I Love My New Office(s)

Enclosing the balcony off of our master bedroom was my present to myself for getting through this year of breast cancer treatment. My first full day in my new office was wonderful! I love the views. When I looked at the dates of my first full day and when I moved in, I realized it was the end and beginning of a new month on the Jewish calendar. I also did some numerology with the other calendar dates & realized I moved in on a Hanged Man day (#12 in the Tarot Major Arcana) and I had my first full day sitting at my desk on a Death card day (#13).

Remember when I went into the hospital? In my stupor, wondering if I was going to make it out of there alive, I kept doing numerology with the room numbers. The number of the room I was in during my pain filled beginning there was the Hanged Man. It made me wonder where I was hung up and stuck repeating an old pattern and trying to get different results.

So of course I thought about the scam again. I'm still working through why that happened. What's really weird is I discovered that the scam happened the very same time on the Jewish calendar as when I fell into the hospital last year after my first chemo. Yeah, it's the yahrtzeit (1st anniversary) of the murders in Mumbai this week, which happened right after I got out of the hospital.

So the pattern I had discovered and conquered in the hospital had to do with giving my power away to authority figures. The pattern I discovered from the scam had to do with my fear around spending money on myself (on the new office) - and seeing Geoff as an authority figure that I had to please if I was going to spend all that money.

I was in a trance when I first gave my neighbor the go ahead to spend money on building the office. All I could think of after that was making Geoff feel ok about our money situation. (And making myself feel ok about spending all that money on myself.) I was in such a trance that I didn't even check out the letter or the check I'd been sent regarding the mystery shopper job. All I was doing was telling myself and Geoff - don't worry! - we've got the money! I've got a new job! We're going to be fine! (If I'd asked him to look at the letter, or asked my bank to do the same, we really would have been fine...)

So instead of $5K for a new office, I got a $9K new office (when you include the $4K loss from the scam) - which is still less than the $10K I was quoted many years ago by a company that specialized in making sun rooms. Doug, my neighbor/contractor was such a great support to me, helping me find windows at such a low price, you'd never believe it. Plus he actually gave me lots of stuff for free that he had sitting around his yard. I am really grateful to Doug for not only helping me clarify what I wanted so I could make inexpensive decisions that actualized my vision, but for giving me the emotional support I needed as well. He is very sweet.

If any of you want to do construction on your home or office, keep him in mind: Doug McCloskey 831-247-2687 - you won't regret it.

I went to the oncologist today. I've got a PET scan coming up. He told me it wouldn't show anything smaller than 1cm. When I asked him if CT scans showed less, he told me that they don't show lymph nodes which are 1cm. I asked him if he's concerned about the lymph nodes and he told me he was concerned about checking to see whether I have anything in my lungs, bones and organs.

So that's where I'm at. And I think it's good for me to be reminded of all of this. My life is precious and could be very short. Spending money on myself and getting a beautiful office just for me is worth every penny - even with the overage based in a scam. I want to make the most out of every day.

I'm also now working out of my friend's office which is another beautiful place that also gives me views of my favorite thing in nature: trees. She offered me this place for free through the end of the year all the way back in August. I wasn't able to take her up on her offer due to my own silly pattern of needing to take care of others while putting myself last. I was worried my clients wouldn't want to travel to the new officel. It took the scam and the need to save money to motivate me to take care of myself and I just love the office and feel so at home there. Both my new offices let me look at trees while I work.

So what's the Death card have to do with my first day in this new home office? Well, remember that the year I was diagnosed was my Death card year? The card symbolizes death & rebirth. Need I say more?

What Doesn't Kill You...

Dark Paths

By Tzvi Freeman

"He could have placed streetlamps along all the pathways of wisdom, but then there would be no journey. Who would discover the secret passages, the hidden treasures, if all of us homed in straight for our destination?"


Tomorrow's the last day of radiation - YAY!! I'm celebrating by buying the paper goods for Aimee's Bat Mitzvah party. And my kids are coming home from their big trip around 3pm (G-d Willing). That will be a treat in itself.

I have been fighting the radiation burn pretty successfully with lots of different lotions. I made a friendship that I will continue after I'm done. And she has her own story of horror: her surgeon told her after her lumpectomy that they had to do it all over again because the lump was bigger than they thought!

Yesterday I went to the Lymphedema clinic and was told there's no need for me to return - unless I get swelling that doesn't go away. I will be letting go of the sleeves next week. She reassured me and gave me more info and so I am not afraid of the disease anymore. Another person who got radiation when I did had 17 lymph nodes taken out of one arm and her hand is swollen. I felt sorry for her and I was so grateful that my doc only took 7.

