The Luckiest Unlucky Girl

       Some pretty major things have been going on with me since returning from our little jaunt down south.  I wanted to write a nice, upbeat post all about the glories of the Chilean lake district, but sadly, news relating to cancer trumps witty banter surrounding the differences between American highway rest stops and Chilean ones, so I will stick to the blog´s original theme: my battle with the big C.

     On Friday Jon and I sat down with Dr. Majlis to discuss the plan for my ongoing treatment.  It turns out that there still needs to be discussion with MD Anderson in Houston as to the official plan (what was the point of our meeting, then?), but I was able to get a few important questions answered.  The next step in my treatment is going to be surgery to remove what´s left of the original tumor.  Luckily, as the size of the original tumor is very small compared to the monstrous blob that was growing there in September, it will not require a mastectomy.  Apparently it will be a small, rather noninvasive procedure known as a lumpectomy.  Dr. Buhler will be performing the surgery and originally we had talked about this taking place on February 12^th.  As far as radiation goes, they will need to do a pathology of the tumor following the surgery to determine if radiation is necessary.  Dr. Majlis does not believe it will be needed, but we shall see.  After the surgery I will then be put on my regimen of antibody drugs that I will receive every three weeks for the rest of my life.  These drugs are meant to prevent further metastasis and keep the cancer at bay. 

Many patients have lived 10, 15 years on these drugs, so we hope that I will have similar luck.  As far as side effects of the anti-bodies, there don´t seem to be many.  My hair will grow back, I won´t need the anti nausea medicine, and I will be allowed to return to my normal life.  I am allowed to begin exercising again, although I will need to consult a traumatologist concerning contact sports such as soccer.  All in all: pretty much the most positive diagnosis we could have expectedJ

    But, as with most things in life, good news is often followed by bad news.   Upon returning from our vacation I received the news that the school has chosen not to renew my contract for the upcoming school year.   This decision is unfortunate for many reasons.  Jon and I love Santiago and consider it home.  We had hoped to put down roots here and stay for many more years.   Also, just when I had decided that I truly enjoy teaching and am, indeed, a positive influence in my students lives, I no longer have the option of teaching.  (At least not next year….)  This news has been hard to swallow.  So many things about my life for the past six months have been out of my control.  Jon and I have been forced aboard a vicious and never-ending rollercoaster that thrashes and tosses us at each turn.  We have been left to simply hold on for dear life as the car runs wild.  A few weeks ago we thought we had reached a nice, restful peak only to be plunged again into uncertainty.  My spirit and faith in humanity has been tested, that is for sure.   But since I refuse to give up and bury my head in a hole for a year, it´s time to come up with plans b, c, and d.  Jon and I can survive on one salary and if I need to make money I´m sure I can find things here in Santiago to earn some cash.  I´ve always wanted to do something in the humanitarian realm, so perhaps this is my opportunity.  There are people in need all over the world, and especially now, I truly want to do something good with my life.  Cooking and traveling have always been passions of mine, so maybe I can incorporate some of those skills into a new profession.  Maybe I can take time out to write the novel that some have encouraged me to pursue.  The scary but comforting thing is that the possibilities are endless.  I know it´s not going to be easy, as the perfect job is not going to magically fall into my lap.  I expect many more tears, difficult conversations, and moments of self-doubt.  But Fuck it!  Onwards and upwards!  If you have any suggestions for my future path, I´m all ears.  Until then, my sister is in town and we are off to Buenos Aires next week to dance the tango and celebrate life. 

 

I leave you with an uplifting 80´s video.  Thank god for the 80´s: a song for every occasion… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XxBbcrs5KY 

Well since I haven´t yet discovered the meaning of life or had any more definitive medical news regarding my treatment, I am going to dedicate my next blogs to discussing, not cancer entirely, but life.  And in particular, my favorite part about life…. the reason that any sane person would embark on a teaching career: summer vacation!

