Flash My What?!!!

The treatments may have ended (February 18th to be exact) but the saga continues. I have settled into life on the drug Tamoxifin quite nicely. Other than the bi-hourly hot flash my mood has improved, my energy level is back and good news for my poor husband: my long lost libido has returned.

It has taken four months to grow back one inch of hair on the top of my head. Is it slower to grow when its grey? The very crown is thick like someone dumped an entire packet of carrot seeds in the one spot and now it will have to be thinned so that any single one can grow. Its headed the way of my father's 1965 brush cut. Now that there's a shadow of color, albeit the wrong one, atop my head, some of my girlfriends have tried to get me to leave the wig/ball cap/ kerchief/ doily off. That always prompts the challenge for them to sit with me in the lounge with their grey hair shining through. We all spend hundreds of dollars a year covering up the fact that we have grey and white roots, that we are aging. So why would anyone figure it would be OK to flash it all now? When I fully intend to get it dyed as soon as the medical world permits (my books say 6 months, but my step-mom was told 2 months so I'm going with her. Maybe I should keep asking and find someone that will say one month! ha). Believe-it-or-not, some men still think our foiled fake hair is real. Am I to be the one to disillusion them? To let them see that its impossible for a 51 year-old to actually have a full coloured head of hair? Sorry guys: the waist-line you could wrap your hands around until your fingers touched, the firm tight spots you loved in our twenties and the naturally blond-streaked hair had to be sacrificed for the joys of mother and grandmotherhood, for our finer age of clarity and wisdom. (...seeing clearly that the grey hair ages us, enough to put dangerous chemicals on our scalp every 6-8 weeks. Okay, so maybe not too wise? But its not like we don't know what we're doing. That would be different, right?)

This past week I have slept comfortably without a beanie on my noggin'. I still reach for a hat when at the ski hill and I have to run to the outhouse in the middle of the night. Not because someone might see me, but because it gets cold!

When people ask how I'm doing ( as their eyebrows furrow in like this is so serious and they wait for me to tell them something they probably do not want to hear) I respond with a cheerful "Great! The hardest part of my day is growing hair and that's coming along just fine, thank you." Their relief is almost palpable. I am starting a second drug to compliment the Tamoxifin on Thursday. I'll keep you posted on any growths of third arms, any signs of a cyclopian eye sprouting in the middle of my forehead or the like.

Side Note: I managed to find some hair dye at the health food store that is ammonia, resorcinol and paraben free. I'll let you know if it works!

When Do I Become A Survivor?

When does one begin to say they are a breast cancer survivor? I have finished the treatments. The medical profession has cut, poisoned and nuked the part of me that contained the psychotically rapid dividing cells known as cancer. I did survive that, with some scary moments of wondering involved. Or do I have to wait until the recommended five years of drug therapy is finished to declare "I made it!" If , that is, I do make it?
I don't want to be ridiculed at a cancer march or a run for the cure as they applaud the champions who beat this disease when I have yet to find out if indeed we did "get it all" or if there is some little piece that survived, starting to multiply some place else as we speak.
It's a very real concern. Worse than the nightmare about going to Sunday school without my underwear on.
I don't know what to trust anymore. My body let me down once. Will it do it again?
They say that one third of women with hormone dependant tumors (like mine) will have a recurrence. Better than half of those five years or more after surgery. Because I opted for the adjunct therapy (the chemo and radiation) combined with surgery my chance of the cancer coming back goes down. I think I'm at a 3-5% chance. It's still enough to make you worry. I've beaten lower odds before in the luck-less life lottery.
Saying you're a survivor implies the war is over but for me, the battle has just begun. This is going to be a life-long assault of learning and doing what I can to survive not just now, but for as many years as I can squeak out of this body.
So despite everything that's been done, I'm determined to keep the numbers on my side. It's a betting game with no guarantees and you must do what you can to help. Swallow large fish oil and Green Tea capsules (anti-oxidants), stuff in the blueberries by the handful, drink the green spirulina/algae with your nose pinched, drag your butt to the swimming pool, fill those lungs with good clean fresh air, drink water not wine and whatever you do ...don't sweat the small stuff.
Possibly when I'm on my last breath, when I have lived a much longer life, I will finally declare myself a breast cancer survivor. Until then...Game On!

