Breathe Don’t Stop

Last weekend I ran the Hood to Coast. When I was just starting up with treatment last year, my brother Jim texted me a picture of his team at the finish line which I received while sitting in chemo. Having done the Hood to Coast before, I knew how grueling it was, yet sitting in that lounger, I wanted nothing more than to be able to run that race again. I told Jim I was in for 2012—one of those comments you typically make after a few beers, but in my case, after a bag or two of Gemzar and Carboplatin. Somehow, Jim convinced his teammates that I could pull this off-and they invited me to join their team.

We had such an amazing time this weekend—my team was unbelievably kind, supportive, fun, not to mention all incredible and inspiring runners. For those of you unfamiliar with the Hood to Coast, it is a 199-mile relay race, run by a team of 12 divided into two vans. Our team, We’re Kind of a Big Deal, ran the h*** out of that race—finishing in 29 hours and change, and about 45 minutes faster than we expected to. Our van spent a lot of time together-between Jim’s non-stop laughing, the peanut butter pretzels and the Jungle Brothers, the 29 hours just flew by.

In my third leg—a 6-mile stretch at about 7am on Saturday, I kept telling myself to take the leg one painful step at time, and just to keep moving. My calves were fried from my first leg—a straight shot down from Mt. Hood—and it was pretty painful to stand, much less run. But, I remembered where I was sitting a year ago and somehow each step kept coming.

When I got home, after unpacking and telling my family the crazy stories from the weekend, I was missing my running buddies and went to iTunes to find the Jungle Brothers tune that kept firing us up the whole weekend. It is called Breathe Don’t Stop. A more aptly named song cannot exist for the weekend—or for the past year.

Here are some pics—the before, the after, and the beer on the beach! Thank you Andy, Jim, Jon, Teresa, Stacy, Hollie, Trevor, Ed, Tod, Tamara, our super-human captain, Nicole, and our volunteers Melissa, Molly and Marit. I'm in for 2013 (and I'm not even under the influence this time!).

One Year + 5 Days

“On July 25, 2011, I was diagnosed with triple-negative breast cancer.  With no known family history, my age (46) and my healthy lifestyle, this came as an enormous shock. As Chris and I began to share this news, we were bowled over by the kindness and support of our family and friends.  To help keep these amazing people updated on how we are doing, we have started this blog”.

That was me one year ago. I remember writing that paragraph very clearly-I was sitting in a house in Tahoe, trying to figure out how best to begin my journey into the world of cancer—both in the blog, and in my life. I had no idea what to expect, and looking back, it’s hard to believe what my family and I have been through in the past year.

Now, one year and five days after my diagnosis, I am once again sitting in a house at Tahoe. Chris and the girls are down at the beach while I wrap up a bit of work, and I will head down soon to join them. Our time here this year has been incredible-Tahoe is even more spectacular without the weight of a new cancer diagnosis.

We are sad to see our trip coming to a close, but know that we will be back next summer. Until then, these pictures will just have to tide us over until we can be here in person next year.

Part of Me

Yes we saw the Katy Perry movie this weekend and I thought her movie title was as good as any in summing up where I am right now.

So, two months after my last radiation treatment, two weeks shy of one year since my cancer diagnosis, where are we? The short answer is I’m doing great. I am feeling very, very normal—even better than normal…super-normal?

Here's the long answer. I did have a rocky patch about a month ago, which my doctors told me is to be expected after finishing treatment. You see, after hitting cancer with everything I had for the past year, and feeling crappy a lot of the time, and trying to keep all of my balls in the air so I could maintain some sense of my life before-cancer, I didn’t have a lot of time to think about the fact that I had cancer. Cancer is a pretty scary, s***y disease, and anyone in their right mind would be scared to death if they had it. Strangely, I didn’t think this until a few months after all of my doctors told me I was cancer-free.

The trigger was seeing a movie called Pink Ribbons, Inc. which is a very good, extremely thought-provoking movie, but probably not a movie someone should see within the first year (five years?) of a cancer diagnosis. It brought a lot of really dark stuff out in me that I didn’t know was there—like, cancer kills people, I could get it again, I want to see my kids graduate from college, etc, etc etc.

It took a few days to rise out of that state of mind—it took the help of my very strong husband Chris, and a very optimistic doctor, but I did it. And (here’s where we get to Katy Perry) what I was forced to accept is that cancer is part of me now. All of my doctors, my friends and my family consider me cancer-free, and most days that’s how I view myself too. But there are those days that crop up where I am gripped by a fear that it will come back. Fortunately those days are few, but they are out there and I know I will have to face them for the rest of my life. One the one hand it p***es me off, but at the same time it is a strange gift. I have a reminder that my life is amazing RIGHT NOW and I am so happy to be in it. Each day really is a gift—as a cancer survivor I really believe that, and can say it without feeling like a totally corny schmuck.

