The First of the Lasts

Three weeks ago was my last chemotherapy treatment. I was supposed to have a one week break, but like Bill Murray said to Chevy Chase in Caddyshack, I wanted to just "cannonball" it. Get it done, out of the way, over with.  Luckily, my blood cells cooperated, and my last chemo treatment went off without a hitch.  The mediport didn't even act up.  It was just like any other day.  Except that the rest of the crowd would be back next Tuesday, and I would not.  Larry and I shook everyone's hand and hugged where appropriate as we left. 

And that was that.

The last chemo.  The first of the lasts that I will be encountering on this cancer journey.  

Next up will be the last radiation treatment, in six or so weeks. 

Then a hysterectomy and oophorectomy, so that I don't have to deal with the possibility of the ovarian cancer that I am at risk for due to the BRCA1 mutation.  Followed by the big surgery--mastectomy and breast reconstruction.  I'm told that they tattoo you some nipples so that you look mostly normal. I'm not sure what normal is any more, but okay.

I'll take a pill for five years to reduce the likelihood of recurrence, since my cancer is estrogen receptive.  I'll periodically have tests to make sure that everything is still okay.  At one point, I'll find myself having the last PET scan, the last MRI, the last blood test.  But then one day, that will be the last of those tests, and I'll be considered cancer free.

But chemo is done, the first of the last, the hardest of my hurdles.  I feel as though I should be finished already, because I never thought I would make it through chemo.  Times when it hurt too much to even drink water, and I wanted to just it to stop.  Times when I was just too tired to get out of bed, even though I really had to pee.  Times when I couldn't button my son's pants because I can't feel the tips of my fingers. Times when I just wanted to quit, to say I was done. 

But I kept going, and got through it. The first of the lasts is done.  Time to climb the next mountain.

picture: free clip art from Google

**while I'm at home and resting, I'm writing.  I just usually forget to hit the 'publish' button, because, cancer.  I'm just now getting around to actually sharing some of what I've written, and trying to read up on some of my favorite blogs.   I hope to catch up some day!

Some Things Cannot Be Unseen

It was just a routine Tuesday at the oncologist.  Larry and I headed back to the chemo lab and sat in two of the empty chairs.  Across from me was a new patient, an older woman.  I checked her out while I was waiting for them to get my mediport ready for chemo.

White haired, I placed her age as late seventies. She was wearing a housecoat, the kind that was popular at one point in the seventies, white with little flowers on it and the snaps running up the front.  It gave me pause to see that housecoat, since I equate such outfits with jammies or other things that you wear around the house but never in public.  Most of the people we'd seen at chemo were dressed in their every day clothes.  I myself usually wear loose fitting pants with a V-necked shirt for easy access to the mediport.   No fuss, but certainly not jammies.

So the housecoat stood out, but the lady was otherwise unremarkable as she sat there sound asleep, a blanket covering her upper body.  She snored a little, but that's pretty common in the chemo lab, too. Because I like to create stories in my head, I hypothesized that this lovely woman likely lived in assisted living, and the facility had brought her over.  Then the nurse got busy inserting the needle into my mediport and I had to focus on that.

Not because it hurts.  They have this wonderful numbing spray that anesthetizes the area around the mediport, so when the needle breaks the skin, all you feel is a little pressure.  And not because of my historically obnoxious needle phobia, either.   No, I had to focus because when they start to pull blood into the tube...sometimes nothing comes out.  That freaks me out a bit, and I have to focus on not completely losing what tiny bit of sanity that I have left.  There's a perfectly logical explanation for the lack of blood, and that is because the needle did not go where it was supposed to.  I know this, but I still freak out when it happens. Larry is no help, because his needle phobia is worse than mine. By the time I was hooked up and had the IV running, the lady across from me was awake.  I smiled at her, and she smiled back. 

And then she decided that she wanted to recline.  She pushed and pushed and pushed, but like most of us, her strength was limited. Larry and I watched; it would be a violation of chemo etiquette to offer unrequested help.  Finally, one of the nurses came over and helped recline the chair, and everything got quiet again.  Larry started answering emails on his phone, and I got a magazine from the table next to my chair.  Before I started to read I looked up at the newcomer.  She was directly across from me, her feet up, her legs slightly spread.  Right at my eye level.