When Dr. Majlis told us the latest encouraging news from the pet scan we asked two important questions: “Will I be able to go back to work next year?” and also… “Can Jon and I go on vacation?”  The doctor was certain that I would be able to go back to work come next July (hopefully even earlier) and that yes- not only could I go on vacation… but I SHOULD go on vacation.  After scheduling my next chemo treatment for January 29^th, we talked about the glories of the south of Chile, he cautioned me not to eat any raw shellfish, and Jon and I set to work hastily putting together a trip.  Since we had cancelled the Brazil tickets it only made sense to hop in our car for a ten day road trip south: destination Pucon, Puerto Varas, and Valdivia.  When I realized the Brazil trip was not going to happen, I got more and more excited about exploring this fantastic part of the country that we live in.  Luckily I have been feeling pretty tremendous following my last round of chemo.  The good news definitely helped me to focus on the end result instead of wallowing around in self-pity.  I haven´t had any of the bone pain of last time, despite receiving the shot in my stomach, and have had excellent amounts of energy.   A few days out from treatment I felt good enough to sit in the sculpture park with some friends for the Providencia jazz festival.  It was wonderful to be sitting outside with the crowd on a summer night, but unfortunately the music didn´t improve my appreciation towards jazz at all.  I keep hoping I will like jazz, but the more I listen to it, the more it continues to bore me to tears.   Call me crazy, but I prefer my music to have a beginning, middle, and end… and also some words to help capture my interest.  Anyway, after realizing I still don´t like jazz despite my best efforts, we met up with my friend Kelsey the following night for another Santiago tradition- the open air movie festival in Parque Bicentenario.  Parque Bicentenario is right by my house and is my favorite place in the city.  The views of the city skyline are unparalleled, the dogs really enjoy running around in the bushes, and the park routinely puts on events like crafts expositions, food and wine fests, and this summer movie extravaganza.  After being welcomed on the festival´s “red carpet” we were entertained with the various company giveaways that greeted us.  Free Heineken beer, free rum tastings, free ice tea and free information and handouts about Clinica Alemana.  (We passed on the last offer- I already know just about everything there is to know about that place, thank you very much!)

After grabbing some pizza and handing my free beer and rum tickets to someone more likely to enjoy them we settled down into our seats in front of the giant, blow-up, six story movie screen to watch the extremely depressing yet uplifting movie, The Impossible.  Around Academy Awards time, I make it a goal to see every movie nominated for Best Picture as well as the major acting awards.  Since Naomi Watts was nominated for her role as tsunami survivor I was eager to see the movie.  But wow!  That movie was extremely hard to watch and yet, very compelling all at the same time.  I have always been drawn towards human tragedy and after seeing the movie became obsessed with reading more about the 2004 Asian tsunami.  I know this sounds strange, but as a teen I was also obsessed with the Holocaust and read just about every book on the subject that I could get my hands on.  I could simply not imagine humans committing such atrocities!  On the other hand, I could not imagine what it would feel like to be a someone, a young child, a mother, a father….  in that situation.  The pain, the misery, the true heartbreak of it all was just too much to fathom.  Anyway, the stories of the tsunami drew me in like that as well… it is amazing the depth of sadness and the overwhelming loss that a human being can be forced to withstand.  And yet, some people survive and life goes on.  I think actually this helped me a little to deal with the news that I had just received.  I know that I am not out of the woods quite yet, and it is extremely possible and even probable that my cancer can flare back up, but it is also now possible that I may also be a survivor.  And for some reason, that realization has been a little difficult to process.

For you see, cancer is truly the great equalizer.  Cancer doesn´t care whether you are young or old, whether you have people who love you, whether you have a family that you need to take care of, whether you are poor or rich, whether you are black or white or Asian, or really anything.  Cancer doesn´t care.  In fact, since I have been diagnosed, I have realized that pretty much everyone that I know has had someone in their family, or a close friend, diagnosed with cancer.  There are some truly terrible and sad stories of loss out there regarding this horrible disease.  In fact, it is so prevalent, that I would compare the rate of cancer in the modern world to that of the plague in Medieval Europe.  The only difference here is that we do have some drugs available to help with the disease and sometimes people survive.  When I started this journey in September I mentally prepared myself for the worst.  I knew, even though the doctors never gave me a percentage number, that I would be very lucky to survive this.  Dr. Majlis described it as winning the lottery.  Sometimes you get the winning ticket, sometimes you don´t.  And while I feel extremely grateful to perhaps be one of the few who received a golden ticket, it also seems a little unfair.  “Why me?”

