The root of the problem

Well my hair didn’t grow back in rich, luxurious or curly; it’s grey – field mouse grey. So I decided it was time to do something about it, but there is no way I’m jumping back on the hair dye wagon. Earlier in my research into what causes lymphoma I constantly came across the suggestions (no proof, research in progress) that pesticides, and chemical hair dyes may be culprits.

Now I haven’t’ been rolling around in a freshly sprayed grub-free lawn, but I don’t eat organic vegetables, (yet) so there’s a possible infiltration source. I do/ did dye my hair religiously every month since I was 14. Seriously, I’m not sure about god, but I know Clairol has always been my savior! Could it be my faith was misguided?

I started looking into alternate hair dyes which lead me to hennas and chemical ingredients to avoid in colourants. Thus far I know I’m looking for something ammonia, resorcinol, paraben, phenylenediamines (PPD) and hydrogen peroxide free; good luck lady! It would take to long for me to outline the concerns with each of these chemicals, just Google them and nasty stuff will come up; I will however get into PPD’s.

This one is great, listed as a potential (means not yet confirmed so go ahead and lather it on until we figure it out) carcinogen (cancer-causing agent) used in hair dyes, rubbers, textiles dyes and pigments. This one seems the worst to me, and yet it is found in every “natural” hair colouring product I have looked up, not to mention the chemical colouring products I used to use like Clairol. What to do?

So I went to the mall to pick up a book I saw awhile back called Gorgeously Green. It outlines concerns with traditional home, beauty, lifestyle and food products, and then gives you alternative products to use. Sounds great, someone has done a bunch of the work for me right? Wrong! First section I opened up to, hair dyes, states “the following dyes contain no harmful chemicals:” So I bought the first brand on the list to try out and right on the packaging it lists PPD’s in the ingredients.

So I don’t know what to do anymore??? I want to be part of this fashionable world that we live in where products can enhance the outside you, but not if they might kill the inside me. To carry on using the same night creams, eye make-up’s, hair dyes etc that I know are filled with chemicals that are bad for me seems as reckless as smoking.

So I’m stuck; grey haired and wiser to the world of what can kill me, but I’m jealous of those who’s bleached highlights, fake nails and glitter scream ‘blissfully ignorant and lookin good!’ I miss my misguided faith.

just eat it.

I’ve been thinking about cracking open my cancer diet & lifestyle books again. In the beginning I was all gun-ho to get the latest books and overhaul my diet to eat things that directly supported my health and didn’t contribute to the cancer.

Ya that went out the window after reading, it never made it execution! I actually had a very basic low fat diet (with a side of chocolate) before I got sick. I didn’t add salt or sugars to stuff, I eat cereals that tasted like cardboard because they’re healthy, low fat everything and dairy free; I’m a soy girl. But I couldn’t even keep up dietary habits let alone improve upon them once this ride got started for two reasons: I started losing my taste buds, and my parents took over the cooking.

One of the joys of moving out on your own as an adult is that you get to do things your way. You get to try new foods, experiment, create your own method of sustaining yourself. The joy of moving back home when you have cancer is that your family can take care of you, and slowly kill you with their methods of sustaining themselves! This evening I saw my father put a quarter cup of salt in a 2 liter pot of water to boil pasta, a quarter cup over a pinch! When I commented about cholesterol levels he was like “you don’t want to eat it, the peanut butter is in the cupboard!” I’m too tired to make my own meals, I ate the clogged artery spaghetti and man was it good!

I also lost the eat well battle to taste buds. After 3 months I couldn’t taste my low fat soy milk, started drinking high fat vanilla soy in my new sugary cereal; bye bye spelt flakes. All the books I was reading encouraged me to embrace a raw food diet. Yes after a rough day of chemo that’s exactly what the body wants, chunks of cold carrots and broccoli, no no Ill pass on the Tim Horton’s fruit explosion muffin give me roughage!

Low Key Last Chemo

I just said goodbye to my WeCare nurse; it’s hard to believe that I may never see her again. No matter how bad I felt on any particular day I always looked forward to having her visit weekly while she flushed my picc line. I guess that’s the mark of a good nurse when you see them as someone who comes to visit you not just take care of you.

I had my last scheduled chemo treatment yesterday. It went down without incident but not really as planned. Everyone kept telling me that this should be an occasion for celebration so I tried to put something’s together for my last trip to medical daycare but no one really seemed interested in helping. I guess it’s like your birthday when people say “it’s your birthday, when are you planning your party?” “I don’t know, when you planning my party – I’m the one with the birthday!”

