News Round-Up

Highlights:

• Because we haven't had enough surgery in this household this year, my husband had knee surgery on Wednesday to fix a torn meniscus. It was one of those things that needed to happen sooner or later, so... why wait? I guess? Of course, I'm the Queen of Waiting, and based on the way things have turned out for me, I'd recommend to everyone that they do the opposite of what I'd do. At any rate, the orthopedist said it was eight weeks between knee surgery and skiing, so it had to happen sometime soon if we wanted to go skiing as a family this year. And we do. And so it did.
• Wednesday and Thursday were a little rough, because I as I have mentioned before, I am a self-centered bitch, and I hate taking care of other people, even if said people have spent the past five months taking care of me. (Have I mentioned that I'm a self-centered bitch?) But... I managed. Yay, aren't you proud of me? And my husband is doing really well, and still loves me (or at least says he does). After all the shit we've gone through the past few months, this surgery was such a piece of cake, I wonder if he will even remember to mention it in our Christmas newsletter. 
• Speaking of orthopedists, my husband's experience with his orthopedist reminds me of why I can't stand orthopedists, and why I'm dreading the point in time in the future when I feel good enough to have to deal with my hips again (yeah, remember my hip problems?). As I told Dr. L, after dealing with such amazing cancer doctors, I'm pretty sure I will never be able to find an orthopedist who is anywhere close to acceptable. And unfortunately, my hips continue to be a problem, I just don't write about them anymore because I realize there's only so much whining my dear readers can take. And, there's only so much energy in one day that I can devote to OMG-I-AM-IN-PAAAAAIIIIIIINNNN-JUST-KILL-ME-NOOOOOW.
• Speaking of pain, I started physical therapy on Thursday, because I'd like to be able to, you know, use my left arm again at some point in time. I knew I had limited range of motion in my left arm, which started with my first surgery, but I really didn't know just how bad it was until I went to physical therapy. I mean, I'm right handed, and apparently I can live a fairly normal life with limited use of my left arm. However, the therapist gave me a few exercises to do at home, twice a day, and I already feel better. (Okay, so maybe it's psychological, but that has to count for something, right?) She said we would be able to do more once the restrictions on my 'core' ( = my abdomen) were lifted, at eight weeks. After that, I'll start doing PT twice a week and really start to kick some ass. (My words, not hers. Although she was better than the therapist I saw for my hip, she had the personality of, like, a pancake. But at least she seemed fairly competent.)
• At my last visit with Dr. T, I mentioned in passing that he had invited me to a 'BRA Day' event up at University Hospital. (BRA = Breast Reconstruction Awareness, isn't that cute? Not.) I'll be honest - when he was telling me about it, I wasn't really listening; I was mostly trying to keep a straight face and not roll my eyes. But later, I reconsidered. For one, the guy spent, like, two whole minutes telling me about this gig, and asking me to come. That's about the same amount of time we spent talking about my nipple. Second, between the time that he invited me to the BRA Day event and the time I left, he volunteered, totally out of the blue and on his own, to come down to my college and meet with students and give a talk. This is huge, yo. Seriously huge. Surgeons at his level don't do things like this unless you offer them a lot of money, which it's pretty obvious I don't have. And even if I did have money to offer for that sort of thing, it's still huge, because plenty of surgeons without his status can't even be bothered to give updates to loved ones after surgery, or return phone calls to answer questions after the fact (see points 1-3). This guy volunteered to take time away from his day, during which he does life-changing surgery and makes some ungodly amount of money, to drive no less than an hour each way, to come give a talk, meet with my students, whatever I wanted.
• I was supposedly supposed to get information about the event before I left, but somehow I didn't. I looked for information about it online, but couldn't find anything. Eventually, while I was e-mailing Dr. T with a few other questions, I asked him for information on the event, and also thanked him for meeting my mom. (I omitted the part about her thinking he is HOT.) He replied: Thanks for letting me meet your mother; it was my pleasure. (...) Attached is our Bra day flyer. Please join us if you can and if you'd like to speak about your experience, let me know.
• I wasn't quite sure how to respond, but I felt like the e-mail required a response, at least to keep his goodwill toward me alive, which was the whole point of me not totally blowing him off in the first place. But... speak about my experience? To whom? Does this involve modeling? Show and tell? Is this a formal event or an after-work event? Is there food? (There was VERY little info on the flyer.) I didn't want to pepper Dr. T with questions, so I replied in what I felt was a pretty non-committal yet please remember who I am kind of way: Thanks for the info. I think I can make it - and I'm happy to talk about my experience. Honestly, I didn't give it a lot of thought before I replied. I just figured... well, I don't know what I figured. I obviously didn't do enough figuring, because to my surprise, he replied almost immediately: Wonderful. I'll ask them to add you on as a patient testimonial. Thanks so much! That he responded so quickly and was thanking me so much made me realize I should have thought a little more before responding to the original e-mail.
• So now I'm ridiculously stressed out about this, of course. First, because I stress excessively about everything. Second, because there are some complicated logistics involved in this, and basically I will have to drive myself to the event and spend the evening there alone, which is pretty much my worst nightmare. I'm not that good in social situations to begin with, and in my opinion, a BRA Day event is pretty much a worst-case scenario as far as a social gathering can go. As far as my 'testimonial,' I'm supposed to talk for 5-7 minutes about 'my story.' On the one hand, it's hard to imagine telling 'my story' in 5-7 minutes. On the other hand, 5-7 minutes is not nothing. It's a lot longer than, 'Hello. My name is Waning, and I'm an alcoholic.' LOL. It's long enough that I need to, like, plan what I'm going to say, unless I want to sound like an idiot, which I do not. 
• I suppose I could fairly easily back out of this. I can think of a gazillion legitimate excuses right off the top of my head - and trust me, I've gone so far as composing e-mails with said excuses in them. But: A. I'm not that type of person. Even though I'm a self-centered bitch, I do follow through with the things I say I'm going to do. And I'm painfully honest; I'm not convinced I'm actually capable of lying, even in a premeditated e-mail. And B. In between the time that I agreed to this, Dr. T agreed to come and give a talk at my school, which like I said before, is quite amazing. Granted, he is getting paid to come and talk, but he doesn't know this yet, and besides, he agreed to it before he knew he was getting paid. I really think he was just being nice. So I need to be nice in return, even though it's not in my nature. But STILL. Gaaaaaaahhhhhhh!  
• Lesson learned: THINK BEFORE YOU PINK!