Some people have declared my news to be a miracle.  Not being a religious person myself I am very uncomfortable with that word.  I am also uncomfortable with the words “God”, “hero”, “brave”, and “courageous”.  Honestly I feel like I haven´t really had to endure very much.  All I did was listen to my doctor, take the poison, gain 15 pounds, and try to live my life as close to normal as humanly possible.  When compared to some of the truly horrible things that people all over the world deal with on a daily basis, my situation hardly warrants such a declaration of praise.  And while I know that most 31 year old people I know haven´t had to deal with a life or death situation, I know there are an equal amount of 31 year old people out there that have.  Going on this trip has helped me to savor the joys of life and also has given me time to process the realities of my future.  And while I promised not to spend this blog talking about cancer, I guess I needed to remove all of those thoughts from my head and get them on paper before I can regale you with humorous tales of our Chilean road trip.  It seems frivolous to tell you about riding ski lifts up volcanoes, and zip-lining across rivers and through forests, without first discussing the elephant in the room.  So now that I have done that, I can spend the next blog telling you all about the fabulous time we´ve been having.  It´s funny.  Even though my life has totally changed from the life I had or thought I would have four months ago, things still remain the same.  I am still me.  Cancer hasn´t made me any less scared of adventure sports or less likely to drop my Iphone into a thermal hot spring.  Cancer also hasn´t stopped me from tearing up with joy while watching some penguins waddle down to the water to fish or prevent me from 7 kilometer hikes in the forest.  I still laugh when reading incorrectly translated menu items like “raw steak in poot” or when a huge glob of palta falls from my sandwich onto my foot at a roadside lunch break.  What cancer has done is make me appreciate it, ALL of it, so much more.  What a glorious world we live in and how lucky I am to be able to see so much of it!   It truly almost breaks my heart.  And now, if you´ll excuse me, I need to remove myself from my un-air conditioned hotel room and go enjoy my summer vacation!

Well…. I promise to write more once the news has sunk in.  I´m feeling a bit stunned, a little bit in shock, and not really sure how to react.  (Except with happiness, obviously.)  The Pet Scan came back and showed that the lesions in the lungs and liver are no longer there.  The original tumor has shrunk significantly.  There is no new metastasis.  My bones are now actively working to heal themselves and I won´t need too many more rounds of chemo before surgery.  They are hoping that I might be done with treatment sometime in late March/early April.  I will know more specific details later, but I thought I would share this excellent news.

Well, don´t go popping any champagne bottles out yet… but as Dr. Majlis so gratefully broke us out of hospital jail last night at 11:30, he did give us a bit of encouraging news to take home.  Yesterday was a marathon session of chemo drugs.  We started at 3:00 and dripped all three drugs in a row. Two hours for the first drug, a half hour for the second, and three hours for the dreaded taxotere.  And then, of course, there were the endless sessions of post-chemo medicines dripped in as well.  Unfortunately they decided to go ahead and give me the bone marrow shot in my belly before we left, but at least now I know what to expect.  Am still wondering when the aches and pains will begin… 

     Anyway, I won´t receive the Pet Scan results (the ones I´m most concerned about) until Friday, but he did have the Brain MRI results.  Originally I had a legion in my bone right underneath my brain, which of course was worrisome.  The scan this time indicated that whatever was there before is no longer there.  I asked, incredulously… “Wait, so the scan showed nothing??!!!”  Dr. Majlis went ahead and made a very appropriate joke about my comment when he said, “Well, there was something… I mean, you probably should be worried if the brain scan showed absolutely nothing.”  Both Jon and I laughed at Majlis´s attempt at humor and went out the door.  But while I wanted to jump for joy at this encouraging news, I know that I need to wait till Friday to breathe a sigh of relief.  So that´s it for now.  I was very happy to get home and hug my doggies again.  Poor things were left home alone for 36 hours while our friend Tom so graciously agreed to feed and walk them.  Thanks!  I plan on spending the next few days watching all of the TV series you recommended on facebook.  And also maybe read a book, although I am already two months ahead for book club. 

“Risin ´up, back on the street…..Did my time, took my chances.

Went the distance now I´m back on my feet….  Just a man and his will to survive.”

As I showered this morning, I belted out the words to the glorious 80´s power ballad above.   My goal: put on a brave, fighting face in order to feel strong and confident going into my exams today.  Why Eye of the Tiger, you ask?  Well… for four years this song was the first one that blared from the speakers as my Athena soccer team took our first lap under the lights during our Wednesday night games.  We never had that many fans, but I remember feeling so amped up jogging around the field, keeping in step to the beats.  It was such an empowering feeling.