Crack The Champagne

It's official enough to crack the champagne- an incredibly delicious bottle of Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin, compliments of Terry Halpin. He gave it to me when the cancer-thing began and said it was for celebrating once I reached the other end of the situation. And I think I've done that! I'm still a little tired after I exert myself, like on Sunday when Sandi and I ran our usual 40 minutes through Houston or today when I swam at the pool. These excursions are usually followed by a mandatory nap as I can barely stay awake for the day if I don't. The side scars from the lymph node removal and the drainage tube still bother me. Its like I have a second armpit; the indent is quite pronounced. I saw my massage therapist who manipulated the skin around the scar to loosen the sticking fascia. It feels better but still aches after a day of skiing and jarring myself on the moguls or reaching for the next stroke in the pool. The nerve endings are repairing from the shoulder to the elbow joint so I can feel a lot more now. But the greatest thing is the past month of semi-depression seems to be lifting. It's difficult when you get spit out at the end of your treatments. You now have time to face everything that happened. You have to look at yourself- at what now faces you in the mirror-and re-evaluate. You have to forgive your old self, accept your new self and face the fact that this might not be the end of "that" side-road. That there might be a re-lapse, a different cancer pop up after all that radiation, a side-effect might appear from the chemo drugs, from the new drugs, from fate itself. You tell yourself you can take whatever comes and you mostly mean it. You've come so far already. OMG. Look at how far I HAVE come. Did I really go through that Hell and survive? And that's why you get depressed. It's an emotional process of shedding off the old skin and trying to get comfortable in this new, cut-up and re-sewn, blasted and poisoned short-haired body that remains. Just add a little eyeshadow, pencil in some eyebrows and set the alarm clock. No napping ALL day for this girl!

The exhaustion has finally started to set in. Quite possibly because we are in a whirlwind of normal life on the ski hill. That includes packing then dragging everything up on our backs in packs (water included) and then lighting the fire and unpacking between secondary and even third loads up to the cabin. It takes a few hours to get the chill out of the air enough to unpack the lettuce and cucumbers and a full six hours before you can relax comfortably without your coat and boots on. Then the socializing begins. This weekend starts with the usual Thrilling Thursday with free appys and draws for goodies starting at 4 pm, then people for dinner. I've been cooking two days for that! Ribs and Heloise's spaghetti sauce (made with bacon and beef! You can google it). No time even to make a proper dessert.
Then we load it all up 4 days later and drag it all back down (the spent battery packs, the empty bottles and water jugs, laundry, food), taking it home to unpack and put away again. Lock and reload days later. Sigh.
Trying to catch up with even my closest friends and family has seemed next to impossible- I have been calling people with the phone tilted to my ear as I chop, stir, fold clothes, research the Internet or dusted. With only 3 nights at home before returning to the mountain, the household chores start piling up. No wonder I am so tired these days! I literally "crash" flopping to the couch or bed not able to muster enough energy to get up for a glass ofd water.
Ridiculous. When will I learn to slow down?
Then again, I bought a card for a friend's 60th that says to live it up now. You can rest when you're dead. Maybe that's what this go-go-go is all about? Nuh, this is just my normal rate. Guess I'm not back to full speed yet. I'll get there.
Thankfully now I have to run! Off we go again. TTYS

