Admittedly, going back to work was not easy. For the most part it had to do with the simple physical drain. Who knew it could hurt to staple something, or use the paper cutter? Being on my feet after nearly three weeks of only wandering from the kitchen to couch, was a challenge that had me back on the couch again the minute I got home until I dragged myself to bed. Yet each day got better, and my range of movement so improved that I’m thinking the paper cutter will offer no challenge at all next week.
But the difficulty of returning also had to do with the way I look. I stood before the mirror the night before trying on different outfits in a futile attempt to find something that would hide the fact that I no longer have breasts. I will have breasts. I had reconstruction along with my mastectomy, but what that means is the plastic surgeon implanted tissue expanders, which will be filled each week, until I essentially “grow” a new pair.
I wondered if I should have returned with a prosthesis—falsies—thus sparing myself this conspicuous feeling. My daughter assures me that no one is staring at my boobs (of course not, I don’t have any!) and that it is my vanity that is the issue.
It certainly is.
Funny how cancer seems to want to teach us lessons about all the major sins. I’ve written about one already—gluttony. But vanity is the sin of the moment, even though I’ve never considered myself an overly vain person.
Here’s the truth though. I’m pretty vain about my hair.
I hated my thick red hair when I was little. My mom would take me to a barber instead of a beauty salon, because it was so thick and unruly. Embarrassing. For the first 12 years it was always short and coarse and bushy. Then an illness kept me at home for three months and oh darn, my hair grew and from then on, I had long red hair. One nice quirk about being a red head is that teachers always knew my name by the second day. Another thing that happened was that strangers would stop and compliment my hair. I was asked if it was real, asked if it was the natural color. I guess it was my one good feature, a crowning touch to crooked teeth, squinty eyes and freckles. So that even now, despite the dulling of age and lightening of gray that on my head happily looks likes highlights, I ‘ve come to love my red hair, even if I am never content with the specific haircut.
It makes me sad that with the migrating patterns of the world’s population, the dominant hair color genes vs. recessive genes means that red hair doesn’t have a chance of surviving beyond another few decades.
It makes me somewhat annoyed that my kids cringe at the possibility of their having a “ginger baby.”
But it really bothers me that my hair is going to fall out, and I will be one lumpy, bald woman with crooked teeth and squinty eyes and a wig that is not red at all because the red-haired wigs all looked too fake.
Yes, it is temporary...but is it? Many people I know had their hair return white, often curly. Interesting and horrifying.
Still, in the real scheme of things, how important is this? We are talking about survival, and so this must seem a trite and superficial thing to whine about.
But sometimes a person needs to whine about insignificant things, because often they loom up there with the significant things. Because after all, there are three basic issues every human, from age 16 to 95 worries about: Is there a God? Who do I love and who loves me? And, “does my hair look okay today?”
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
the cranky phase
These days I have an interesting silhouette. I imagine my stomach has always been this big; I guess I just never noticed because I couldn’t see it beneath my boobs! (Which come to think of it, often used my belly as a resting place…) So right now I kind of resemble Yogi Bear or maybe Wimpy… If I didn’t know better I’d accuse the doctors of simply shoving my boobs into my belly. (When I asked the surgeon about this today he assured me they had not!) Add to this my two drains that end in little hand grenades that are pinned under my shirt—increasing the bulk—and you have a truly chic look.
My hair as seen in silhouette is a frozen tableau of mussy-ness. It retains its bed-head shape because while I have had it washed for me (as I stand bent over the kitchen sink) I haven’t truly showered and so I can’t believe two or three pitchers can really be considered a good rinse. Ah, at least I still have my hair. We are looking at the bright side of things are we not?
It all comes to this: I’m dirty and itchy and lumpy and misshapen and everyone who visits me tells me I look great. Oh yeah? You should see how great this looks. I can hardly look at it myself-- at this lumpy, dimpled, puckered line that runs across where my breasts used to be.
Tomorrow it will be two weeks. My daughter and I have cabin fever. I have been reprimanded for using too many water glasses. It has been suggested that she is getting cranky. I have been assured that I am getting cranky as well. There are only so many food network shows a person can watch in between Oprah and Ellen.
I know what all this impatience and frustration means. It means I am healing. So when I catch a glimpse of my styling-self in the mirror (a hazard in a house with mirrored doors everywhere) I just laugh.