I have been waiting for quite awhile now to get these Pet Scan and MRI results, which will let us know how well the chemo is working.  So far, Dr. Buhler believes the original tumor in the breast to be responding positively to the chemo, but now we need to find out what is going on in the rest of the places the cancer has spread to, namely the lungs and the liver.  Apparently chemotherapy is a systemic treatment, which works well on soft tissue and organs.  If this is doing its job correctly, we can then proceed to other treatments such as surgery and radiation.  There is no way to accurately predict my future without these exam results.  So, as you might assume, I have been rather nervous about it all.  I was hoping to have the tests done either before or directly after Christmas, but my doctor kept pushing them further and further back.  At first I was going to find out on December 28^th, the day Jon´s parents were arriving.   Then, I was supposed to find out on January 2^nd… then, it was moved to the 4^th.  On Thursday I was out enjoying a Spicy Chile Tour of Barrios Brasil, Yungay, and Concha y Toro with the Krumtinger family when I received an email from the hospital.   It told me, unapologetically, that the Pet Scan machine was broken, so they would have to move my hospitalization to Monday, January 7^th.  One might think that I would have been happy to hear that I would have another weekend to enjoy myself and spend more time with Jon´s family, but actually I immediately burst into tears.  I had steeled and prepared myself to find out on the 4^th, and now I was going to have to wait three more agonizing days.  Awaiting news of this magnitude about your health and your future is like sitting on pins and needles.  Outwardly you might be smiling and laughing, casually sipping on white wine and playing games of euchre with your future in laws, but inside you are tense and full of fear.

Not that all of the time between Christmas and New Years was stressful, but hardly a day went by when I didn´t think about cancer.  It was hard to relax, even on a lovely four-day jaunt to the world´s biggest swimming pool in Algarrobo.   Jon and I spent several glorious days reading books and soaking up the sun with his parents, and there were times when I did, indeed, let my mind relax and simply enjoyed the warmth of the sun´s rays.  I also had a fabulous New Years Eve celebration with Jon, Shannon, Daniel, and Beth.  Around 12:30 (hora chilena) we snuck into the party at the rooftop bar of the W hotel by simply riding the elevator up.  Once we arrived it was clear that an expensive party was in progress, but no one even asked to see a wristband or Id or anything.  Instead, they decked us out in leopard sombreros and neon feather boas, and filled our wine glasses with free champagne.  We spent a glorious night laughing and taking pictures in our garb, overlooking the lights of Santiago and dancing to the beats of the DJ.  It was almost like old times, I would say… except much harder to recover from a late night the next day than it was in the past.

After New Years, however, I was pretty much ready to get to the hospital and finally know the truth.    During that time Jon and I spent some aggravating hours trying to cancel our plane tickets and hotels in Brazil, as we had planned that trip a long time ago and the departure date was fast arriving.  Unfortunately for us it was the first trip that we had invested a lot of money in advance since we were going to some popular secluded islands in the North, nature reserves in the Amazon, and were hoping to enjoy the Carnival festivities in both Rio and Salvador.  I had really been looking forward to the trip so it was especially irksome to realize that not only would I NOT be travelling to Brazil, but that I was probably going to lose a few thousand dollars in the process.  I know I totally sound like a spoiled brat, whining about missing a vacation that most people dream of their whole lives, but so be it.  I became an international teacher so that I could travel and see the world first hand, so this was a huge disappointment.    I got in a bit of a row with Jon about it all because he had previously cancelled some very expensive flights without calling the airline to explain what had happened and find out if they would be refundable.  The fight was very embarrassing for me because his parents were there, and I´d have preferred it if they didn´t have to see this ugly side of me.  I´m pretty sure by now, though, they know that I´m not necessarily the sweet girl-next-door type.  The first time I met them I was recently divorced and had lost my wallet and passport en route to China.  I was a bit of a mess and it was a bit of an ordeal….

Anyway, just like the previous situation, Jon and I eventually worked through the fight and LAN airlines was so kind to give us a whole 48 hours to get a note from our doctor and scan it to them so they could review it and decide if my cancer was a good enough reason to refund some of the money.  Luckily Dr. Buhler was nice enough to write something up and hand it to me one hour before the LAN appointed deadline.  (I swear that man never sleeps!)  Now, we shall see if they will accept it.  Hopefully, if a human being with a heart is in charge of their customer service, than they will try to accommodate us.  I thought mentioning the word “cancer” was supposed to automatically elicit an appropriate amount of sympathy.  Perhaps not when money and an inefficient bureaucratic process is involved.

