Doc Called

The radiology nurses called Wednesday. Everything looks great! The calcs were benign. No need to worry for the next 6 months. Wahoo!

Back For More

You're shitting me, I thought when my routine mammogram turned into two hours of close-ups and an appointment to come in for a biopsy. I wasn't dreaming and this wasn't last year's nightmare. It was a whole new kind of ugly. The good news- Your left breast (the one with a tumor that sucked away my summer of '09) looks great. The bad news, your right breast has microcalcifications. These look like specs of sand on a mammogram. I had five specs. Five. Five f&%king specs that could turn my life upside down again. 80 percent of calcs are benign. You get a little metal clip in your boob, a pat on your head and be on your way. 20 percent come back malignant and you're back on the operating slab and then on to radiation. I'm starting to get how people could just stop treatment altogether and say f*&k it even if their odds are good.
Every six months I have to go through this hell? This dread that it could be back. Canser. The bitch is back? And even if it doesn't turn out to be canser, my breasts will be Swiss cheese. So this Asian radiologist is describing what will happen next and all I'm thinking is how smudged her glasses are and how I want to pull them off her nose and clean them off for her. Maybe she was just seeing the dirt from her lenses? But then I see the evidence for myself. Those little fricking specs. And I want to run out of the room and cry. But I can't. I have to sit there and pretend like I'm listening to my dentist explain how to floss. I nod my head. I keep my cool. I'm going to have a stereotactic biopsy she tells me. It shouldn't hurt too bad and it won't leave much of a scar.
The procedure involves me lying flat on a coroners' table with my breast hanging from a hole in the center. Lovely. They numb me up then send a giant needle straight to the place where they 'think' the calcs are and vacuum them out. The tissue gets sent to a lab and 48 hours later, I will know.
I talked this all over with Ryan last night. Up until then I guess it hadn't hit me. I was fine all weekend. Even forgot about this 'issue'.
As I described what would happen to me today, I scared myself. Regardless of the pathology, this is my life now. Every six months for the next five years, at least, I will be forced to deal. I can never put it in my past and pretend that was someone else it happened to. Can I be strong and stoic forever? I got a copy of "Somewhere in Time" just so I could have a good excuse to ball my eyes out. I don't like feeling sorry for myself.
My doctor tried to make me feel better. "It's too soon after chemo for this to be anything bad," she said. "I'll see you in six months." God I really hope she's right.
I brought in my Zune and watched a movie while they did their thing today. It helped. Not sure if it was a smart choice to watch "Crazy Sexy Cancer"but I only had 15 minutes left and I wanted to see how the documentary ended. It took my mind off what they were doing under the table. The hot pain of the lidocaine needles, the dig of metal into my ribcage, the snap of the vacuum sucking out my insides. All were slightly dulled thanks to my headphones and lack of focus. The movie ended and I was helped up. The nurse pushed firmly over the wound to squash the bleeding but also to keep me from freaking out when I saw the hole. Oops. Too late. But I didn't freak. In the scheme of things what's one little hole compared to a 2" scar on your nipple??!!! I'll take the hole.
It's been a rough day. Did I mention my Homeowner's Association is breathing down my neck? I got a certified letter today telling me I can't rent out rooms in my house because it's a single family dwelling and that if I stop renting they won't pursue the matter further. NEWS FLASH- single family dwellings these days are defined as three unrelated people living together. That's what I got. And don't you people have anything better to do with your lives than scour Craigslist looking to 'catch' me? My Prepaid Legal lawyers are all over this one. As much as I'm irritated by their Nazi-like abuse of power, I do appreciate that the HOA actually took my mind off canser for the rest of the day. Thanks, guys. I spent all afternoon researching the laws and combing through my CC&Rs. I'm ready to walk- head high- into our annual homeowner's meeting tomorrow night. That should be fun. NOT. I wonder if the person who complained will speak up if I'm present. Or will they be chickensh*t? Stay tuned....

Welcome To First Descents or My Week At Summer Camp

So this part sucks. I can’t find a pen and have to type! 4 women in a tiny cabin, no bath, all with varying thermal temps and everyone but me trying to sleep. I want to write. Damn! Where’s that pen?
The light tapping of keys sounds more like footsteps in this dark silence. I’m exhausted yet inspired to write. I came on FD so I could have just one time in my life where a trip was for me- not work, not family- and just languish in it. But then there’s the part of me that can’t help but document this experience. I’ll say it’s for Sage. So one day she’ll understand why I left her alone with Daddy for a week while I went whitewater kayaking in Montana.

A year ago today, I was sitting on the roof of Ryan’s car, watching the Park City fireworks and wondering what having cancer means to me. At that time I had no idea what stage I was, what my treatment would be, whether I would see my daughter grow up. I was numb. I watched the lights in the sky and blanked out. I told myself not to think about it because there was nothing I could do over the holiday. On July 5, however, the wheels burned rubber. Like a leopard focused on his prey, I pounced on this cancer thing. I stopped contemplating a future (or better stressing about one) to deal with the here and now. The summer swirled down the drain- flushed like bad poopy as Sage would say.

One year later, I’m here, I’m strong, I’m ‘surviving’ and I’m about to punish myself in freezing waters for five straight days in the woods. First Descents out of Boulder, Colo., is a non-profit org that puts on something like 15 adventure camps a year for cancer survivors. Idaho, Jackson, Washington, Colorado, Montana, Utah. Rugged places if you’re up for a challenge.

My only luxury is Internet. We have to walk 5 minutes to the showers and toilets. There’s no running water nearby and no TV. It reminds me of my eight grade retreat to Yosemite.

Just yesterday I was bombarded by high-tech gadgetry. I had an MRI yesterday. The experience sucked. That’s about right. Took two nurses, several shrieks and three tries to get the IV in. An hour and 40 minutes later, both boobs were scanned and I was dressed and out the revolving door. I won’t have the results until Tuesday or Wednesday; I see my doctor a week after that. Will I be back at square one, don’t pass GO, Don’t collect $200 or will I be able to relax and feel like I’ve poked my head out of the woods? In other words, will I have to repeat last summer or not?

In a way, this trip is my last week before the news. Like a deathrow inmate getting his last meal….Or it’s a celebration of the new – I can’t say ‘me’ because I’m the same me only a little less cocky and a lot less immortal- so I’ll say it will be my homecoming. My new year; my Cancerversary. Please let it be this and not the former! All of us here – at this First Descents Camp – have some form of cancer. No one talks about cancer here. Not yet anyway. Not on our first day. Maybe we never will. This is emotional therapy by way of the physical. We get to kick our butts on the river, feel strong and come home with skills. We don’t need to deal with cancer this week. We have better things to do.

One year ago today, I wondered how my life would look. Today, I’m still wondering. Tomorrow, however, I’ll be stuffed into a plastic torpedo, forced to roll it over and swim in water only penguins appreciate. I won’t have time to think about the good or the bad of my test results. I’ll only have time to “be”.

You don’t get those kinds of opportunities that often, Sage. So I’ll understand if you choose to do something completely selfish and extreme when you’re older. Leave me alone for a week with your Daddy and do everything you can to squeeze life by the balls and make it scream in your face. You scream back, dammit! And for just that moment feel like you can control your fate.