DIEP Reconstruction Aftermath: 5 Weeks

Five weeks and feeling good!

Two days into taking tamoxifen, and my world hasn't fallen apart. I am my usual crabby self, and I haven't even had any hot flashes. Knock on wood.

I'm still having occasional shooting pains in my chest and abdomen as I regain feeling, but it's manageable. I also get itchy a lot, but it's manageable, not to mention something I'm used to. (I've been itchy my whole life.) I still have quite a bit of tightness in my abdomen, but it's manageable. I'm upright for the most part for most of the day.

Oh! And the biggest news is that my insomnia is improving in a major way. I've been trying to wean myself off of sleeping pills, and it's going pretty well. I've been sleeping about 5 hours a night and it's AMAZING. It's still not enough, but it's so much better than it was. I'll take it.

Probably the best part of all of this is that I am loving not working. Waaaaaay too much. I'm kind of scared of how much I enjoy doing nothing all day. I knew that work stressed me out in a major way, but OMG, I had no idea just how much. I feel like I need to go back to work just so I don't get used to this level of happiness and stresslessness. (Is that twisted logic? It's like the Seinfeld episode where Jerry and Elaine are arguing over who should get to fly first class, and Jerry's logic is that since Elaine has never flown first class, it's easier for her to fly coach, because she doesn't know anything different. NOW I KNOW DIFFERENT. Ahhhhh!) I hope I don't become permanently lazy.

Interestingly, when I was debating what to do over my work situation, my plastic surgeon wrote me: As far as the recovery, I typically tell folks to anticipate 4-6 weeks to be completely conservative. You are very young and in great shape so should heal very well and much more quickly. I have to say that while I do feel good, I don't feel that good. I'm REALLY GLAD I ignored this, because if I had made plans to go back to work after, like, 3-4 weeks, I'd be one unhappy camper right now.

Anyway, no complaints. Life is good.

9 Years, 364 Days to Go

I took my first tamoxifen today.

I got up, and first thing, before I could even think about it or make an excuse about why I shouldn't take it, went downstairs and just swallowed the damn thing already (along with my vitamin D, vitamin C, multivitamin, and baby aspirin). The sort of funny thing is that I almost took it by accident yesterday, because I wasn't really paying attention as I took all of my pills out of their various containers, and the tamoxifen happens to look a lot like vitamin C. (Do I even need all these vitamins anymore? Who knows?)

After I swallowed it, I waited for the world to end, and it didn't.

All that happened is that I immediately felt nauseous. (And yes, I'm aware that was 100% psychological.)

I'm waiting for the side effects, but so far, nothing. No cataracts yet, no 20-pound weight gain - praise God. (Who are we kidding? It has only been four hours.)