So… finally the day of the tests arrived, and as you might expect, it turned out to be filled with a whole lot more agonizing wait time.  Jon and I headed to the hospital this morning at 9 AM, per the instructions on the hospital´s email.  We packed our bags the night before, Jon carefully gathering the DVD player, the stereo, a stack of funny movies to watch, snacks, and fluffy entertainment magazines.  We also downloaded three Bill Bryson audio books to listen to in case the TV, magazines, and movies were not entertaining enough.  I really enjoy Bryson´s sarcastic humor when detailing his travel adventures.  We listened to several of them to help pass the time on the Trans-Siberian Railroad a few years ago.  Actually, being cooped up in a small train compartment for three days is pretty similar to being imprisoned in a hospital room.  The view here at Clinica Alemana, while pretty nice, isn´t quite as majestic as watching the silver birch trees glide by our window on our Siberian adventure.  But props to Clinica Alemana, because the service is light-years ahead in terms of friendliness.  Our Russian train stewardesses who answered every question with “Nyet!” struck fear in our hearts with just one icy stare.  The nurses here are significantly nicer.  When I was forced to take a pregnancy test before the Pet Scan because I couldn´t say “seguro, seguro” that I wasn´t pregnant, at first the nurses were a little annoyed.  I was going to be messing with their very tight test schedule even further.  Even though I knew there was approximately negative 25% chance that I had a ”huahita” inside my belly, my body has been pretty out of whack since the chemo treatments began.  Go figure!  Once I explained to the nurse that I was sorry that I couldn´t be sure, and that I was scared, and that I really, REALLY didn´t want anything to prevent me from receiving the scan today, she was pretty nice.  She admitted that they don´t get a lot of people my age taking the test (dagger through the heart…) and so they just aren´t accustomed to dealing with this kind of issue.  She promised that I would be able to have the tests today, albeit much later in the day, and that everything would be fine.

So I was wheeled back up to my hospital room in tears, due to all of the embarrassment surrounding my “pregnancy scare”.  It was time to simply wait some more.  The phrases of the Survivor song that had been running through my head all morning faded to a faint whisper. Eventually (an hour and a half later) the results of the test came back negative as expected and I was sent back down to receive the radiation for the Pet Scan.  The test itself didn´t hurt, but it was a little disconcerting to watch a nurse carry in a test tube of radioactive material that will then be pumped into your veins.  Seriously, that thing looked like a mini nuclear bomb, and judging by the mask and thick heavy gloves the nurse was wearing, the hospital pretty much treats it as such.  An hour after they administered the radiation I was sent to the machine.  The medical technology that we possess today is truly amazing.  The machines themselves are extremely impressive looking, especially for a humanities major, like myself.  I thought I was walking into a NASA testing lab.  Anyway, they had me lay down on this board, hands above my head, and loaded my veins up with some contraste so that they could properly take the images.  This injection made my body all warm and tingly (also slightly disconcerting), and then my body was passed through the machine very, very slowly.  My arms definitely fell asleep and became numb, but I knew I couldn´t move them.  After this test, I had to wait some more for my brain MRI at 7:35 PM.    I had been asked to come to the hospital this morning fasting (en ayuno), so by this point in the day I was starving!   It had been almost 23 hours and 25 minutes since my last meal and I really wanted to sink my teeth into a slice of warm, gooey, pizza.  Alas, I had to be content numbing my brain with more celebrity gossip and waited to be wheeled into my next testing room.  I was already familiar with the brain MRI procedure as I had one done before my diagnosis, so I knew what to expect.  The test was mercifully short and the only irritating thing was that one of my earplugs fell out when the machine began to vibrate.  I don´t know if you´ve ever had an MRI, but that sucker is LOUD!   The Eye of the Tiger beat became less “wah… wah-wah-wah….wah-wah-wah… wah-wah-waaaah”  and more “YEEeeEEeeEEeeEEeeEEee!  YEEeeEEeeEEeeEEeeEEee! Knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock….   YEEeeEEeeEEeeEEeeEEee!  YEEeeEEeeEEeeEEeeEEe” *  If I didn´t go into the exam with brain damage before, I certainly emerged with some serious damage to my ear drums.

I was very glad to be able to return to my room.  Even though the cold food the hospital gave me was completely inedible and unidentifiable, Jon at least had some bags of fruit and nuts and was nice enough to fetch me a Ginger Ale from the snack stand.  The nurses came in and declared that due to the late hour I would not be able to do my chemo that day.  I had pretty much figured that out when my pet scan took place a full eight hours after I was originally told it would take place.  Dr. Majlis also came by late in the evening to declare that he had no news for me, but he is sure it will be positive.  I find his attitude regarding the exams to be both uplifting and a little cavalier.  I hope he isn´t setting me up for the greatest disappointment of my life.  And now… we wait.  It is the following afternoon at 2:45 and I still have yet to receive any chemo or any news.  Will let you all know as soon as I hear something.  Love to you all!

