End-of-Semester Insanity + REALLY GOOD NEWS

Things are pretty crazy right now. This is always a crazy time for me in terms of work, and this cancer crap has added a whole new dimension of craziness. Yesterday I told the Chair of my department what was going on, just because I had told enough people in the department about it that I figured it wouldn't be long before heard it through the grapevine. He has been good enough to me that I would rather him hear it from me. Plus, I've been asking colleagues to cover for me, which is my business (which is one of the things I love about my job), but at the same time, I want it to be known that it's not because I'm taking off for an early summer vacation. As expected, the Chair was extremely supportive, and assured me that no matter what, the department would accommodate my needs. Also, since we will have a new Chair in the fall, and this might potentially affect my work in the fall, he asked me if I wanted to tell the new Chair or if I him to. I asked him to. I told him it's not as if it's a secret, but at the same time, it's not something that is really easy for me to talk about with other people, especially those I don't know well. And I discovered this is one way people can help me a lot: by telling other people for me. People who should know, but people I feel awkward telling.

Anyway, here is how the next eight days are shaping up:

• Saturday (tomorrow): EMT class from 8 AM - 5 PM
• Sunday: Hopefully rest (isn't it Mother's Day?) and get caught up with grading (Needless to say, I am SO. FAR. BEHIND.) and studying for my EMT class
• Monday: Give a final from 10:20 AM - 12:20 PM; MRI at 4:20 PM; EMT class from 6:00 - 10:00 PM (includes the written final exam - eeek). I think the MRI is to try to see if the cancer has spread to other areas within the breast tissue. Dr. L was originally undecided about the MRI, explaining that they often pick up a lot of 'noise' and sometimes end up resulting in unnecessary stress/extra biopsies; however, after doing her own ultrasound and discovering some suspicious-looking lymph nodes, she decided to order an MRI. That does not seem to be a good sign, now that I think about it.
• Tuesday: PET scan at 9:00 AM. This is to follow up on the suspicious spot on my rib and look for other cancerous areas within my entire abdomen. (I think?) This involves fasting and dye and is going to take at least two hours and doesn't sound pleasant at all. Then at 3:30 PM, I have an appointment with a genetic counselor. Apparently if I want to have further genetic testing done, I have to meet with a genetic counselor. I'm not sure how I feel about this, but since I don't know my family history, I decided it might be a good idea.
• Wednesday: Give a final from 8:00 - 10:00 AM; EMT class from 6:00 - 10:00 PM. On Wednesday afternoon, I was supposed to have a consultation appointment with Dr. Not Friendly about PAO surgery (remember my hip?), but needless to say, I canceled that appointment. I can so not think about my hips right now, even though we are having terrible weather and they are absolutely killing me. Oh well. The good news is that they are not literally killing me. I'll have to start rethinking how I use that phrase. LOL.
• Thursday: Meet with the medical oncologist at 10:00 AM. I am supposed to give a final from 8:00 - 10:00 AM, and I guess technically I could be there for most of it, but... I have an awesome colleague who is going to cover it for me (a different one than the one who covered for me this week). So... I'm just going to let her cover the whole thing. Back to one of my survival strategies: Let People In, and Let People Help.
• Friday: Nothing scheduled so far. Hopefully I'll be able to actually, like, get some work done. Apparently Cheri actually scheduled my PET scan for Friday morning, but then my husband didn't think it was soon enough and called around, and I got the appointment on Tuesday at a different place - the place that knows me reeealllly well now. Gee, it has been a whole week since they've seen me; I guess it is time for me to visit them again, haha.
• Saturday (a week from tomorrow): I have my practical exams all day for my EMT class. This is a big deal. While it's small in the large scheme of Waning's Current World, I have put A LOT of time and effort into the EMT class for the past 4.5 months, and I would really hate to see it all go to waste. I hope, hope, HOPE I can hang on enough to pass the exams, which would be a challenge for me even under normal circumstances. (I am a book person, not a hands-on people person.) If I can't, then I can't, but I'm really hoping I can hold it together for just another eight days. There have been times throughout the semester when I have not been in the mood for class, yet the class has always lifted my spirits. I have thoroughly enjoyed it and learned so much, and I hope that for the next week, the class will be a welcome distraction. Things are getting fairly intense, though, so it's hard to predict how everything will unfold. Again, my stress level is already at an all-time high, and I'm trying not to put extra pressure on myself about this, but still. I would love to be able to pass my practicals so that I'll be eligible to sit for the national exam when I feel up to it.

