HAPPY NEW YEAR 2015 - PRAYING FOR NED TO STAY

Wow it’s been a long time since I’ve written. Lots of things going on. All part of this new reality of “living with” cancer. Knowing there is no cure and it could pop up to scare me any time. Staying on chemo indefinitely as its working beautifully to keep me NED. I just passed my 51st round of chemo and met a woman who was having her 81st!!! She also has metastatic HER-2 cancer and is going strong after 10 (very tough) years. Sadly there aren’t many of us living after the first few years so it was inspiring to meet her. 

In the last week I’ve woken with panic attacks twice. No particular reason comes to mind at the time. I’m just shaky, overwhelmed emotionally and freaking out. SCANXIETY is my diagnosis. February is my month of scan, wait then get results from Dr Tequila Feb 25. What if this is the time that cancer decides to come back and throw a wrench in all my plans? Everyone who’s had cancer or is “living with” knows what scanxiety is like. Perhaps all a bit different. Akin to PTSD at times.

Besides that, life had been going well. I’ve been working on setting up a Concussion Support Group for adults in Whistler as a “volunteer" OT and it feels so good. I’m a little nervous about facilitating a group after so long. I’ve learned so much more about group process since I had cancer. Thanks to Callanish. Where one learns to “trust the group process” and take time to really, truly “listen” - please read the entry at the end - I absolutely love it. So I want to take this story telling ‘healing’ approach to my little group.

I started jogging again before Christmas and successfully completed the 5 km Santa Shuffle. Training for it was more difficult than training for the half marathon I did before cancer. Damn cancer and chemo. I jogged the whole time and took it easy finishing in 40 min. I raised $750 for the Salvation Army and about $1500 for my metster friend (friend with metastatic cancer). She was able to enjoy treating her family a bit more over Christmas and it hopefully helped with some travel expenses. Everyone pray that her new treatment is working!!!! Go Maria Go. May God help you raise those beautiful girls to adulthood and beyond! 

I signed up for a 10 k run during the Whistler half marathon June 6.The 10 K is a reasonable goal………I think. It hasn’t snowed much in Whistler so training has been easy enough. I’m using a “couch to 10k” App on my iPhone so I just do what it says. “Ding…..Time to walk, time to run, you have completed your workout!” The dogs love it but i think they find the alternating jog/walk kinda confusing. 

Emotionally things are about the same. Some days I feel good and almost like a “normal” person going about my day. Other days I get overwhelmed with fear and anxiety and rely on medication. About 1-2 days a week I’m still restricted to lazing in bed to manage the unbelievable nausea chemo causes. I sleep 12-14 hours a day. I’m still working with a psychiatrist with the BCCA and plan to start an 8 week Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy program with a psychiatry resident that works with her. It’s about using meditation. I’ve taken something similar before and found it very helpful. I don’t expect to feel unicorns and rainbows every day of my life but I would like to be able to ride the rough patches a bit better. 

Perhaps some more art therapy is in my future too. I’ve been seeing and feeling many images related to my “life force” when I take time to notice. At present it’s a strong pink glow deep inside - kinda like my new himalayan pink salt crystal candle holder. Its leading me to my running, to the concussion group, keeping me away from social media and getting wound up in cancer land. Don’t get me wrong, I have my cancer network and they are very important to me but I’ve placed more boundaries on when and how I interact. I love to help individuals (like Maria) and have found a good friend in a newly diagnosed colleague in Whistler. I get as much support as I give. The kind of friend one needs. But I find I need to limit my energies in cancerland - it can over run my life and my life force doesn’t like that.

A circle of friends surprised me this Christmas with a special big basket of goodies - friends I may not see often but who wanted me to remind me that they think of me often and wish me the best. I also had some wonderful thoughtful gifts from friends and family far and near that made me “feel the love” of that long ago fundraiser all over again. 

Unfortunately the run in the rain and a bad cold followed by chemo resulted in a truly nasty case of pneumonia. I required daily IV antibiotics at emergency for the first few days for fear my case had gone septic and into my blood. It ended on good old Avelox and severe nausea. But I was able to enjoy a quiet Christmas.

We had a nice Christmas. A quick trip to Peachland and time with family. We were home for christmas eve and our 4 th annual Keg appies followed by an outdoor skate - a Gordon tradition now. This year we added watching the Polar Express. Everyone got spoiled by Santa. The big gifts were a new TV (Boxing week sale), an X box (we all like it - not just the kids) and a new iPod for Bina. I love my KOBO e-reader and am reading more than ever. I can sign out library books on it so it costs very little. The TV was a little extravagant - a Samsung 50” Smart LED TV -  but our TV speaker has been broken for 2 years, the TV was 8 years old and it was time….

We spent New Years with our dear friends and Mexico pals the Groves from the city. We played board and video games, Rockband, watched Sabrina’s dance show and ate and drank all day and night. It was the perfect way to bring in the New Year. Comforting and fun. And NO new year’s resolutions. I resolve to live day to day. That’s about it.

I came to realize I love comfort and being a little selfish - my new faves are “smart wool” merino wool socks, L’occitane shea butter hand cream, my KOBO in a warm bed, Lululemon vinyasa scarves and my pink himalayan salt candle holder. We’ve finally put up a TV in the bedroom despite my years of denying it. How lazy and selfist is that? Giving up our home phone to get get better cable and internet. Please contact us by cell now. The benefits of the new TV and game system is that we spend more time as a family in the living room - a benefit I was hoping for. The kids were starting to just take off to their rooms whenever home and I missed the chaos of kids in my living space. But at least now I can take it or leave it and escape to my own room. To read, watch the screen, sew, nap, knit and so on. I’ve been knitting more again and hoping to sew more soon. 

I’ll be back with details after scan month. Everyone pray for another NED. I have so much more living to do……vacations to plan.

And pray for snow for Jeff - he works so hard around the home and helps me so much he DESERVES some deep powder….

To finish I’d love to share this with you:

“Just Listen” by Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D.

(Taken from Kitchen Table Wisdom)

I suspect that the most basic and powerful way to connect to another person is to listen.  Just listen.  Perhaps the most important thing we ever give each other is our attention.  And especially if it’s given from the heart.  When people are talking, there’s no need to do anything but receive them.  Just take them in.  Listen to what they’re saying.  Care about it.  Most times caring about it is even more important than understanding it.  Most of us don’t value ourselves or our love enough to know this.  It has taken me a long time to believe in the power of simply saying, “I’m sorry,” when someone is in pain.  And meaning it. 

One of my patients told me that when she tried to tell her story people often interrupted to tell her that they once had something just like that happen to them.  Subtly her pain became a story about themselves.  Eventually she stopped talking to most people.  It was just too lonely.  We connect through listening.  When we interrupt what someone is saying to let them know that we understand, we move the focus of attention to ourselves.  When we listen, they know we care.  Many people with cancer talk about the relief of having someone just listen.

I have even learned to respond to someone crying by just listening.  In the old days I used to reach for the tissues, until I realized that passing a person a tissue may be just another way to shut them down, to take them out of their experience of sadness and grief.  Now I just listen.  When they have cried all they need to cry, they find me there with them.

This simple thing has not been easy to learn.  It certainly went against everything I had been taught since I was very young.  I thought people listened only because they were too timid to speak or did not know the answer.  A loving silence often has far more power to heal and to connect than the most well intentioned words.