Kind of Like Fred Rodgers

I love my neighbors.

I think this all the time, but I rarely say it aloud.  I should say it more.  

I have really good neighbors.  Really nice, caring people who act in a friendly way. Even the ones I don't know well or see often are neighborly.  Sometimes we gather because a hawk looks hurt and we are all concerned; sometimes it's to shake our heads at the teenagers who like to use our street as a by-way to their party place by the river; sometimes it's at a social event some other neighbor has thrown.

Two of my neighbors are good friends of ours. Most of our time spent together is organic, occurring naturally as our kids play together or we just head over to one of our houses to have a glass of wine and a chat.  We rarely schedule activities, except in times of snowstorms, hurricanes, and other natural disasters, and then it's just to confirm who bought the wine and who bought the cheese. I think that says something about people - who are you picking to play cards with when the winds howl and you pray your trees don't fall on their house.  I love these people dearly and I think it a lot, but I don't say it enough. I'm lucky with them. We are lucky.

My neighborhood at large is pretty special, too. This is the kind of neighborhood that has a yearly Halloween party and parade, the sort of place where you end up talking to friends in the middle of trick or treating without worrying about where your kids went because the parent up ahead has your kids with her.  I could tell you all kinds of stories about how the people come together for good and bad events, but instead I will just say: it has a book club. This neighborhood has a book club.  I mean, if you are going to judge a place, judge it by its love of books.

The women who live here have no real reason to know me and care about me - my kid doesn't go to school with their kids, I don't socialize in that way, and frankly, I'm not super friendly - but they do.  When my mom died, they showed up with food.  They have sent cards, gifts, and meals for me during this time.  They check in with me, ask me if I need anything, and mean it.

I ascribe my entry into this community to my aforementioned neighbor and good friend.  She is one of those people that can talk to anyone, anytime, in any place.  She's excellent at making connections between people - she literally does that "introduce people with thoughtful details" trick.  I almost feel like our nation is wasting her talents - surely she could be brokering peace somewhere.  

She walks in and talk to everyone.  I tend to smile vacantly and try not to make eye contact because I am overcome with shyness at these large gatherings with 50 people that all know and see each other regularly.  The mass amount of people is so intimidating.  There is something about walking into a place where everyone knows each other better than you do that just tweaks my insecurities.  Nick and Emily are on the same footing but he just grabs a beer and starts talking to people and she runs off and plays - and there I am, hoping someone I know walks by.

But then something amazing happens.  People walk up and talk to me. They ask how I am.  They know my story - which is frankly a bit of a relief, because it's never fun if someone finds out you had cancer recently in the middle of a social chitchat - so it saves me all this awkwardness.  They are all predisposed to liking me, even if I am standoffish and unsocial and can't remember how old their children are. 

I was puzzling over this recently until it dawned on me.  First, these are seriously nice people in this area I live in.  Two, it's my friend. She speaks well of me, and so they look at me and see something good. 

What a gift that is, to have a friend who speaks well of you. This says a lot more about my friend than it does about me.  And with the kindness my neighbors show, their interest in me, that too says much more about their character than mine. Every single time I make my way through lawns and around corners from a neighborhood gathering, I think two things:

Well, you should stop being scared of this.

and

I have the best neighbors.  

Ready for the storm

Like Sunshine and Rain

It's six weeks today since my bilateral mastectomy. On one hand, it feels like it went by so fast.  On the other, I can't believe I am still dealing with this.

Lots of good news - I had an excellent time with my friends in Florida, and felt, for the first time, normal.  I felt like a normal person all the time.  Not who I was before  - I will never be who I was before - but like me.  Good enough.  I walked - not ran - the 5k, and it was super fun.  I felt great about it.

I have been feeling good in general, so I started back to work this week.  I learned I do not know the meaning of "ease in".  Nope, it was all or nothing apparently.  In some ways, it feels like I never left.

Also in good news this week, a huge team of oncologists discussed my case and determined the risks I would incur from chemotherapy would outweigh the possible benefits.  This is a relief to me, because I don't want to suffer.  Not going to lie - I really, really did not want to go through that.  There were a few options, some being more attractive than others - cocktails of drugs, other surgeries, etc. The option they picked for me and that I agreed to try was to take an estrogen blocking drug.  They would like me to do this for years.  5 years, probably 10, maybe 15.  We will see how it goes for a month.  Let me make this clear - I am not refusing medical care or going against advice.  I'm simply following the usual protocol, which is to take it for a month and evaluate.

In bad news, I have spent the last day or so in pain from an ongoing procedure that comes with the reconstruction.  It's so uncomfortable I am actually wishing I could take narcotics.  This, from the woman who refuses Advil for headaches and used Tylenol after her double mastectomy.  