It was a bad day for me to be a short woman. 

The housecoat was apparently all this lady was wearing for her chemo appointment. It took a moment for my brain to fully comprehend the horror that was right in front of me. This elderly lady, who looked like a stereotypical grandma, wasn't wearing underpants!  My eyes protested vociferously this visual invasion.  It was all I could do not to throw my hands up over my face and scream. I got flashed by Grandma. 

My first instinct was to grab my husband's arm and share my torment, but I managed to smother that thought with a coughing fit.

"You okay?"  Larry asked.  I merely nodded, my eyes watering.  He didn't need to share in my pain.

I decided the better course of action would be to pretend that I saw not a thing. Deep breaths, I told myself.  Take deep breaths, and try to forget.  That's it... Just shove that retina-burning image right down there in the dark with that one night in Nuevo Laredo when I did drink the water.   I  buried my face in an old magazine, until I calmed down.

I do not think that this woman was showing off her hooha on purpose; I just happened to be looking in the wrong place at the wrong time.  It was an unhappy accident, at least for me.  She did speak to me later.  I was polite, and we traded medical information regarding our cancers, just like I have done with all the other patients.  When I see her next time, I'll pretend that it never happened. 

But some things just cannot be unseen. 

It's The Little Things

It was a Wednesday, and I was feeling pretty good the day after chemo.  Zane and his dad had gone to soccer practice, and I looked around for something to do instead of my usual nap.  There were dishes in the sink that needed to be put into the dishwasher, but I looked around the house in vain a few more times.

I hate doing dishes.  That's probably weird to most people, but I have my reasons, mostly tactile. It was my usual job growing up to wash the dishes before the invention of dishwashers, and I can still remember my hands in the soapy water, scrubbing the night's dinner from plates and pans.  Familiar things feel weird when they've been in the water; that lasagna that was so tasty on your palate feels just plain icky when your fingers hit it and you're trying to clean it off.  I still have nightmares about a particularly stubborn pan of leftover shortcake and the way the breaded mess felt like skin under the water. 

Finally, I just bit the bullet, washed off the dishes in the sink and got the dishwasher started.  I did not think about my hands, or my fingernails, which were detaching from my fingers due to my chemo.  I did not think about any of that, because I've done dishes my entire life without wearing gloves and never had a single problem. Why would I think anything had changed?  I wasn't thinking like a cancer patient, which is where I went wrong.  When your immune system is compromised, every day normal things, like doing the dishes, can invite all sorts of microscopic critters into your body, which is no longer prepared to fight back.

I woke up the next day, and the index finger and thumb of my left hand were swollen and painful. I knew that was a possible side effect of the chemo drug, taxitere, but I called the oncologist anyway.  Since I was already having the usual skin reactions to the chemo from Tuesday, I chalked the new symptoms to that and went about my business.

But they got worse.  I did not sleep at all that night, because those two fingers were throbbing and painful and continued to swell.  I did not go to work on Friday, but stayed home and slept.  I put ice on my hand, trying to get the swelling to go down. I took my pain medications, hoping that would allow some relief.  I couldn't even bend those two fingers. I was getting frantic, and then I hit my thumb on the wall and it exploded.  The nail lifted just enough for the icky stuff that was underneath to escape.  It was extremely gross, but I finally felt some relief, both physically and mentally.  Now I knew what was going on, and I could deal with it. 

I called the oncologist, and they prescribed antibiotics.  The first round prescribed was vetoed by my husband, because according to the pharmacist there was a derivative of my old nemesis penicillin in it.  The second round was finally brought home from the pharmacy that night.  The swelling started to go down, and I got a good night's sleep.

All of my fingernails are loose, as the chemo does its work.  They ooze sometimes, and I just have to let them.  I have two finger nails that I have to prevent from popping up and scaring random children; those will likely fall off at some point.  My hands, which are also shedding skin like a scaly reptile of some sort, look like they belong to someone else.  My toenails are not nearly so bad, but they're now opaque and a pedicure is not going to help. 