As for my cranky daughter, I am trying to limit myself to one water glass for the entire day, and trying to put my dirty washcloths in the laundry basket, not on the floor, and trying not to feel guilty for being so happy that she has come home to take care of me.
My hair as seen in silhouette is a frozen tableau of mussy-ness. It retains its bed-head shape because while I have had it washed for me (as I stand bent over the kitchen sink) I haven’t truly showered and so I can’t believe two or three pitchers can really be considered a good rinse. Ah, at least I still have my hair. We are looking at the bright side of things are we not?
It all comes to this: I’m dirty and itchy and lumpy and misshapen and everyone who visits me tells me I look great. Oh yeah? You should see how great this looks. I can hardly look at it myself-- at this lumpy, dimpled, puckered line that runs across where my breasts used to be.
Tomorrow it will be two weeks. My daughter and I have cabin fever. I have been reprimanded for using too many water glasses. It has been suggested that she is getting cranky. I have been assured that I am getting cranky as well. There are only so many food network shows a person can watch in between Oprah and Ellen.
I know what all this impatience and frustration means. It means I am healing. So when I catch a glimpse of my styling-self in the mirror (a hazard in a house with mirrored doors everywhere) I just laugh.
As for my cranky daughter, I am trying to limit myself to one water glass for the entire day, and trying to put my dirty washcloths in the laundry basket, not on the floor, and trying not to feel guilty for being so happy that she has come home to take care of me.
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Blueberries for Sal
When I was little, growing up in Michigan, August was the month that my sisters and I would ride our bikes to the woods at the end of Swede road. We looped buckets over our handlebars because we were on a mission—picking blueberries.
Blueberry picking was a hot and sometimes painful business. For some reason the best berry bushes were always surrounded by bushes with thorns. You had to sidle your way through the prickly branches and then were plagued by bees and mosquitoes. It was slow going filling a bucket, but always worth it. First of all, there was mom’s promise to make pie. But the best way to eat blueberries was in a bowl, with milk and sugar, stirring so that the milk turned blue. Imagine eating a pint of blueberries like this now with blueberries, at $5.99 a pint, more if you buy organic, which with blueberries, you should do.
Of course, it was a different world. Consider the differences. What parent today could send their kids on bikes to spend several hours in the woods at the end of the street? (For that matter, how many of us have woods at the end of our street?)
What brings me to this tangent is my cancer-fighting diet. Blueberries star. Blueberries have one of the highest antioxidant activity rates of any fruit. Blueberries are a wonderful fruit, and while I can’t rationalize eating an entire bowl with milk and sugar, I have been putting them in my oatmeal, in my pancakes, on top of my whole wheat bagel, and on my waffles.
Cherries are good too. And because I lived in Michigan, there was naturally a cherry tree in our back yard. It takes a few years for a cherry tree to begin producing a hefty amount of cherries but once it gets going, the fun thing to do is to have a competition spitting pits at the neighbor’s garage from the picnic table. Of course, the neighbors did not particularly care for this activity. (But that was only ½ as much fun as participating in a pit-spitting contest at the Barber’s house--another family with Michigan roots--where else can you spit pits at each other at the dinner table?)
When I was a blueberry picking, cherry-pit spitting little girl in Michigan, I was a skinny little thing. I rode my bike, did hand-springs, I broke into a sprint the minute I stepped out of school and liked to go to the park alone just to swing and think. My dad made us oatmeal for breakfast and despite our efforts to fool our parents (the old peas-under-the rim-of the plate-trick) we were made to eat our vegetables. On Saturday movie nights we ate popcorn with orange juice—with the very occasional root beer float treat. As for fast food, McDonalds was a rare event, such as the night mom and dad had bridge club, and Dog and Suds was reserved for unique celebrations or difficulties, like a broken stove.
Spin ahead with me now some 40-odd years, from my Michigan roots to this present-day Illinois suburban self. The world has changed. I’ve changed. I’m no longer the skinny girl who loved nothing more than a juicy orange, a good book and a stretch of green grass to lie in. I still love a good book, but with so many choices, would an orange be my first pick? I have to admit that for the last several years, my favorite orange snack has been Cheetos!
When my husband and I were in East Germany (pre-1981) I remember thinking that all we needed to do to end the cold war was to take the communists and drop them off at the Jewel-- the difference being choices. In East Germany we shopped every day because there was no ability to store food, there was no abundant supply to save for later and we never knew what might be there. We saw bananas once in four months. When we would go for a walk after dinner, we could tell that everyone had the same thing to eat that night. Cauliflower was in the store that day and we could smell cauliflower in the air throughout town. I adore capitalism as a result of this experience, and yet, perhaps the abundance of choice that I have reveled in for so many years has done me no favors.