Ya so in-between all the commotion over the week-end I baked 2 dozen cookies, decorated them, shopped for a cookie tin, a card and then tried to put the whole thing together Tuesday morning in-time for chemo. It wasn’t really coming together in-time, I was late to chemo and neither my mother or I brought a camera so I was feeling very frustrated and disgruntled at the fact that if this is supposed to be a celebration for everyone over my accomplishment, that everyone pushed me into celebrating; why am I the one that had to do all the work?

As it turned out none of my usual nurses where there, it wasn’t the usual chemo crowd, there was no pictures, no cookies, no onslaught of well wishes (and no balloons or strippers – a girl can hope!) rather the last chemo visit just passed quietly - done and gone. Sometimes big moments on the inside aren’t that big on the outside, and I'm okay with that.

Just breathe

So I drove myself to the ER. Don’t you love it when a story starts like that? Because you know the person telling the tale is either someone who lacks perspective on what a real emergency is, or really stupid and lacks perspective on the real nature of their emergency. You be the judge.

So I drove myself to the ER on Saturday after a breathing attack. My ability to catch my breath had been deteriorating for about a few weeks to the point where I could only take shallow breaths and getting down the stairs to get my cereal required multiple stops. So I fixed the problem by barely getting off the couch. Then the breathing attacks started when I did exert myself (like walk to the bathroom), so I pulled out an old puffer I was prescribed BC (before cancer) to help.

Finally I had an attack Saturday afternoon that left me seeing stars and that scared me into going to get it checked out. Of course I waited until my family was out of town and the doctors offices were closed, so I drove myself in the snow storm to the ER.

I was into see a doctor in good time and then a few tests. I did a chest x-ray, and ECG and blood-work that included a D-dimer test. The x-ray was of no help, the ECG showed tachycardia (rapid heart rate) and I tested positive for a possible blood-clot… oh and low blood pressure. The doctor wanted me to have a lung VQ scan which would show us what we needed to know, but the machine wasn’t available on week-ends so he insisted on a CAT scan to look for the clot and I said “no way!”

I have had 3 or 4 CAT scans this year during the diagnosis phase; 2 of them nobody bothered to put the protective skirt over my reproductive parts and I didn’t know any better. Anyways I explained to him that I had applied for the PET scan program for my after chemo scan in January to avoid more CAT scans aka. radiation as I wasn’t keen on unnecessary scans and I would wait until Monday for the lung VQ. He told me I might die in my sleep tonight and I was getting the CAT.

I gave in but my body would not. My destroyed circulatory system refused to provide a vein big enough for the contrast dye injection so I was given a 24h shot of Heparin (blood thinner) and sent on my way with a referral for a lung VQ, junkie looking arms, a smug smile and a new phobia about going to sleep.

I spent most of Sunday in the Thrombosis department getting a lung VQ (open on the week-ends!!!) which was inconclusive. So I was given another 24h shot of Heparin, a referral for a leg ultrasound… because I guess that’s where blood-clots hide and guess what another CAT scan suggestion!

By Monday the ultrasound showed no clots and I was feeling better, so it could have been that the Heparin did the job or this may just be what it’s like at the final stages of chemo? (God how awful!!!) My body just might be so run down and attacked that some of my organs are having a little trouble doing their job. If that’s the case I would think they would function better again as my body repairs and recovers from chemo? I have a Cardiologist apt in a week to assess this.

Moral of the story: Don’t wait till you can’t breathe, don’t drive yourself anywhere when you can’t breathe and don’t hang on every breath of every doctor you encounter… because if they are only looking at one part of you, they are not looking out for all of you.

Birthdays are a pain in the ass – literally!

Well I’m older now, but not wiser that’s for sure. I started the first day of my 28th year with an enema in the morning and then iced that cake of an idea with a rectal exam in the afternoon. “happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me…” Actually maybe that was smart; the year can only get better from here!

Chemotherapy is very hard on the digestive system which in turn messes with your bowels. I have read about (and experienced) a constant swing back and forth between constipation and diarrhea in patients getting treatment. It all becomes very hard on the backdoor and can lead to a whole mess of other problems like fissures and hemorrhoids. I honestly spend more time dealing with this shit (pun intended!) than the actual cancer; thus the ass exam.

Oh well, putting that “behind me” I have a fun filled week of other doctor appointments to address all of the other side effects that have occurred from the cancer or treatment. Next the eye doctor – I’m going blind and can’t do anything without what used to be my reading only glasses. This could either be nerve damage from the lymphoma or a temporary side effect of the chemo. (I’m also losing memory and going deaf but I’m confident these are temporary and take far too much joy in driving people nutz to address the issue right now.)