On a different note, I mentioned that I understand it's hard to know what the right thing to say is in situations like this. I don't even know what I want people to say, and I only know what I DON'T want them to say after they say it. LOL. As someone who often says completely the wrong thing, I can totally relate to the horrible feeling of not knowing what to say, yet wanting to say something. A few years ago, my brother and his wife lost a child in the third trimester of my sister-in-law's pregnancy. It was extremely devastating, and I had NO IDEA what to say. What can you even say to people who just had to deliver a dead baby in the middle of one of the happiest places in the hospital? There are no words for that. I remember having a conversation with my brother where I kept saying, 'I'm so sorry, I don't have any idea what to say,' and him responding, 'I know.'

But today, I made a new discovery: while it is easy to note the things you don't want people to say to you, it is just as easy to make a note of the things people say to you that are awesome (and keep them in your arsenal for the future). I came home from work and discovered that my daughter had a friend over. My daughter knows about the cancer, although it's hard to know how much the 9-year-old mind can grasp about the situation. When her friend's mom came to pick her up, she said, 'I know third graders don't always convey information accurately, but Lilly told me you have breast cancer?!' I was totally not prepared for that, as I don't know this woman very well, despite the fact that our daughters are pretty good friends, and I was a) surprised that this type of information could make it through the third-grade grapevine with such speed and accuracy, and b) surprised she brought it up (not sure I would have if the situation had been reversed). I replied that it was true, and the conversation that followed was Textbook Perfect. Basically this woman said all the right things, even though I had no pre-conceived notion of what 'the right things' even were. Like I said above, I only recognized these as the 'right' things after I actually heard them, and realized they were actually making me feel better, and not like I wanted to run away and start sobbing. And they are really quite simple, actually. The two major themes:

• I'm sorry; I really don't know what to say except I'm sorry. (I know this feels LAME when you're saying it, because I've said it so many times, and it has felt lame, but I now know it's really okay on the other side of it.)
• Please let us know if we can do anything; we'd really love to help. (Granted, don't say this if you don't mean it, because I just might take you up on it.

Anyway, a few concluding remarks:

I'm going to bitch about a lot of stuff here, and some of it is going to be sort of vague, due to the fact that I want to retain some anonymity here. I realize this is a public spot, but I'm choosing to write all of this here not because it's about me, but because it's about the more personal side of the things I'm experiencing, and I've personally learned a lot from reading about others' personal experiences with similar issues.

If you are reading this because you know me and care about me - and that includes IRL and Internet friends - please know that if I'm complaining about an annoying person, it's not you. Yes, if you know me, you know I'm passive-aggressive, but I will not exercise that trait here, I promise! I just don't want to create an environment where people are afraid to talk to me or e-mail me or leave comments or text me or whatever because I am super pissy and they are worried about saying the 'wrong' thing. It is the comments and e-mails and texts you send me that uplift me and help me get through this, and I really want you to know that.

* * * * *

While I had planned to end this post with the My Friends Are Awesome And I Love You message, I got some awesome news somewhere in the middle of the post. And because I love you, I also want to share the good news with you.

Upon returning to the computer sometime mid-post, I also had a notification of new activity on the patient portal I signed up for, at Dr. L's recommendation. When I met with Dr. L on Wednesday, she encouraged me to sign up for the patient portal, saying that any test results she got, she immediately released to her patients, so we could see exactly what she saw. She also said that it was good because while she always called patients with test results, she knew it could be a lot to take in, so you could always go onto the portal and read a report of what she had told you. (I've written about patient portals before, and how I have mixed feelings about them, but so far the patient portal with Dr. L has been an amazing resource. I've even been able to read about my hips...)

Anyway, I logged onto the patient portal and read the new message, which said:

Hi Waning, great news, the node was negative for cancer. I am happy with proceeding with surgery if you know what you want to do, or we can wait for your genetic results.
Give me a call Monday and let me know what you'd like to do.
Jane Kay Listens

I read the message and immediately wanted to start crying (out of happiness - duh!), while at the same time thinking it was weird she hadn't called me to share this news before sending me an e-mail about it. Of course, I then checked my cell phone, and she actually had called me, around the same time I had been having Awesome Conversation With Daughter's Friend's Mother, and had left a message conveying all of this. Have I mentioned that I love this woman?

I also found it interesting she signed the e-mail as 'Jane Kay Listens' as opposed to 'Dr. Listens,' considering most of the people I work with refer to themselves as Dr. So-and-So, even though they are 'mere' Ph.D.s and not even MDs. Like... I get it... to a certain extent. But still. Anyway, it's a story for another time!

This is the best BEST BEST news I've had in so long, so I'm just going to go with it. :)