Seventy per cent of cancer can be attributed to lifestyle, but can I possibly blame my cancer on capitalism and a life of privilege? I don’t think so. The change from a skinny little girl who loved to run and eat blueberries, to this person I am, one who has to force herself to eat fruit and vegetables and choose exercise over reading a book, has been a slow erosion of discipline, developing tastes and good choices. I still love capitalism. I especially love the ability to choose.
I choose to change. Somewhere inside me is a skinny little girl who longs to climb a tree with a book under her arm and an apple in her pocket for later. Surely that’s a good compromise.
Blueberry picking was a hot and sometimes painful business. For some reason the best berry bushes were always surrounded by bushes with thorns. You had to sidle your way through the prickly branches and then were plagued by bees and mosquitoes. It was slow going filling a bucket, but always worth it. First of all, there was mom’s promise to make pie. But the best way to eat blueberries was in a bowl, with milk and sugar, stirring so that the milk turned blue. Imagine eating a pint of blueberries like this now with blueberries, at $5.99 a pint, more if you buy organic, which with blueberries, you should do.
Of course, it was a different world. Consider the differences. What parent today could send their kids on bikes to spend several hours in the woods at the end of the street? (For that matter, how many of us have woods at the end of our street?)
What brings me to this tangent is my cancer-fighting diet. Blueberries star. Blueberries have one of the highest antioxidant activity rates of any fruit. Blueberries are a wonderful fruit, and while I can’t rationalize eating an entire bowl with milk and sugar, I have been putting them in my oatmeal, in my pancakes, on top of my whole wheat bagel, and on my waffles.
Cherries are good too. And because I lived in Michigan, there was naturally a cherry tree in our back yard. It takes a few years for a cherry tree to begin producing a hefty amount of cherries but once it gets going, the fun thing to do is to have a competition spitting pits at the neighbor’s garage from the picnic table. Of course, the neighbors did not particularly care for this activity. (But that was only ½ as much fun as participating in a pit-spitting contest at the Barber’s house--another family with Michigan roots--where else can you spit pits at each other at the dinner table?)
When I was a blueberry picking, cherry-pit spitting little girl in Michigan, I was a skinny little thing. I rode my bike, did hand-springs, I broke into a sprint the minute I stepped out of school and liked to go to the park alone just to swing and think. My dad made us oatmeal for breakfast and despite our efforts to fool our parents (the old peas-under-the rim-of the plate-trick) we were made to eat our vegetables. On Saturday movie nights we ate popcorn with orange juice—with the very occasional root beer float treat. As for fast food, McDonalds was a rare event, such as the night mom and dad had bridge club, and Dog and Suds was reserved for unique celebrations or difficulties, like a broken stove.
Spin ahead with me now some 40-odd years, from my Michigan roots to this present-day Illinois suburban self. The world has changed. I’ve changed. I’m no longer the skinny girl who loved nothing more than a juicy orange, a good book and a stretch of green grass to lie in. I still love a good book, but with so many choices, would an orange be my first pick? I have to admit that for the last several years, my favorite orange snack has been Cheetos!
When my husband and I were in East Germany (pre-1981) I remember thinking that all we needed to do to end the cold war was to take the communists and drop them off at the Jewel-- the difference being choices. In East Germany we shopped every day because there was no ability to store food, there was no abundant supply to save for later and we never knew what might be there. We saw bananas once in four months. When we would go for a walk after dinner, we could tell that everyone had the same thing to eat that night. Cauliflower was in the store that day and we could smell cauliflower in the air throughout town. I adore capitalism as a result of this experience, and yet, perhaps the abundance of choice that I have reveled in for so many years has done me no favors.
Seventy per cent of cancer can be attributed to lifestyle, but can I possibly blame my cancer on capitalism and a life of privilege? I don’t think so. The change from a skinny little girl who loved to run and eat blueberries, to this person I am, one who has to force herself to eat fruit and vegetables and choose exercise over reading a book, has been a slow erosion of discipline, developing tastes and good choices. I still love capitalism. I especially love the ability to choose.
I choose to change. Somewhere inside me is a skinny little girl who longs to climb a tree with a book under her arm and an apple in her pocket for later. Surely that’s a good compromise.
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