Smile!

This made me smile!

Less is More

It’s not so much that the breast cancer has been life changing, my life was already on a path of change at the start of 2012 before the cancer diagnosis. I’d applied to do a university degree (unsuccessful in my application!), successful in my application to do HNC Social care at college, which I should have begun in August, I’d booked myself onto an adventure holiday, the house went up for sale, I studied psychology at evening class and I joined Jog Scotland all in 2012! The timing of surgery meant I was unable to start the full time course or continue with the 10 week evening class. The Sahara trek was put on hold.

What is life changing is that the weekend of my surgery, Maisie moved into halls near college and I have suddenly discovered, after my recovery, that the demands for a la carte dining, all inclusive board, taxi service, hunting for things that have been borrowed, clearing the trail of pots, pans and pants from the floors and surfaces have all disappeared! For as much as it was a full time job looking after teenagers I miss it. Along with the sitting on the kitchen table, legs swinging, deep in debate and conversation over some current topic of news or scandal! Along with the smell of fresh pancakes, splattered hob, sticky maple syrup puddles. Along with snuggles on the sofa watching hours of “Come Dine With Me” or "The Great British Bake Off”!

Two little girls suddenly becoming young ladies and moving into their own flats has been life changing, it just so happened that the cancer came at the same time. The result of the clash of these two events leaves me with a rather large empty space in my daily life and leaves me wondering what I should “do”?

Faced with a huge blank canvas, it would be easy to start splashing paint about and rush into something to fill the time and space. What the cancer has done, is that it has made me think more deeply about what I really want from this life going forward. It is teaching me that sometimes it is better just to “be” rather than to “do”. I have been a doer all my life and have put much of my effort into caring for everyone else, having been a full time mum and part time support worker for over 18 years. The cancer has pointed out that it’s now time to care for myself and to sometimes put myself first! Something many of us woman find difficult! I have always looked for the next challenge, the next achievement but have probably not given enough thought to personal fulfilment and contentment.

I am reaching the decision to move away from my work in support (the huge bouquet of flowers and messages from work made me feel guilty that I could even think about giving up let alone go through with the decision!).

My focus lies with getting myself back into tip top shape mentally and physically, to deal with not only events of the last 3 months but also with the highs and lows of the last six years since our move to Aberdeen. The house and gardens need to be kept tidy, ever hopeful that someone will fall in love with this tower of granite allowing us to take more new paths.

I have ideas as to what I would like to do more of and certainly less of! Despite the ever popular “as one door closes, another opens” I’m afraid the words of Christine Collisters song have spun through my head often, as we rolled from one crisis to another “as one door closes, another door must slam, how cruel this world, how weak I am”.  Yes, of course things never stay the same and when you’re at the bottom there’s a good chance you will soon be climbing back up. We are uneasy waiting for further news of Paul’s job, moral low and internal support fairly non-existent. Not wishing the time away but looking forward to the end of the consultation period on 16^th November so we know one way or another. We are neither of us in a position to be dealing with much stress but are both aware that whatever happens it will not initially, be easy.

Inspired by last night’s TV program “Small Spaces” and a believer that “less is more” I very much look forward to spending happy times in yurts, camper vans, Bedouin tents and the great outdoors! I need somehow to relieve the spells of loneliness that I encounter at times so that means getting out and mixing with people, spending more time with the people who have not given up on us, who seem to enjoy our company, who still have time to make the effort! It’s been surprising who has fallen by the wayside since the cancer diagnosis yet I accept for some it can be a tough one to handle. Accepting and offering invitations to “come and stay” “meet for lunch” “share a coffee”. With my energy levels low it’s been hard to make the effort but I’m very thankful to my assertive friends, even those in far flung places who have kept my spirits up. I didn’t hesitate in accepting an invitation to a chocolate cookery course in Derbyshire in December, or a night at the Royal Opera House in January. Ok,so it’s not always a case of “less is more”, sometimes “more is more”!

Sink or swim

We have been counting the days since surgery in much the same way as one does with a new born baby. Three days, ten days, two weeks, one month, 6 weeks etc. Reaching six weeks post surgery feels like quite a milestone. Week five to six saw a great improvement in my underarm cording with just a little tightness remaining but no real pain. Stabbing at the site of surgery is only occasional, although much of the area remains generally numb. I feel far less tired and generally “back to normal”.

It was fantastic to get back into running shoes on Sunday morning and I enjoyed a gentle two mile jog in glorious autumn sunshine. No pains, not a twinge, although the thigh muscles are feeling it a bit this evening!  I’d paid little attention before to the baseball cap that I always run in “Moonwalk Edinburgh 2007 – Uniting Against Breast Cancer”. Five years since I pounded the streets of Edinburgh through the night, wearing a decorated bra!

