I’m embarrassed to say. The old, “let me clarify” thing when someone disagrees with me. This time someone did that with me, “let me clarify” when I disagreed with him and I responded with something like “Oh, I understood completely and I stand by what I said.” I’m being really snarky today. Really. Snarky.

I suppose the combination of waiting for results, steroids, and just going through this from week-to-week is making me somewhat . . . OK, very, cranky. Add to all of those that I’m going to have to ask for peoples’ sick leave donations and it all just makes me either want to cry or punch someone; I don’t know which one. Or preferably both at the same time.

At some point, I’ll probably have to go on disability for awhile, which makes me want to cry again. I don’t know how much of my salary I’ll get with that. It’s hard when you’re the major breadwinner and working or not working isn’t a choice. I have to work. No work, no health insurance for any of us. Not working isn’t an option. It’s never been a problem like this before, though.

People say things to me like “it’s nice that you can continue to work” and how great it is to stay busy and “it’s probably helpful to keep yourself busy,” and I think, “I’m not so sure.” There are plenty of days when I’d rather be resting at home, but maybe it is good for me to come out where other people are. I just sometimes wish it was a different environment, and that’s all I’ll say about that.

Ah well. Work is almost over for today, thankfully. I have my support group tonight; maybe that will help.

Until then . . .

SNARK!

Today is my “easy” day of chemo which means that I get just one drug instead of three. That also means fewer side effects this week, although since the side effects are cumulative, I do tend to be pretty fatigued, even with the “easy” weeks lately. I have noticed, though, that I don’t have nearly the nausea that I have during the other weeks.

The easy day typically takes only 1/2 hour for the chemo, and with no other doctor’s appointments or anything, I’m planning to go into work for the rest of the day. There’s a student worker party, for one thing, and I’ve got a ton of sick leave that I’ve added up for another thing. In fact, I have to call HR and talk to them about my sick leave.

I’m not feeling quite as scared as I was yesterday, but of course that’s for right now. I expect it will come and go until I find out, and then it depends on the results. *sigh*

This stuff sure isn’t easy to go through. It just isn’t.

The test that means so much takes such little time. Well, there’s the preparation time which takes longer. You have to drink that stuff they give you, in two installments. Then 45 minutes after drinking the second drink, they take you to disrobe (everything but underwear and socks), put on hospital pants and gown, and then go into the CT scan room. The tech was so sweet and gentle, calling me “honey,” probably just because he didn’t know my name. Funny, but I don’t seem to mind when they call me endearments anymore.

The machine tells you when to hold your breath, when to let it go. It didn’t take long at all. The MUGA scan that I had earlier today, the scan that’s to tell them how my heart is doing, took much longer. I’m not worried about that test at all, mostly because my oncologist isn’t worried about it. She said that the regimen that I’m on isn’t typically hard on the heart.

But the CT scan is the big test, the one that will see how big or small the tumors are, how well they’ve responded to the chemo, how much (or little) they’ve shrunk.

As we started driving to our next destination, silent tears fell down my cheeks. I couldn’t help it. I wish I had the faith that this morning’s scripture verse talked about, I wish I could be more faithful, more believing, stronger, more . . . . something. But the truth is that I’m damn scared. I’m just really really scared. I know I have too much riding on these results, but I can’t help it. I just can’t.

I want them to be good results. I want there to have been a great deal of progress. I want this fucking disease to start going AWAY.

I haven’t even been living with it for very long but it’s turned my whole life upside-down, it’s made my future into a bunch of “what if’s?” and “I don’t know if I’ll be around for . . . ” and wondering about my little boy and feeling scared about him losing another mother and I try to keep these demons at bay, I TRY and most of the time I succeed but not all the time. The times when I don’t succeed are the scariest times ever, I just can’t tell you how agonizing those times are, I honestly just can’t even come close to explaining it; then again, why would I want people to know what kind of horror it is?

