Did You Ever Think Life Was Gonna Be This Way?

Gratitude, like anything else, is a habit. I have a picture that I see every day when I'm getting up; it says, "Begin each day with a grateful heart." We also have a family ritual at dinner each night, where we go around the table and explain what we're thankful for. We've done this since Maggie was a tiny toddler, and we never forget to do it.  It's often my favorite part of the day. Sometimes, it's little things, like minecraft or beer or weekends. But oftentimes, there's some profound thanks: for family and a h ome and love. For random acts of kindness and for dinners and their makers. For schools and books and brains that work well. For God and farms and the gift to choose. For parents and children and grandparents and friends. All of these have had a place at our table over the last few months. It's hard to keep track, and I forget many of them. That's the way life goes, I guess! But here's the best part: it's never difficult for m

I chunked a big, dark, heavy rock at you all... ...And this is what happened. Thank you for the beauty and support and love. I am blessed beyond measure.

I have the tendency to leave out the messy, sad, difficult parts of my everyday life with cancer. The reasons for that are legion, but they boil down to one: we all like to present our best selves. No one likes to feel vulnerable and naked to the world. I don't want people feeling sorry for me or pitying me. There are only a tiny handful of people that I really open up to about this terrible disease, and that's because it's a huge burden and frankly, I don't want to trust just anyone with sharing my load.  But I don't want everyone to think life is all rainbows and sunshine, either.  When one of my closest friends, who loves me very much (and the feeling is mutual), urged me to stop obsessing over certain things and gave me a well-intentioned pep talk about how the big crisis was over and it was time to find my "new normal"...well, I knew I had some 'splaining to do. If someone that close to me thinks that we're all done with cancer around her

Since my last scan, I've been thinking a lot about the next phase of my life.  I've had life-saving medical intervention that has allowed me to banish almost all of my cancer. I've spent some serious time relaxing and pampering myself, and I have the energy and recovering fingernails (they kept splitting!) to prove it. And now I'm ready to move on, to open a new chapter in my life. I feel as though my future wellness is really in my own hands right now. Do I want to spend my life "managing my illness" - or do I want to commit myself to enhancing my wellness? Um, I'll take the latter, thankyouverymuch!! My new approach consists of four "buckets," if you will: nutrition, exercise, mindfulness, and intellectual engagement . I'm not becoming Buddha or anything (yet!), but I've read enough that I'm convinced that a vegan, low-sugar diet is going to serve me best. I'm walking every day and committed to enjoying yoga again 3-4 times

This time last year, I was starting a new round of chemo - Folfox, which we now know really REALLY wreaked havoc on my systems, especially my platelets and white blood cells - they even wound up testing me for leukemia this spring because my counts were so low. Andy platelets, once robust and normal as yours, still have not recovered. At this point, my oncologist says the damage is probably permanent and that my platelets have "reset" themselves at this new, much lower level. Just to give you an idea of what's normal in the world of platelets, 150k-400k is the normal range. During chemo, my oncologist required my platelet levels to be at 100k or higher. Today, my platelets are generally around 75k. Last time I had chemo, the medical team had to request (and thankfully, received) special permission ("compassionate use")for me to use a drug that would boost my platelets to an acceptable level for treatment. Fun stuff, right?  But I  digress. I started this post fu

Last week was, well, hellish. I did my best to keep busy...we even had family pictures taken on Thursday morning: See? Tranquilizer darts DO work! And then came Thursday night and that meant I wasn't going to get much sleep. Not only because of the anxiety but because of the prednisone. See, way back a long time ago (um, last spring), the first time I had a high-contrast CT scan, I developed a mild rash a few days later. And so now all of my files have big ALLERGY ALERT stickers all over them, and any time I have to get a high-contrast scan, I have to take 10 tablets of steroids within the 24 before treatment and then, just for good measure, I chase that cocktail with a couple of Benadryl an hour before the scan. It's super fun. I'm jittery as hell and then suddenly sleepy (if they give me the injectable Benadryl, then I'm REALLY the life of the party). If these scans were just once a year or whatever, I probably wouldn't mind as much. But by my reckoning, I

...brought to you by "Friends," rose, and the world's most chocolatey cookies.