Then into see the cardiologist about my fluttery ticker. Again this could be from the chemo, but it’s more likely something to do with the mass that was/is in my chest pushing on my heart for so long. I hope it’s just that as the mass shrinks the pressure is receding causing irregular activity, but I’m worried that there’s a thin spot on the wall of my heart from where the mass was because I have read about it happening with other lymphoma patients; and all my symptoms sound the same. My hematologist just “loves it” when I Google.

But all this gets me thinking about how even when it’s over, it’s not really over. After chemo I may have radiation (or more chemo) and then endless check ups and scans. Overall I am confident that I will eventually be Hodgkin’s free. But what if I’m left with a heart problem, damaged eye sight, a broken ass! What if my eyebrows never grow back, I’m so fucking sick of painting my eyebrows on like a geisha girl everyday. What if the potential radiation to my chest area causes a breast cancer 10 years down the road, as we now know radiation can do? I don’t think I can do this again, and certainly not breast cancer. What if I have children by then, god what if I can’t have children because of this?

It’s not really going to be over. Life AC (after cancer) will be a life of some certain cancer problems and the uncertainty of potential cancer problems. No wonder I feel sick when people talk about this being over soon and getting back to my old life. I don’t know about you, but none of this was in my old life; certainly not the first 27 years.

I’m afraid for this to end. I have just two more scheduled treatments to do, and you would think it would make it easier to do knowing I’m so close to the end, but it's not. Everyone keeps talking about this ending and me going back to work and back into a normal life and it makes me feel worse - anxious. I've been sick for so long, and feel so run down now it's hard to imagine ever feeling good again. And then going back into my normal life, I don't even know what that is anymore! This whole thing has changed me, I can't quite pin point how but I know I am not myself; I’m going to feel like a stranger in my own day.

Treatments are getting harder physically now in that I feel very nauseous during and after treatment and my body is just not recovering the way it used to. These days I barely have anytime between treatments that I feel good and have a normal amount of energy, my WBC never recovers before the next round now. I’ve upped my Neupogen to 4 shots per cycle, but it’s not really helping and the pain of it is too much for me to do 5 shots. Id rather have low counts and be a slug.

Despite the nausea I have done a fabulous job of eating my way through this experience. I’ve pushed out of most of my jeans and had to buy bigger underwear! Horrifying, I’ve gained weight before but it never pushed me to the next ass size. I keep telling myself Ill deal with the weight after, be happy with the cookies now, but I’m a little afraid I wont have the energy to shape myself up after.

The weight is also tainting my excitement for our upcoming vacation. My family has planned Christmas on a beach to celebrate the end of my treatments and give us all a break from… why we’re going with each other I don’t know? But there is no way I’m getting in a bikini, not that I can get much sun so soon after chemo anyways. So I have this awful picture of myself fat, pale, baldish and in one of those old lady skirted swimsuits knitting in the shade. That’s right I knit!

Going Feral.

I haven’t got much of a reason to leave the house today, so I’ve been circling it like caged animal. My responsibilities and abilities are so minimal these days there’s not much to do; not much I want to do or much I can do. I thought about getting dressed and going out to the mall but it seems like a lot of effort for nothing, as I’m out of spending cash and what’s the point of painting on my eyebrows when I’m just going to wipe em off again.

This is perhaps how depression starts. Why get out of my pajamas when I’m just going to get back in them having done nothing in-between, might as well stay in them. It’s hard to keep track of day and night when you have no routine beyond the recognition that Oprah signifies that transfer between daytime and evening television at 4pm.

However it is amazing how fast time flies pissing it away, Tuesday was lucky number 13 (out of 16) rounds of chemo finished. I am the last patient booked each Tuesday, so the place is empty when we are done and the nurse ends her shift to go for dinner when I finish. Unfortunately for her I have an uncanny knack of waiting till the end of my rounds to be sick which makes the nurses stay late and Mum terrified that she'll have to drive home with me, head in a bag. Although she much cooler about it since we started driving my car to and from.

So it was a tough time when I got home and crackers for dinner. But it didn't last long; thankfully I got a new prescription to help me sleep... I think it must be anesthesia in pill form because I barely remember taking it and woke up quite refreshed the morning after - organs intact.

ECG...is this thing on?

I spent 30 minutes scrubbing sticky residue off my chest this morning in a state of frustration and exhaustion. I acquired my portable ECG monitor yesterday for a 24 hour trial after bringing concerns to my doctor about my heart randomly starting to pound over the past 6 weeks. It’s becoming more frequent and intense, but apparently the cure is to wear a heart monitor… because nothing happened the whole time I wore it! It’s just particularly awful because I have bruising and rash between my chest and round my ribs where the jumper cable sticker thingy’s were and a headache from another sleepless (yet calm and rhythmic) night. Eerrr!

