Lets start with my experience with PEOPLE in October:
The Magic
After
releasing my blog, the response has been nothing less than surreal.
People who I least expected to express support, were suddenly there for
me. My oldest friends, closest friends, casual friends, friends of
friends, and family showed their support through private messages, by
reposting my blog, by reaching out to me with emails, phone calls, even
by mailing gifts to me. People shared stories with me about their own
challenging times and experiences with cancer. New adjectives were used
to describe me that I'm not even sure I deserve: strong, brave, amazing
(is that really me?).
The Loss
Well
intended, generous, and kind people have their own lives, their own
kids, their own jobs and their own problems. People can't be at my
beckon call. Nobody could possibly keep track of all my appointments and
check on me after each one. As helpful as people are, and as genuine as
everyone is when they proclaim that they want to "be there" for me, I
still spent many days of the month scrambling for childcare and often
feeling overwhelmed and stressed.
On to another topic...the WAITING ROOMS I spent time in this past month:
The Magic
While
waiting for a mammogram I witnessed the most amazing thing. Two
friends, who I later discovered were 79, were sitting together in the
waiting room awaiting their yearly mammogram. As they sat in their
medical gowns talking and laughing, they ran into another girl they grew
up with. The three women gossiped and reminisced (again still in
medical gowns) about high school crushes, losing their husbands - but
having new male companions, they caught up on who among their peers had
died, stores that weren't around anymore and grandkids who were too busy
with the internet. Eavesdropping on their chat was such a wonderful
reminder of how bittersweet life is.
The Loss
I came this
close to writing an entire blog entry about doctor's office waiting
rooms, but it sounded like a bad stand-up act. Have you ever noticed how depressing the reading selection at the oncologist's office is? But seriously
folks... So yes, there were a series of waiting room mishaps: an old
lady crying for help from her changing room after an accident with her
walker, a two hour wait, and of course the magazines and pamphlets that are exclusively limited to depressing reading material.
Next, I’ll share the good and bad in the content of those many APPOINTMENTS mentioned above.
The Magic
There
was the hopeful appointment with the plastic surgeon. Yes, it was the
hopeful appointment that included my husband kneading a silicon implant
for an embarrassingly long time, but it was also the appointment where
we created a realistic game plan for my surgeries (mastectomy and
reconstruction) in August.
The Loss
Remember my last blog post about the appointment with the breast surgeon where she found something that ended up being nothing? (http://mymastectomy.blogspot.com/2013/10/i-have-bunny-boobs-blog-post-that_28.html) Well psych, just kidding, it still might be something.
The breast surgeon still wants to do a biopsy - so yeah, that sucks. It
also sucked when I got a glimpse of my lab paperwork at my pelvic
ultrasound. I saw the ‘reason’ for my referral stated in black and
white. “High risk of ovarian cancer". It was kind of a harsh reality
that freaked me out quite a bit, on the day of an already not so fun
exam.
And one last thought to tie it all together:
The
day I found out I was brca1 positive, my husband and I stayed up all
night talking ‘till morning. That night, I created a list of dream
bands/singers who would come to play my 40th birthday party bash. Number
one on my list was Lou Reed. Reed died on October 27, at the end of my
month of magic and loss. It seems appropriate then to end with a quote
by Lou that speaks to life's lows and highs: “There's a bit of magic in
everything, and some loss to even things out.”