Early this week, not long after I wrote a tongue-in-cheek post about how I wasn't going to say things about how you should hold your sweeties tight and tell them you love them, I received word that my college friend, Rachel Perlmeter, had died of a heart attack on Sunday. She was 38 years old. An absolutely brilliant artist and human being. I met her when she was a freshman at Northwestern and I was a sophomore - a place really just chock full of geniuses - and even so, she stood apart. She was kind and brilliant and funny as hell and one of only a handful of people I've ever met my whole life long who loved books even more than I did (do). She went on to have this amazing career full of artistry and beauty, filling the spaces between theater and literature and art with her own special vision, and married a man that she told me she adored. We hadn't talked in a couple of years but she came to mind at unexpected times and places. Her death has really rocked me.  It migh

...My next CT scan has been scheduled for October 10th. I probably won't post about it until the weekend though, so don't ask. xo First up: Tightrope Walking Across the Uneven Bars Don't worry, Nadia. There's a mat for when you fall. (Can you believe there aren't any "anxiety olympics" images? Quick, someone make me a sketch.)

After a long hiatus in which I could only watch "Friends" episodes, listen to the All Souls trilogy on audiobook, walk around feeling like I'd drunk a gallon of coffee, and sometimes - sometimes  - knit, I've finally read a book. Two books, in fact! I'm so proud. One seems to have a bit more synergy with my present situation, however, so I give you: Station Eleven: A Novel by Emily St. John Mandel Had Station Eleven been written in a chronologically organized way, it would have been a nice addition to the growing field of post-apocalyptic fiction. But Mandel instead takes readers through life before "the collapse," as well as during and after that seminal event, using a technique that reminded me of a disorganized but dazzling pile of photographs.  Readers follow the fates of a handful of people introduced in the first chapter of the book, which occurs in a theater just before the collapse. What really makes this book sparkle is the organi

It's been a while, because my brain has been too scattered to focus on an actual book, but I like to post recent book reviews I've written, especially when the book in some way intersects with the rest of my life. Today, The Light Between Oceans : If you're looking for a book to break your heart a little, this is the one to read. A sweet young couple pines for a family as they live alone on a lighthouse island, and one day, fate plays its hand and brings them a baby, which they decide to keep. The decision to do so winds up destroying their quiet and isolated lives.  Is it a happy ending? I don't know. Is it a heart-true and lovely story? Yes, absolutely. It's very easy to put yourself into the positions of the various protagonists, and every avenue is an awful one, with agonizing consequences. I was pleasantly surprised that the story stayed strong all the way to the end, after the obviously discovered denouement. That's difficult to achieve, but Ste

So, I'm all done with my radiation therapy, two days early - and not a moment too soon, because for whatever reason, it was making me supremely depressed. My oncologist mentioned once that radiation patients seem to experience depression at a higher level than other patients but he didn't have an explanation. I don't have an explanation, either, but I was a big disaster for the last four days. Just ask my husband, my mom, or my dad, all of whom were privvy to various temper tantrums and breakdowns. My kids also saw me weepy and taking to my bed, Victorian style. Not terribly proud of that, but to be honest, it was probably for the best to have me tucked away in the bedroom like an ailing great-granny. My poor kids - they're going to think motherhood consists of crying and sleeping. At least they seem to take it in stride - when I fell asleep on the couch yesterday for two hours, my 7 year old daughter, who was home sick with a fever, came over and covered me with a b

I spent most of the day today in bed. I guess the radiation treatments of last week sort of wore me out more than I had expected they would. But with all the laying around, it reminded me that this time last year, I was in the hospital. After I couldn't shake the 40 pounds (!!!) of water weight I'd gained during my liver resection in three weeks, my oncologist decided to do a CT scan to see if it would help them figure out what was going on. And what, exactly, did he find? A MASSIVE blood clot that extended from somewhere near my liver all the way down my left leg. Exciting, right? They admitted me to put me on an IV drip of blood thinner and to perform tests trying to understand where it came from. Unbeknownst to me and my medical team, I'd been a ticking time bomb for weeks. This is probably the closest I've come to death.  Blood clots, as you know, can kill you. The really big ones will almost certainly kill you, because they break off and the pieces can get stu

