Every time I sat down to post my blog over the past few days, something would happen that would derail my posting. Usually my son's need to do homework, but other things such as a phone call, or suddenly not feeling the love for writing. So I have found, made the time to write this morning.
Since my daughter left for LA, I have fallen into the chemo fog of nausea IBS and blech that follows the week after treatment. This week, most likely because I pushed myself last week, I feel it, really feel it. Feeling bad is not normal for me, and I am a bad patient when it comes to feeling bad. I am the type of person who is always going, doing, highly independent, the "I can do it myself, thank you very much" person. This is the biggest life lesson for me. To know that I have limits, to know when to stop myself even though my overblown sense of super heroine says to keep going, to know when to cry "Uncle" and ask for help. Pride cometh before the fall, and this week is the fall. I found myself weeping in the elevator yesterday not knowing why, except that I was so tired and nauseated that all I wanted to do was lie down on the floor of the elevator and sleep. Life lesson, KNOW YOUR LIMITS.
My weekend without Sarah was not without Sarah. I still went shopping with her on Sunday, although 3,000 miles apart, Sarah carried me on her IPhone while she finally got her furniture for her new apartment in LA. Between tweet pictures and online pictures, Sarah and I settled on a living room and a bedroom. Just try to stop Mother/Daughter shopping, just try. Can't be done. WE will always find a way. bwahhhaaahhhaaahhhaaa.
Monday started like any Monday the week after chemo, feeling gross, IBS'd, and wanting to stay in bed, but knowing I had P/T. It didn't take much to make the nausea take over. Standing for more than 3o seconds, waiting for the bus, sitting waiting to be seen. I sat with my P/T friend, Margarette, a women in her 60's who suffers from Lymph edema. A kind woman who years after her struggle with breast cancer has now suddenly had lymph edema kick in. We meet briefly each week and speak of how we are doing. Talk about Health Care Reform, and worry about the ability to pay for our health care in the future. Then she goes off with her P/T and I go off with mine. This week was no different, except that this week a weary African-American woman whom Margarette knows entered the waiting area and sat down looking so defeated. Margarette was called away first and so I sat with this woman in silence. After a few minutes, the woman looked at me with war-torn eyes and said, "I just don't think I can do this anymore. I'm so tired of the doctors, the appointments, the cost." What to say? My heart bled for her. She went on to explain the endless appointments, the P/T, the co-pays, a whole year of not being able to work, and the fear of not being able to get employed now. She cried out to a complete stranger, tears welling in her eyes. How could I not be moved? I felt like saying, "Let's go. Let's run away." But I knew that was no answer, so I told her to hang on. God has a plan, even when it feels like God has abandoned you, he is there, holding you, your job is to have faith that all will work out. Our deepest struggles will have the biggest rewards when faith and hope are applied. Her face changed, and the pain melted from her face, and she responded with, "Yes, you are right. But sometimes it's just so hard." I nodded, and said, "Just don't give up, you've come this far, how sad would it be to quit now? I don't know you, but I just know you aren't the type to quit." We shared a hug, and I was called in to work with my P/T. Cancer links us, but it is the human connection that saves us. Compassion. She just needed someone who got it. I totally get it. There are days that I'd love to just quit. The cost is enormous, and I don't know how we will survive this financially, but at the end of the day, I want to live. I want to go on more IPhone shopping trips with my daughter, and help my son tea-dip his History projects, and congratulate my husband on a callback, and do what I do, everything.
I learned how to do Lymphatic drainage Monday, sounds a whole lot more complicated than it is. I'd look like a weirdo if I did it on the train, that's for sure. People might think I was doing some bizarre imitation of Mary Catherine "Supah-Star". After P/T I foolishly decided to walk to the Credit Union. Avenues away and blocks North I walked mostly on an incline and in the rapidly dropping temperatures and the beginning rain. By the time I got to the Credit Union I was drained. Wearily I stood in the elevator of the Equity Building not noticing anyone around me when I heard my name, and there stood John of FBI. So I detoured to visit my son's agent's office and say howdy to everyone there, before going upstairs to open the money vein for Insurance premium. I'm glad I took the break, I needed to sit down, and there was John the angel telling me to sit. Thanks John.
I headed on up to financial hell and to consolidate accounts to come up with the money to pay for another 3 months of insurance. $3,298.00 That's my premium for one quarter. The thought is draining. Robbing Peter to pay Paul. To have faith that the next quarter of funds will be there is a difficult one, especially in this economy. But I have to have faith! I cannot give into to demons of despair, but this is a hard one. When you cut a check that takes most of your money away, and you are not working right now, and Christmas is in the air, and you try to say, the present this year is me still being here, and that will have to do....difficult. I ran into a couple of friends and chatted and felt a little bit like the "Mayor of Broadway", usually it's Ed who does the running into, not I. I pay my Insurance pound of flesh and head home on the train. I am now completely exhausted and don't know how I'll make it home. I grab an express train and decide to hoof it from Broadway/Lafayette. There are enormous flights of stairs at this stop, did you know that? I knew there were stairs, but not until yesterday did I know just how exhausting those stairs could be....I struggled up the first flight to the concourse, and rested. The second flight seemed longer than ever, and I rested at the top of those stairs. Then the final flight to the street.. Ugh! It seemed to take forever, the temperature had dropped again, the rain had picked up, and as I strained to put my foot to the pavement away from the stairs a man charges me and insists that I give him money because he has none. WHAT!!!!???? Are you kidding me? You ask a woman who has cancer and has just written away all that she has so she can continue her treatment for 3 more months for money?! All I could muster was F*ck off! I stumbled down Houston toward home as people pushed past in the hurry to get somewhere fast, like I used to do. It took a half an hour to walk home from that stop, a stop that usually only takes 15 minutes, if that. I weakly stepped into the empty elevator and as the door closed and I realised I was alone, I wept, I wept for 14 floors, and felt like that woman I met earlier, and as the door opened, I pulled myself together and said, "Have faith. The harder the struggle, the bigger the reward." I spent the rest of the day in a nausea induced way. I went to the acupuncturist and had temporary success, but it was temporary. I pushed too hard, and this is the price I pay for pushing. Today will be spent on meds and bed. With the hope that tomorrow will be a better day. That tomorrow will bring good news on multiple fronts. That tomorrow will be a good day.
So to bed with me, thanks for reading, it means a lot to me to share the journey, and now it makes sense that I got delayed in posting. Hope you don't mind the lapses, I have a feeling this will happen more often.
Nite!
Love and Light!
Melissa
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