Last week I was talking to the therapist I started seeing months ago when the whole cancer thing started and during a conversation about sleep it dawned on me that I have not slept, like truly and deeply slept in almost a year now. By the time I was diagnosed I could barely lie down without suffocating from the mass and fluid that was rising in my lungs (and later heart) not to mention a choking cough, night sweats and itching… I was a zombie for about 4 months before prior to my x-ray. Then broken painful fragments of sleep during my stay in the hospital after surgery, and straight into chemo with all its side effects shortly after. I can honestly say I sleep in fragments never really hitting REM for very long, no wonder my short term memory is getting worse by the… what was I saying?

On a bright note it snowed for the first time yesterday, big time! I should be grumpy about it (like everyone else) but the whole house was piercingly bright this morning with the sun reflected off the snow which is so much better than the last 2 weeks of rain. Plus for me the faster we move from one season to the next, the faster I get through this. Ill be grumpy when I go shovel off my car later, jeeze where’s my portable ECG now!

"pic" & choose, but ya can't have it all.

My hair is growing back! Three weeks ago I was almost bald. I had a rapidly thinning brush-cut that was quickly starting to look more "chemo patient" and less "GI Jane" by the day. No sooner had I resolved myself to the fact that I was going to have to bic my lid, it started to grow again. Prior to cutting/ shaving off my hair, it was long, straight and red... with a great deal of silver on the sides of my head. Although I had no idea just how much silver was there, (thanks to Clairol) until my head was shaved exposing the roots; the sides of my head looked bald due to the lack of hair pigment!

Anyways the hair growing back is already much darker all over my head, and brown. The nurses advise me it will likely fall out again over the final three months of my treatment, and speculate that this crop of hair is due to the last chemo round(s) not happening to take effect during my heads hair growth cycle. Whatever, I’m enjoying it while I got it! And really looking forward to my new hair after chemo as I hear it could come back another colour and curly… “Oh to be curly! Please god after all this I deserve rich curly locks, devoid of grey!”

Four weeks ago I got a pic line put in my left arm – fant-“ass”-tic! Four weeks later, still not impressed. The merits of a pic line are: They save your veins from over use and damage resulting from over use and chemo. They are also a non-surgical procedure, and easier to get that a portacath. I was too chicken shit to get either a pic or port in the beginning and waited until my veins were collapsing, and the burning up and down my arms (from chemo) kept me up at night… and on a steady dose of pain killers before I conceded to sign up. By then the waiting list was too long for a port so I got a pic line within two weeks of requisite. Lesson for ya: Don’t be an ass, listen to your nurses and get a port or a pic when you start this process to avoid the above.

The downside to the pic line is: it’s a bulky tool kit on your arm for everyone to see. The bandages itch all the time. Local bloodwork clinics can not use pic lines, so you still get a needle unless you go to the hospital. It’s a bitch to get comfortable at night if you’re an “arm under head sleeper” and my favorite… it has to be flushed with saline every week. The later is the worst for me because after 4 months of treatment I can now taste the saline when I get my lines flushed (it has to be flushed after every chemo, blood work and cleaning) and it makes me nauseous. In the beginning I couldn’t taste it, nor would it have affected me if I could, but the body is smart! After awhile it learns that everytime we taste this shit bad things happen and we feel sick, so let’s just cut to the chase and feel sick anyways. Patterned responses, hard to control, hard to overcome. So in the end, every chance I get to not use the line, I opt for a needle (collapsed veins = 2-3 try’s) just to avoid a flush… why do I have this pic line again?

Let's Wig Out!

Well I made it this far; I'm halfway through my treatment with great progress, and I feel like celebrating!

These days I'm getting pretty sick being bald and am dying to get out there with some fun new hair, but I don't want to do it alone. (I'm sure you can all relate, because being bald is just like having a bad hair day... except it doesn't go away the next day - imagine everyday all day... ahhh!)

So Id like to propose we pull out our party wigs and go out for cocktails to celebrate... trust me you don't want to dance in a wig - too hot!

Being the types of girls you are... I know you crazy bitches so well... most of you already have wigs in your tickle trunks. For those of you that don't, well it was just a matter of time before someone like you (wild & crazy) ended up with one! lol

Let's get together Friday August 5th at 8pm at The Collection in the Byward Market. I hope you can all make it, I really need a girls night out and miss your company. Please reply asap below and remember to come incognito!

Sobbing with Joy!

A tear started rolling down my cheeks as I walked out of the hospital this afternoon, and by the time I hit the hwy I was sobbing with joy. I had a check up with my hematologist to see how I had progressed halfway through my treatments, and the news was great. After four months of chemo, the mass in my chest is almost gone.

At first I found it odd to be sobbing over the news, since I barely cried when I found out I had cancer. I mean I cried a little (or allot at specific periods) but it was more about upsetting my family, never the cancer. I always accepted the cancer like a moment I knew was coming had finally arrived.