First things first: I told you God was busy making new planets! I'm a soothsayer, I tell you! Ka-boom! new planet evidence Next, I was going to write a post full of sunshine and glitter stickers, explaining how much I love my friends and supporters and in no way was trying to shame or embarrass anyone with my last post, because a couple of people mailed me to apologize for being stupid and that's just, well, dumb. Internet huggies for you. But then. Then this happened: That's right. I came home from a lovely little lunch date with my mom to discover that a fucking funeral planning service had sent me a mailing. I mean, are you fucking kidding me? Little #PSA to the funeral planning crowd: sorry to disappoint but I'm not planning on shuffling off this mortal coil any time soon. And if I do, I sure as fuck won't be using any company that tried to get my business with a fucking form letter!   I don't recommend this brand.

I had my first SBRT session today. Can you feel me glowing right through the screen? I actually fell asleep while they were doing it. I hope that was okay because last time, there was this issue where I was breathing too slowly and so I had to speed up my breaths without hyperventilating. Try it some time. It's super fun. Seriously, though, if I don't breathe in the right pattern then they accidentally might get some normal tissue and I'd like to hang on to as much of that as possible, thankyouverymuch.  So, one down and five to go. Apparently it made me a little bit tired. (It also, I noticed as I was getting ready for bed, left me with permanent marker all over my body - x's and circles and lines - so that they can be sure I'm all lined up correctly for the machine. All this technology at their disposal and a Sharpie is the best they can do? Really?) Anyway. As we were leaving, I caught sight of another patient and she was in a bad way. I couldn't help but thi

There's this crazy amazing thing that happens when you cry out for help. Within minutes of my last post, I discovered someone had sent me a card game in the mail; I received comforting (and in at least one case, perfectly bossy) texts from several dear friends, all of whom made me laugh even though I was also crying; and I got plenty of internet love, too. Plus my dad called to tell me to ditch the edema and keep the boots, and he threw in a bonus idea of what to make for dinner. So you know what I did? I discovered a Xanax on the floor, so obviously I took that.  Already feeling a bit better, I proceeded to watch the "The One with Ross's Sandwich" episode from  Friends  while taking a bubble bath, and then I got out of that bathtub and put on decent clothes - I even wrestled those damn boots on, too. Next, I started walkin'. Because that's what you do after you finish your middle of the day bubble bath pity party and put on kickass boots. (And also what you

My life feels a little...blank right now. The kids have started school: my sweet daughter is now a confident third grader, my beautiful baby boy started kindergarten yesterday, and my funny and engaging students have begun their semester without me. My treatments don't start until next week.  You'd think I'd be euphoric - No responsibilities! Time to read whatever I want! The ability to make lists of things I want to clear out and organize! Hours to take walks and practice yoga! But, all I want to do is sleep. I'm exhausted. The house is a bit of a mess and I didn't even manage to put away the laundry my mom came over and did for me (on her birthday, no less). I'm looking at the clothes I bought for fall semester and lamenting that I have no reason to wear them. The awesome boots my dad bought me don't fit my feet now, even though they did in the store (curse you, edema! *shaking fist*).  My pile of e-books that I've been dying to get through are ga

This summer has been deeply satisfying in a number of ways, not the least of which is that several of my favorite series published their concluding tales. Below are two of my very favorites: The Book of Life by Deborah Harkness and The Magician's Land by Lev Grossman.   Deborah Harkness made that two year wait worthwhile with her masterful ending to the All Souls trilogy. Diana and Matthew have returned from their trip through time and the problems surrounding them are more pressing than ever. Oh, and Diana is pregnant with twins of course, as all readers of the trilogy already knew! As they race to uncover the secrets held by the Book of Life, Diana, Matthew and their growing list of friends and family find themselves forced to confront the darkest secrets of Matthew's past.  This book is suspenseful and beautifully crafted. If you were expecting Harkness to end her tale by allowing gory violence and death to take center stage, prepare to be disappointed. What rea