Out of Italy and into the fire...

Well, I'm thrilled to be able to say that we did indeed have our vacation. It was amazing. And I thought up until the last moment that something was going to arise to prevent the fulfillment of the dream of this trip. In fact, one hour before we were to be picked up to go to the airport, Xena ran around a corner, slipped and yelped and turned out to have pulled off a rear toenail. I tried to doctor it myself but the nerve was exposed and she wouldn't let me touch it. So off to the vet, with me promising Dave as we walked out the door that I would leave her there if waiting for treatment would have made me late for our ride. The vet bandaged the foot, gave me a course of antibiotics to have her take twice daily for a week, I called the housesitter to give her the lowdown, and off to the airport we went, right on time.

The first flight was delayed and we had to run when we hit the Charlotte airport to get on our airbus to ride to Rome. It was one hell of a stressful day, but we did make it, and although our flight crew was quite unpleasant and our fellow passengers loud and obnoxious, proving that the "airbus" is aptly named, we did arrive the next morning in Rome, finding our charming deco-era hotel a block up Via Cavour, across from the station, in the heart of wonderful central Rome. Arriving too early for our room to be ready, the hotel treated us to a round of drinks in the roof garden bar where we could gaze from our Pallatine hill vantage point out on the Collosium and  domes and spires all over Rome.

Back at work today, I'm dealing with medical issues concerning my mother in between patients. She's been back in the hospital since last Monday, one week, so the vacation is truly over. I'm very glad we came home in time for me to rest a bit before returning to work, even if I have had to spend much time on the phone dealing with this situation.

I'll try to continue to record some remembrances of the trip each day. I wanted to keep a journal of the journey, but I often find while traveling that I'm way too busy being there to allow time to write about it. Will upload some of the pix we took as well. Can't wait for the next time! I had no idea just how badly I needed that vacation.

Just can't bear it right now

I have had a few messages asking why I haven't written in so long. My mom had a stroke a month ago. I miss my blog, but can't bear to write right now. Too much emotion with others involved, too many people who may be hurt by my expression of my own feelings, and I just can't write while self editing to this degree. More when the crisis is over. I'm continuing to write in the meantime, but not posting right now. Hope all are well. I've been having a hard time remembering all the positive messages I fed myself during cancer treatment, but try to remind myself each time I wake or lay down to sleep, that every good day is a good day, but cross-country medical emergencies make it hard to find the happy moments. I'm working on it.

Article

 http://www.vicc.org/news/2011/06/moving-on/

This article appeared in our cancer center's monthly magazine. I'm in there.  

Tomato Time

Despite my terror of ticks and my extreme allergy to mosquitoes, I manage to plant a small garden each summer. Just a tiny tomato patch and this year a 2 by 4 foot herb garden in which a few cherry tomato volunteers have sprouted vigorously enough that I didn't have the heart to pull them. All the plants are loaded with green fruit and have been for weeks, with nothing beginning to pink out. This is late for the persistence of premature produce, usually I have begun my harvest by this time of year.

Local farmer's markets make up for my tardy garden however, and the luscious, giant heirloom tomato beauties contribute to an over-sized bowl of Sugo Cruda, a recipe I got years ago from Beppe Gambetta and that we gorge on every summer. With dishes like this and the various salads I've been making lately, I have no trouble getting my daily 5 cups of fruits and veggies. A diet low in animal protein and high in fresh produce,  along with 30 minutes of exercise daily, is supposed to promote health. And I'm getting all of it, along with lots of green tea and supplements and sleep and fun, but I still stress slightly over the pain in my right hip that has bothered me for a few months, and every bug bite, and anything that might be a symptom that could possibly indicate illness. I truly believe that I am cured and am healthy and in the process of living the second half of my long glowing life, but nagging nervousness creeps in despite my best intentions to maintain a positive outlook. I do maintain it, but have to occasionally take on the doubt. Surely that is a normal, healthy response to factors that could indeed be fear-worthy. So, having these fleeting fears must be another indicator that I am healthy, right?

Chemo Brain?

I like to make yogurt out of milk that is just ready to turn...not sweet enough to put on cereal but not actually spoiled yet. I especially love to use raw milk for this, but don't have a source at the moment. Still, the milk I buy is organic and I love yogurt, without which I could probably live without dairy, and as long as I continue to eat milk products, I'm loving cheese too. Anyway, yesterday I took most of a half gallon of turning milk and made yogurt in the crock pot. It's easy, especially when spending the entire day at home, the way we chose to spend our holiday. The final step in the process is to wrap the pot in a heavy towel and leave in a warm spot for 12 hours or more. I usually leave it in the oven with the light on, just warm enough to ferment very successfully. Gotta remember that it's in there, though. And today, despite mentally noting this morning that I would need to remember to take it out when I got home from work, meaning to leave a note on the oven but not doing it, I came home, took a nap, got up to make dinner, turned on the oven, and didn't even think about it until I smelled the smoke. I was fortunate enough to avoid a fire (whew!) but I did melt the electric cord. I turned on the exhaust fan and opened the windows in the house and went to sit outside on the screen porch for an hour or so waiting for the fumes to clear. I got just about all of the plastic off of the oven racks and floor, but will have to scrub the dregs of it. Didn't hurt the yogurt a bit, but I will need a new crock pot!