I wish I had the strength of those people you hear about, read about, see on the news, the people who don’t let fear get in their way, who just keep on.

But I guess I don’t and I guess I’m just scared.

I’ll get the results sometime later this week.

Until then — maybe after, depending on what the results are — I’ll probably be scared.

Just scared.

I just started playing with iGoogle recently and one of the things I have up on my page is a daily scripture verse. Today’s verse really nails it with having my CT scan later today:

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:6-7

Indeed!

Happy birthday today to my loving husband who I plan to stick around with for years to come.

Happiest of birthdays, Frank!
___________________________

Tomorrow is my CT scan. Anxious, yes, but it’s out of my hands.

Done doing what? Done making a lot of previous posts private.

Posts that mostly relate to Nate’s adoption or other information about Nate, posts that are heavily pictures of Nate.

Why? Simply put, they’re Nate’s stories to tell, not mine.

I know, it’s kind of like the proverbial “shutting the barn door after the horse is out,” or something like that, but it’s something that I’ve been thinking about for the past however-many months now.

Why now? I can’t really say. A few nights ago, something in me shifted, and I just made the decision and started to make some posts private. I finished up today. I may have missed a post or two, but maybe I can catch those soon.

It’s time.

The tides are shifting.

I find I keep reminding myself, or Frank, that “it’s week three.” Why is this so significant? Well, as I’ve mentioned before, my life now revolves around four-week cycles, and week three is my hardest week of every cycle. This is when the concentration of my meds are at their highest, when I’m at my tiredest, my crankiest, when I’m feeling most beaten down physically and emotionally. This is the time when, as I call them, “the dark thoughts” are more likely to be around, when I’m going to hit Frank with some hypothetical, “Sooooo, if I’m not around, what do you think you’ll do with Nate in X situation? This is what I think would be best.” Yeah, not always a real pleasant conversationalist either. The other day, I wanted to discuss where Nate might go to high school “if I’m not around.” Thinking about this after the fact, all I can say is, “Poor Frank.”

I think it’s exacerbated now because of course I’m anxious about the upcoming CT scans on Monday. I so want for those to have good news. Well, DUH!!, OF COURSE I do! These are the first scans I’ll have since undergoing all of this and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t some combination of scared and . . . I don’t know what. I’m putting a hell of a lot on those scans even though I know that if the scans are less than what I’d like them to be, it’s not the end of the world. The oncologist said “at least six months of chemo” at the start of all of this and we’re about half-way to that point so even some progress will be good.

I just want it to be more than “some progress.” I want there to be a great deal of progress. I just can’t get past that.

So, yeah, I’m trying to be as normal as possible to the people around me. It’s mostly that I can’t stand myself right now, but you know how that is — you really just can’t get away from yourself. Oh, I’m snippy and at least a bit on edge, and I suppose we’ll see what the rest of the weekend brings. There’s still time for a meltdown or two, but I’m really hoping I can keep things in check. These people I love don’t deserve that. Maybe I can melt down in private like I sometimes do.

ARGH!! It’s WEEK THREE, people, WEEK THREE!! Nate has two birthday parties this weekend! I’ll be around a lot of little people screaming and running around!!! What the heck am I supposed to do with myself?!

Maybe I’ll just go quietly nuts at one of the parties, start rocking in the corner, sucking my thumb, and singing to myself.

Naaaaaah, not my style.

I’ll get through it. Somehow.

Here’s hoping you don’t see me on the evening news.

Heh.

I called the oncologist’s office and spoke with one of the phone nurses. She told me that they should have the results from the CT scan by next Wed. or Thurs. so I can call the office then to get the results.

Much better. Much much better.

And I didn’t even have to go all DIVA on her — but I was ready to!

I’m anxious. I can tell I’m anxious because I downed a good part of the box of Wheat Thins (who cares if they’re the Reduced Fat kind) last night and started going to town on the almonds this morning before I stopped myself. Yes, I’ve always been a stress eater.