We are off to Tahoe in a few days. Some of you may remember that this is where it all started last year. We are looking forward to visiting that magical place in a different state of mind this year.

Exit Stage III-B

Last Monday, I had my last radiation treatment. After 10 months of tests, appointments, chemotherapy, surgery, recovery, and radiation, I’m done. My last CT scan showed that I am cancer free, and I am pretty much off the hook for appointments until I see Bobbie Head six months from now. After spending so many hours and days and weeks and months being a patient—I don’t know whether to celebrate or go to sleep for a week.

Last night the decision was made for me—we celebrated.  My crafty friends Christine and Patty planned a very special surprise dinner with some of my very dear friends. Patty enlisted Chris in the surprise—and it worked. I walked into Marinitas last night expecting to have one margarita with Patty and then go home to an early bedtime. Lets just say I had more than one margarita, and I stayed up way, way past my bedtime. Thank you my amazing friends!!

In addition to successful treatment, one of the gifts I have been given during this past year, is that I now belong to a new community of stupendously strong women—the women who had breast cancer and have come out the other side, and the newly diagnosed women who are just starting their journey. One of these women is Kat—who I met through my friend Shannon. Kat was diagnosed with breast cancer when she was 8 months pregnant. They delivered her baby girl, (Alice!), as soon as it was safe, and began chemo three days later. Her smile in this picture tells it all—while she has a rough few months ahead, she will be fine. And her fight inspires me, and all of the women she has not met, that she will reassure and encourage for the rest of her life.

A decision I do have to make is whether to continue this blog. It has been such a wonderful way to communicate with my dear friends and family, and it is as much a part of my life as the cancer is. I can’t quite give it up yet, but when I reach that point I will know. Until then, I will continue to post when I have something to share about my treatment—please keep checking in once in awhile, as I do love having you in my community of supporters!

Great News & A Great Day

On April 2, I had a CT Scan of my chest to see if there was any remaining cancer, or if it had come back in the tumor site or any of the nodes. The news: nothing abnormal showed up anywhere, and we are all clear. Hooray!

Alice turned 7 on Tuesday, and we celebrated for the whole day. 

We started our day with breakfast at Hilda’s, then went ice-skating:

Hit a merry-go-round:

And ended with dinner at Mi-Pueblo’s:

We had so much fun—happy birthday Alice!!

Radiation & Field Trips

I can’t decide if radiation is easy, or if it is a complete pain in the neck. On the one hand I don’t feel any different--my skin is growing a little red, but that is to be expected and Dr. Halberg and her team are keeping a VERY close eye on things. At the same time, it is logistically a huge hassle. I go to the doctor every Monday through Friday at 3:10pm so this is not only cutting deeply into my work day, but it is right at school pick-up time. Fortunately, I have many people stepping up to bring the girls home from school—we really couldn’t do this without our friends and family.

In the past couple of weeks, the girls both had field trips and I got to go. We successfully dodged the rain storms both days--what a stroke of luck!!

Elsa went to the Kule Loklo Miwok Village in Pt. Reyes:

Alice went to Spring Lake Regional Park in Santa Rosa. Here she is with her cousin Gracie and friend Elizabeth.

Last weekend, Chris and I (and Josie too) went to Inverness for the weekend to celebrate my birthday. Thanks to Susie and John we not only had a beautiful place to stay, but they took the girls for the whole weekend! We also fit in a field trip--ours was to Dillon Beach:

Baaaaaahhhhh!!!

Last Thursday I started radiation.  On Wednesday and then Thursday before radiation, I spent a good hour on the table in the radiation room. The technicians moved me into different positions, sometimes making miniscule adjustments, so that I was in precisely the right spot.

Radiation is directed at the areas where cancer has been found—so, the tumor site, the nodes under my arms, and the nodes in my internal mammary chain. It is those internal nodes that are the most difficult to reach, as they are under my sternum, and above my lungs. They are also the most important to hit with radiation, as we did not remove them during surgery. So while we assume they are cancer free, we could not confirm that as we did with the nodes that we took out during surgery.

Dr. Halberg (and her fantastic team) spent a lot of time calculating the exact position for me to be in so that the internal nodes would be hit with radiation, while also minimizing the radiation that would touch my lungs. The calculations are so complex that they have a physicist on staff to help them figure this out. Amazing.

On Thursday, the calculations worked, and I got my first treatment. This entailed a few minutes more on the table while a large machine whirred and buzzed a bit next to me. Then it was over. I just need to do that every weekday until April 30 and I’m done.

One of the side effects of radiation is that my skin may get burned. To help protect my skin, the nurse at Dr. Halberg’s office, Jana, gave me a large tub of lanolin to put on my skin twice a day. For those of you that don’t know what lanolin is-it is a wax or fat (depending who you talk to) that is extracted from sheep’s wool. It is extremely thick, sticky and yes—I now smell just like a sheep.

Anyone watch Frozen Planet last night? Josie did! She was especially enamored with the wolf pups.