Wednesday, August 29 – I love when he kisses me there

I know it has been a week since I last updated here.  I’ve been so exhausted that just the thought of having to string together coherent words into a sentence, into a paragraph, into a comprehensible post has been such a daunting task I just hid from it the past week.  Shoved my laptop under the sofa so I could not even see it hiding.

Part of me wonders if this was a metaphorical hiding from where I am now.

Don’t get me wrong, I am relieved, ‘ugely relieved, so massively relieved I think the crowds of relief is even bigger than Obama’s inauguration attendance.  That big!  ‘uge!  (Yes, I am poking fun at our President, because his verbiage is what comes to mind when I think of how relieved I am at this point.)  I feel like a weight that has been hanging on my heart is gone now that I am done.  Almost a year to the day of when I originally discovered Blink, I am done with active cancer treatments.  No more chemo, no more required surgeries, no more radiation, done.  I rang that bell yesterday.  I hugged all my radiation therapists good-bye, had my check in with Dr. Endicott who wanted one last check on my skin before I left.  I go back in 3 weeks for my check up on healing.  Nevertheless, I am done.

I found Blink on a Thursday night as I was taking out the trash.  That whole Labor Day weekend I kept feeling that lump knowing in my heart it wasn’t a good lump but convincing myself that it was just a cyst.  It was soft, rubbery and big.  And now, almost a year later, I am done.  I get to heal and get on with my life.  Decide next year if I want to try to fix the ugly boobs.  Maybe, maybe not.  I really don’t know right now.  There is still so much numbness, aches, red, and scars that I am not sure I want to even go there again.  They don’t feel like my boobs anymore, and I wonder if they ever will.  Part of me wonders if this is because there is still so much numbness around my breasts.  They feel foreign.

With the end of treatment, I feel like I am now standing on the edge of a cliff.  A cliff I have to walk for the rest of my life.  One wrong step and over I go.  Knowing what I know now about breast cancers is scary.  Knowing my risk recurrence with all the treatments I’ve had is 45%, the highest risk of recurrence for breast cancer is a little ball of dragon anxiety in the corner of my gut.  Knowing that other types of breast cancer have follow up therapies that help reduce the recurrence rates to fewer than 5% makes me feel jealous.  Knowing the girl that did everything right diet and exercise wise in my support group STILL developed triple negative breast cancer adds a bit of teal green panic to that yellow orange anxiety ball that my dragon tail bats around.  So yes, despite all that relief, joy, and determination to move on with my story, to face my life head on, move forward, live long, love deeply, celebrate everything, laugh outrageously and spread joy everywhere, I still have that cliff I see off to my side.

I finished the week of boost to the bottom half of my breast with flying colors.  Despite the problems last week with the original plan, on Wednesday the plan was correct, the negative adjustments lined up just right, the lines drawn on my torso all matched the negative adjustments Dr. Endicott had programmed and outlined the exact area she wanted targeted, and my first boost was completed.  I forgot to take pictures of the lines before we left the hospital that day, so the pictures are not great.  Thankfully, all the ink that rubbed off on my bra tank washes off.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was still feeling pain in the upper part of my breast that extended from my armpit across the top to the mid part of breast.  That was still waking me up several times a night.  I had tried adding Aleve in one night to try and help offset the Extra Strength Tylenol since I was swallowing that like there was no tomorrow.  It didn’t help, so I went back to taking the ES Tylenol every 4 to 5 hours instead of the every 8 hours as directed on the label.  And the fatigue just continued to get worse, as well as the damage to my skin under my arm. 

We took on watching the neighbor’s new kitties while they took a long weekend out of town, and had a wonderful time playing with them.  I finally had to let Robert take care of them himself as it was just taking too much out of me to go over twice a day to help feed all the cats.