The good news is that I've been forbidden from doing any more dishes for the duration of my treatment.  My reality has changed, at least for now, and I just have to go with the flow until I get the all clear.  A new normal.  I'm okay with that.

Beauty Products for the Cancer Patient

While I am going through treatment for cancer, beauty seems to be irrelevant.  Oh, I still care about looking presentable, but I have no hair.  I have no eyebrows.  I have three eyelashes, stubbornly clinging to my eyelid, and my eyes are watering constantly due to the chemo.  My fingernails and toenails are falling off, and the skin is peeling from my hands and feet.  Those are just little things, I know.  The bigger picture is always at the back of my mind.  All those things will pass, eventually. 

But in the meantime?  I can't wear makeup.  I can't paint my nails or go get a pedicure. My beauty routine right now is a three minute shower, followed by...not much else.  Since my fingernails started loosening up, I haven't even been able to put on jewelry without assistance.  I've gone down a couple of sizes since all this started, but I'm waiting to buy new pants until after chemo.  Just to celebrate. 
Still, not much of a beauty routine...except that I do have some beauty products that are helping.

The good folks at Influenster.com sent me something free to try out, and it's really cool.  Neutrogena Naturals.  These are towlettes that one can use to remove makeup, if you happen to be wearing any, and they can be used to clean the face. The hope is that you'll use these instead of washing your face, and conserve water.  

The great thing about these towelettes is that they make my skin feel very soft.  Plus, I can use these to clean around my eyes, which are a bit chapped right now from my constant chemo water works.  I even run this towelette over my bald head, and it feels wonderfully cool, especially after wearing a hat all day.  Since I've been using these, I've actually had people compliment me on my skin, and those compliments are gold to my poor ego.  Neutrogena always seems to have terrific skin care at good prices. 

Another beauty product that I've found helpful has been Bag Balm.  This is something that farmers use on the udders of cows, but it works for hands too.  At night I slather my hands with the stuff, then put on cotton gloves.  It has helped with some of the more severe cracking and peeling, especially between my fingers.  I think that it's the lanolin in the bag balm that does the miracle magic, and I love it.  I ordered my Vermont Bag Balm on Amazon. 

I can't use lanolin on my face, but I have been using this Clinique product, Turnaround Overnight Radiance.  It's a moisturizer, and it's helped keep the dry, leathery skin that sometimes accompanies chemo far, far away.   When I was younger, I used to use Clinique's Turnaround cream,
and this version of it has seemed to help keep my skin hydrated enough to get me through the day.  Sephora sells this stuff for $12.50, which is pretty reasonable. 

Using sunscreen during the day also helps, as does wearing a wide brimmed hat, particularly when I go to my son's soccer games or am outside longer than five minutes. But I did that before I had cancer, because my skin is white enough to be seen from space. My favorite sunscreen is, of course, Neutrogena, particularly their stick versions.  I find the sticks seem to go on my skin better and blend in easier. 

My lips are extra chapped right now because my mouth has all those sores in it and that makes me drink extra water and lick my lips.  Don't judge.  To combat that lovely cracked lip look, I use Sally Hansen's Overnight Lip Recovery, which is truly a godsend.  It doesn't evaporate likes some lip balms. It actually is still on my lips when I wake up!  My lips never had it so good.  Plus, a tube typically lasts a long time. Which is great, because this stuff is also the hardest to find, and it is a bit pricey.   I searched every Walgreens and CVS locally, in addition to Walmart and other stores near me, with no luck.  So I finally ordered it from Amazon.

These are the products that are keeping me sane right now, at least as much as a cancer patient can be considered sane.  I may look a hot mess, but this too, shall pass.  My hair will start to grow back, new fingernails and toenails will show up, and the cracks in my skin will heal.  I'll be back to my old neurotic "Do my shoes have to match my eye shadow?" self in no time, I promise. 