Is that a chemo brained act, or just normal distraction? Actually, my interpretation of chemo brain is very word oriented. So I think my lapse today was just typical dumb behavior that could have been disastrous but fortunately was not. I feel sure I won't make that particular mistake again.

NED and me; RIP Mojo

written last night, Thursday June 30, 2011

Last Thursday I had appointments with the nurse practitioner I see for my feminine health needs (she follows me for the 3 fibroid tumors still in my inactive post-menopausal womb) as well as with my breast surgeon. The response to my examinations? NED. No evidence of disease. Ah...that's what we want to hear. At the cancer survivors celebration/education session at our medical center a couple weeks ago, one of my colleagues spoke about the emotional impact of cancer on adult patients, from diagnosis to survivorship. She revealed her status as a survivor, not just a social worker in the field, and reported that NED is her new best friend. I get it. I love NED.

It's been a good busy time lately, so busy I rarely get to write about all of the events that touch me, the daily experiences that I want to share with the occasional reader who stops here, but it's good to have the activity. I have to remind myself that I still am less than a year from chemo, still in the recuperation phase from numerous surgeries with general anesthesia and still significantly weaker than I was before diagnosis, not to mention being over 50. Still, it's frustrating to miss those thoughts that sounded so interesting when I spoke them to myself with my inner voice.

I don't want to allow this day to go by without comment though to memorialize my old cat, Mojo, who reached the end of his time today. He was the cat with the most personality of any I've ever known, and a great mouser, and Xena's best pal. He had insinuated himself into the home of some dear friends who lived at the end of a rural road with 4 cats and a cat door; many cats were dumped in the area and quite a few of them got the word on the kitty hotline that there was plenty to eat and an open door and from time to time one would move in, Mojo among them. I talked my friends into letting me have him.  Mojo weighed over 20 pounds in his heyday, and was so big that visitors coming to the door would often step back in alarm when they saw this friendly giant. He would chase and fetch a crumpled grocery receipt with glee, and would reach out from his perch on the back of the sofa to grab me with a declawed paw as I walked by just to create some contact and remind me that he was there. When we got Xena a few years ago, Mojo had already been here for several years, and at first the cat would not speak to me, so irritated was he that I had brought this big canine into his domain. But about a month later, one afternoon Mojo reached out from his nap on the floor and slapped Xena across the face as she walked by, then took off down the hall with the dog in chase. They have been best friends ever since and I worry about how Xena will handle being the only 4 legged critter in the house.

I sent this message to my friends and family that were particularly fond of Mojo:  He's been in failing health for several months now; he was diagnosed with hyperthyroidism in February and for a while responded well to medication to treat that condition.

I took him to the vet today as for the past couple of days he has been looking very disoriented, having trouble breathing and only eating occasionally. The vet took an X-ray of his trunk and it was plain that he was in heart failure with too much fluid in his chest to have any hope of a remedy to his situation. We agreed that  the kindest thing to do would be to put him to sleep.

I stayed with him, and then went home with great sadness. I know we all will miss him. He was a truly great kitty.

Every Day is Survivor Day

Today Vanderbilt had their Survivor Celebration Day. Rain bucketed down this morning and I almost used it as an excuse to not go, but am glad I went. Got some good information, met some nice folks, heard Lance Armstrong's mom speak, and attended a presentation by one of my collegues who I had not known is a survivor herself. We're everywhere. There's way too much cancer but more and more of us are living long to complain about it. I couldn't make it through the entire event, though, and went to the Y later to work out on the bike for 45 minutes, having been reminded of the importance of exercise to survival and realizing that I have been slack on it for the last couple of weeks. This week, I've paid for last weekend's lack of sleep. I plan to get back in the groove of exercise and eating carefully next week, with the start I made today.

Last weekend in LA, I substituted calories for sleep, enjoying several yummy meals with my folks where I set aside my usual attempts at controlled nutrition and stayed up late each night visiting, propelled by adrenalin and the joy of being in my native land with the ocean breeze nourishing me. I loved the course that had provided the opportunity to take the trip home, and loved being with my family for the all-too-brief time.

I thought I was handling it all so well, but at the last moment, I realized my exhaustion when I went to pull my computer out of my backpack at airport security, and it was not there. After a panicked moment, I remembered that I had left it on the desk in my parent's house, having tried and failed to use it to print my boarding pass. Thank goodness for helpful sisters; Jill sent it back to me and all is well. But I am once again woefully behind on this blog. More soon.