 

 

It was taking all my effort to get out of bed by noon.  I was so glad I had the weekend off.  I knew I wanted to cook on Sunday, so I just continued to let my body rest, as it demanded despite wanting to do things, like head back to the pier for the Thursday night and Saturday concerts.  I didn’t go…  I became the queen of 5 to 10 minute napping.  And then on Saturday I stayed in bed until past noon.  I woke up somewhere around 9:30, but stayed in bed, napped three times before I finally woke up about noon.  I could hear Robert working in the back yard, singing.  Then he started to sing like Scuttle from The Little Mermaid.  Cracked me up!  Saturday night was the best night of sleep in weeks.  I only woke up once from pain, about 2:30 am, and the pain was not as bad and it was different, more my rib than the top part of my breast.  I was finally starting to feel improvement.

Sunday I finished the shopping for dinner, came home, and started slowly prepping food.  I planned a vegetarian paella with some seafood and chicken cooked on the side for those who wanted some meats, a tomato tart, some cheeses, olives and almonds for appetizers and a cardamom coffee cake for dessert.  All were yummy!  The kids came over, and we had a wonderful dinner, celebrated Jordon and Kelly’s engagement and talked about the end of my treatment.  Joseph left his phone (for video watching and game playing only) under the dinner table so when they were leaving and Heather asked him where his phone was, he had to come running back into the house.  Thankfully we leave the front door open until all the kids have driven away, as Joseph came running full speed back to the house; yelled “comin’ in hot” as he sped through the front door; dove under the dinner table; came out with his phone and ran again at top speed back out the door; once again yelling “comin’ in hot!” as he exited the house through the front door.  Kid cracks me up!

Monday we had a follow up with an urologist for Robert.  He has been having some minor prostate problems.  The urologist was very positive about his findings and wanted to start a history on Robert’s PSA levels so he could stay on top of everything.  He goes back in a month.  Monday afternoon we were back at Radiation Oncology for the 29th treatment.  So close I can taste the end of being done.  We also went to dinner with our friends to do have an early celebration of being done.   I was trying to ignore how tired I was feeling, so made myself stay awake.  I thought I had texted my friend Linda to see how she was doing, but realized I never sent the text.  So I texted her and we had a great laugh over text messages with misspelled words.  At one point, I just could not figure out what the word that came across was supposed to be so I took a guess – Horcruxes?  OMG we laughed so hard, I silently laugh crying in the bathroom because Robert was already in bed asleep.  The word was really supposed to be exercises.

Tuesday I made myself get up when I woke up about 9 AM.  I showered and took my sewing machine to the repair shop and went shoe shopping.  I had previously listened to an archived education workshop at CancerCare.org about Neuropathy and living with it.  I learned I needed new shoes.  Which made sense, as my most comfortable pair of shoes are my ugly Birkenstock type sandals with leather covered cork bed and loose straps.  Very similar to the type of shoe that was recommended by the podiatrist and the physical therapist on the workshop.  I went to a store recommended to me by my friend Linda and the proprietor there was a Prosthetist and Occupational Therapist before she opened her own show shop.  She worked with mostly diabetic patients with neuropathy and limb loss, so having her help me find shoes that worked for me and did not cause me more pain was a delight!  She understood exactly my neuropathy issues and helped me with two pairs of shoes.  I will still need one more pair of basic black shoes for work, but I think I am now covered.

From there I picked up some organic herbs to dry and add to my cooking herbs as I was running low, and then home to eat lunch.  My gut was starting to turn somersaults as the time drew closer to my last appointment for radiation therapy.  I applied my last two tattoos that I had reserved for this day.  All too soon, 2:30 PM arrived and it was time to head over to the hospital.  I told Art, David and Terri that I needed Robert to come back and take pictures of me ringing that bell as the neighbors had asked for pictures.

Art asked me what he should call Robert and we laughed when I said he should ask for The Wussy to come back. This is what Jordon and Robert always call each other.  As I finished up my final dose of radiation treatment, Art called The Wussy over the intercom system to come back.  There are camera’s in the lobby waiting room and the patient waiting room with the monitors in the techs treatment operations rooms so they can see patients as they arrive and when they are ready and they call them back to change and to treatment over the intercom system.  When I exited the treatment room, the techs were all laughing as Robert had started to respond to “The Wussy” call back, but sat back down after no one met him at the doorway to the hallway.  We were all laughing that he didn’t want anyone to know he was responding to Wussy, Art called him again by his name.  We watched as he got up again, but didn’t come all the way back.  He was confused as no one was meeting him at the hallway, which had always been the case in the past.