Helpless Sausage Fingers

I'm at the halfway mark for chemo. Just eight treatments to go in this leg of the marathon.  I've discovered that it's not the poisons that get to you, but the side effects.  No matter how many times the doctor, the nurses, or my husband talk about the side effects, they aren't real until they happen. It doesn't help that they give a list of 20,000 possible side effects, of which you may get ten in a number of combinations.  You just have to wait and see what the chemo fairy brings you and count yourself lucky if you don't get the "sudden death" side effect. 

With the previous drug, it was all about being tired and nauseated.  I had a week off between those treatments to recover.  The biggest side effect of that drug was muscle weakness, which means that I couldn't open things like jars of pickles and bottles of water.   That had me wallowing in a vat of self-pity.  It's always been a point of pride that I could do things on my own, like open jars.  That tiny feeling of independence was sometimes all I had in my twenties, when I lived on my own.  I would say to myself, at least I'm not so helpless and fragile that I can't open my own jars or kill a bug that needs killing. Fortunately, that side effect went away as soon as I was off that particular chemo drug, and there was much rejoicing when I was able to open a bottle of Gatorade for my son without resorting to power tools.

This current chemo drug is a weekly visit, and the side effects were non-existent the first time.  I even felt hungry enough to eat afterwards!  As more of the poison has been introduced, however, the side effects have become more obvious.  The skin on my toes has been peeling off.  My hands are swollen and blisters are popping up.  I have helpless sausage fingers, that can't open necklace clasps or peel the tops off of things or unbutton things.  My fingernails feel as though someone whacked them with a hammer; at night they throb painfully.  It's difficult to complete any of the fine motor tasks I used to take for granted, and I find myself getting tearful when I can't hold my pen correctly, or when it hurts to type. That independence I so treasure is slipping away again.

My gums are all painful and inflamed, with sores popping up on my tongue and in my throat. It hurts to swallow, and therefore it hurts to eat, or to drink. Eating and drinking are two of my most favorite past times on the planet, and to not be able to enjoy my two favorite things has been another upset for me.

I've got eight more weeks of this. The downhill is ahead, the end is in sight.  I know it's going to get worse, however, before it gets better.  I am trying to keep a positive attitude.  I feel as though I've fought for everything my entire life, whether that's actually true or not, and I'm still fighting, blisters in my throat be damned.  I plan to keep fighting until I beat this. 

But this week...

I used to stare aghast at people who survived cancer, who told me flat out that they would rather die than go through chemo again. My own father told me that five years ago, and it just floored me. He's a fighter, too.  Why would he not want to fight?  I get my general stubbornness from him. It's not in my nature to give up, ever, and it was beyond me to think of just not fighting anymore.  But I get it now.  This week, it makes sense.  I understand that feeling now.  How tired and worn out would I have to be to want to stop fighting, I wonder?  I don't know, and that scares me.

This week was hard. 

A Roller Coaster That I Don't Like

One of my favorite movies is Parenthood. It stars Steve Martin and a host of other actors portraying an extended family and their growing up and older and wiser.  In one scene, Steve Martin is ranting about something, and his grandmother comes into the room and talks about how her husband took her on a roller coaster when she was 19.  I loved that story about how something could be so scary and so fun at the same time.  A metaphor for life. 

I used to love the roller coaster when I was a kid.  Unfortunately, as I got older, my inner ears ganged up on me.  Now I can't even look at a roller coaster without getting nauseated.  But I still love the idea of the ups and downs that life can take, even if my days of actually riding roller coasters has been curtailed.  And while I've been going through cancer treatment, it's helped me to see this as a dip in the ride.  

This week after my by now routine chemo treatment, the Physician's Assistant at the oncologist asked to speak with me.  Larry and I were puzzled, but we went into one of the exam rooms and waited.  We haven't had a lot of dealings with this PA.  Mostly we speak either to the oncologist directly or his nurse practitioner, both of whom are very laid back sorts of individuals.  The PA came in and told me that the cancer markers in my blood were up, and he showed me a graph with lovely colors.  Then he said my liver markers were also up, and showed me another graph.  The implication may not have been that the cancer had spread to my liver, but where do you think my brain went?