So that's one pill down, 3,646 more to go. That's 10 years x 365 days/year minus three days for leap years in 2016, 2020, and 2024 minus the one I took today. So 3,650 - 4 = 3,646.*

Not that I'm counting the days or anything.

* ETA: And I'm a idiot. Leap years have an extra day, duh. (Thank you, Lexi!) Well, what is three more days in the large scheme of 3,650?

A Moment of Peace

A while ago (a week? two weeks? - I don't know), I got a call on my cell phone from a number I didn't recognize. That's not highly unusual these days, because I get a lot of phone calls from doctors and doctors' offices and other random people related to cancer stuff. But after the woman on the other end told me she was from a spa, I wasn't really listening. I just figured it was a telemarketer or wrong number or something, because I never go to spas. But as she kept talking, I realized she really was calling for me, and I was like, 'Wait, I'm so sorry. (I wasn't listening!) Whaaaaaat?'

Very patiently and nicely, she repeated everything, telling me that she was the manager of a salon and spa in town, and that one time a year, they closed down on a Sunday, and employees donated their time to come in and give free salon and spa services to people who are having a hard time and need 'a moment of peace.' I was like, 'Uh... okay.' (And what do you want me to do for you?) Finally, she was like, 'Well, someone put your name in and you're one of the people we chose.' To which I was like, 'Huh?' Then, 'Oh wow, really?!' (Seriously?! That's, like, so nice. Who does that sort of thing?!)

So, I went in today and got a free facial and haircut and pedicure and ate and had makeup put on, and it was really fantastic. I've never had a facial before; in fact, I've only been into a spa, like, three times in my whole life. (On a side note, I was listening to two of the other women talking, and they were both like, 'OMG, I totally started crying when they called me and told me!' and I felt pretty bad for not crying, and just being like, 'Huh? Whaaaat?!')

Anyway, I've often said that I've had more medical procedures in the past five months than in the whole rest of my life combined, but now I can say that I've also had more pampering, too. :) Before my mastectomy, I decided that I wanted a pedicure. I'm not quite sure why, it was just one of those things that I've never done before, and figured why not? I'm getting my boob cut off, the least I can do is get my toenails painted. Or something like that. Plus, I normally take good care of my feet, and I was afraid I wouldn't be able to reach them for a while. So a friend and I went and got pedicures with our daughters as a back-to-school/pre-mastectomy treat. And I was glad that I did, because so many people admired my lovely green toenails while I was in the hospital. LOL. I didn't think anyone would notice, because they make you wear color-coded socks (mine were yellow to show that I was a high risk for falling - WTF?), but it turns out they took my right sock off during surgery so they could put an IV in my foot, and that IV stayed in for three days, so that foot got a lot of attention. :) Today I went with something more fall-like; hopefully we'll have a few more weeks of flip-flop weather!

It really was a lovely afternoon, even though I felt kind of guilty the whole time. Like, what did I do to deserve this? On the other hand, I don't think I did anything to deserve breast cancer, either, so I guess that it just how the universe works. Ha. I know I promised to never be one of those people who professes that cancer has made my life so much better, given me a new outlook on life, whatever, but... it sort of has. LOL. At the very least, this experience is giving me a new appreciation for people. My relationships with my friends have grown to new depths, my love and appreciation for my husband has grown as we live out the 'for worse' part of our marriage vows, and I've been amazed by the generosity of miscellaneous folks throughout all of this - whether it be people spending the day doing free facials or distant acquaintances bringing food. I feel spiritually centered and strangely peaceful. I used to feel that it was just resignation and fatigue, but I'm not sure about that anymore.

I need to take a lot of deep breaths and try to hold onto this peace, for tomorrow I have to start taking tamoxifen, and I am terrified.

A Great Patient

I mentioned that at my last appointment, Dr. T had volunteered to come give a talk at my college. This is, quite honestly, an amazing offer. For one, this is a guy who works, like, 80+ hours a week, making hundreds of dollars an hour, and lives an hour away. He really has nothing to gain from this - nothing at all. Now, oftentimes people say things in passing that they don't really mean, but there was honestly no reason for him to say anything if he didn't mean it. He is the one who brought it up completely out of the blue, so I decided he was serious. And my mom was there to corroborate this.

This was such a nice offer that I really didn't want to ignore it, but at the same time, it is a fairly complicated process to arrange to have a speaker come and give a talk. And even if you get through all the hoops, then you have to worry that no one will actually show up for the talk, and it will be a waste of the speaker's time and an embarrassment to your institution, not to mention the person who arranged the talk (which in this case would be me). Of course, I could always have him come and talk during one of my class times, but plastic surgery is not directly relevant to anything I teach, aside from the fact that 90% of my students think they are going to be doctors someday. Plus, I would feel really bad having him come down in the middle of the day to talk to a group of largely apathetic students, when he could be doing life-changing surgery instead.

