Half Way

Two weeks later and I've had one more treatment bringing me to the half way mark. I want to feel excited and on the count down. But I feel discouraged and scared. I have been having some more intense stomach side effects, so have been feeling even more run down and more tough days lately. So I wonder if the next few months will be filled with rest and television rather than the life changing I was dreaming of in the last post. And so maybe I need to surrender to the process and be gentle with myself. And that is probably true. I keep being encouraged by Cyndi to start businesses and projects and I feel uncertainty brew like all the old times. Fear ad self doubt. But I also feel the pull of surrender. And maybe this is one of my life lessons - knowing when to dig in and push and knowing when to surrender. I feel like I could use more of both. I remember in college being creative all the time. Loving thinking about projects. Taking on more then was necessary in many classes. But I also needed the push of a class and deadlines to make it happen. On my own over the years I haven't proven to be as active. And maybe it is fear driving the lazier version of myself. But then I think about all the time I dreamed of being a mom and being home for my kids and playing and baking and being with them. And I haven't always surrendered to that dream completely either because I feel the nag of needing to be busier and providing more income for the family and making something of myself. So I am in this constant vortex of noncommittal energy. I have been there for a while. And I feel like it is still continuing now. Now when I should feel the raw sense of being alive and know what is important and what my next moves are. But here again I tread water. And maybe I'll be in the same place when it's all over that I started in. And then what's it all for? Or maybe it's not for anything and it just happened.

Firsts

I had excellent results from my PET scan yesterday and I feel a renewed sense of life. Even though I am not even half way through the treatment I feel like I am beginning my recovery. I don't want to expect too much of myself, but it feels like the hard part is over. I am currently cancer free. A clean PET scan. Yahoo! That is the best possible scenario at this point in the treatment. It doesn't mean the treatment changes in any way, though. We continue on in order to ensure that it doesn't come back, and in doing so the cure rate is ninety percent. So I feel elated today. I hope I can make this feeling last through the rest of this intense treatment experience. Perhaps it will make it more bearable and go faster. I want to increase my activity and get in shape. I want to do creative projects around the house that I haven't gotten to. I want to begin projects to bring our lives to a more creative and flowing place. I want to get massage and go to qigong and study with Cyndi. I want to take classes on line. I want to enjoy the fall and the holidays. I want to take good care of myself and get through this with grace and ease. I want to come out the other side a changed person with a brand new lease on life. So to end and begin with a cliche: Today is the first day of the rest of my life!

Wild ride

So it was a weekend of spark and inspiration, mostly due to the visit of a very dear friend and the magic that happens when she is around. But let me not get ahead of myself. It really all started the day before she arrived when I underwent the fourth chemo treatment, officially putting me at the end of round two. How many rounds to go I am not yet sure, but this is the crucial time to see how treatment is working and make a plan for the future. Momentous in itself. Then Catherine arrived and we played and sat on my bed on our computers looking at blogs and ecourses and things that inspire us us. She showed me how to use pinterest. We ate amazing food like quinoa black bean burgers at Birchwood and cobb salads at the Bulldog. She brought me to a panel at the Creative Connection and meet Leigh Standley of Curly Girl Design and Kelly Rae Roberts. We toured the market place there with the lovely Beth Nichols from Do What You Love For Life and saw more amazing people and their amazing wares. It was a fabulous event of whimsy and practical inspiration. Wish we could have attended the whole thing! Maybe I'll try to get back there next year. We also got to attend a Buddhist Relic presentation at the Gyoto Monastery across the street from my house. It was peaceful and beautiful and full of energy. We were blessed by the monks. It felt powerful and much needed and I am wondering how I may try to involve myself in this little temple more often. And this week holds many more moments of awe and self care. I get to see my wise therapist today. I have a meeting with a qigong master on Friday before the PET scan that will reveal the effect of all this treatment. I get to see my amazing energy healer, Cyndi Dale, the following Tuesday. And end the whole intensive with a meeting with my oncologist to discuss the road to the future, followed my another chemo. This feels like a very significant round for me. 

And it has begun to bring up questions of exactly how this could or would change my life? Being surrounded by all of this incredible talent this weekend really stirred the longing of the artist inside. She has always been there, but has been so dormant for so long in the hustle and bustle of babies and children. She has come out of hiding for birthday parties and Christmas cookies and knit hats and an occasional sewing class. But what about her? What if she came back in stride? I envy these women that spend their days being creative and cherish and support that part of themselves. I wonder what life could look like if I did more of that myself. So, as much as I like to pontificate about what career I may want to start when the girls are in school and what I could do to help support my family while maintaining the level of involvement I have been able to achieve. Maybe now is not the time for that. Maybe now is the time to continue to explore. Maybe this is the year for exploring healing and creativity and just see how it feels and where it leads. Considering everything that is going on I think that is about as much as I can bite off and chew right now. But I feel a hopeful exhilaration at the thought of the process. Perhaps there is something more there. Perhaps this is a time leading to something.

This is it

Cancer. It feels like a "this is it" diagnosis. Life or death. Now or never. It is completely confusing and unimaginable and yet with it comes a kind of clarity. Sometimes. This is the moment you have to choose to live or die on your own terms. To finally do and say all the things you've never dared to do or put off for a rainy day. The rainy day might not come. This is it. And even though there are so many great things - people, love, accomplishments, life - what has been missing? What can't you live without if you die tomorrow. Don't get me wrong, I have two little girls. I don't plan on going anywhere for a long time. And statistically with Hodgkin's Lymphoma I have a very good chance of living a very long life. But now there is a what if where there hadn't been one before. A life changer, they say. But change it how?