"And?" I asked. "What does this mean? Why would my cancer markers be up if I am in the middle of chemo?"

The upshot of his discussion was that I needed to have a liver ultrasound, and they needed to do another blood test.  The first test could have been an error, he said. The thought popped into my head while he was speaking that if the first test might have been an error, wouldn't it be better to wait until after the second test to say anything?  We asked a few questions, and I suppose that we confused him, because he finally said that we should speak to the doctor, who wasn't in the office at that time. I made an appointment to talk to the oncologist on Thursday, and we left. 

Of course we freaked right out immediately.  I cried off and on for the rest of the day, finally taking a Xanax, because my eyes were getting all puffy and I didn't want Zane to see me.  He already thinks that I look like a puffy Mr. Clean. 

Once I calmed down a little, I started thinking about my liver.  My liver and I have had a long and storied relationship.  Over the years, through many alcoholic beverages, many migraines, and lots of chronic joint pain, my liver has struggled to filter my blood.  It has done an admirable job, but the long term result of my hard living youth and middle age has been that my liver markers tend to be higher than expected.  In fact, the last time I spoke with my family doctor, he mentioned that very fact.  So what was different now?  How did one leap from higher liver markers straight to cancer spreading there? 

This was an extra dip in the roller coaster ride that is cancer.

I was torn between panic, hysteria, and my normal, healthy skepticism. My inner compass had been thrown off way back in September, when what I thought was no big deal turned out to be cancer.  I was wrong then, what if I was wrong now?  I was a mess. I spent most of my morning in my office, alternately sobbing and getting angry. 

My husband, who is my champion in more ways than I can even count, was thinking the same thing.  Except instead of sitting in his classroom and sobbing quietly like I was, Larry got on the phone and called the oncologist.  He spoke to the nurse practitioner about what the PA said, and she conferred with the doctor.  My test results were not significant for anything, they told Larry.  I didn't need an ultrasound.  I didn't need to come in and talk to the doctor.  There was no problem.   And as I had known, my liver markers had always been elevated, so that was not a big deal, either.  Essentially, the PA freaked us out for nothing. I'd really like to throat punch him. 

Larry texted me the news, which made me go from sobbing to euphoric. Sort of bipolar, I suppose.  But at least the roller coaster is going the right direction now. 

I Watch Too Many Movies

Tuesday started off as another routine chemo day.  I would be getting a new chemo drug, and I would have 12 weeks of this before I would be finished.  Mentally, I had established my own inner countdown--four treatments down, 12 to go.

Routine.

Except that it wasn't routine.  As soon as the nurse inserted the needle into my mediport and tried to draw blood, nothing was routine.  What was supposed to happen after the insertion of the needle?  That would be blood flowing into the syringe.  This time, nothing happened.  No blood.  Nothing came out of my body.  The nurse didn't panic, but I certainly got anxious, especially when she immediately started pumping on the plunger that went with the syringe.  It appeared to my untrained eyes that my nurse was pumping massive amounts of air into a major vein located right next to my heart.   My anxiety rose rapidly.

Nobody really talks about the anxiety and the panic attacks that come with a cancer diagnosis. We start to freak out about everything, just because that lump we though was "nothing" was something. We cancer patients can no longer trust ourselves to know anything about what is going on in our bodies. Any little thing sets off a chain reaction of "What ifs?" that would drive anyone over the edge, but a person with an anxious personality, like me?  Amp that anxiety to 13.  If I can't catch my breath after climbing stairs, I'm dying.  If my feet hurt, it's some obscure cancer-related disease and my feet will have to be amputated. If my eye twitches because I'm tired, I think I'm losing my vision. Whatever is happening is THE. WORST. POSSIBLE. THING.

As I'm sitting in that chair, watching the nurse,  my brain is remembering that I've seen all the cop shows.  I've seen the movies where people are eliminated by some bad guy inserting a single air bubble into the IV of a victim in a hospital room.  I know what an embolism is, fer cryin' out loud!