I pulled on and off, in front of the full length mirror, various items of swimwear to see what would be best to return to the pool in this week. I’m hoping to have a swim prosthesis after my appointment at clinic in November but until then I have to make do. That said, I’ve read stories of them floating away so maybe it’s less stressful to do without! Bikinis a non starter, not retaining any sort of shape and not at all likely to stay in place! V neckline of a one piece not ideal. Patterned, straight neckline, tankini proved by far the best option, my asymmetry less visible along with the scar, drawback, the lycra’s all gone in the top and so I need to search out and purchase something similar! Probably the wrong time of year for buying beach wear!


Edinburgh Moonwalk 2007



Race For Life 2010

                                        

Stand Up To Cancer

It was quite emotional watching Channel Fours Embarrassing Bodies cancer special. The program was part of Channel Fours fundraising event “Stand Up To Cancer”.  www.standuptocancer.org.uk

Graphic images of a young woman’s double mastectomy opened the program. Real life stories showed the reality of cancer and its effects on people’s lives. A young man with eye cancer, who lost much of his face but survived. A father of two young boys, trying new treatment for bladder cancer, a 22 year old woman with ovarian cancer going through hysterectomy and chemo. So many of us are already affected by cancer, know someone who has it or who sadly has died from it. I feel so incredibly lucky to have only lost a breast, to not have suffered the effects of radiotherapy or chemotherapy and to be returning to a full and healthy life. Three weeks into the adjuvant treatment,Tamoxifen and no apparent side effects . More broken nails than usual but that could be the effects of 5 weeks of being more or less indoors, lacking in sunshine and daylight!

I’ve been looking into re booking the Sahara trek for early next year. I was originally booked to be flying away today, for a week of trekking in the sand and sleeping out under the stars in a Bedouin tent with a few camels and some like-minded travellers. The whole idea holds even more appeal than when I first booked it and I guess will prove to be just a little more challenging and rewarding. Very excited to be having a taste of adventure next weekend when I shall be spending three nights under canvas in a yurt!

Adventures!

As I came round the bend and up the hill, changing to second gear, the gear stick decided it was a good time to snap. I was amazed at how calmly I dealt with this, checking behind me for other vehicles – none. Nothing coming the other way either. Well I would be ok, just needed to manage the next two miles home. With the gears engaged alright the car was still moving but the gear stick completely floppy. With two corners yet to turn, I decided on a test gear change while nothing was about. Like fumbling around in the dark with keys trying open a lock, I managed to wiggle the stick somehow into third. Presto! Kept up a slow but steady pace to the junction, rolled down the hill and then into the drive! Figured, not having driven for five weeks, I could manage a few more.

I wouldn’t usually take such things in my stride, but with my mind and body having been in stress overload for several weeks, it seemed quite easy to shrug shoulders, manage the situation and accept that this is life and it’s only a car!

It’s six weeks since surgery. How quickly life resumes where you left off! Never a dull moment in our household! There was the stray collie dog on Tuesday morning. Having dropped Sarah at the train station and then not remembering to pop into the supermarket even though I practically drove past it (brain has gone to mush – I blame the Tamoxifen) I arrived back at home, going about household chores, taking laundry out to the tumble drier in the garage. I saw the cat sat under the van, but looked again, the eyes were so big! Not a cat, a dog. He didn’t move. Just as well, dogs and I, not a good combination!

“You know how you’ve always wanted a dog Maisie? Well I’ve got you one, he’s outside”

Miles (he soon had a name and was seemingly trying to move in with us) had moved from under the van to the warm and dry of the far corner of the garage. We chopped up the one small piece of cooked chicken that we had in the house, cooked some rice, fed and watered Miles. Down in one. He was clearly very hungry. Maisie, being on the ball and keen to show how she could care for this creature, pointed out he needed a blanket.

Miles curled himself into a cosy ball and fell asleep while we set about trying find whom he belonged to. Not known locally to any of the farmers and with no tag on him our final resort was the RSPCA who put us onto the local dog warden. Big brown eyes peered up to Maisie through the garage window then Miles waited by the door for it to open. He and Maisie, already bonded in these few hours. With a tummy full of energy, Miles leapt up for a hug then bounded off round the garden! What if we couldn’t catch him, the warden was coming!

Food! We enticed him back to the garage with a small portion of rice!

The warden looped a blue rope lead onto Miles and walked him to the big white van with its cages. Sad moment. Miles, a young male collie of about five months old, would be cared for locally for seven days and if not claimed, will go to the rescue centre and be re homed.

Since being old enough to throw pennies into wishing wells Maisie had wished, coin after coin, for a puppy dog. It may only have been for 6 hours, but it was a very memorable time! Better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all. Dreams can come true.

