“Authenticity is the alignment of head, mouth, heart and feet…”
Dr. Lance Secretan
One cannot be selectively authentic.
This Day in 2018:
Meltdown…Independence…Progress
I had a complete meltdown in the middle of the night last night. 2am. Sobbing.
My skin was so tortuously itchy from my neck to my upper thighs. And every time I scratched, it was searingly painful. It kept me up most of the night and by 2am I was out of patience. I had done what I could to bring relief, but nothing was working. I kept telling myself – “everything is temporary”…”this won’t last forever”… I tried thinking of other things. I listed the things I was grateful for as a distraction. Nothing worked. So…I just cried. At some point I fell back asleep because I woke up later so I was grateful for that, but man…there has been so much about this that I was not prepared for. On that note, the more days that progress, the more progress I make. I did lots for myself today and it felt nice to have quite a bit of independence back. I’m thoroughly exhausted because of it, but it was nice nonetheless. Other than that, there isn’t much more to write tonight. I pray for restful sleep all through the night…for relief from the crazy-making itchiness.
This Day in 2019:
To renew or not to renew?
I have 4 days left of my anastrozole prescription……and I now face an interesting decision. Do I renew my prescription? Or do I not renew my prescription? Because, well, my quality of life is s%&# while taking it.
I’m in this weird place where my cancer was not like the masses (no pun intended) where the cancer was fed largely by hormones. I was barely 9% estrogen receptor positive. And if I remember correctly, that wasn’t even the pathology report of my largest tumor.
This awful med that I’m supposed to take daily for 10 years is intended to block the estrogen from feeding cells that have a receptor on them (which could grow more cancer….9 chances out of 100). At least, I think this is how it all works. Anyways, without ovaries, my adrenal glands are the only things barely producing estrogen so how at-risk am I really?? My oncologist says that I am just ‘high’ enough (9% is apparently on the low end of the range) to require this type of maintenance chemotherapy……… But I am asking – at what cost. 9 out of 100. 9. N.I.N.E.
Ugh. I can literally barely walk tonight the arthritic joints and bone pain are so bad. If I stop taking it, well, I’m fully choosing AMA. And that doesn’t feel good. If I stop taking it, there is a chance cancer comes back. And then I only have myself to blame. And that, too, doesn’t feel good. But if I stop taking it, I will have relief from these dreadful side effects. And that would, of course, feel great. ….But would the cancer monster get bigger? Would it get louder?
At the moment, while I hurt like hell, I know I’m doing what my doctor says I should do to keep the cancer monster away. ….But if I go rogue and take my chances, I might actually enjoy whatever life I have left to live. …..And the bottom line is that anastrozole or letrozole or tamoxifen only reduce the risk of recurrence, they don’t actually eliminate it, so if cancer is gonna come back, it’s gonna come back. To renew or not to renew. There may not be a more difficult question…….
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