Food as Medicine

Yesterday I drove for the first time. It was a bit challenging because of the twisting and turning. I did it because I wanted to go out but don't think I'll make a regular habit of it yet. I should be careful not to speak to soon though since I have appointments next week I need to get to and haven't arranged rides.

I went to a class called Food as Medicine that is taught at some of the big cancer centers like MD Anderson that have CAM programs as well. It was quite good and I got several messages that I was right where I need to be. Yes! Thank you source! It was taught by Dr. Debra Symons (Dr. Debbie) and I really liked her. She is an ND and I've made an appointment to attend her clinical yoga class to get my range of motion back post surgery as well as a 1 on 1 consult to discuss ways to manage side effects of chemo. She had a lot more personality than Pfau but the bottom line is that I will consult with both and take the best they have to offer to create my own regimine.

I learned that for women no soy, no lavendar and no grapefruit. These are all pure estrogen and since we are exposed to so much estrogen in our environment we don't want to add to it. I found this interesting since I use all lavendar; it's in my laundry soap, my hair care and skin care products. Back to the drawing board on this.

I need to share with Dad that sage tea helps with high blood pressure.

If you get migraine headaches frequently it's a sign that your liver and colon need to be cleansed.

She argued to drink distilled water only. There is a lot of debate about this and I'm going to have to do some more research.

While I was there I thought a lot about the woundology of dis-ease. Some people get stuck in this. Do I do this? Do I find some sort of comfort in this place? Is it familiar and comfortable in some way? Am I content with my illness? I don't think so but I will ponder this and see if this is the case. Dr. Debbie shared that some women have admitted to them that they prayed for breast cancer as a punishment for some life situations. This certainly isn't my situation but at some level I have to think it worked for me and that is scary.

I got some great tips for treating naseau after chemo and some great ideas for taking charge of chemo and making it mine instead of something scary that I must face alone. More on that in a minute. I also received a free cookbook called "One Bite at a Time" by Rebecca Katz. This is a fabulous book. These are nourishing recipes for cancer survivors and their friends. I laid in bed this am and read it cover to cover and it made me want to go to Whole Foods, do some shopping and some cooking. I wonder if I can get friends and family to cook for me from this book while I do chemo. She spent a lot of time talking about how chemo changes taste and how there were things you could do to make the food taste good and be healthy so a person undergoing treatment would eat it. Reality though is that this cookbook would be good for anyone period but it's great healthy food.

Another tip Ms. Katz shared is that there are times when chemo patients eat little (a noursihing broth is good during this time) and then the next week they might eat like a line backer. No one has really discussed this with me. All I've heard really is that food becomes the enemy because normally you loose your taste buds and get mouth sores. My friend Katie said she lost 35 pounds on her chemo routine. I'm already down to my lowest weight since pre kids and think if I lost 35 pounds that wouldn't be a good thing. I also don't really want to gain weight either. I've lost 8 pounds since surgery on the 11th but certainly not on purpose. Boy my ideal would be to hire someone to come in and prepare food for me and mine daily so I don't have to worry about it. Wonder if Ms. Katz hires out?

Many people have asked what they can do to help support me during this time. Well I've actually come up with some ideas. So here they are:
1. Come in and cook a few meals for my family and stick them in the freezer. I of course want to use my new cookbook because we really are what we eat and I want to feed my body well.
2. Send a funky or pretty scarf that I can wear when I am bald.
3. Make a mp3 file with funny jokes, stories or words of love that I can download to my mp3 player and listen to while I am doing chemo.
4. I plan to take my laptop to journal my experience of course. It has a DVD player so funny movies would be an option too.


Last night I watched The Inn of the 6th Happiness. This was recommended to me by my beloved friend Donna Goff. It's based on the life of Gladys Aylworth who was a missionary in China. The movie is a 1958 job with Ingrid Bergman. It was a great flick and I was so inspired by the strength and courage of this woman. It's my new favorite movie and I encourage every woman to watch it. Who knows maybe I'll start giving this to all my good girlfriends. We need inspiration now and again.

Katie and Anna are out hiking this morning with the Alicea family. Poor Steven couldn't go because he hadn't finished his schoolwork for the week. I keep encouraging him to finish so he has freetime for the rest of the day and tommorrow too. These lessons can be so hard to learn and 13 year old boys seem to have a harder time focusing than girls at that age.

Yesterday I cut my hair even shorter in preparation for losing it. We are going to have a family photo taken in a few weeks before I start chemo. It's been a long time since we've done this and I'd like to have some hair.

I plan to have a quiet day surfing the net and catching up on life. It's a great day to be alive. Try to practice acts of random kindness today. Peace.

Divine Intervention?

