reason to celebrate :)

Did you know that last week was the first week in 54 that I haven’t had a doctor’s appointment?! Hallelujah.

Breast cancer sailing retreat in the Caribbean

Remember all the times during treatment when I said I might just take off and go to the Bahamas instead? Check this out: Selah Sail. (So it’s the British Virgin Islands.  Close enough.) Oh I wish I’d known about this in time: Feb 2008 would have been a perfect time to go. The organization is new, here in Portland, and I found out about it through a counselor when I was on another retreat out at Menucha (sponsored by Cancer Care Resources). If you hear of other healing retreats, please let me know. I’m on the list for Casting for Recovery, and Harmony Hill was wonderful.

I have to say that I love having meals prepared for me (happy to help as well), and eating in a social setting. And walking to meals, and sitting by fires. And being outside. All very relaxing, on a deep level.

Also worthy of mention is the Quest Center’s Eating to Beat Breast Cancer class -vegan cooking at it’s very very best. Enjoying that one thoroughly.

If one has to deal with the ickiness of cancer, there have got to be perks, right?!

After cancerland :)

from a friend in the UK, responding to me:

” ‘Picking up the pieces after cancer’ must be a very difficult thing to do (says me, who knows nothing) but you know what, it’s a wonderful thing to read. You are PICKING UP and it’s AFTER.

phone #s I know by heart

In this land of one-touch pre-programmed dialing, there are few phone #s that I know by heart.

it’s all right, baby, it’s all right

realize that a year and two days ago your niece tried to tell you that you had cancer. before the mammogram people even called. before there was any way to “know.” ponder this. wonder how we know what we know,

Knock on wood :)

For various reasons here and there, I’ve had a brain MRI, two sinus C/T scans, and a chest C/T scan, all since December.  And the upshot?  ALL CLEAR.  No Evidence of Disease.  No brain mets, no lung mets, no liver mets, no bone mets.  So, nothing left to anxious imaginings - I know.  In cancerland, we call that “Dancing with NED.”  My dear friend Ned.  May he stay around a long, long time.

the, ahem, hair-do

BTW - I know I longed for hair when I was bald, I know I wished for it daily, but sheesh, I should have been more specific in my wishes. Ok, powers-that-be, here is the genie-specific wish:

6 months post-chemo

…and there are galanthus, hellibore and crocus. Need I say more? Oh, and it’s light after 5 pm. And dear friends gave me an old guitar (my first). And, and, and…

Happiness after cancer

I came back from my mini-vacation  with a light step and a clear eye, and happier than I’d been in eons.  And I was happy all week, floating, bouncing happy, until I had to go into “cancer-land” again, for a support group meeting and to meet with the cancer counselor.  Cancer-land makes me G-R-U-M-P-Y.

the $34,000 hair cut

It keeps happening: total strangers come up to me in public and say, “Your hair is so cute!”

My response to date has been a sort 0f jaw-dropped, you’ve-got-to-be-kidding response:

“Chemo…..I got this hair through chemo.”

(Implying that in a million years I never would have chosen this haircut. Or actually not a cut, it’s only grown in, as the hair dressers keep shooing me away, saying “Wait, just wait a bit.”)

My other options, “Why thank you, it’s my $34,000 haircut.”