....that today for just a moment, in the slightest subtle way I was glad I was at chemo because I got to SLEEP. Again the 50 mg of Benadryl made me feel so heavy. Everything sort of melted away. Conversations were going on around me, but I couldn't drum up the energy to join in. My eyelids were impossible to keep open and I was able to succumb to sleep for the entire 3 hours while the Taxol dripped in to my veins. I feel sort of guilty for 'looking forward' to this drug induced nap and I am positive that if it wasn't for the lack of sleep due to waking up every two hours to give Sadie her bottle, I would be going crazy with impatience to get the hell out of the Infusion Center. Maybe this is another one of those crazy good/bad moments.
Ever since I have been diagnosed I am bombarded with the goodness and the badness of my situation. In this case it's really bad I have cancer and have to get chemo while I have a newborn at home. But, it's good that when I do go to chemo, the anti-reaction drug they use makes me super sleepy and I get to lie in a bed and get some sleep. Sleep, something my friend Susannah calls 'porn for moms'. Another one: it's bad that I have cancer and a newborn at home, but I am fairly positive if I just was a new mom, I wouldn't be getting the almost round the clock help I have received from all my friends, family and in some cases complete strangers who learned of my situation and want to help. Here's a third: It was pretty bad that I waited almost 6 months to get my lump checked out by a doctor--but it's good I did wait because if I had gone in during my first trimester, I would have had to wait till I was in the third to get treatment and have an agonizing stressful pregnancy, living with the knowledge I had breast cancer full of worry and dread at what was to come, or worse, maybe I would have had to get a late stage abortion so I could get treatment right away. The way it all went down--I didn't know I had breast cancer until Sadie was fully cooked and can look back at the bulk of my pregnancy as fairly stress free event. And finally--again the breast cancer/new baby combo--not good--BUT, as it is Sadie won't remember any of this. She doesn't know her mom leaves her every other Thursday for the entire day (in the good hands of Sarah Bott and Amber Horen) to get toxic chemicals put inside her body. All she knows is she is warm, well cared for, fed, rocked and sung to. She won't have memories of her mom bald, tired, sick, cranky, in pain and unhappy. She'll look at pictures and think I look pretty funny bald and that will be it. Once she starts collecting memories in her head, I will be cancer free and back to my normal self. It's good this is happening now--and not when she is older because I experienced watching my mom with cancer. I don't want Sadie to go through what I went through. I don't want to go through what my mom went through. Not really wanting to go there right now--but I really hope when the medical profession professes that treatment is so much better now and that they are discovering new ways to treat cancer every day they are telling the honest truth. It's everyone's favorite thing to say when I 'go there'--that there is no way my destiny is my mom's because medicine is getting so much better. But is that just the 'thing' to say? Is that a band aid to cover up a hard truth, a real fear? It's hard for me. I am the type of person who goes on to MovieSpoiler.Com before I see a movie if there is any chance someone dies because I can't stand not knowing when the sadness comes. I read the ends of books before the beginning because I need to know how it ends to enjoy the journey. The anxiety of not knowing ruins everything for me. I speed through the writing and I can't enjoy the book.
Having this cancer, and knowing my mom's fate--how can I not compare? How can I not think her end is also mine? Her story is how mine ends as well?
That's all I need to say about that.
Pictures above are first my view from the bed--before I passed out and then passed out Rosalie.
Love
Rosalie
Pictures above are first my view from the bed--before I passed out and then passed out Rosalie.
Love
Rosalie
3 comments:
Wow. Great post--I have a big lump in my throat and my eyes feel pricked by hot tears. Deep breath because I am at work.
I thought of 2 more good/bad diametrics for you:
On the one hand it's good that you were pregnant when you got cancer because the hormones made the tumor grow more quickly, right? Otherwise your cancer might have spread silently and insidiously, small cells multiplying into parts unknown. The bad side of course is that you got cancer while you were pregnant, duh.
Another one:
In my experience as a 'fraidy cat fatalist--having a baby gives you something to live for. Watching those smiles and how quickly they grow forces you to embrace endless possibility. But at the same time it makes you SO afraid of dying, of leaving, of being left, of THOSE possibilities. You have given birth to something you cannot bear to lose or to leave and that is the most frightening thing in the world (to me, again, 'fraidy cat fatalist).
Is your fate the same as your mother's? I believe we don't become our parents (as we are all simultaneously hoping and dreading). Rather we take up where they left off. Your mother was a fighter and simply didn't have the weapons strong enough to help her. You are a fighter like your mother but you do have the weapons. You will take up where she left off and win this battle. And Sadie's fate? Who knows--maybe she'll take up where you left off and find the cure for breast cancer!
Sorry for the novel. But your post really got to me and I had to sit here at my desk and type so I would look busy until the tears went away. But I'm good now. You're good. See you Sunday!
love,
S
Rosalie,Susannah, what wonderful things you both have to say. Thanks.
thanks for specifying that I am your FIRST cousin...i appreciate the direct connection!
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