We finally got him back and he videoed and took pictures of me ringing that bell.  He watched as all the techs took turns hugging me goodbye and we were escorted to an exam room for that last meeting with Dr. Endicott to signal the end of my treatments.  Tuesday is doctor day.  Dr. Endicott took a look at my skin, asked how my pain was, commented that it is very unusual for someone to experience as much pain as I did, but I countered it with I didn’t have any of the itching peeling that most experience either.  She reminded me I needed to stop at the nurses’ station to get my follow appointment and she would get me a copy of my treatment summary on that follow-up appointment.

On the way home we picked up Sparkling Apple Cider for me to take to Support Group so we could celebrate my last treatment.  We arrived home, I put the cider in the freezer to get it to chill quickly and we both grabbed a bite to eat before heading out to Support Group.

There was an earthquake last night down here while we were in support group.  Stephanie and I felt it and both started to react, but Anne said it was just a big truck going through the underground garage.  Nope, it was an earthquake; 4.4 in Laverne, but felt all over So Cal.  I texted Stephanie to let her know she was right it was an earthquake.

Today is the first day in almost a year where there is no doctor appointment or treatment scheduled in the next week.   No pressing appointment that we need to plan for or take time out of Robert’s day to get me to on time.  I can just relax and heal.  And think about that precipice I now stand against.  I am trying not to think about all the bad statistics, and concentrate on what is good.  I had a complete response to chemotherapy.  No lymph nodes were involved.  I am envisioning my story going forward; despite using Noom for 8 weeks now, I’ve not even lost 10 lbs., and walking is still difficult and swimming has stopped since my skin got really bad, but despite all this, and the fatigue, I am pushing forward.  I am going to heal, I am going to get to my “fighting” weight; I am going to get my sexy back; I am going to love hard, laugh loudly and live a long time!  I am going to get back to swimming regularly, and be fit.  This is my story and I am sticking to it.

In the meantime, that little dragon is waving that banner showing me the precipice.  And while all this was going through my head this morning, as I checked email, made my latte, ate my yogurt, Robert asked me how I was feeling now that I am done.  Oh boy, what a day to ask me that, so I told him.  Laid it out, my fears, my hopes, my dreams, my plan, and my story.  At first he started to cut me off, tell me how he would take the part about no follow up therapies as a good thing.  You know the pharmaceutical companies would find a way to bleed more money from the system if it was necessary.  If he only knew all the things I know that I wish I didn’t.  We ended the conversation, he headed back to his office, and I sat back down on the sofa after checking on my laundry.

He came back out of his office a short while later, as I was getting ready to start this post.  As he walked by he leaned over and kissed my forehead, right between the eyes.  That is a sacred spot, for those who follow the chakra system it is where the third eye is located.  The third eye is said to be your intuitive self, the center to your true self, it stands for foresight, intuition and openness.   I always feel a deep connection when he kisses me there, as if we have connected on another level.  He always lingers in this kiss, stays longer than he would normally, with any other passing kiss.  I feel loved, I feel connected, I feel understood, and I feel embraced, acknowledged, and accepted unconditionally.  I love when he kisses me there.

On that note, later in the day, after lamenting the death of my sewing machine, and the prospect of having to buy a new one in the future with Robert and having a heated discussion over space, neatness, money and then apologies because we were both feeling frustrated over different things, Moses and Denise came over to surprise me with a HUGE bouquet of flowers and a Burt’s Bees Tips and Toe’s gift set to celebrate the end of cancer.  I love that our neighbors love us this much.  I love them this much!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day one of being a survivor almost done.  Next!

Life is connecting