*To check the accuracy of my use of onomatopoeia, please consult the following highly credible website: http://www.writtensound.com

      Since my last post was filled with despair and misery, this post will hopefully bring you tidings of good cheer.  As much as there are bad days during chemo there are also good days.   In fact, they have been some of the best days I´ve ever had.  I´m sure that at the end of this journey, like many of the more difficult periods of my life, I will remember only the good times.  I find this selective memory to be especially true with romantic relationships.  No matter how many blow-out fights you had or moments where you felt utterly alone and vulnerable… after the relationship is over you yearn for those tender moments: the fancy steak dinners, the inside jokes, the walks along shady moonlit streets, hand in hand planning out the future.   Yes, the mind is so good at blocking out the painful moments.

Luckily this past week was filled with relatively few painful moments and many that genuinely made me smile.  In addition to the general jolliness that tends to accompany the holiday season, this week Jon and I celebrated the beginning of his summer break and the birth of our friend´s first baby.  To kick off the Christmas celebrations, Jon and I hosted a White Elephant party on the 20^th for our Nido friends.  If you didn´t know already, one of my favorite things to do is plan a party.   Six years ago when I quit teaching to attend the New School of Cooking in Los Angeles, I envisioned making a career out of it.  However, after one year half-heartedly attempting to get Swift Catering off the ground, I realized that when you make a hobby your job, it becomes a whole lot less fun.  These days, I enjoy teaching for a living and throwing parties for free.  After an invitation for a party has been sent out, I spend hours upon happy hours flipping through cookbooks and browsing the web, trying to find the perfect combination of food and drinks to accompany the party´s theme.  Christmas parties are the easiest to plan because the theme and accompanying eats are usually pretty obvious.  Christmas in the southern hemisphere does throw a small wrench in the party planning, however, since no one really wants to drink mulled wine or wear ugly sweaters in the middle of summer.  So Jon and I settled on the following menu for our last-day-of-school White Elephant gathering:  (Yes, this is meant to make you drool…)

White Sangria

Spiced Roasted Nuts

Baked Brie with Raspberry Glaze and Assorted Cheese Platter

Veggies and Horseradish Dip

Swiss Bacon Dip with Chives

Gazpacho

Israeli Couscous Salad with Roasted Vegetables and Feta

And the piece de resistance…

Bourbon Peach Glazed Brisket

The desserts were brought by guests since I ran out of time to make the chocolate pudding cups, and also because I prefer making and eating savory food.  In order to complete our fantasy menu, Jon and I searched the entire Vitacura area for anything remotely resembling brisket.  We finally found something similar in a fancy meat store where the owner spoke English.  Even though I speak Spanish pretty well, it is difficult to translate that you are looking for the fatty, slow-cooking meat from the breast of a cow.  Our search was made more difficult by two factors: a) the people working the meat counter had no knowledge about cuts of beef in English OR Spanish and b) had absolutely no desire to help the customer.  There is no such thing as service with a smile in Chile!  Regardless, we found a brisket-like cut of meat, Jon labored over it for three straight days, rubbing, and grilling, and braising, and broiling…. and luckily, it was spectacularly delicious.  Yum!  I´m still thinking about it…

The party was a grand time as White Elephant parties often incite a great deal of laughter.  When I lived in Los Angeles, my friends and I used to have a girly Christmas party every year where we did a White Elephant gift exchange, and I longed to recreate that experience.  Some of the Nido guests had never done a party of this sort before, so the gifts ranged from actual presents like scented candles and sets of champagne glasses to used DVD players without the remote, cookie tins with no cookies inside, and aprons with a painted-on male body wearing a Chilean flag speedo.  Now that we´ve all had experience with White Elephant, I´m sure the gifts next year will be even uglier and funnier.  After the party most of us headed to a bar in Providencia where the Nido band, A lo Gringo, was playing a gig.  I was invited onto the stage to reprise my performance of “Hit Me with Your Best Shot“, and it turned out to be even more fun than the first time.  Don´t worry, folks: as much as I´ve enjoyed living out my fantasy of becoming a world-famous singer, I respect the music industry enough not to quit my day job!

The holiday celebration continued on into the weekend when Jon and I decided to make use of my gift certificate to a great little bed and breakfast in Zapallar.  Thank you, history department!!!!  Zapallar is the most beautiful beach that I´ve been to in Chile.  Part Newport, R.I, part La Jolla, part Italian coast: Jon and I both fell in love with this perfect little cove of beach, crystal blue water, rocky outcrops, forested hills, and beautiful, New England style mansions.  Jon and I haven´t spent a whole lot of time by ourselves over the last three months so it was nice just to relax together, have a romantic meal, and enjoy the sunshine.   While in Zapallar we also got the fantastic news that the Chile Pepper had finally arrived. On the 22^nd our friend, Erin, gave birth to a tiny baby girl named Lucia Antonia Flannagan.  Erin and I have spent a lot of time together the last few months as Chile has a mandatory 6 week pre-baby maternity leave.  We spent many an afternoon wallowing on the couch watching Homeland (highly recommended!) and attempting to make Christmas cookies.  It was my first up-close-and-personal experience with pregnant ladies or babies.  Although many of my friends and family back home have had kids, I haven´t been around to see their pregnancies or to meet their newborns.  Being able to ask Erin questions about her backaches and pains and to feel the baby kick in her belly was definitely an interesting experience for me.