The past week (while the kids were gone), I found myself thinking about that saying, "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." Twice I heard Geoff reference that saying while telling a friend that motherhood didn't kill me, but it did weaken me. Whereas this diagnosis & treatment has made me stronger.

With the kids away from home, I found myself obsessed with what Geoff said and wondering why motherhood didn't make me stronger and why breast canSer did.

When Jason was a newborn, he had reflux which made him a terrible sleeper and a screamer. I had thought I would always go back to work but when he needed medication 20 minutes before every feeding, it was hard to trust anyone else to know when he was getting hungry in order to give him his medicine. Harder still was trusting someone to know how to hold him off for 20 minutes before getting fed. The first time I got a baby-sitter and pumped and got out to my office to see my one client, she was a no-show. That was the last time I tried to go back to my practice for 10 years.

In the meantime, my health began to fail when in addition to weekly migraines, I was having severe insomnia from my baby's sleep habits. Then came Aimee and I ended up selling my furniture to the woman who was sub-leasing my office. It was really hard to let that go. I had done the office up so nice and it had a view of the ocean and the Hermosa Beach Pier.

After moving from So. CA. back to S. Cruz, my life wrapped around the lives of two little people. I volunteered in their classrooms and focused on their needs, while trying to catch a few hours here and there for myself when they were in school. Baily and I had a great time back then, hanging out together and talking while our kids would entertain each other.

Then Aimee got into kindergarten and first grade and I finally got a full 6 hours all to myself. But at the time, our school board was threatening to close our school and I became consumed with advocating for my kids through the loss of all that was familiar and the move to another school. That was when I became PTA president to help make that transition work for us as well as I could.

I suppose focusing on my kids to the extent I did wore me down. It also gave me an excuse for not having to face my fears of going back to working at my practice. I had been holding the belief that I never really liked that work anyway. Plus, the thought of dealing with others' problems seemed overwhelming when I had so many of my own. I couldn't imagine taking care of one more person. And I held the belief that I was never really good at being a therapist anyway.

I couldn't imagine building a practice again after being out of the field for so long. I was very insecure and didn't think I could ever market myself the way I'd built my practice the first time. Unfortunately, I had no idea all I needed to do was apply to insurance companies and they'd send me clients without my having to teach any classes or market myself in any way. Working with the insurance companies and doing all that paperwork didn't appeal to me, so I never pursued it.

That's when I tried to market to mothers. I felt I had a real good picture of what problems they faced and had the heart to help mothers like me. Unfortunately the website I created and the workshop I led didn't build the kind of practice I had before when all I did was lead a workshop to build it. Luckily I ended up trying the insurance companies just in time to catch this canSer before it turned into a stage 4. Once I had regular clients coming in I must have felt secure enough to finally get that mammogram and face what I didn't want to face and had no clue I would have to face.

So I guess where I'm going with all this is that maybe having my practice finally going right before getting diagnosed helped me to stay stronger through this ordeal than through the ordeal of motherhood. It's been helpful because it's something I do for me that helps me feel stronger and accesses the best part of me. So it reminds me of my strengths.

Going through this diagnosis and treatment has also made me stronger by reducing my tendency to lose myself in other people's problems or get overwhelmed by them - like I may have before when I had my earlier practice. My life is just too precious now and my energy too important not to protect. I don't go down that co-dependent road as much as I used to. So doing this work is not as draining as it was and I can be better at it than I was before.

There's nothing like staring death in the face to make you rise to the occasion. Of course the anti-depressant helps tremendously. In addition to no more migraines, it would be very easy to give up and just want to die instead of live if I didn't have a handle on my tendency toward depression. Getting my practice going and getting on Celexa right before getting diagnosed was such a miracle for me. I could not have survived this year and all its trials without either my practice or Celexa.

I think there's one more important piece that I have now that I didn't have back when I was a new mother. Geoff. Ok, I did have him back then but truthfully, I was the one to work in the classrooms, help with the homework, make the dinners, clean the house, work on the yard, pay the bills, do the taxes, get the kids ready for school in the morning and take them to school. I pretty much had gotten used to doing it all and not asking for his help. Gradually, through the years, he's taken on many of these tasks and thankfully, through this canSer challenge, he's been doing everything.

I have not had to do anything but focus on myself and get better.

