Deep breath

Today was my follow up appointment with my breast surgeon. She's called a surgical oncologist, and the ones who give you chemo are called medical oncologist. This, I never knew. 

I'm feeling better and I'm kind of finding medical appointments tiresome right now. I have seen a lot of doctors in the last few weeks and I relish the break. Also, I am really really tired of people looking at my breasts, in whatever form. It gets old fast. 

So it was with trepidation that I headed to this latest appointment. I didn't want to put on a gown that opens to the front and I didn't want to be examined. And I didn't want bad news. 

As it turns out, I got no news. 

We waited for a bit. I tried to finish a Poirot mystery. I complained about being bored. Finally my surgeon came in. We chatted. The end result is that I am apparently delightful and she's bummed she won't see me regularly.  

I don't feel very delightful. 

Here's what I do know. I am healing beautifully. (Their words, not mine.) My pathology came back and my cancer did not spread. I will most likely (aka definitely) be recommended to take Tamoxifen. They don't have the results from my Oncotype yet. Once they have those, I will meet with a medical oncologist and discuss my options. That appointment is in a few weeks. 

How do I feel about it? Well, I'm tired. I'm crabby. I am firmly in the "I would rather know and deal with it" camp than any other. I really don't feel like handling this gracefully or with strength, and God knows I don't want to spend the Christmas holidays discussing it, and Lord, I am sick of people looking at me sympathetically. 

Yet I am reminded, right now in this moment of a mini tantrum, of one of my favorite lyrics. It's from a song by the Indigo Girls and it's called "Closer to Fine". 

"The less I seek my source for some definitive, the closer I am to fine."

I'm going to learn, again, to be okay with the unknown. The uncertainty. The space most of us live in, whether we acknowledge it or not. It's sacred, that space. It's real. It's not always pretty and there are no neat bows, and that's okay. I cannot wrap this up, in a package, and put it under the tree. There is no clean ending to my story, mere days before Christmas.  

Instead it's gloriously uncertain and messy and open ended and ongoing. As it turns out, I can live with that. 

Thank you for all the ways in which you sent love and hope to me.