What an interesting day. I went to see my oncologist today and after waiting an hour + to see her the first thing she said when she walked in is "Lisa my friend, it's divine intervention". I said "what do you mean?" and she said "Did you see the pathology report from your surgery? There is no way that a mammogram would have shown a .2mm cancer. I am so glad you took the breast." So is this another reminder from divine source that I am right where I need to be?

Boy do I need those reminders. I told my oncologist that I was prepared to do chemo but I was not happy and actually was terrified. I joked with her and said "Hey Doc it's nothing personal, I'm sure you are fabulous but I didn't want us to be such good friends and now it looks like we will be good friends." She laughed. I have to admit that when I cry she doesn't shut down and does touch my arm and says"I know." Can she really though?

The rest of my visit is a haze. I was so overwhelmed by the list of meds, etc that are used to treat all of the side effects from this, etc. and etc. Even to find out that depending on where I put my port a cath I may have to have blood thinners as well. Dr. Qs tip was to remember that this is just temporary but I'm having a hard time wrapping my brain around it all. I feel so shell shocked and so numb right now.

First chemo is slated for 10/24 at 10:30am. I also found out that no one can sit back there with me. Wow, an opportunity to face all of my demons by myself. The week before chemo the port goes in. Blood work must be done always the day before or treatment can't be given. The day after I get a shot of Neulasta to keep white count up so I can get treatment again.

Dr. Q. has encouraged me to stay active and has said other than losing all body hair and naseau she can't really predict side effects. If I get a fever of 100.5 or higher I am supposed to go to ER right away. That seems contradictory. Chemo lowers your immune system and then if you are having an infection you should go to ER so you can pick up more cooties. Gofigure.

I think my beautiful son Stephen is struggling with all of this. It's hard enough to be 13 and then to deal with your Mom going through cancer treatment would be enough for anyone. We had a conversation yesterday and he seemed to be really hung up on me being bald. I think he's scared and doesn't know how to experess that. I was honest and discussed my reasons for changing my mind and doing chemo afterall. I do so want to be there to watch my children grow into the beautiful and capable geniuses that they are. I want to have grandchildren and share my story with the world. I want to make a difference so when I get to the end I know that I used it all up while I was here.

Got a beautiful card today from a friend. She said she has been hearing my name in different circles she frequents and is convinced that I have a very important mission to fulfill while I am here on earth. I hope she's right because at the moment I am fighting very hard to stay positive. I feel stretched to my capacity right now.

By the way. I am so willing to have people share their comments with me on my blog. However, I would greatly appreciate it if you would keep in mind that I don't have any space right now for negative energy. It's all I can do on some days to get out of bed and face the challenges the day holds for me. If I'm not handling this journey the way you want me to I apologize but this is afterall my journey and I must do it in the way I feel called to do. It's really not about you, this journey is all about me and I would appreciate it if you don't try to take that away from me. I'm working so hard to get the lessons. Bottom line, only post positive comments please. If you have negative to share please keep it to yourself right now or address me offline. Thank you for your understanding.

It's a great day to be alive. I hope you'll make it great. Peace

I hurt!

I'm still struggling with those darned boundaries. It's day 15 post mastectomy and the little bit of moving around that I did today really hurts. I woke up hurting which is an indication that I did too much yesterday too. Do you realize how much we use our arms? Try moving around for 1 hour without your arms - dare you! :-) My back between my shoulder blades is where it really hurts as well as my right breast. It seems funny to me that this one is hurting more than the left but the expander feels really tight and is pushing on my side. And forget laying in any different position than on the back because then you can feel it even more. That includes watching a movie on the couch.

Do you realize how much gravity pulls on us? No wonder women are saggy in old age. Bending over pulls, sitting up pulls, laying down pulls in it's on way as does turning. I feel grumpy and say "enough already". Is there some lesson that I am missing? I really don't want to miss the lesson and have to repeat it at some future point in time.

Katie went to rehearsal, Steven to scouts and Anna and I watched a movie called Catch and Release. It wasn't a very good movie (4 or 5) but it had an interesting thread. If you haven't see it, Jennifer Garner is engaged to be married and her man dies. Long story short she finds out that she really didn't know him at all. She has a great quote along the lines of "Why did it take losing someone to really find them?" I wonder if I do that? Do we look past people and see only what we want to our what fits our comfort zone. In the end she makes peace with her man, what she knew and didn't know, says goodbye and moves on. And isn't that what we humans do? We get through it and move on.

So yes I hurt but I will move on. I must get to bed so I can try again tommorrow to find the elusive balance. Do women who are mothers and wives really ever find a balance? A friend is coming to nuture me and I have to see Dr. Q. It's still a great day to be alive and I am so grateful for all that is because all is well and as it should be.
Peace.