Focusing on myself has been so healing. Not having any other responsibilities but your own self-care has got to be THE way to make sure that what can kill you instead makes you stronger. I'm in my own therapy, I've got my own carepages for writing therapy, I'm reconnecting with friends, I'm watching TV whenever I get tired, I can sleep in if I've had a rough night, I go to acupuncture weekly, I've had more massages this year than probably my entire life, I found an exercise I can do regularly that I really like, etc. My life is no longer so entirely wrapped around two other beings. I am finally able to take care of myself.

Clearing Out

The radiation continues and I guess I'm 6 or 7 weeks post-surgery. My energy continues to be good and so is my outlook/perspective. Tomorrow's day 10 of the radiation and I'm starting to get red - especially under the arm. The doc told me they are especially targeting the lymph nodes there on my left side. I'm still pretty numb for a good 2 inches on either side of the scar which extends across my chest from under one armpit to the other. I wonder how much feeling will end up coming back.

I find myself wanting to clean out every nook and cranny in my house. I guess that tells you how my energy levels are doing. But I wonder if this desire for clearing out is simply a parallel healing that's going on in my psyche. The radiation is clearing out every last bit of disease and I'm wanting to clear out every closet, drawer and cupboard in my house. Interesting isn't it?

I am a pack rat and it takes me forever to clear out and let go of stuff. Going through my closet today, I cleared out 3 bags of clothes to donate and 2 bags of clothes and shoes to throw away - they were worn to their last threads. I guess I save my husband money on clothes even if I need to spend it on health.

I'm also finding myself wanting to clear out my negative emotions. My anger has been a problem over the years. It's not that I lash out at people, but I stew and can be snippy with Geoff. And not very supportive. I'll never forget the comment that the director of Jason's co-op preschool told me once: "We are better at being mothers than we are at being wives."

I know that my anger is really about my own martyr complex. If I don't do what I want to do and don't take care of myself the way I need to do, I will tend to blame it on others. It's been a lifelong pattern that I want to clear out so that I can communicate in a healthy way - with power, rather than as a victim. Standing up for myself and what I want in life can be done cleanly and without anger, fear or other people's permission and agreement.

Life goes so much more smoothly when I just do what I need to do for myself and not worry about what others think...Like going hatless! And flat-chested...

I did have a dream one night last week about wishing I still had breasts. It was about wanting to have sex appeal. I was even contemplating reconstruction in the dream. I suppose my psyche needs to go there to sort all this through. Maybe one day I'll want to wear prostheses. Who knows. But right now, I'm happy wearing nothing...especially these days while my skin is turning red.

I've got about an inch of hair all over my head. It still looks like a haircut no woman in her right mind would get - just too short. But everyone says I look cute.

I'm eating a lot of my sugarless chocolate these days and worrying about my tummy getting bigger and bigger. Being flat doesn't hide that one. And I'm wondering if those last dying canser cells are crying out for sugar-fuel even more now that they know the jig is up. The end is near and they don't like it.

But here's the recipe: melt unsweetened chocolate in a pan on a low flame and add some coconut oil. Add stevia and a bit of agave. Once it's all melted you can do one of three different things:
1. Add nuts and/or unsweetened rice crispies. Pour it into a mold over waxed paper and put it in the frig to be cut into pieces once a bar again - ta da! you've got bites of a chocolate bar!
2. Add peanut butter and some nuts and some oats. Drop by spoonfuls over wax paper and refrigerate. You've got yourself something pretty close to fudge.
3. Freeze 1/4s or 1/3s of banana on a toothpick and then roll each into the melted chocolate and you've got yourself a chocolate covered Popsicle.

Those darn cells won't get any fuel this way and I will still get my chocolate! Die you freaks of nature!

I'll just have to dance more to get rid of the round tummy.

Hope you have a Happy Father's Day.

It's a Party!

Bailly offered to put together a party for me to celebrate the end of the hard part of my treatment. I wasn't sure at first whether to do something at my house or to take her up on her offer. Then I realized that not only would it be easier on me, but she'd do a better job at putting something together and the party would now take on spiritual significance. I guess it's traditional to sponsor a Kiddush after making it through something like I've gone through. So I've already got 30 people or more, including kids, set to come over to Bailly's house on Saturday (Shabbos).

It still doesn't quite feel like I should be celebrating yet because I'm going through a lot emotionally. But it is also my 50th birthday and I have gone through the most difficult of the treatment and had a clean cat scan. So I need to commemorate this passage somehow and it will be nice to see everyone - including my parents and niece.

