I have really struggled today with being in my own skin. Man, breast cancer wreaks havoc on self-image. And the heart-hurt of that is deep and very painful.

The “and” part of today – I’ve also felt reminded about how important it is to cling to what cancer is teaching me so that it creates a purpose for that deep pain. I have the lessons on repeat in my head but sometimes they don’t reach my hurting heart. One of my favorite pages on my website is my Anchors page…so very rich with meaning.

*Post 954

More Unexpected Difficulty :: 11/13/17 :: Post 77

Oh how I want this week to go by fast. I want to get round three done and over with…because it’s one step closer to being done with all of it. My friend mentioned today that she was thinking about time and how fast it goes but that she imagines I want it to go at warp speed. Yup. I do. The sooner I get these 6 first rounds out of the way, the sooner I get to feeling better.

Round two was pretty brutal…my nurse called today to check on me and in our conversation, she mentioned that these first 6 rounds have a cumulative effect and it will start taking my body longer and longer to bounce back after chemo Mondays. Awesome. It’s day 15 of 21 of round two and I’m just barely starting to feel better………..

I need to be really careful about managing my expectations for round three as I have no idea how it will go. Hoping for better but being realistic is necessary for survival. And my mental stability.

Time is an interesting thing. It feels like molasses in the midst of it but looking back, it seems to have flown by. I can’t wait until I can ‘look back’ on this chapter… and I’m grateful I’ve been given the prognosis that I will even have the opportunity to ‘look back’.

I wonder what that will feel like…

Until then, I walk this. I walk every day out…as slow as each day feels. I experience every day for what it is. Like today – I wore my brown wig for the first time since getting it. And it felt hard to wear it??! I cried when I put it on??! I felt so strange in it all day??!

Was it weird to put on brown hair because mine is all gone? I wrestled with feeling “fake” today which is opposite of how I’ve wanted to walk this journey so is that why it was hard? It’s one thing to wear a bright purple wig – like I’d never really dye my real hair bright purple so of course it’s “fake” and covering up a bald head due to cancer…but to “put on” brown hair…and have to “take it off” when I get home. I dunno. It just felt so emotional today. I don’t know why and I’m not going to work too hard to find the answer. It’ll come. But it was yet another hard thing in this really strange and difficult and unwanted journey. And it was yet another unlikely difficulty that doesn’t make much sense.

Like me having breast cancer. And having had a double mastectomy. And having chemo and radiation. And having lost my hair.

It doesn’t make much sense at all…..

The Quiet Speaks :: 11/13/18 :: Post 426

My days are full of noise…All of the life lived before even heading to work is noisy…the hustle and bustle of the morning routine is never quiet. The drive in is noisy as I focus and concentrate on driving. The job is always moving and is constantly filled with noise of all kinds. Driving home. Noisy. Home life after work. Noisy.

I’m laying here in my bed and choosing to be in the quiet. In the actual quiet. Even though there is noise in the background, I’m laying here finding the quiet for my head and heart. And this place is hard. My heart feels sad here. I feel down and weary and low. It’s easy in the loudness to ignore the reality. To not notice or pay attention to the raw and real. The quiet speaks a different experience and the realness of how hard it is, is intense tonight.

Gratitude Month Day 13 :: 11/13/19 :: Post 789

Two years ago today was day 15 of 21 for chemo round 2. And I wasn’t feeling better even though they thought I would. I also learned that chemo usually has a cumulative effect so the days ahead weren’t looking much better. An unexpected difficulty, for sure. Then I wrote about how I wore my brown wig that day, struggling emotionally because the brown wig was hard. I only ended up wearing it like 5 times total, if that, the entire time I was bald. It was too much like my old me, the me before this all hit and it was too difficult to see it reflecting back. I did much better in my purple and blond wigs… another unexpected difficulty.

Then last year I talked about how noisy life was. How the morning routine was noisy. How the drive to and from work was noisy. How life at work was noisy. How life at home was noisy. I talked about how ‘easy’ the noise can be because reality tends to get really really loud in the quiet.

Tonight, I sit here saddened and stunned that chemo and wigs and bald are even in my story. And I still get those, ‘is this really real?’ moments. As I sit here tonight, in the quiet of the day, I am being forced to accept the reality of yet another unexpected difficulty, the nagging-seven-out-of-ten-twenty-four-seven pain that I now live in.

Gratitude Month Day 13 – I am so grateful that I have learned, over these past two really difficult years, how to sit in the quiet and listen for what only the silence can bring. And as hard as it is, there is just so much here.