Why does it mean so much to me to know that it’s almost gone? I think I figured it out… I didn’t know I had so much to be afraid of when I began treatments. Ignorance is bliss, and that bliss got me through about the first three months of treatments. Knowledge, experience and fear has started to wear me down over the last month.

Thank god there is nothing to compare just how horrible chemotherapy can make you feel. If I had known… I can’t even finish this sentence; I have no answer for it. I don’t know what would have happened if I had even just a taste of how four months into the future might feel. It’s that knowledge of how awful it does feel that had shaken my resolve over the past month when anticipating future treatments.

Everyone was really enthusiastic about me reaching my halfway point in treatment, but I couldn’t get into it the same way this news has affected me. To them the worst was almost done; to me the worst was still coming. Chemo doesn’t get any easier; it’s cumulative and gets worse everytime! I hate to articulate that to anyone who’s just started. I feel like I’ve told you a bully’s about to kick your ass around the next corner, rather than let you take at least the first half the surprise beating in shock.

Anyways this news has given me back something that I didn’t realize was missing until it popped back in my head tonight, “you can do this, you’re strong”. I run an inner monolog constantly, I mean constantly! (I keep myself up at night because I wont shut up.) I tell myself that I am a strong person all the time! It is a constant phrase in my mind during tough times, because… well cancer isn’t the first pile a shit I’ve dug through. And I just realized it hasn’t been in my inner monolog for the past few weeks, I was really starting to succumb mentally to the physical beating of chemo.

Well I still have to do four more months of treatments, but I start my second half with the same resolve to stay strong that I had when I began my treatments. Now that’s something to sob with joy over!

Chemo Carnival

Step right up, step right up!
16 shots of chemo, for the cost of your existing life! Knock down all the cancer cells, win yourself... well the rest of your life. That's right folks, 16 shots of chemo and you too can live to see another day. 9.8 outta 10 win everytime! You look like a sharp shootin little lady, here's your gun sweetheart, good luck!

seventh-inning stretch

I had a little sob on the front porch this evening with my mother. I feel like I am nearing the end of my emotional & physical strength; like I’m going to run out of chemo-steam before the chemo-train is done takin me for a ride. I’m not there yet, but I feel it coming. It’s like every fiber of my being is screaming at me “what are you doing… you remember how awful it was 2 weeks ago, don’t go back… listen Tam, I really think this chemo thing is designed to kill us… you’re crazy to keep letting them do this to you!”

Every other week as I near chemo day my fight or flight response starts to whisper “you can’t win this one, just sit this one out, remember how it knocked us out last time; please don’t do it to us again”. That Tuesday morning I have a self preservation siren that is screaming code red in my head telling me to abort the mission as I drive to the hospital. How long can someone ignore themselves in the best interests of themselves?

Paragraph one “you’re crazy to keep letting them do this to you!” After puke treatment 5 I decided I needed to disengage myself during chemo visits in order not to become overwhelmed by the process of putting in the needle, receiving the drugs and really just acknowledging that I was there and that was happening, because sights and sounds of the hospital were making me physically sick. Did Pavlov’s dog barf at the sound of the saline drip? Somehow I’ve trained myself to; so I disengage, pretend I’m not there and block out what’s going on around me. The problem I’m now having with that is a feeling like this is being done to me, and it perpetuates the reality that I am not in control of this, and I can’t stop it. (Cancer or treatment)

In the beginning I felt in control, I was a willing participant; I’m no longer willing and as much as I hate the word, I feel like I’m being molested every 2 weeks. Every 2 weeks I don’t want to drive there, I don’t want the needles, I don’t want the drugs, I don’t want to sit there for 3 hours while it burns up my arms. So I close my eyes and try to will myself to sleep or pretend I’m asleep and that I don’t feel the chemo or hear other peoples cancer conversations, and I walk out feeling (well sick and disoriented) but also wronged… like it was wrong of them to that to me because I’m not willing.

So I’m emotionally stuck. In the beginning I felt like had a choice, and the choice was to embrace the treatment in a calm rational manner. I mentally can control my outlook and chose to make the experiences positive. Except now I’m like a dog that’s been kicked to many times for wagging it’s tail and my body is taking over and declaring my mind unfit, because it’s evident to my body that we (I) need to be in panic mode and stop wagging my tail at it. “I’m being attacked, panic, panic”. Yet if I choose to shut it all out and endure, my self preservation siren still goes off screaming “how can you let them do this to you emotionally, and by the way it is still happening physically!”

Mind and body don’t want to do it regardless of whether I embrace it, acknowledge it or ignore it and pretend… there’s no foolin me. If only I was schizophrenic, then only one of me would have to go through this. The rest of me could just carry on “la de da”, although it would be hard to explain the hair loss to the other me’s.