Phase Four Begins

I'm in the Home Stretch, sports fans! Now for the easiest of all the anti-cancer treatments since this all began in May. I have been scanned, probed, needled, cut, re-opened, re-cut, poisoned and nuked. The scars are fading to a less angry color of pink and the burnt skin is turning to tan. It's time to rest the body and heal and let the world of pharmaceuticals protect me from any Big C recurrence.
Today I started a five year regime of a one-a-day pill named Tamoxifen. This is because I have..I mean HAD a hormone sensitive receptor in my tumor. This drug blocks the growth of hormone-sensitive tumors and the effect of estrogen being produced in my body. Side effects are extremely menopausal sounding: weight gain, hot flashes, loss of libido, tiredness, aching joints, hair thinning (what! wait a minute...) and headaches.
And because I managed to escape the last two chemo treatments, I'm being injected once a month with an anti-cancer drug called Zoladex. That will decrease the estrogen and progesterone being produced. Side effects? Even MORE hot flashing, tiredness, decreased libido and weight gain. My waist-line is DOOMED!
Good thing I still have a cute butt. Oh wait...I won't care because I'll lose my sex drive. Maybe we should put the husbands on the same stuff at the same time? Slip a little into the bottle of wine he gets to drink the majority of. They say "alcohol in small amounts does not appear to affect" the use of these drugs. I hate how they let that hang. Meaning, we're not 100% sure if it does or doesn't at this point. What would YOU do when looking at having to go through all this again. Right, avoid the sauce for now. Actually, I've lost my taste for most of it. I'm quite content with the Saudi Champagnes ( sparkling water with a splash of white grape juice). If a VERY great bottle of wine gets cracked, I love a sampling. Not a glass, but a taste of it. Stressful days still demand a rye and water. I don't always finish it. Still, I do have moments like last weekend when I couldn't walk past the bottle of Baileys. Before anyone could witness it, I tipped the bottle to my mouth and took a big swallow. Then I walked away. It was all I wanted.
But for five years...I don't know about that. What I do know is it was time to start seriously slowing down on the 20+ drinks a week. Get it down to the recommended three to seven (4 ounce drinks) for women. Think of the calories I'll save. Between that and the loss of two pounds of hair and a half pound of breast, the scales are going to be friendlier for awhile yet.
What comes after this? I'm trying to spend some time working on the books and then plan on doing a cleanse and liver detoxification in two weeks. I'll make sure to fill you in on what we have planned for that. It's going to be a hot topic!

Breast MRI and Radiation Explained

Ahhh...there's nothing like a good night's sleep in your own bed! Thanks to our wonderful friends The Kearns for making sure the house and hot tub did not blow away during all the wind and snow storms they experienced.
I've been asked to explain more about the breast MRI and the radiation treatment that I have been through so will add the info to this blog.
After numerous mammograms and follow-up ultra sounds on my very dense breasts, Dr. V decided the next course of action would be a breast MRI, which at this time can not be done in PG. I travelled by myself to Vancouver, hopping a Sky Train, bus and ferry to get to North Vancouver. I spent the night in a motel, ordering pizza from across the street for dinner and in the morning rolled my suitcase the thirty minute walk to the Lions Gate hospital. Once there I was put into a hospital gown and housecoat and lead to a room where the Magnetic Resonance Imaging machine awaited. I have had a brain MRI before and knew that I would be put on a steel table and slid into a long cylindrical "cigar tube" where the tests would begin with a series of long beep and boop sounds. The difference this time was that I was put face down on my chest with my breasts placed inside squares that had been cut out of the table. The problem with this is you are lying right on your diaphragm making it difficult to draw a full breath. Especially when you're not totally comfortable being in tight spaces to begin with.
A ball is placed in your right fist that you may squeeze if you need to come out, but they stress not to squeeze that ball unless it is absolutely necessary, otherwise they have to start all over again and no-one wants that. I recall lying in there reminding myself I had travelled a long way to have this done and as uncomfortable as it was, I made myself lie still until I didn't think I could do it anymore. You are given headphones that they play music and talk to you through. The sessions seem very long, other s quick, but the entire process still took forty minutes. Long enough for them to test both sides. Long enough for them to surprise us all with a detection of a suspicious miniature mass in the right breast that turned out to be cancerous. That MRI may very well have saved my life. It took 2 weeks to hear back and after that I saw a surgeon who sent me to Terrace for a biopsy. Four samples were taken, three of which did not hurt. I don't know what was different about the fourth except that it made my toes curl and the breath escape me. Owwwwww. What a wimp I was back then.
As for the radiation machine, same cold steel slab that you lie on, this time face up. You have been warned not to wear any deodorant or perfumed lotion on your skin, no necklaces or jewellery around your neck. Your arm on the affected side is raised up behind you, resting on a cushioned holder. The techs introduce themselves and start moving your torso this way and that. They draw little lines on your skin with a marker that later rubs off. You have two to four new pin-point blue tattooes on your flesh that will stay with you forever as a reminder not to ever radiate this same spot ever again. The techs then flick a switch operating two oblong light-covers that now illuminate a beautiful forest scene with a babbling brook running through it. This is what you look at as the gigantic head of the machine radiates you on one side of your body with steady humming noises before rotating up and over your chest to your other side. The techs leave the room. There are sliding and clicking noises as different parts of the head open and close, depending on what strength of radiation you are getting (or so I imagine?). The techs re-appear and lower your table to the floor. You hop off and wish them a nice day before heading off to change. You now have the rest of your day to yourself. Radiation was definitely the easiest part of the cancer experience, physically. Emotionally it is one of the hardest as you start to relax and remember all the things that you have been through the past 7 months. You weep both from joy and terror that the treatments are almost over. Your life is about to be back in your own hands and now is when you really face the fact that you just had a big bad brush with that scary "C" word.
All you can do is keep on breathing and enjoy the rest of the time you have left as best you can. I tell you, after all this, going to see the dentist is going to be a breeze!