It´s no secret that I´ve never been much of a baby person.  I´ve never spent time around them, and I don´t think they´re all that cute.  (Sorry!)  Most of all, I have never really had the urge to join the mommy club.  I remember becoming inexplicably upset and a bit perplexed when friend after friend announced their pregnancies.  I couldn´t believe that we were old enough to be having children.  I still have trouble realizing that it is actually normal for people my age to be on their second child.  I did not feel ready to take that plunge.  I still had so much traveling to do, I was still too selfish, too immature… I also had decided long ago that if some day I finally felt ready to have a family, I would like to adopt.  My first husband was adopted from Korea at age three, and I saw how much he appreciated the opportunities he was given by his American family.  They loved him, supported him, and allowed him to lead a life that he wouldn´t have been able to back in Korea.  Luckily Jon is keen on adopting as well, since it will be impossible for me to have children after chemo.  There are drugs you can take to keep your eggs in sort of a holding pattern during chemo treatment, but the drugs have horrible side effects and aren´t necessarily that effective.  In addition, there is no way I could knowingly pass my cancer gene on to my children.  But I won´t lie, the medical realization that I may never have a family of my own has sort of made me want to have a family.   You know that saying, “You always want what you can´t have?”  Well, it´s definitely true.  Since my diagnosis both Jon and I have found it hard to be around people with babies who are so happy about starting their lives together as a family.  It seemed so unfair.  I am very grateful, however, that Tom and Erin have let us share in their journey as new parents.  I´m pretty sure that first hand experience with diapers and crying fits will cure any of my romanticized feelings about having a baby.  I do have to admit that Lucia is a darn cute baby, though, and for me that´s saying a lot…

After my baby-holding experience, Jon and I spent Christmas Eve at a friend´s house with other Nido people who had decided to stay in town and had no family around.  Expat communities are always so good at including “orphans” in their holiday gatherings.  It´s something I really love about living abroad.  Everybody takes care of each other, just like family would do.  Christmas day, itself, was pretty nice, although much different from my holiday memories at Grandma Doft´s house filled with noisy dinners and lots of presents.  This year it was just me and Jon; so we opened our stockings and the six presents under the tree that we had purchased for each other the day before, and we were done.   We spent the rest of the day at the park with our dogs and later cooked a roast tenderloin meal for some more Christmas orphans.  All in all, a pleasant day, filled with lots of laughter, but not your typical snowy white Christmas Bing Crosby wistfully crooned about so many years ago.   But, you know what, I couldn´t have asked for a better day given the circumstance.  During this journey I have learned not to complain (as much) about what might have been and just try to make the most of what you are given.  Sometimes it´s been hard and I know I´ve done my fair share of complaining, but so far, it´s been do-able.  So…thank you, Santa, for bringing me a hard dose of reality and wisdom this year for Christmas.  Next year, though, I wouldn´t mind it if you brought me something frivolous…I´ve had just about as much reality as I can take.

      Well it´s been two weeks since my last treatment and the emotional trauma and depression of last week seems like a distant memory.  It´s strange: physical pain or sadness is a hard thing to remember and describe accurately.  Perhaps this is why so many women willingly have more than one child… The way I have felt this week (alive, happy, and full of energy) seems so drastically different from the way I felt while lying helplessly on my couch for days on end.