Outer beauty's not home right now, it's just me and MacGyver...

My eyebrows and eyelashes are thinning now along with what’s left of my hair. I hate what I look like in the morning. Some nights I go to bed sad that I’m alone in this, but I always wake up thankful that no man has to see this. But then my thought circles round again; if I were loved they would find me beautiful anyways and I would have someone to go to bed with. Hummm…

I do think inner beauty goes a long way, and that I do poses enough of it in the absence of my outer attributes to get me by. It just takes as much effort to invoke it on a daily basis as it does to paint on outer beauty. I’ve never had to call on it so much before; my inner beauty was a bonus, an “on top” of my outer beauty. I’m habitually described as “tall, gorgeous “and secondly,” funny or cool” by them to their buddies. Now I don’t know what they say, and that makes me nervous. I’ve always had a clear idea of my sexual appeal, and am learning how much I valued and needed it as part of my identity when dealing with… well everyone, not just men. Outer beauty was a tool I used to lure them in. People don’t see inner beauty in brief encounters, they see bald chick.

In someone’s day of dealing with the public, at the end of the day they can usually only recall 2 or 3 people that stand out in there mind; the rest are a blur of nobodies. I’m sure I was always one of those 2 or 3 and took pride in standing out in someone’s mind. Id hate to be part of the blur, the nobodies, to not register on their radar or worse yet register as something odd in their day.

More acceptance, patience and confidence is required for this note. Ha, acceptance… I was cleaning out the bathroom this morning and I can’t get rid of my hair elastics or clips! I’ve got a brush cut now, but who knows when those might come in handy? Maybe a friend will stop by with a hair emergency or Ill get trapped in the bathroom in a life or death situation and have to MacGyver myself out with a barrette and scrunchy. Yes, these are all very good reason to hang these things…. If I cannot master acceptance, patience and confidence today, then I will work on my ingenuity and MacGyver skills.

Observations on Losing Hair

Here's a few observations being 4 weeks into it you won’t read in any book:

- When it starts to go, it goes fast! I couldn't cut it all off without proof that it was going to fall out. The nurses warned me that it would go quickly, and it may be traumatic if I didn't bite the bullet and cut it before then - I didn't listen. It fell out for about 2 weeks before I cut it; that was about 1 week too long! If you are a "freaker outer" cut it on the 4th or 5th day your follicles start jumping ship. You'll have enough proof that they're mutinying without having to watch the ship sink.

- Don't shave your head completely. Get a hair dresser to cut it into some kind of pixie cut first keeping length on top or around your face because you may not go bald for awhile or at all. Short cuts can do thinning hair, I've rocked it for about 3 weeks and just went shorter last week... and now it seems to have stopped falling out. yay!

- Nothing screams cancer patient like a scarf or turban on a young chick; just live your truth or wig out.

- Wear bigger earrings and more eye make-up, you wont look over done. I've had to kick it up a notch and sport my evening looks during the day. In photo's coming back to me I found I looked really pale and naked with such little hair to draw attention to my face. I started using my former hair-styling time in the morning to Tammy-Faye the eyes and I look alive again.

- My armpit hair has stopped growing - yay:) Don't ask about the bikini... why god!?

- You may look like a stereotypical lesbian, a really cute lesbian, but one none the less. Here I was all worried no one would hit on me at the bars anymore:) If you're not gay, thank the ladies and what the heck, let them buy you a drink! Years from now you and your loved ones can fondly refer back this time as that year you were "experimenting" (with the hair lol), rather than that time you had Hodgkin's!

Canada Day - Pity Party - BYOP (Peanutbutter)

I seem to be writing this a lot lately:
“I just realized I didn’t send you a note back when you wrote me last week… duh! I am having a really rough time with the memory these days; I hear “they” call it chemo brain. Passing thoughts get filled into the “done & sent” pile before I get a chance to do them. (I think I’m getting way more done than I actually am – good for the ego, bad for production. Lol)”

Just came back from chemo, feel yucky this time. Most times I tolerate the drugs going in well and then in 48 hours I start to feel queasy, this time that feeling started the moment I was hooked up. Bourns! I’m not really a “I’m gonna puke kinda girl” (Id like to think its years of Jägermeister shots at the bar that have conditioned my stomach for chemo… I knew all that drinking would come in handy!) so when I say I’m nauseous , I mean it’s an overall off feeling that makes me feel icky and sometimes have a bad taste in my mouth. You know that feeling “after” a night of drinking and puking - minus the drinking and puking – that’s what I get. Although I really do think they should serve me a real cocktail with my chemo cocktail just to make it all better!