"Am I about to die from an embolism?" I blurted, ready to at least punch her for killing me.  In my growing hysteria, I wasn't thinking about what the poor woman's motive might be for murdering me in a crowded chemo room with my husband standing right there.  That would have required less anxiety and more actual brain.  I was thinking of the movies, and the TV shows, and freaking myself out. 

"What?" the exasperated nurse replied, still trying to get blood out of my chest. She laughed.  "No, you aren't going to die from an embolism! Give me some credit here!" 

She then explained what she was trying to do, and why no actual air had gone into my vein. Essentially, the needle was stuck in the port, having never exited to the other side as it is supposed to do.  After a few more moments of fiddling with my mediport, she finally got it to work.  I have never been more happy to see blood coming out of a syringe in my life.  I was especially happy that the blood was red and looked normal.  Routine.

"See, I do know what I'm doing!"  The nurse teased me.  I sheepishly smiled back. 

We Are All Brave In Our Own Way

There's a older gentleman who started coming to the oncologist for his chemo treatments. He walked in by himself, unlike the rest of us who had our friends/spouses with us.  The place was crowded that Tuesday, every seat full and plenty of IVs to go around.  Larry was sitting next to me, and they asked him to give up his seat for this man. 

I looked at the man who was to take his seat.   He held himself rigidly, as if there were a steel bar in his spine.  His brow was furrowed, a look of concern on his face.  His hands were almost clenched into fists.  I knew that look.  He was terrified.  The nurses had told him to have a seat several times, but he didn't seem to hear. 

"Come on over here and sit right down next to me!'  I smiled at him and patted the empty seat.  I could see that I had his attention; he blinked at me a couple of times, and then moved to sit down beside me.  As soon as he sat down, I made some inane comment about him being new, but he did not seem to hear me.  He just sat there, lost in his fears, as they hooked him up with his IV and got him started.  The lady on the other side of me was talking nonstop about food, and after a couple of attempts at quiet conversation in a room full of people, I just returned to my crochet and left him alone. He sat upright in the chair, never leaning back.  He left after about 30 minutes, stiffly shuffling down the hall.  I tried to see if someone was out in the waiting room to pick him up, but they were changing my bag and I didn't see him leave.

The day after my chemo, I was back for my booster shot(it's a shot to raise my white blood cell count that costs...$8,000. DOLLARS. I call it the Money Shot.).   The same gentleman was there, and he had the same terrified look on his face.  Usually after the first treatment, the anxiety is reduced, but this guy looked much the same as he did the day before.  We were facing each other this time, so I put on my nicest smile instead of my usual grimace and stared right at him while I listened to the same woman from the day before continue her discussion of food.  I was starting to get a little concerned, because the look on the poor man's face was almost catatonic, as if his mind had gone far away.

After they gave me my shot and said I could go, and went over to that man and took his hand.  He looked up at me, and I smiled at him again, and I told him that he would be okay.  Whether he heard me or not I wasn't sure, but I said it anyway.  I turned to leave.

"Are you going to be here tomorrow?" I heard a small voice say.  I turned around and apologized for not being able to see him tomorrow.  I reassured him that he would be fine.  Whether that is true or not, I think that is what he needed to hear; he seemed to relax. 

Being brave is not just about the big moments, when you're facing the Big Bad and there's no way out.  Bravery can be found in quiet moments as well. Being brave is sometimes about just getting out of bed.  Being brave is speaking up instead of keeping silent.  Being brave is not hiding who you really are because someone might say something.  Being brave is raising your hand in class, even when you're not sure of your answer. Being brave is opening the door of that doctor's office, and walking in.  Being brave is showing up for chemo by yourself, no matter how scary it is. 

We are all brave in our own way. 

It's All About The Attitude

When you have cancer and are prescribed chemotherapy, the first thing you do is panic.  Your oncologist hands you a bunch of paper listing all the side effects of the poisons they plan to put into your body, and you panic.  You panic about losing your hair, you panic about the nausea, you panic about the mention of sudden death, you panic about the impossibly stupid costs, etc.  You panic about just about everything. 