The emotional stuff I've been going through this week has to do with fears of getting Lymphedema. I've been told it's something I DO NOT want to get and yet I'm a great candidate for it. My lymph nodes have been taken out on both sides and I'm getting radiation to one of those sides which doubles my risk.

So prevention is key. I've been wearing uncomfortable pressurized arm sleeves which I'll need to wear everyday for the next few months and every time I fly for the rest of my life. I'm also refusing any blood draws in the arms and blood pressure checks. I almost had a nurse inject my arm with iodine last week for the ct scan because my oncologist said it was fine to do that. Luckily she couldn't find a vein and got frustrated enough to ask the radiation tech if she could try the other arm and he stopped her and called the surgeon. The surgeon told them to absolutely not inject anything in my arm veins right now. Close call. Freaked me out.

I never got the bone scan since it requires an injection into the vein of the arm. I refused the injection and told the tech that my surgeon didn't want me to get the one for the ct scan. He tried my foot veins (painful) and told me never to let anyone even try them - they are too small.

So I've come to accept that getting the bone scan right now doesn't matter. They got to see some of the bones on the ct scan anyway. And I can't be mad at my surgeon for taking lymph nodes on the side that only had a nodule because it was an invasive cancer and so it's standard of care to sample those lymph nodes too.

I just have to learn to be a good advocate for myself - which I'm afraid I'm not very good at. All I can do is try to prevent it as best as I can. I also have to accept the fact that I may get lymphedema and if so, reassure myself that I'll be able to handle.

I went for a ct scan at the radiation oncologist today. She told me that I need another 2 weeks to heal before the radiation starts. Going to a new doc and getting more tests and going over what's left in my nodes and what she's targeting and why made me feel scared all over again. I'd rather not know all this stuff.

Lately I've just been feeling like letting myself not have to wear anything to look like my former self. Scarves are my friends. Jackets are my other friends. Especially since I accidentally burned myself when my surgeon told me to use hot compresses to break up the scar tissue. I am still numb across the surgery site and so now I have a burn blister in one spot. Didn't know how hot the compress was.

The good news is that I've been told over and over how good the surgery site looks. They tell me I'm healing well and my surgeon is such a good surgeon. I'm able to stretch my arms up over my head already too.

Looking forward to the party and to seeing everyone - especially, my parents.

Path Report

Well, I had myself a good cry yesterday due to the pathology report coming back with finding cancer in 4 out of 7 lymph nodes. The good news is that the oncologist wasn't surprised and told me I didn't need to have more chemo. The other good news is that there was no cancer on the right side and they removed the original tumor on the left side when they removed the breast. It had shrunk from 6 cm (measured by MRI) to 2 cm.

Next week I get to see the oncologist and the radiation oncologist. Radiation will begin as soon as I'm healed from the surgery - which she originally told me would take about a month. Then that's 6 weeks of radiation but I hear it's a breeze. After that, G-d Willing, it's Hawaii. Then it's a CT scan that will determine if it spread beyond the lymph nodes (the CT scan before all the treatment showed that it hadn't spread). And then I have 10 years on Tamoxifen which blocks the estrogen that this type of canser tends to like.

Luckily I had just received a DVD from Netflix yesterday that kept me smiling the entire time I watched it. I knew that I had ordered it for this week for a good reason but didn't know it'd be there that very day! It was a documentary on the Monkees.

How many of you liked the Monkees when you were little? I must have been around 8 - 10 or so when all the girls on my block had all the Monkees albums and cut out the photos of our favs from the magazines to tape all over our bedroom walls. We always had to be wearing yellow when we played that one song that said, "...a girl in yellow dress..."

Anyways, my good friend Bob Hall made me some CDs of old live Monkees concerts and so I just had to get the DVD. I remember also liking Bobby Sherman. Then I remember feeling embarrassed to like the Monkees and Bobby Sherman - so I never told anyone!!! I kept it a secret. After watching the DVD I realized how sad it was that the Monkees had to end feeling ashamed of themselves after only 2 years of what I thought was really good music and a funny show. But the world was moving in more serious directions and the teeny boppers were seen as...well, just stupid.

One thing I found fascinating & hilarious, (and then I'll stop it already), was that for some time, when the Monkees performed, Jimi Hendrix was their opening act! Whenever he sang the word, "Foxy", everyone would scream, "Davey!" One time after he was done with his performance, he threw his guitar at the audience. (According to Mike Nesmith and Davey Jones.)

So, some tears and some laughs...the Monkees were fun and funny and Jimmy Hendrix was very cool and groovy and deadly serious and died an early death that was very sad...happy times, sad times, I guess that's just life.