Had to pass up Canada Day plans, which are too bad as I think this is the first C-Day that it hasn’t rained in 5 years. I would have liked to be downtown today to see the buskers and fireworks on Parliament Hill tonight. So I’m trying to catch up on my notes listening to Jamiroquai on the itunes. (I can’t believe it’s been over 10 years since this album, Travelling Without Moving – 1996, came out!) (I can’t believe I’m not 16 anymore!!!) That’s it I’m hitting the 90’s dance mix next!

I’m feeling much better than I was last night mood wise. I was just furious at my mother last night when I learned from a friend that she has continued to send out “tam updates” to my friends and family. I knew that two months ago when I was in the hospital she was keeping everybody up to date, but I thought that had stopped once I got out. The when I went to send out photos and an update from my Martini’s for Hodgkin’s event I learned that she had beat me to it. Way to steal my thunder!

I have so few things in life right now that keep me busy and in communication with my world, that I feel like she was taking that outlet away from me because she needed something to keep her busy. We talked about it after the party and she seemed to understand about not sending out my big news but I guess had continued on with bi-weekly updates. Fast forward one month and I’m sitting here wondering why my friends and family out of town haven’t contacted me in months to see how I’m doing? I only learned about it last night when I sent out an update to a friend and she replied that she knew all about my current med’s and status thanks to Mum’s updates, and what else was new? Well shit – nothing! My new job day in and day out is taking care of me; some days it’s all I have to talk about.

It’s hard moving back home when it’s not on your terms, my cancer is very unreasonable. I’ve had to take a leave of absence from work, stop consulting independently too, have giant needles stabbed into my chest (biopsies) and back (bone marrow), have an oh-so unpleasant heart and lung draining, no one ever gives me anesthesia!, pack up my whole life into a storage unit and move me and my shoes back home (shoes – couldn’t afford a big enough storage unit. Lol) I’m back into my old bedroom recreated next door to my “very different from me sister” who answers most “questuccusations” with “whatever Tam” and the whole family eats different peanut butter than I do… grumble.

It’s hard to want/ accept help from people who eat gross peanut butter (ha!), even when you need it. It’s like sending someone to the store for PB and they come back with chunky… even there best efforts piss you off sometimes. Or maybe the chunky/ smooth debate is old news that went away when you moved out on your own, but now you’re back and their chunky peanut butter is hard to swallow some days.

the healing touch?

I went to see a man who does healing touch with a girlfriend tonight. I am sure he received a great deal of healing from the parts he was touching, me… not so much. Just as I suspected, someone who prays on the weak as regulars, but mostly makes a living off one shot curious George’s like me.

We drove out to a house in Gatineau and walked right in and sat in the living room until we were seen. I went first into a room and lay on the table and the man (I can’t even remember his name?) just started putting his hands on my stomach, under my breasts and near my pelvis and meditated. (so much for buying me dinner first!)

He did this for about 4 minutes without word and then left the room, for an hour. For an hour!!! For the first 10 minutes I lay there and gazed out the window. The next 10 minutes I started to get irritated, and the next 10 minutes I wondered if I should be meditating, then the next 10 minutes I listened to him go to the bathroom and head to the basement to start up the washing machine. For the next 10 minutes I was irritated again, and then the last 10 minutes I just started text messaging people… did I not get it?

When he finally came back he was surprised that I had not fallen asleep. I resisted the urge to let him know I do that in my own home… for free, but I tried to keep an open mind: ) He then placed his hands in the same locations and told me there was a great deal of tension in my left breast… not my “chest” my “breast” and it was channeling down to the right side of my pelvis. (I guess he missed the giant cancerous sweet potato size mass (6"x6"x2") lying behind my right breast? Although I get why he's drawn... I've always thought the left one was cuter - perkier:) It was important that I realign it through the center of the body because the charkas run from my pelvis to breasts. (I seem to recall them running to my head, but okay?)

He then described to me that there was a charka in my labia, that’s the part between the vagina and anus that needs to be grounded. He actually used the words “labia”, “vagina”, “anus”, “breasts” and “nipple” (I haven’t told you that part yet) in the combined total of 9 minutes he was with me. Our session ended with him telling me to put my left hand on my left breast, making sure the nipple was in my palm, and my right hand on my pelvis for 10 minutes a day to realign and redirect my energy.

Where I come from we call that masturbation. It doesn’t happen every day, it does realign a few things, I didn’t need to pay you $30 bucks to tell me that… and I can do it in 4 minutes!

Coping with Cancer for $13 dollars please.

Today I went to my first cancer class, Coping with Cancer through the Cancer Clinic at the General; 2 hours and my parking ticket was $13 bucks! Thank god I consumed 9 timbits during the course, almost got my moneys worth. Three other people showed up to watch a power point presentation, “so you’ve got cancer” followed with a meditation video; original, innovative – thanks, do you validate parking?

