest of places, if you look at it right.

I’m a week and a half into my recovery from my mastectomy.  I’m doing as well as can be expected, managing pain, and reveling in the amazing support of my network of friends and family. Truth be told, I sometimes wonder if it’s their support that is doing the most for my healing.  They are amazing.

Z is home with me tonight.  B is at hockey practice. It’s early September and Z has decided that now is the time to write his Christmas list.  A few years ago, the boys decided to start putting their lists on the chromebook, so he’s sprawled out in front of me intermittently asking for help with formatting and then showing me what he learned in STEAM that day about formatting a google doc. He’s also put a “motor bike” on his list.  I’m not quite sure that Santa is going to come through on that one, but I’ll let it be.

I’m in a little more pain than usual today.  I’m learning that this is normal for the healing.  One day, I feel like I’m on my way. The next day I’m on my way back to the couch.  Truth be told, I’m not that interested in this Christmas list thing tonight. I’d like him in bed.  I’d like to zone out and return to my book. I’d like to just be still.

But then he looks at me and smiles and asks me how to spell “fidget.” [Um, isn’t that fad long gone?] And I tell him and then it hits me, like a ton of bricks, how amazing this moment is. How many people are out there knowing that they won’t be around to see their 8 year old on Christmas? How many people are recovering from a mastectomy while knowing that cancer has already spread to other parts of their body? How many people grasp at each precious moment because their number of moments are limited? How many people are managing poverty and cancer, abuse and cancer, other major life events and cancer?  

Again, it hits me, I am so lucky in the unluckiness of this disease. I am so grateful for what I have. People tell me that I am strong. That I am handling this with such positivity. That my words have power. But, sometimes, i wonder if this diagnosis was different, if I wasn’t so lucky, would I be able to rise above it? And there is this feeling, not loud, not strong, but a feeling that is there all the same, of guilt. Guilt for writing this.  Guilt for the help I’m getting. Guilt for having a bad day or feeling low. Guilt for accepting people’s best wishes and gifts. This disease, this cancer, is doing a number on me, for sure. But in comparison, others are struggling so much more than me. And sometimes I just feel like I have no right to complain, no place at all to make a peep, no justification for asking for, and accepting, help. 

I get teary watching Z continue with his list. I attempt to cuddle with him, in my limited capacity, as he finishes up. I’m no longer lacking interest in spending this time with him. In fact, I think bedtime just got extended. I’m likely going to be sick with chemo when we spend Christmas together.  All the same, we’ll be spending Christmas together. That is the true gift.

In the strangest of places, if you look at it right.