Travelling to the land of Chemotherapy

Well it's official I'm travelling to the land of Chemotherapy. I have fought this from the very beginning and quite frankly am still in shock. I had decided that whatever Dr. Link advised is what course of action I would take since he was so spot on about the mastectomies. Of course I knew when they found more cancer in the left breast they would say Chemo but honestly I was holding my breath hoping beyond hope that he might advise something else. How the hell did I get here? Frankly this is not what I expected to be doing at 41 going on 42 years of age. It really sucks and I am really scared. Chemo is a really crappy birthday present.

Links recommended chemo cocktail is CT - 1 treatment every 3 weeks for 4-6 treatments. Apparently in the standard of care world 8 treatments is the standard but there are new numbers coming out showing that less is more. He said if I handled the chemo well he'd like to see me do 6 rounds but honestly there aren't any numbers out about 4 vs. 6. How the hell can you handle chemo well, it's poison! It's not about losing the hair because I have plans to take charge of that area. It's about knowingly killing cells in my body. This is not the LisaB that I know and I can't believe I'm even agreeing to it. But the #s are suggestive. In women with 1-3 nodes positive the chance of a recurrance without chemo is 50%. Holy cow who wants to go through this more than 1x? With Chemo my chances of a recurrance drop statistically to 33%. With the hormonal therapy I drop down to the 19% statistical range. The reality is that none of us are statistics and there are no guarantees. But from a non-emotional, logical place how can I not do chemotherapy? Many women of all walks have done it and survived. Let's face it breast cancer is not a club you ask to join, it chooses you.

So don't be surprised if you hear me saying Bald is Beautiful. The reality is that I will loose all of my hair in all of it's places. Eyelashes and eyebrows too! I sure hope that my head is symmetrical and beautiful so I don't have to cover it up. Too bad it's winter and I won't have a need to show my hairless legs. On the other hand, a friend who has lived chemo shared that it raised her body temperature so perhaps doing this in winter is best. With the hormone shot to turn my ovaries off before I start chemo I'll probably be hot all the time. That'll be a change.

I sort of feel like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz to wake up in this strange place and wanting so badly to go home. Will I find that I too had the tools all along? Do I have super powers that I don't know about yet? Where will I find the strength to make this hard trek? To me this is even more daunting than going off into the wilderness by myself. I know that I am a survivor, a fighter as there is no other choice. While I am so grateful for the opportunity to grow it's challenging at times not to go to a dark place. I have some choice words about it all that I won't share right now.

But get ready cause I need you. I'll need all the love and support I've gotten to date plus more. Hold me in the white light, where my body is whole and healed, where I've let go of all the pain and I flow through chemotherapy. Keep my children and my husband in that light as well. Can we travel this road without any casualities? Only time will tell since there really isn't any other path for me at this time. I must live strong as there is no other choice.

I'm off to make plans, hair shaving parties, henna tatoos on my bald head, pretty hats and scarves to accessorize with, discussions with my oncologist about when and how to start, port vs. no port,people to ask for help during the weeks of chemo, schedules to coordinate ....You're in the Land of Oz Dorothy.

Despite all of this I would argue still that it's a great day to be alive! What are you doing today to make it a great day and what blessings are you forgetting to be grateful for in your life? Peace.

Fall Equinox

"To everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under the sun; a time to be born, a time to die, a time to plant and a time to reap...."(Ecclesiastes 3:1)

Yesterday was fall equinox, 1 of only 2 days in the entire year when light and dark, day and night are equal. The long days of summer are gone, long days are fading into shorter days and nature is showing signs of slowing down. Traditionally this has been a time of harvest. There is something in the air that reminded our ancestors to hurry to prepare for the upcoming and long winter. Preparations were made to slaughter the animals, pull the last bits from the garden and put them up or store them for the winter ahead. In the Greek Mythology system this is the time that Persephone went back to the underworld with Hades because she had eaten 7 pomegranite seeds. Demeter, her mother and the goddess of the land, go into mourning for the loss of her daughter.

I think spiritually equinox is a time of harvest too. It's a time for me to think about what I have harvested in my life and to ponder on how I have been transformed by the experience. I love the fact that nature is showing signs of slowing down. The weather has cooled quickly, the leaves are changing. This gently reminds me that transformation is a vital part of change. And make no mistake I am changing. It's very subtle in some ways but I feel it nonetheless. Who will I become? Who do I choose to become? How do I choose to let my breast cancer experience mold me? How much can I really control?