I don’t know if I am going to like going to generalized cancer groups because it seems to me that other cancers are yucky! One lady had thyroid cancer and was looking bald, pasty and toothless. (well she may have been toothless before, but jeez cancers done nothing for her!) The other woman had throat cancer, was bi-polar and was itching for a smoke break. I learned something about myself sitting next to her; I’m not real receptive to people who a) gave themselves cancer and b) are continuing to give them selves cancer while sucking up services we all paid into. She was nice enough for the first half of the course, but then I think the voices in her head told her to quiet down for the rest of it.

During the meditation video when I was meditating, I made a shopping list for Friday and convinced myself that I really needed a massage. I drove back to the west-end was able to get a walk-in relaxation massage with hot stones at “The Spa”; nice! I started a yoga class yesterday that did help my sciatic nerve, but messed up my shoulder. The girl was rubbing my neck with oil and went a little over my hair line and stepped back with a “oh” and I had to explain to her that her furry fingers were a result of my hair falling out from chemo, and it was best to avoid my lid with sticky fingers. I’m on hair preserve.

The cat and I attempted a nap this afternoon, but the phone wouldn’t quit. The irritation on his little furry face is priceless, especially when he rounds on me like it’s my fault! So I had a 15min cat nap and then was off to learn how to give myself a needle. The nurse said I needed to pick a fat spot to poke, I offered up the booty but she said my belly was just fine – ouch! (note to self, lay off the baby cookies… I just said that with a mouth full of baby cookie!)

The needle was for Neupogen; (sounds like the name of some Asian dude) it’s a drug that will help me grow white blood cells faster. Apparently people with other types of cancer receiving chemo usually have their treatments about 3 weeks apart which gives their bone marrow enough time to grow enough white blood cells back before they knock them out with chemo again. When you have Hodgkin’s its common to have difficulty growing enough white cells back in time for the next round because they are 2 weeks apart. So 1 week after each chemo session I will have to inject myself daily for 5 days with Neupogen to get those cells a’multiplyin… like little white rabbits.

I teared up a little after I gave myself the shot in the nurse’s office (well after I got the balls to do it after three psyches.) Not because it hurt at all, it was because it was another little “real” moment. This is real, it’s really happening; people who are healthy don’t inject needles into their belly.

Thanks for coming out to Martini's for Hodgkin's

My thank you letter to all who came out to support & donate:

Oh what a night… I’ve left the bar many times without the things I came with, hats, shoes, boyfriends; but never my hair!

Big thanks to everyone that came out Thursday for Martini’s for Hodgkin’s at Bar 56. The evening was a huge success in raising funds for The Lymphoma Foundation of Canada in support of Hodgkin’s Lymphoma research.

My thanks to all my friends that donated gift baskets & gift certificates through their corporations in support of the event, I knew I could count on you guys to help! Congratulations to all those that won gift baskets and gift certificates. (Robyn I’m especially excited for you and your SAAB gift certificate, as a new mom you deserve it!)

I had a blast! It was a little hard for me to stop and chat with all of you for as long as I would have liked to, but just note I was so pleased that each and every one of you came out to support me and my event. And boy did I need it; it was tough parting with all that red hair… which has provided me with a fabulous opportunity to see all the silver roots that are underneath. Errr!

Actually it wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be to cut off all my hair because I had all my friends cheering me on, and I was able to donate that ponytail to Locks of Love, and organization that makes wigs for kids going through the same deal.

One of the things I forgot to mention in my impromptu address to the crowd was why it was so important for me to host this event. Empathy. During my process of being diagnosed with Hodgkin’s leading up to treatment I have had to undergo some difficult procedures and surgeries, and each time the doctors would say to me “don’t worry you’re so lucky, you’re young, strong and healthy; you can endure this.” And I would/ am enduring, but I think about how horrible it would be for a 5 year old or a 75 year old to endure say something like my bone marrow collection (drill into the hip bone) and am just overwhelmed with empathy for others who may not be as young, strong, or healthy as I am, yet have to endure none the less; and so I needed to do something.

So together we were able to raise funds to help others endure Lymphoma and all its pleasantries, but if they’re really lucky they have great friends like I do who support them and that’s the most important help anyone can get.

Thanks again for coming out to show your support.
Tam

I want my Ms. Bigglesworth!

It seems perfectly reasonable to me that if you are losing your hair to chemo, than you should be blessed with hair loss all over. The gods should give you a break from bikini waxes and say “one hairless cat coming right up; this ones on us!” They did not, I’m still on kitty maintenance and I am one sour puss!