Thursday, July 12 – Adventures to Quiet the Dragon

Since Tuesday I’ve been doing all I can to keep the trepidation and anxiety dragon at bay.  The one that likes to do somersaults in the pit of my stomach, and wrap it’s tail around my heart and use it’s wings to drive the breath from my lungs.  That one…

We have two new ladies in our support group as of this week. One is my age and is triple negative like me. She brought forth everything I have been trying to ignore about triple negative breast cancer. This totally freaks her out, and her constant reminders during our two hour session were difficult for me to ignore. Everyone kept looking to me to validate her statistical statements, and of course I had to validate all she said, as all of it was true. She managed to make the rest of our group thankful they are not triple negative, with her reciting those dire statistics and our options, when recurrence is most likely to happen, all that stupid jazz.

She is also a Vegan, and runs 5 miles a day. The whole diet thing and what contributes to triple negative cancer, feeds it, has been something I’m taking in slowly. If you read enough studies on diets, cancer and specifically triple negative breast cancer you discover most foods are bad for you. Or at least that is how it seems. A vegan diet is actually the best from what I have read so far, to keep triple negative BC at bay, or at least not feed it. I’m not ready to hit a vegan diet right now. I am taking this in little steps. I am concentrating on eating more fruits and vegetables. She was also quick to spout that sugar feeds cancer, and admonished the whole group to quit sugar now. She was so superior in telling us we all need to take on her diet plan, and feel as great as she does while on chemo, so we can all run 5 miles a day.

I feel so small and insignificant in my attempts to slowly modify my diet. I keep telling myself moderation is best. Moderation in all. I can have that piece of dark chocolate to help satisfy my sweet tooth. My yogurt has small amounts of sugar, and it works for me in the morning. It’s less sugar than protein. Justification my Healthy Haley voice yells at me, as she continues to chide me about how I have brought all this on myself. My child voice stands up with false bravado and says “one step at a time.”

She has not helped my anxiety and trepidation over radiation therapy. And the new girl was quick to jump on me about not having a mastectomy so I didn’t have to have radiation. I did say having a mastectomy doesn’t change your recurrence or survival chances.  What I wanted to say was mastectomy may work for you, but to me, why do that, why go through so much more extensive surgery, with higher complications rate not only in the primary surgery, but also in any reconstruction surgery you choose. Why? And if this is the BC with the highest recurrence rate, why would you take away the tissue it’s most likely to recur in? Seems to me that would make your chances for a distant recurrence to happen, like in your liver, lungs, bones or brain. All places trip neg likes to go. So I keep reminding my dragon that everyone has their own way of dealing. Even though she is angry that this has happened to her, and she is expressing this anger by telling the rest of us how to manage our health going forward, it doesn’t mean that this is what is best for me, for my dragon and the voices in my head that try to tell me how wrong I am. But this has done nothing to help that one nagging little voice that likes to remind me every once in a while – someone draws the short straw.

So the rest of this week has been about diversions, to keep me away from all those negative thoughts and over thinking. Yesterday I had a date at the beach with Heather and Joseph. We had so much fun. Joseph found a bunch of live baby clams. Teeny tiny clams. They also found a TON of sand crabs. Both of which were collected in the bucket and kept in the shade of our umbrella to stir up and play with every once in a while. Before we left all the creatures collected were set back to their home in the surf. When Heather got tired of being in the surf with Joseph it was Nane’s turn.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It felt so good to be in the water. I let Joseph go out a little further than his mom, and he had a fantastic time learning how to ride in with the surf. He was watching the other kids body surf, and took it on to teach himself how to do this. He stayed in the white water, but was having a blast.  A good time was had by all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today I took on the errands I had not accomplished on Tuesday before I met up with Linda from support group for an early dinner before we headed over to CSC. I checked in with the YMCA on my way to Madrona Marsh, only to find out not all Y’s have a pool, and they told me that membership in one Y does not get me access to any Y. That just seemed wrong, but I wasn’t willing to sacrifice any more of my foot time to them, so I went on my way. I walked over a mile in the marsh today.

When I first arrived, I could smell the marsh. It was a smell of green and heat. The smell of trees and brush, flowers and grasses, getting ready to slowly move into fall, the scent before leaves turn brown, flowers fade and vegetation slowly decays. It was a wonderful smell, filling my lungs with renewal and gold. As I’ve said before the marsh is surrounded on four sides by busy streets. Two heavily trafficked and two moderately trafficked.

 

 

 

 

 

On the corner of the two heavily transited streets is a car wash with a large blower to help dry off the cars as they exit the wash before a worker can attend to wiping it down. As I walked towards the end of the marsh where the densest of vegetation and trees grow, it took me closer to the corner of the property where the car wash sits. As I explored that end of the marsh, listening to the birds calling, watching a butterfly flit by, watching for the lizards as they scurry across the path, I could hear the sound of the blower revving up and slowly ebbing as cars exited the giant maw of this angry sound monster. As I followed the trails into the trees and brush, I caught glimpses of the pond still available to the water fowl.  As I turned one bend heading back to the main trail, I caught a quick glimpse of two snowy egrets making their way into the reeds for a mid-day nap. As I was taking a picture of the pond with ducks bathing and eating in the distance a small little fairy seed landed on my thumb. It was gone with the next little puff of breeze.

As my feet slowly grew in their protest of the socks I had applied, then the shoes to further protect them while I walked, and then the actual walking more steps then they wanted, I turned back towards the entrance where I had parked the car. Each small dew of sweat that seeped from my skin was another painful reminder of the neuropathy that continues to plague me as a reminder of chemo.
I promised my feet, my hands, and my skin that I would rest them soon. I still had errands to complete. Once I was done with my walk, I headed over to LA Fitness to see what their rates were like. Their rates are more in line with what I was thinking for a gym membership, I can access any LA Fitness, and the one in Playa Del Rey has a salt water pool, which may be exactly what I need during radiation. I now have access to a pool for exercise so I can save my steps for what I want!  I joined a gym.

From there I hit Joann’s to get some knitting needles and yarn for my little cousin Max who is coming to visit so I can teach him how to knit. You always start with a scarf! I got as close to his favorite color as I could. I also saw some ready to paint bird houses and decided that would be a great Joseph project. Heather and Joseph will be over Friday afternoon. Target was after that to pick up PJ’s to deal with all the greasy ointment I’ll be applying every night, and other things we needed, cotton balls, heat wraps, and yogurt. After that I headed over to the Lomita Sheriff’s station to get rid of the extra sharps I still had, and from there to Goodwill and then the Animal Shelter to drop off donations.

Tomorrow I have a date with another Linda from CSC. We’re going to get some lunch and then she’s taking me to a crafting center in San Pedro she thinks I would love.

I am loving Noom, being accountable is very helpful to me in keeping my diet healthy.

Life is keeping busy