Back to the Future

Greetings from sunny Las Vegas! My counts were too low to start chemo, for the third week in a row, so I decided to pass another week of waiting by taking up a friend’s generous offer of a condo and pool to relax by, just off the strip. It’s nice to have a vacation. It’s been at least a year since I lounged by a pool. It’s a little scary to leave everything that has become so familiar behind: my doctors, my bed, my medicines and special foods for when I get nauseous. I have to trust that no matter what happens on vacation, I can take care of myself.

It’s been several weeks since I’ve written. Don’t worry. It isn’t you, it’s me. I found out two weeks ago that I’ll need to receive treatment for two and a half more years (roughly December 2009), not one and a half, like I had thought. Whether an oversight on my part or a matter of miscommunication, the added ‘year’ came as a shock. While the ‘big stuff’ is finally over, I’ll still be in chemotherapy for what seems like a long time. It’s entirely uncertain how I will react to the new phase of chemo and whether I’ll be ill and nauseous or energetic and spry. The new drugs might not be as potent as the old ones, but my body is still very tired and weak from this beating, and it’s hard to tell how much it will be able to recover while continuing treatment. Some doctors have said my energy should start to increase after four or five months of maintenance; others insist that I shouldn’t expect a great amount of energy until at least a year after finishing the entire treatment. Regardless, it makes contemplating the next step a tricky thing.

Originally, I made the decision to move back to New York in the very early stages of treatment. I had little idea about what to expect, and New York felt slightly more like ‘home’ than Utah. At this point, understanding much better what the past year has asked of me, and gauging what the next several years will continue to ask of me, I’m not ready to take on the Big Apple’s marathon pace yet. This process has constantly forced me to reconcile what I would like with what reality has given me. I would like to have energy. I don’t. I can either fight that (which I’ve done) or I can embrace that. Embracing the current state of my body and health has been a difficult but liberating step. I find that reality, rather than expectation, is a much more honest way to approach my life. The truth is that healing and recovering are my top priorities right now, not graduate school and ‘moving on with my life.’ There is no moving on, only listening to and following the constant advice my body is giving me: lay down, rest, take it easy, go run up a mountain, now STOP! It is always communicating and, whereas before it needed to contend with a very controlling mind (which would not stop), it has taken over full navigation of my life at this point.

So I am staying put in Utah for now, and searching out what I will need in order to facilitate healing and strength conditioning over the next few years as I continue chemo. Again, as always, I have no idea what lies ahead. When I was told I had two and a half years of treatment left, I made a commitment to myself to not spend it dwelling in conversations about the ‘future.’ The future right now is as unreal as the thought that I could pick up my old life where it left off. It’s a nice thought, but it ain’t happening! I want to find happiness in the moment. I need to find true happiness now, not in a future that is constantly changing.

But for now, it all can wait. I’m on spring break and the pool is calling my name. Judd…Juuuuuudddd… Peace out fools.

Reach Out and Touch

My ex-boyfriend is in town. We haven’t dated in six years. We haven’t seen each other in three. Jesse came into town yesterday, eager to get his hands dirty with this whole process, or at least understand my experience better. I was nervous, or at least really curious as to what would happen. Would old habits come into play? Would we even know how to interact with each other as more mature adults?

When we broke up years ago, a great amount of hurt and anger were present for me. It was my first big break-up; my heart was a little overwhelmed by the emotion. In order to process it, I covered the love I had felt for Jesse with anger. Over the years, the love has always remained tainted with the hurt. Is it always?

Last night, I took Jesse to a yoga class I like to attend for C-patients and their friends. It’s one of my favorite communities: me and the gals fighting breast cancer. We sit together for almost an hour, talking shop about cancer treatment. (Jesse had wondered at first if he’d be up for a ‘rigorous’ yoga class…silly boy). Last night’s topic of conversation was fear, and how fear can be the most pervasive emotion to deal with during an experience like this. Afterwards, the instructor had us enter some simple stretches followed by a relaxing five minutes or so of simply lying down on the mats. She likes to come around and rub essential oils into our temples. This is my favorite part of the class. As someone who has been dealing with disease, one of my biggest shocks is how timid people are to touch me. Nurses sanitize their hands and put on gloves before interacting with me. I’ve even noticed people close to me (no fault of their own) unsure of whether or not a hug is ‘safe.’ The instructor boldly moved around from person to person, giving each of us a good amount of time and attention—touch, beautiful, delicious touch. I had an impulse. I wanted to reach over to Jesse, lying next to me, and take his hand. The old fears returned: would I look too needy? Would he take it the wrong way? Would he reject the impulse? I remembered our conversation about fear and decided to reach. Jesse’s hand felt very warm and comforting. He didn’t hesitate, but wrapped my palm in his fingers. Suddenly, I was present to something I haven’t been in years. I loved this guy, like really loved him with all my heart. He and I walked together through some pretty intense moments in both our lives. The hurt, the anger, the need to ‘protect’ myself was gone, and all I could feel was the overpowering love that both of us were capable of feeling for each other. It made me wonder why, when things don’t work out in a relationship, my M.O. has always been to push the love (that is very real) aside. It felt nice to tap into that, to be touched, and to remember that I’m a person capable of loving deeply and expansively, and that it’s a choice to either push that aside because the love doesn’t look like what I thought it would look like, or to embrace it for what it is. I’m not as afraid as I once was of love changing. It will always do that. But it’s nice to know that even years later, regardless of what it looks like, love’s still there, if I can release my fears and give myself the gift of experiencing it.