Admittedly, I am horrible at this blog thing. I'll try to be better.
Fast forward three months. I wish I was on the road again. The trip was blissful: mountain cabin, Rhythm Devils tour, backpacking through the woods in Oregon, sipping amazing espresso in Portland, camping in the redwoods, driving on Highway 1, seeing the ocean again, driving driving driving, waking up in a new place every day, Berkeley, Telegraph Avenue, Phish tour, the long road to Las Vegas, (complete with bats!) the beauty of Utah, being held on all sides by the mountains in Telluride...
God, it was beautiful.
Regarding the tumultuous and tumorous journey of the last year, I have a clean post-treatment scan under my belt as of a few weeks ago! A few little nodes in the right armpit area mean I go back in December for another scan. (No biggie. Just making sure nothing's growing.) I told my Onc that he could go ahead and schedule my surgery to have my Port taken out. I'm ready. He says he'll give it the green light if I get a clean scan. In other words, I hope to have the last remnant of treatment yanked out by the winter solstice. Beautiful.
In other news, my mind has been a mess. Up and down, like waves crashing. I'm insane with hopelessness one minute, calm as a Buddha the next. I'm having trouble remembering things still, and school is very tough as a result. I have panic attacks frequently, or little episodes of depression. I figure that this is all pretty normal after the last year of being pumped full of poison. As a friend of mine reminded me, "The effects of chemo don't stop at your neck." I guess my mind and body are still reeling, no matter how good I feel physically. (And I do feel good. So much energy!) The only issue that still plagues me on the physical side of things is the Raynaud's Syndrome stuff (which has actually gotten worse) but it's not painful, so no more complaints here. If Raynaud's is the worst lasting side effect I have after everything, I consider myself very lucky.
I feel lucky to be alive either way. Yet the further I get from the horror of the last year, the more I forget to put things in perspective.
"Dear Sara: You are ALIVE. Quit yer bellyachin'."
More later, I promise.