I’m anxious because next Monday, May 5, is the CT scan of my chest and abdomen that will show how much the tumor in my left breast and the two tumors in my liver have shrunk. But then, we don’t see the oncologist until the following Tuesday, May 13. I figure that’s when we’ll talk about the results because that’s just how things go in the world of medicine. I’ve figured out at least that much during my Journey Through Cancer. *cue the music*

I was thinking about that this morning and wondering why, when I saw the dates on the schedule card that I was given however-many-weeks ago, I didn’t just go all Diva-like, snap my fingers, and say:

That doesn’t work for me.

Of course, I would have had to explain what the heck I was talking about, what didn’t work for me, but I’m trying to imagine myself taking on some diva attitude — which isn’t easy when you’re wearing sorta yoga-like pants and some t-shirt with a snarky saying on it, with your husband who is carrying a ridiculously large bag with all of your junk in it because you describe yourself as being “high maintenance” and might need your personal DVD player, DVDs, books, cell phone, etc. etc.

And the scarf covering the hair-growing-out head. And I’m sure I had no make-up on because that was before the eyelashes and eyebrows fell out and I just didn’t typically put make-up on just to get poison injected into my veins. So pulling a Diva act would have been stretching it. BUT STILL!!! Where’s my inner Jennifer Lopez when I need her?

Finger snap! Head raised high, chin up, not even looking at the receptionist. AT-TI-TUDE!

THAT. DOESN’T. WORK. FOR. ME. I’ll need to talk with the oncologist the next day. Since my usual day for treatment is Tuesday, she should have the results by then, so we’ll just talk to her then, thanksomuchbye.

Yeah, right.

My nickname at this place is Giggles, for goodness’ sakes. They’d probably laugh in my face if I tried something like that.

But don’t you sometimes just want to try? And have it work?

It’s going to be a tough few weeks for me.

Anxious.

Waiting.

Anxiously waiting.

Yes, the eyebrows went. First the eyelashes, then the eyebrows. Makes no sense to me since I still have the weird growth of hair on my head, chemo-style. But there you go.

The thing about not having eyebrows is that NOW I really look like an alien. Oh yeah.

So I need to make some semblance of eyebrows on my face before I go out in public. Now, there are these things called “eyebrow stencils” that you can pick up at any drugstore, and they looked perfectly reasonable and like they’d work really well. Only, they don’t. Well, they didn’t, for me at least. Using them made me look just really . . . weird. I don’t know if it’s because of the shape of my face or the normal shape of my eyebrows or what. But THOSE are just not MY eyebrows. So I tried some eyebrow pencils and . . . . well, let’s just say Drag Queen. Yes, I was starting to look like a Drag Queen. Not a good look for me. Took off those eyebrows.

The eyebrow stencils came with a kit which included some stuff that looks very much like eyeshadow. Maybe they call it eyebrow shadow; I don’t really remember. So I used that with a small brush and that seemed to do the trick. I used two different eyeliners with my eyes and that worked better than just one eyeliner like I used the other day.

It’s trial and error, this getting ready when you wake up looking like an alien, I’ll tell ya. Also, covering up the zits and all. What an ordeal! PLUS, I had remembered that I had a lighted make-up mirror from Back In The Day. Well, I’m really talking Back In The Day. This thing must be from when I was 17 years old, NO KIDDING!! It was lacking a piece to prop it up so I rigged it with a fork. As soon as I can, I’m going to go out and buy myself a new lighted make-up mirror.

My co-workers — who, believe me, would tell me if I looked like crap — told me that I looked fine, that you couldn’t tell that the eyebrows were fake, and the eyes looked fine. So I got the ultimate OK. I’m just going to have to wake up 15 minutes earlier than I normally do or something each morning just to change from alien to human each day. Sheesh!!

Ah well. Tomorrow is my day to stay home and sleep all day

in my doggie pajamas

looking like a freaky alien.

So there.