A friend recently commented on my version of manageable versus what she thought of as manageable.  It made me smile - I did think a double mastectomy and months of reconstruction was reasonable. Now I know it's huge. I would not change my decision, I am very happy with it.  But it's still huge. Even though this is early stage, "easy" cancer, it still sucks.  I wish I had a more eloquent and elegant way of phrasing that, but I don't.  Cancer sucks.  Some go through more than others, but it all sucks.  

I hope that not one other person ever feels the need to quantify or qualify their experience with this, or any other disease.  I catch myself doing that all the time.  Yet I am encouraged to do so by people who like to remind me how much worse it could be.  I know how much worse it could be.  I saw it up close.

When I got the news about not needing chemo, I was at first happy and then deeply sad. For 18 years, I have been a bearer of bad news about cancer.  My mom's initial diagnosis, her second diagnosis, her problems with reconstruction, her stage 4 diagnosis.  All the scans for the 8 years after that. We had very very few moments of good news about cancer. I made a lot of phone calls that ended with tears.  And here I had good news, and I didn't know how to tell it.  I was happy but it was a loaded happy.  It was a little joy with a whole lot of sadness.

I wish this was news my mom would have gotten.  Or my aunt.  Or anyone else with stage 4 cancer that I have known and loved.  So many women and men who do not have it easy, and so many who should never be told they do.  

Let's just take this good news, be grateful for it, and hold in our hearts all the people we have known and loved who got different news.  May they be at peace. May you be at peace in your heart. May the world one day be at peace.

Back to Life

A sign that hang on my bedroom wall

Although the double mastectomy was much much better than I expected it to be, it was still hard. Really hard. Somewhere around day 10 I hit this slump - I didn't want to see people, look at posts, or texts, or anything. I felt isolated. I felt, probably, some of the grief this surgery can bring. 

Then I got my surgical drains out and I started to feel like a person again. I went to Christmas Eve and Christmas Day celebrations. I started to walk, slowly, in the local parks. I could wear a bra that wasn't from the hospital.  I could put shirts over my head. 

Recovery is defined as "the return to a normal or healthy condition".  

I knew I was feeling normal when I cared about the news again. When I felt righteous indignation. When I could go and sit in a movie theater and walk out of there making connections between what I saw on screen and how we treat people we perceive as different from us. 

At 3.5 weeks post surgery, I can drive again. I can open doors - not all of them - but ones that aren't too heavy. I can make simple meals and do simple household things. I can do a lot more than I can't. 

I still have to be careful not to lift heavy things, or push myself too far. I would have one great, active day and be totally exhausted from it the next. I've skipped parties and swim meets and all sorts of things just to rest. 

So it's a treat when I take my kid to swim practice and have coffee with a friend. Or run an errand that doesn't relate to the diagnosis that has taken over my life since October. Or when I do things two days in a row.  It's been great to spend so much time with my husband and my daughter, but my life is filled with lots of people, and I missed that.

The other night, my grad school friends came over, sort of a holiday celebration. I was very nervous about this going in. What would I be able to do? What if I couldn't handle it? Was even going to be able to have a non-medically centered conversation? I shouldn't have worried at all. Everyone brought food, helped set up and clean up, and acted exactly like themselves. It was like...being normal. Totally unremarkable but yet I was so grateful for it. It felt like I'd taken a week's vacation. 

That's how good friends make me feel, like I've been away relaxing. A twenty minute phone call from my neighbor can make me laugh and relax enough that it's equivalent to a massage. My friend calling from the airport before she leaves for a business trip buoys me for the day. Even sorting through the tricky stuff with a woman who is like a sister to me feels good. 

Friends are a huge part of my self-care. 

So for the next step in my healing, I am going to see a group of woman I love dearly. We have spent the last few years doing half marathons, and this year four of them are doing a particularly challenging set of races. On Thursday, they will run a 5k, on Friday a 10k, on Saturday a half marathon, and on Sunday a full marathon. I couldn't be prouder of them for this insanity. Three of us will be in the cheering section, handing out mid race snacks and holding up signs.

Before I was diagnosed, my plan was to complete the 5k and 10k with them. Once I knew the dates of my surgery, I asked both surgeons if I could still go on the trip. Even just to sit there. These women have supported me through everything for the last seven years, and I wanted to be there with them, even if I couldn't do the races. Both surgeons encouraged me to go, and my breast surgeon in particular understood the significance for me. She told me I would get on that plane, that I would survive this and be able to celebrate and heal with my friends.  She said the trip was part of my recovery plan.

So tonight I will get on a plane and fly south. I will get to hug my girlfriends and see their beautiful faces. I will get laugh with them and probably cry a little too. I will get to cheer them on and be there. Just soaking up the way that good friends make you feel. Loved. Whole. Healed.