Too Busy for Cancer

Hi Everyone,

I realise again that time has escaped me and it has been weeks since I wrote. I think summer is such a busy time and having my monkey at home full time really makes it near impossible to find time to write. I have never been able to just sit down with distractions all around and write something worth reading. So I am trying to write today despite the multitude of things happening around me and give you an update. I know how many of you interpret my silence as something bad so I don't want anyone to worry.

What has happened since round 4 concluded? Well I am still trying to find my "normal" and am realising what a number this chemo has done to me. Every day I wake up, it is a lottery in terms of how I will feel. Some days are better and others awful. I honestly feel my body screaming out in protest to the abuse it has been through. My stomach will never been the same again and the tiniest imbalance sets it off. It makes it hard to make plans as I dont know what the day will bring. I think my daughter is really picking up on what is happening with me as she has said to me quite often (in an exasperated tone) "Mommy - you can't lie down and rest all the time! You have to be with me!¨ Her playing has also evolved and she informed me earlier this week that the mud concoction she was making was in fact medicine to make my tummy feel better. Bless her little soul. I love her so much and she continues to make me push myself to be here...living in the present and hoping for the future.

My doctor called me last week with the update from the CT planning session which was to determine whether I could get anymore radiation. If you remember, we tried to do this back in February but it was deemed too dangerous at the time. You know it is funny when I think back to the beginning of chapter two when we were told it was cancer again. My doctors gave me three possible treatment options and we would give me the best and safest option. But now nearly 4 months later, I somehow ended up getting all three things - surgery, chemo and now radiation - lucky me...not! Yes my doctor has found a way to give me more radiation. Perhaps it is due to time passing and more healing happening from my initial radiation or the new organic material they put in during the operation. Whatever it is - I am starting 25 sessions of radiation in a week and half. It will suck big time as my skin is still so sensitive and I will burn more easily then before. When I asked about the risks involved, he told me that the risk of not doing it outweighed the potential side effects I could get. And the side effects are potentially major but we hope I get lucky and dont end up with necrosis (this is essentially tissue death and can be very serious) or god forbid another type of cancer. He also told me to not bother googling anything about this as it was new territory and there was little to no literature on it. He knows me so well! I joked about how my case will make a great paper one day for them to publish. He laughed and said that they never saw me in that way - as in a patient and an opportunity for publicity. But I reassured him and told him I was more than happy to be a part of the future - a part of furthering research in this specific area of breast cancer treatment. I want my story to help others and make a difference somehow. What he said next surprised me so much as he has always been incredibly conservative in terms of what he has told me about my situation. He has been the harbinger of bad news for so long and I know it is impossible for him to promise something he has no guarantee on but he told me ¨I will look forward to publishing something about how I cured you.¨ I was so shocked by his words but they provided such a comfort to me and gave me hope. Hope is everything to a cancer patient and feeling that your doctor believes in you can help you get through the darker times. So I will face the next hurdle as best I can and try to imagine a time when cancer might not feel like such a big part of my life. A time when things will be different for me...a better life far far away from cancer island. Like I said - hope is everything.

Hope everyone is enjoying summer. We are seeing lots of sun in Norway. Me likey alot.

OBB xxx