And then you actually start chemo, and everything you panicked about seems...routine.  Mundane.  Even banal.  You show up at your appointed time and the nurse weighs you and takes you to a room filled with other cancer patients.  You get a comfy chair, they stick the needle in your mediport, and the drugs start dripping through the tube.  Then you sit and do whatever you want for however long it takes, which for me is about three or four hours each time. 

My husband comes with me, and we usually bring books, computers, magazines, and whatever to occupy the time.  When we first arrived for our initial appointment, we expected a room filled with dread, fear, and despair.  Maybe a little anger.  All of us have a disease that requires more than a pound of flesh for even the hope of a cure, after all.  Who wouldn't be upset, angry, or depressed about that? 

Reality is a different story. 

I've sat next to people who were quiet or sleeping during their treatments, but that's been the exception.  Usually we are greeted with smiles and cheers.  It's like I've joined a club of some sort, and Larry gets to come along, too.  One visit Larry spent the entire three hours talking to two other gentlemen about the Dallas Cowboys of the 1970s, the Union Pacific Railroad, and East Texas, while I crocheted and listened. 

There's been a lot more laughter than I expected.  One person asks for a margarita to be added to their IV each time I'm there, with the others chiming in with their alcoholic beverage of choice.  We joke about our hair, and gripe about the weather.  When and if we do discuss our cancers, it is always in a upbeat tone, no matter what.  Even the people who end up at the hospital for a transfusion seem happy.  I've decided that having a good attitude is essential to fighting cancer.  Keeping your spirits up, and sharing that cheer with your fellow cancer patients, can make all the difference.

This week, when I was visiting for a blood check, a woman(who has been dealing with cancer for fifteen years) got up from her chair to visit the restroom.  Since she was attached to the IV, she started to pull the IV pole with her as she crossed the floor.  When this tiny, frail woman got to the middle of the room, she stopped. 

"Look!" she said, smiling  "I'm a pole dancer!" 

And she did a very slow turn around her IV pole.  The rest of us applauded and laughed as she took a short bow.


Go visit Mamakat's Pretty Much World Famously Awesome Workshop and check out the other writers!  The prompt I chose was 2. Something that made you smile this week.

Stinky Feet

My nostrils were assaulted the other evening when I walked into the living room.  A foul odor wafted from the general direction of my husband and son, who were busily playing Minecraft together on the Xbox.  Not the usual gaseous anomalies generated by diet, but a horrifically dense fog of an odor that practically melted my nose hairs.   This was a "OMG, something died under the couch three weeks ago" smell.  This was a "zombies are hiding behind the china cabinet" smell.  This was a "hasn't been seen by his neighbors in weeks" smell.  Have I adequately conveyed that this smell was AWFUL?  I could go on. 

As a result of chemo there are a number of smells that just make me want to immediately lose my lunch, and this particular smell was registering as a 13 on a scale of 1 to 10.  I had moments to investigate, locate the source, and destroy it before there would be a mess.

"What in the name of all that is holy is that SMELL??!!!" seemed a good opening question.

"What are you talking about?" Larry didn't move his eyes from the television.

"You don't smell that?" I was incredulous. How could anyone miss that greenish miasma floating in the air?  The mustard gas used in WWI smelled less lethal.

"I don't smell anything," Larry said.  Zane didn't say anything; he just kept digging or building or whatever it is you do in Minecraft.   I began to hunt around for the cause of such an obnoxious odor, sniffing the air and then gritting my teeth and dry heaving.  Fortunately, there were no dead animals underneath the sofa, although I did find a number of empty paper plates.  There were no zombies behind the china cabinet, either.  As I drew closer to my boy, however, I figured it out.

The foul, offensive odor was my son's stockinged feet.  Yes, I have to put this on record: the foulest stench I've ever endured in my almost fifty years, the smell that made me want to projectile vomit all over my living room, was the smell of my son's sweaty, stockinged feet.

I was appalled.  I know that teenagers often suffer sweaty, stinky feet.   But my boy is SEVEN!!!  He is way too young for such stinkiness! Do they even make Odor Eaters for kid feet?  If his feet were this horrific now, what would the teen years be like?  My brain cringed at the image of my son bereft of a date on Prom Night because he forgot to wear his Odor Eaters.  Instead of showing up at school with a left behind lunch, I'd be dropping off a new pair of shoes.