We followed that, with the Great British Bake Off final. It was far too much excitement for one day. Yesterday I was SO tired again and had to take an afternoon nap, first one since Friday.

As I write there is black sky and a huge storm on the hill with sheet lightning and thunder. I’m looking forward to a quiet end to the week…

                                                           Miles - the stray Collie dog

The Thin red Line

After looking at The Scar Project Paul wrote to me:

“it’s very easy sometimes, to get a bit caught up in the Race for Life, tie a pink ribbon round the tree thing, but it’s much rawer and immediate than that. You, people like me, and all the photographed women who really are from completely different places in life, have to deal with the reality of amputation. Human beings can be truly awful sometimes, but they can also be wonderful and life changing too. Women should be aware that the universe is random and that, heaven forbid, it could be them or their family and loved ones next, and that it has to be dealt with head on.”

When I was first told that I would need a mastectomy, I really had no idea what that would look like. I asked how big the scar would be, where would they cut? But even having asked, it still wasn’t very clear to me. I was unsure whether I dare to look on the internet for pictures. Some days after diagnosis I took that step and found pictures, quite shocking at first and I did upset myself but I needed to know how it would be, how my body would look. After the initial upset I happened upon a story and also a beautiful photograph of a 40 year old woman who had been through mastectomy. To mark her survival Joanne had photographs taken of her with mastectomy scars just two weeks after surgery. Wishing to help others through their journey Joanne posted the pictures on Facebook but they were banned for “nudity and pornography”. I was completely inspired and comforted by seeing the photographs on the web before my surgery. If I looked like that after two weeks, I would be doing ok. I did look like that after two weeks.

It also became clear to me that other people also had little idea as to what my mastectomy actually involved. Did I still have a nipple? The answer is, no nipple, no nothing. The entire breast is removed neatly through a diagonal cut from underarm to the middle of the chest. My scar is a very neat, a thin line about 7-8 inches long and my chest is very flat, my upper rib bones visible. I don’t dislike my scar, of course I wish I didn’t have it, but I do and it tells a story, a very big one, as do my caesarean and appendix scars.

The Scar Project link was sent to me from a friend in Australia. It is stunning. I think this is what “breast aware” should be about. This is the real story, this is what it’s really like to find out you have breast cancer, this is why we check our breasts, these pictures tell you cancer is not choosy and life isn’t fair. These pictures tell you that women are vulnerable yet strong, determined and full of courage. These women want to show the world the journey they have been on and survived. We feel the pain with every blow of the sculptures hammer, yet with each strike we are shaped and we emerge more beautiful.
Last week, I sat and looked at my own photographs, from before and after surgery. They are an important visual, real reminder of what has happened to me over recent weeks. After much pondering, I decided to not bare all on the blog, but did post, in the Photograph Page, a black and white shot of just my scar.

Breast cancer is not a pink ribbon. For me, it’s a thin red line.

Thank you to Elaine for sending me the link to The Scar Project        www.thescarproject.org

Happy Birthday!

Happy birthday to me! I sat in bed with coffee and opened cards and presents quietly, weather outside appalling, the lovely view of yesterday changed into a windswept soggy picture! Up and about, household chores to do with changeover this weekend Downstairs and guests back in on Sunday. Piles of wet laundry! Organised Pauls packing for his trip to London with Maisie for the Goldsmiths University open day. 12 hours overnight on the bus from Aberdeen, I knew I wouldn’t manage that so opted to stay home. Sarah’s arriving to keep me company, tomorrow. Was just thinking about having an afternoon nap when I heard the door and wondered who it was, there stood Alice, soaked from the rain! What a surprise! She had caught the bus from Glasgow to Aberdeen, then Aberdeen to Potterton, followed by a mile and a half’s walk in the pouring rain, carrying a birthday cake and an overnight bag! What a fabulous present! Made my day.

We took a taxi to Liz’s and arrived for tea just after five. Lovely to be out and among people! A glass of bubbly, little sandwiches, cupcakes, jelly and a slice of Judy’s delicious pavlova! And of course a chorus of “happy birthday to you” and a game of pass the parcel! A super party! Taxi home before nine and straight to bed! Still not managing long days yet!

Getting back behind the wheel on Thursday boosted my mood. Good just to get out independently even if only to the supermarket! No heavy trolley to push just a few things for the weekend. Managed driving fine but reverse parking could prove a bit sore still with twisting.

Bought myself a copy of “Adventures of a One Breasted Woman” to motivate and inspire me! I will be starting my own adventures with a three night stay in a yurt near Elgin (north coast) in a couple of weeks time. Been on my “to do” list ever since we sat in one for a story telling session at The Aboyne Fire festival some four or five years ago! Also on my “to do” list is to take a seaplane flight from Glasgow and to sail on the ferry to Shetland, amongst other things!