Being in the thick of this breast cancer experience though I am having trouble getting my perspective this fall. There are still decisions to be made and treatments to go through. So many unknowns, so many choices. Like a tree, I have released my leaves through the removal of my breasts. I've allowed a yielding to occur so that I can allow a new to emerge. What will that be? Right now I am struggling to find the balance of movement verses rest. I ache to move my arms and yet they are sore. Showering by myself is a challenge, a slow and ardorous process. I am unable to dress myself by myself at this time. I long to be able to wash the dishes and yet how much is too much? So quickly doing a little bit can become overdoing it. There is a balance there that eludes me and has done so for my entire life. Have I ever really been able to do things in balance? I don't think so. I've come from a place of all or nothing. I've worked until my body hurt so bad I was in tears. And while that intensity has it's place has it served me well?

For me this crazy, sexy thing called cancer has been the illness that has caused loss and a breakdown of reality as I've known it. Now don't get me wrong this isn't necessarily a bad thing. I've worked very hard not to be fearful during this process of change. Nature reminds me today that all things have a season and this is just another season in my life. Today I choose to be inspired by nature's example to accept the countless blessings and gifts this season is offering me even if I can't clearly see what these are yet.

As winter approaches I see clearly that the tempo of my life must slow down just as that of the natural rhythm. It is a time to center down into the ground of my being. A time to withdraw from the relentless activity of life with it's demands and errands and responisibilities. A sacred space and time to nourish my body, mind and spirit.

The house is quiet, the kids are filming their version of The Bridge to Terabithia today and tommorrow. A storm has blown in and there are clouds in the sky. Greg has the afternoon off and I am hoping to get him to take me to run a few errands today. I am less sore today than I have been and will start some exercises to get my arm movements back slowly but surely. My book calls to me and yet for some reason I have put off working on it. I'm trying to be OK with that.

It's another great day to be alive. Where are you on this first day of fall? What are you harvesting in your life? How do the rhythms of nature speak to you? What transformations do you intend in your life? And how do you feel about change? Are you cultivating the practice of welcoming change or do you push it away? Make it a great day!

A new view on the path....

Well I've gone 21st century. I'm switching my blog from pink-link over to a blogger site so people will stop having trouble with reading my journal. I just have to figure out what I'm doing.
So Welcome to my blog - Designing My Own Life...One Woman's Journey. While I've started journalling to track my exerpience with breast cancer I can't help but believe that I will continue on with this pasttime even when cancer no longer consumes my life.

Today I've been thinking about extrordinary time. I've been living in this place since my surgery. Because I've given myself permission to heal and I have the permission of others as well there have been no expectations of me. I can lie in bed all day and no one really cares or gets mad. I've spent afternoons lying on my bed listening to the sound of nature in my yard, planes flying overhead, the chickens clucking, my children singing as they play and taking long and luxurious naps (when I can sleep well that is). This time is so different from being in linear time when kids have to be at a certain place at a certain time and I want to cram 10 other things in along the way. How would my life be different if I could live in E Time on a regular basis? How can I shape my life in the future so I get bits and pieces of this time in my daily life? A way to take a time out....like walking to a pond in nature and take a leisurely swim or sitting with a hot cup of coffee and watching the sun rise in all it's glory. I don't have any answers today. Sure I see the value of this but can I realistically work it into my life. Will I be consistent? If not, why?

Last night I ventured out to a function that was important to me. Stephen, Anna and I went to a BBQ for a Statesmanship Club that is forming in the valley. It was the first time I had ventured out for other than a Dr. appointment. It was a wierd experience. I had picked up a bit around the house earlier in the day and had of course overdone it. I was hurting and knowing that I was going out took some pain med. Well I took a bit too much and felt like I was in lala land. I walked around with a smile on my face and felt very day dreamy. I felt like my friends were looking at me funny and maybe they were. I was definitely in my own place. Now mind you I don't intend to go to this drug induced place regularly but can we get there without
drugs? Is this part of the path to finding extroardinary time?

While I was at this function I was asked a very interesting question by my hostess. First came the "how are you doing?" I'm always puzzled by how to really answer this question. How much do you really want to know? How much can you really handle? What will make me feel better saying? But the next question really threw me for a loop. The question was "How does it feel to have your private life be public. How does it feel to be the subject of emails?" Wow has my private life been too public? Have I been the subject of many emails without realizing it? And if this is the case is that bad? I've worked very hard to reach out and ask for help. This is not something that has come easily to me and I've been grateful and humbled by the love and support I've been shown. Should I hide behind closed doors? I realize that many of us endure our struggles in silence but is that a good thing? Is there a way that we can share the journey without being a downer? If we really talk about how it really is won't our life be more real and authentic? It's food for thought.

I'm healing, slow but sure. I hurt and often I get tired of the dull throbbing pain that is with me constantly. But I'm grateful. Having a double mastectomy was not nearly as hard as I thought it would be. I'm 12 days into my healing and hopeful that the throbbing will lessen and that this week I will make some choices about chemotherapy.

It's a great day to be alive. Fall is in the air in Las Vegas and it feels fabulous~LisaB.