I'm Flying Again

Its actually a symptom of ADHD- the incredible highs and the bottom-of-the-barrel lows. I have virtually vibrated right out of my skin from powerful feelings of joy and then days later been weeping from how futile everything seemed. But when you're in that moment the world sparkles and it was in this space that I jogged to the Southern Interior Cancer Clinic for my last radiation treatment this morning. Indeed, the LAST treatment of this entire horrific roller coaster ride. I jogged not because I had a ton of energy because I don't this week. It's been steadily declining since Monday. I jogged because I was making a statement to myself. I had cancer but it did not beat me. I have made it through alive and still in one piece. I have two breasts, five scars a head of peach fuzz and nothing but the rest of an amazing, never-a-dull-moment life to look forward to. The suffering has ended, hopefully forever.
I am now officially a breast cancer survivor and will be until I die.
Today was the only time the techs were two young men, both who grinned broadly at the booming Yahoo! that was shouted as soon as the last beep of the radiation machine sounded. They pretended not to notice the tear marks streaking my cheeks as I leapt four feet off the steel bed I'd been on, not waiting for them to lower it. "Good-bye and good luck everyone," I threw over my shoulder at the people dressed in their hospital gowns waiting their turn to go in.
I changed, put my ear buds in, turned on the MP3 player and began the jog back to my Uncle's home.
Three streets later I slowed to a walk because I could no longer stop the flood of emotion overwhelming me. Inside my head was a movie playing every single moment of this entire experience. Like a powerpoint presentation of someone's life, I flashed upon, well, I just tried to write them all out but there are so many. Suffice to say I flashed and I flashed and the flood of tears kept coming with every incredible moment. The fear, the encouragement, the shock, the love, the pain, the calls, the concern, the small triumphs, the harsh realities, the rug being pulled out beneath my feet over and over, the look on Barry's face, the look on Sharon's face, on Sandi's, the arms that held me, the tears that mingled with mine, the strong hands that soothed me, relaxed me, assured me everything was going to be alright. Barry and Kim and Sandi and Jane and Sharon and Kelly and Dorothy and Terri and Carlie and Debbie and Grace, Jen, Marelize, and our families and the e-mails from old friends, the staff at all the doctors offices and clinics and hospitals- the astounding amount of people I have been funneled past-the young man on the t-bar that told me I was beautiful and didn't need my hair or my boobs to be so.
It's time to get another box down from the shelf inside my head. I am going to pack all these memories into it and put it somewhere safe. In a place that I can reach if I ever need to share the story with someone going through the same thing, but in a place behind me that I can move forward from.
I believe all things happen to us for a reason. I mean I TRULY believe this with all my heart. I was meant to go down that road and you were meant to be there with me. Thank you to everyone for every little or large action that you took, whether it was merely a smile or a kind word, a little surprise or a house to borrow.
The cancerous chains have come off of me and I feel like I'm finally flying again.
I'm going to relish this ecstasy as much as I can for as long as I can hang onto it.
We're starting the celebration with dinner out at the classy Yellow House restaurant. I guess we weren't meant to have dinner there on Valentine's Day, after all.
Funny how life turns out if you give it a chance to reveal itself.