My thoughts exactly. . .

*Post 972

Rest :: 12/1/17 :: Post 95

The hardness and the exhaustion of the week came crashing into me. I was asleep by 7:45…I couldn’t keep my eyes open and I let the sleep overtake me. My body simply giving in to its exhaustion. 

Now up for just a moment to brush my teeth and then to allow the depth of rest to envelope me once again. 

Thank God for the weekend. My body and heart need the quiet and the rest.

Beyond :: 12/1/18 :: Post 444

Exhausted. Beyond exhausted. 

My body will never be the same… They say chemo has forever effects. 

I will always feel the fatigue unique to having had chemotherapy poison course through my veins. 

This morning I was so foggy-headed. I was so annoyed with myself. But I have to remember that chemo brain is most certainly a real thing.

My body is being asked to battle the intensity of cancer and every day is a reminder of how hard that battle is. 

Exhausted. Beyond exhausted. 

Living Changed, Head to Toe Day 1 :: 12/1/19 :: Post 807

Hello, December. I’ve spent most of my day thinking about how I want to honor this last month of this decade. And even just writing that, I am amazed that another decade is soon to be over. I remember back when 1999 was ending and 2000 was days away and everyone was freaking out that the end of the world was coming… And here we are 20 years later……… 

In my own story, the last 20 years have been wonderful. I played D1 college volleyball, I married my best friend, I have three amazing daughters and a baby we’ll meet in heaven, I have become very close to my Mom and Dad, we’ve moved 5 times, I accomplished both a Bachelor’s degree and a Master’s degree, I got to be a stay at home mom for 10 years, I started a coaching career, I started a counseling career, we’ve survived teaching two kids to drive, we’re talking college with our oldest who also now has an almost boyfriend, we’ve gone on numerous family vacations and we’ve made an abundance of lifelong memories…… no doubt it’s been an amazing 20 years. 

We’re also weathering our hardest storm. A storm that has and will continue to transform us. I ended November with recognizing my gratitude that I’ve allowed cancer to change me, to change my relationships, to change my perspective, to change my life. And that is how I am going to honor this last month of this decade. I am going to write about how I am going to live changed from head to toe, inside and out. These are the things I want to remember…

December 1 – starting with the literal top of my head. The day that my oncologist told me that chemo was a certainty, I remember being devastated. While she said it so matter-of-factly that I was going to lose my hair, I was having the most difficult time wrapping my head around it. For her, everyone in her world is bald; for me, it was the most brutal blow. I had to be bald for my favorite time of the year. Bald for my birthday. Bald for Christmas. Bald for my anniversary… I had to be bald at all. I remember the day my head was shaved. I remember seeing the hair I was born with, fall to the ground. I remember the feeling of the shower on my scalp. I remember going to work the next day and having a dear colleague and friend literally stop dead in her tracks and swoon over how badass and beautiful I looked. I remember sleeping and having my head hurt on the pillow because my little tiny hairs felt like needles in my head. I remember hating the way I looked in scarves and hats. I remember my bright purple wig and the first day I was complimented on it as if it were my own hair (and not having any idea how to respond). I remember putting on the wig sock before putting my hair on every day. I remember having to go wig shopping. I remember my sister in law getting me a silk pillow case in hopes it would help sleep be more comfortable. I remember washing my bald scalp to keep it healthy and how weird it was to keep that routine even though I didn’t have hair. I remember crying about that, too. I remember family pictures up in Breckenridge with my different looks: a hat, a wig, and a bald head. I remember seeing it grow back, stage after stage. I remember going to a salon for the first time because it was just long enough that I needed to. I remember thinking how weird it was that my hair was growing back curly and coarse because before cancer it was fine and straight. And today, as we were getting ready for this year’s family pictures, I cried because I still struggle with it all. 

And that’s just it – as I strive to live changed, when I look in the mirror, I am working on having more days of acceptance and less days of struggle. I am working on taking compliments better. And I am working on redefining confidence.