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scary stuff
On November 4th, 2011, I remembered first to post a happy birthday message on my brother’s facebook wall and then made my way to SMIL, ironically pronounced SMILE, for my mammogram. On the doctor’s handwritten order, I noted “12 0’clock” and “ultrasound.” The other words were indecipherable, but I wasn’t concerned. Initially. I’d had mammograms before and lived to tell the tale. For me, a mammogram is less about pain and more about indignity and discomfort. Ungainly too, the mammogram dance in which a strange partner tells me to relax while she positions my small breast, compresses it between two plates, tells me to hold my breath while she flees…
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‘racing’ thoughts
My post-surgical lap around the hospital ward, was at best, tentative and unsteady, but that was more to do with all the things still attached to me, the urinary catheter and the JP drains, as well as the stunning realization that standing up straight is just not possible three days after a DIEP flap reconstruction. Magically, just two weeks later, I was walking along the Arizona Grand canal with Ken and our girl. Standing a little straighter, I was thrilled to be outside, the last of the JP drains removed, but also a little frustrated to be reduced to a stroll. My feet wanted to break into a run. Today…
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lucky 21: saying no to chemo
Decision made. At 9:45PM I took my first 20mg of Tamoxifen, having spent the better part of the weekend prowling every corner of the Internet in hopes of finding someone to validate my decision, to tell me unequivocally that having weighed the relative merits of treatment with or without adjuvant chemotherapy, Tamoxifen would be enough. Enough for me not to die from cancer. My head is teeming with highly inventive usernames and passwords for me to hide behind so I can post anonymous questions for nameless experts on the Johns Hopkins Breast Cancer Center or loiter expectantly on online discussion boards. I have poked around the Stage II Breast Cancer forum…
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the real warrior in our house
I didn’t know about a World Cancer Day. Until today, I’d known only about Breast Cancer Awareness October when the world seems to turn pink for an entire month. Since October 30th, when I found the lump on my breast – and, believe me, I am thankful to have made it until the end of the pinkest month, blithely unaware of cancer having settled in, I swear I have encountered more metaphors of war in the literature about breast cancer, than I ever found in my collection of Wilfred Owen’s poetry. Let me be clear. Within the context of my breast cancer, I show up – albeit, reluctantly – for every…