However, apparently my mom and I had the same thought at the same time. My dad runs something called the Café Scientifique at our school. The idea of the cafe is to highlight the scientific work being done locally, outside of the traditional academic context. There are cafe talks once a month - Tuesday evenings in the university pub - and they are always about random topics related to something interesting and new in anything remotely science-related. There's a group of dedicated cafe-goers - mostly faculty and administrators - who go regardless of the topic. And, of course, various topics draw people who happen to be interested in the topic. But the important part is you never have to worry about no one showing up. If nothing else, there are random students in the pub who become attendees whether they want to or not. It seemed like the perfect forum for Dr. T to give a talk about boobs and butts. LOL. And since my mom thinks Dr. T is hot (and oh, is probably a great speaker, too) she of course mentioned it to my dad, and there actually happened to be one open spot left for the April cafe.

Here is where you hope Dr. T really meant what he said, because my dad e-mailed him, introducing himself as my dad, explaining was the cafe is, asking him if he would like to come give a talk, and thanking him for taking care of me. Apparently Dr. T responded immediately - my dad sent his e-mail at 6:04 PM and received a reply by 6:09 PM - and was so amused by Dr. T's response that he forwarded it me:

Dr. Moon, (interesting role reversal here)
I would be honored to speak on advances in plastic surgery.
Waning is a rather extraordinary young woman and a great patient. It's been a pleasure getting to know her and her husband.
Ty

HAHA! So apparently I am a great patient?! Those are words I never thought I'd hear. LOL. It got me thinking... I wonder what constitutes a 'great patient' in a doctor's mind. I always figured I was the type of patient that doctors dread seeing because I'm needy and demanding and have ridiculously high standards, much like the over-achieving, uptight straight-A students that drive me crazy. (Contrary to popular belief, the best students in a class are rarely the instructors' favorites.) In Dr. T's case, I'm constantly pestering him with questions via e-mail, including one mortifying e-mail in the middle of the night, and I strong-armed him into doing a surgery he didn't want to do. I'm guessing that if all of his patients were like me, he'd have to work 200 hours a week. (Wait, are there even 200 hours in a week?) I mean, I think I'm a pleasant enough person, and I make an effort to express my gratitude when it is deserved, but I think that's pretty normal, no?

As for the extraordinary part, that actually strikes a chord. Because I am not. But I wish I were. The thing is there is nothing wrong with just being a normal, ordinary person. Not everyone can be extraordinary, by definition. However, as some of you know, I spend a lot of time frustrated with my professional life, overcome by the feeling that I need to be doing something different. Maybe not something extraordinary, but something... more. And if there is one thing that will make you feel the weight of your own mediocrity, it's getting cancer and being cared for by people who truly are extraordinary - people with a wealth of knowledge, insanely refined skills, masters in their fields. People who really do save and change lives for the better.

Many people will try to convince you that cancer will make your life better, because it will change your attitude, make you appreciate the beauty of life, whatever. I don't buy it. Make no mistake about it: I already had a deep appreciation and love for life before I had cancer. I was already working to change my professional life. I can forgive myself for getting side-tracked from this while dealing with cancer for the past five months, at times wondering if I have enough years left to make it worth the effort. But now it's clear to me again: I need to do something more, something that is at least different from my old ordinary. I keep thinking of the words of Anna Quindlen, who was the speaker at my college graduation. She said that as graduates of our particular college, we had obviously done well, but the question we should ask ourselves was, have we done good? I need to do some good. Even if it's nothing extraordinary, I need to do better, be better. But first, I have to get better.

DIEP Reconstruction Aftermath: 4 Weeks

Four weeks, wow.

I feel really good. I mean seriously, I feel human and half normal again. Maybe even 3/4 normal. At least 3/4 of my new normal. (God I hate that term already.)

This is not to say there are not still bumps and some major challenges ahead, but I do feel like the third week came with some massive improvements. I can stand up straight for most of the day, my massive back pain has subsided, and my energy is returning. It's as if I woke up one morning and I was just... better. In reality, it probably was more gradual. I keep thinking of how my husband likes to tell everyone that our daughter didn't talk until she was three, then one day she was speaking in full sentences. Ummmmm, no. He's obviously not the one who took her to speech therapy twice a week between the age of 18 months and three years old! But it's true: she did go from being in, like, the second percentile at 18 months to being totally caught up by three. But still. She didn't just wake up normal one day, and I doubt I did, either.

