Love you all!

Okay, okay- I get it!  My lovely, wonderful, friends and family- you are so right.  I don’t need to worry about what may happen in the future.  So I will give it all to you to hold.  Actually, I think we should all to have a big huge bonfire of the mind- we can toss all our worries on it and watch the sparks dance upward, everything burning to ashes.  That’s how I pictured the chemo all this time, as a fire burning away the cancer, leaving a clean pink scar.  (Well, it’s hard not to think of it as a healing fire, given the hot flashes I went through.  My hands and feet are still burning and numb from the Taxol.)

I recieved two wonderful presents last week.  One, from my VF friend Tami, was a book called “Model Patient: My Life As an Incurable Wise-Ass” by Karen Duffy.  I laughed and cried as I read it- it really struck home.  My new goal is to be as sassy and upbeat as “Duff”.  Tami, I mailed you a thank you, but I also wanted to thank you here.

Second, from my wonderful TNT friend Barbara, I received my very own “end of chemo” marathon medal.  That also made me laugh and cry.  This was one race that I really didn’t plan to be in, but I’m so glad to have crossed that finish line.  Now on to the next goal, the next finish line.  Thanks, Barbara for reminding me that there is always another race to train for, another goal to aim for.

And I think I owe a very overdue public thank you to Andrea and her knitting buddies for my chemo caps!  I know I wrote you a thank you, Andrea, but I never said anything here, because I kept planning on photos- alas, they never got done.  My goal for this next week is to get those photos, because some of those caps are a riot!   I think I also want a photo of me, my bald head, and my chemo medal!

The accumulation of 8 courses of chemo continues to affect me, even after the end.  I still have the neuropathy, the chemo anemia- and now, after all this time, I’ve started to lose my eyelashes and some of my eyebrows.  But I’m thinking a little clearer, so I guess some brain cells survived.

I want to assure Husband (not really sure who that is, just know that it is not my hubby) that I did in fact already have a full body PET scan.  It only showed the cancer in the lymph nodes and no where else.  According to my doctors, the PET does not always show all the tumors, though it does show most of them.  There is a possibility that my primary tumor is microscopic in the breast and has just multiplied faster in the lymph nodes.

My surgery is scheduled for Thursday, March 8th.  It will be the double mastectomy and removal of the ovaries.   I’ve chosen no reconstruction at this time.  Still getting all the details about how long I’ll be in the hospital, what my estimated recovery time will be, so I’ll let you know more later.

Sass on, everyone!