I was making myself dizzy holding my breath and staring at my son's feet.  Breathing through my nose, I looked closely at his socks.  Perhaps he stepped on something?  The socks looked a bit...lived in.

"Zane, when was the last time you changed your socks?"

"I don't know," was my answer.  I calculated, using laundry day(Sunday) as the latest possible date. 

It was Thursday. 

We had a discussion then, about remembering to change his socks on a daily basis.  It was the same discussion we have every month.  Except this time I told him that if he forgot again, I was just going to throw up on him. 

Mutually assured destruction, I called it. 

Stinky feet are NOT genetic. 

Laughter is Not Always the Best Medicine

Prompt: Write about a time when you laughed at an inappropriate time. I'm going to try something new and see how it goes...

Exactly one week after my husband asked me to marry him, he was diagnosed with cancer. It was a cancer that is highly common among young men, and it is very curable. However, my husband was heavily into denial about his diagnosis, and dragged his heals a bit. The result was that his cancer had spread into his abdomen, and we ended up at a cancer treatment facility.

Larry is terrified of needles. He told me that several times while we were dating, but it didn't really sink in. I'm scared of needles, but I usually close my eyes and grit my teeth until it's over. I thought that that was what everyone did. I held Larry's hand while they drew blood(using pediatric needles JUST for him), I had him look at me until it was over, and he seemed to do just fine. I thought that that was all there was to his phobia.

Chemo for most people involves being hooked up to an IV and pumping them full of poisons to attack the cancer cells. When it was time for Larry's second chemo treatment, he was placed in a chair that reclined in a room full of people having their chemo treatments. Some were in beds, some in chairs, some had a 'civilian' with them for moral support.

The nurse placed the needle into Larry's arm and started the IV, and then she left the room for a few minutes. I sat in front of my husband so he could see me, and I started to get my book out of my bag. Larry and I were talking about something mundane, when he happened to look down at the IV needle sticking out of his arm.

My husband looked right at me.

His eyes rolled up in his head.

Larry started to slide. Right. Out. Of. The. Chair.

I watched this happening in slow motion, and lots of things were going through my mind all at once. Could an air bubble have passed into his blood stream? Is it a heart attack? An allergic reaction? All three at the same time! What am I supposed to do? Do I remember CPR? Where the hell is the nurse--Siberia? Do they have those electric paddles here? Is this a subtle way of backing out of the wedding?

I couldn't help it.

I started giggling.

The laughter rushed up and poured of my mouth before I even knew it was coming, and once it began, I could not call it back.

It had never occurred to me that Larry had fainted. I thought something was terribly, terribly wrong.

So I giggled as I watched my future husband start his slow slide to the floor. Another chemo patient yelled for the nurse while I giggled. Many nurses came rushing into the room while I giggled. Larry is a large man, and they all seemed to be very tiny women as they: a)tried to keep him from sliding onto the floor, b)make sure he didn't pull the IV out if he did hit the floor, c)calm the other patients in the room, and d)make sure that hysterical, giggling woman in the corner doesn't need a shot to calm her down.

Nurses, by and large, are completely awesome people. As tiny as those women were, they got Larry completely back on the chair without incident. They reclined the chair, check his vitals, made sure the needle was where it was supposed to be. The lead nurse made sure that I knew that the emergency was over. I was extremely embarrassed. I kept giggling, however, until Larry woke up, and then sporadically until we left the treatment center. I don't think that Larry really knew what was going on, but he was worn out from the drugs and just went right to bed when we got home.

I'm still embarrassed about the whole thing even after all this time. I pride myself on being calm in an emergency situation, on knowing what to do in an emergency situation...and I panicked. I was completely useless when it happened. I would have been more helpful if they would have knocked me out and used my body to prevent Larry from falling out of the chair.

I know that laughing is a common fear response.

I know that it was an instinctive reaction.

I know that I couldn't help it.

I know that I am being too hard on myself.

But I still do it.