Regardless, there are a lot things going right for me, and I'm so grateful for that. Besides what I already mentioned, here are some things that are good:

• My nipple is well on its way to recovery. Even after Dr. T determined it was viable, it went through various phases of grossness, then bled for a good week or so, with no sign of healing. However, over the past few days, it seems that a new layer of skin is finally growing over the top. Only about 1/3 of it is still bleeding. It looks like the pigment might even return. Dr. T was unsure about this, and told me at my last appointment that we could always tattoo pigment back into it, which gives me the heebie jeebies just to think about. My husband said it was okay if I didn't want to; an albino nipple would be easy to find in the dark. HA! 
• I've been seeing a really great massage therapist that one of my colleagues recommended to me. Now that I can drive again, I've gone to see him three times, and he is fabulous. I realize that getting a massage so often is an activity that is not sustainable (financially, that is), but for now, whatever. If the cancer kills me in a few years, I'd definitely regret not getting massages while I was alive. LOL.
• I've been slowly returning to my normal activities: taking my son to preschool, cooking, doing laundry, etc. Today, I dropped my son off in the morning, went to get a massage, met a friend downtown for lunch, and picked my son up. We just got home, and I feel good, despite the fact that A. We got caught in a seriously scary hailstorm/downpour on the way home, and I actually thought we might die. (Luckily, we got home intact, with the only obvious damage being that part of the underbelly of the car is now dragging on the ground.) and B. I slept three hours last night, from around 11 until 2, and that's it. 

The latter point is a good segue into things that are still a work in progress.

• I'm still having insane insomnia. It was better for a while; I would take a pain pill at night, because my pain does tend to get bad at night, AND it would help me sleep. For about a week, I was able to get away with the hydrocodone only, or on some nights the hydrocodone + melatonin. However, the past few days, my pain has been minimal, even by the end of the day, so I decided to ditch the hydrocodone, which led me back to needing a sleeping pill. I can't decide which dependency is worse - the hydrocodone or the temazepam. LOL. Last night, I went back to the hydrocodone + melatonin, and woke up at 2 AM. Of course, I started thinking about having to start tamoxifen, which led my stress levels to spike, and I was never able to get back to sleep. Aaaaaargh. I joke that I am sleep training. 
• At my last appointment, Dr. T brought up the possibility of doing a second, revision surgery to add fat to the reconstructed breast to make it softer. I do have to say it is rather rigid; I call it my coconut boob. At the same time, I am so over surgery right now. There is really no rush, but Dr. T suggested doing it before the end of the year - while it's 'free.' (I'm pretty sure we met my individual out-of-pocket maximum of $3,500 with the first surgery.) Part of me just wants to leave well enough alone, but the other part of me thinks that if I went through all of this, maybe I should go the extra bit and let him polish his results. After all, if my goal was simply to be acceptable-looking in everyday clothes, I could have just gone with no reconstruction and used a prosthetic. So... it's another thing to think about. 

Regardless, things are good! Really good. I am happy. :) 

DIEP Reconstruction Aftermath: 24 Days

It is Friday, so I feel like I should be making the trek up to the University Health Clinic to see Dr. T. However, at my last appointment, he said things looked good enough that I do not need to go back for another month, which is actually going to end up being more like six weeks. So hopefully he meant it when he said everything looks good, and complications this far out from surgery are rare. My fingers are crossed.

At any rate, today was a big day for me (insert slightly sarcastic tone): I ran errands! First I went to the post office to mail a package, then I went to the pharmacy to finally have my prescription for tamoxifen filled. While I was waiting, I went to the liquor store and bought three bottles of wine, a bottle of sake, and a bottle of port, because we are having friends over tonight and I was indecisive about what we should drink. I'm pretty sure that carrying these out to the car violated my lifting restrictions, but sometimes sacrifices have to made in the name of alcohol. LOL.

So now, I've got a bottle of tamoxifen sitting on my kitchen table, and I just need to grow some balls boobs courage and start taking it already. Ugh, ugh, ugh! Have I mentioned that I fucking hate cancer?

But the good news is that it feels really good to be getting back into the swing of things. And while running errands is not particularly exciting, it is exciting to not feel trapped inside the house anymore. Until today, the most I had done was drive my son to preschool and drive myself to go get a massage. Granted, I don't see any long trips to the mall in my near future, but it's nice to know short trips are completely do-able (and I almost never go to the mall anyway).

All in all, this is far less down time than I had imagined - or at least far less complete, lying-on-the-couch down time. Heck, I ordered a whole season of True Detective and have only watched three episodes. I feel good enough that I want to start setting some goals to get myself through the end of the year, and start laying the foundation for my 'new normal.'