After my last chemo session the other doctor prescribed some different after-treatment medicines.  One of them was a shot in my stomach that was intended to increase my white blood cell count.  I was a little confused as to why I needed the shot in the first place since Dr. Majlis always proclaims my blood work to my “Great!  Amazing!”, but I am the kind of patient who doesn´t really question what my doctors tell me to do.   When I went to get the shot I was pretty annoyed because, first of all, they made me wait two hours in order to get a five second shot.  I always find it so amazing that the different parts of the hospital never communicate with each other.  My doctor simply told me to go to the outpatient oncology section sometime in the morning, but of course those nurses had no record of me needing a shot and so had not ordered it from the pharmacy yet.  Typical…   The second reason I was annoyed was because no one told me what symptoms to expect from the shot.  When I asked the nurse if the shot was going to hurt, she said “No.”  The shot itself didn´t hurt, (unless you are adverse to giant needles piercing deep into your belly) but the days after the shot were not so fun.  At first the pain started in my feet and ankles and began to work it´s way up into my entire body.  It felt like really bad shin splints and then began to escalate until every bone ached and occasionally sent out shots of pain that pulsed for a few minutes at a time.  Doctors always ask you to rate your pain on a scale of 1-10, and usually I respond with a 1 or 2, but this particular pain registered at more like a 7 or 8 on my threshold.  Again- all you women who have given birth may be laughing at me since I am sure there are worse pains than this, but I haven´t experienced anything like it before.  I certainly never experienced intense growing pains when I was younger, as I´m sure my five-foot-tall stature might have already indicated.  Jon, on the other hand, could probably relate pretty well when he grew five or six inches the summer after his freshman year.

When it was evident that the pain wasn´t temporary, Jon and I googled the drug and found out that it causes your bone marrow to grow and expand, which explains the aching bones.  The pain alone might have been more manageable if I had been able to do anything but lie uncomfortably on the couch and obsess about not feeling well.  Unfortunately, in addition to the aches, I also felt extremely dizzy when I tried to stand for more than ten minutes and was overwhelmed with fatigue.  I was completely submerged in the rabbit hole, if you will.  Luckily for you readers, I chose to write the blog when I was feeling better instead of during the depths of last week´s depression.

There was a lot of uncontrollable crying last week.  Usually I am able to pull myself up pretty quickly after a good cry, but I just couldn´t stop being sad.  I think mainly because I felt it was the end of “Eli- Superhuman Cancer Patient”, and the beginning of “Wow, Chemo Feels like Shit!”.  After the first three treatments, I had managed to complete small tasks like grocery shopping or walking to Erin´s house, even when I wasn´t feeling so well.  This time I had to stop during the middle of a session of dishes because I was about to faint.  Grocery shopping was un-thinkable, and I my very VERY pregnant friend (she gave birth yesterday) had to waddle to me since I couldn’t even make fifty feet of the mile long trek.    It being the holiday season, I also had a list of things I needed to get done and also a number of events I wanted to attend, but none of this was possible.  The key to remaining optimistic while going through chemo is to continue to live your normal life as closely as possible.  You have to force all of the unanswered questions about the future out of your mind and focus only on the image of yourself as strong, invincible, and healthy, while feeling anything but.  I felt so horrible I couldn´t do any of this.

Last week I lost the mental battle so integral during cancer treatment and my former emotional weaknesses reared their ugly head.  Even under normal circumstances I have had bouts of depression where I hate myself and can´t think of anything remotely positive. Laying at home, too lazy/sad/weak to cover my bald head or attempt to dress, I let these feelings of grief overwhelm me.  Reading about the school shooting in Newton and scrolling through the lists of online responses to the articles did not improve my mood.  I don´t want to get into a fight with any of my Texan readers about gun control, but anyone who thinks the answer to a devastating school shooting is to arm the teachers with handguns is completely deranged.  Being a historian, I have often wanted to cry out at the desperate state of humanity, and last week´s events proved to be one of those times.  Sadness over that event, coupled with my pain and loneliness, forced the haunting question, “What is the point????” to wash over my body over and over until it became one giant emotional tidal wave, threatening to flood me and anyone unlucky enough to be in my presence.  Since Jon was busy with school my dad had to bear the brunt of my sadness during one tearful phone call home.  I know that one of the worst things for a father to hear is a daughter pleading for help when he lives thousands of miles away.  For this reason I usually don´t call my friends and family back home when I´m feeling sad, because there is usually nothing they can do I and don´t want them to worry.  Even when I was going through my divorce four years ago, there were seldom phone calls home.  I was hoping to be able to put up the same front during my cancer treatment, but last week it was just a little too hard.

Regardless, I was very happy I called home because my dad was a great comfort to me.  Usually when I call he talks for a few minutes and then puts me on the phone with my mom.  This time we talked for over an hour about everything and anything.  Last year dad had a serious medical scare as well: blood clots in the lungs.  We talked about the need to cut back on activities in order to recover and recuperate.  We discussed the importance of remaining mentally active while being physically inactive.  Perhaps I could do puzzles, or Sudoku, or learn a new language, or take some online classes, or work on my photo books.  All of his advice and also his empathy really helped to pull me out of the hole of depression I had dug for myself.  I know there are going to be more terrible times ahead, but I also now have the right mental attitude to face them.  It is so important to focus on the good days when the bad days are occurring and to realize that the fatigue and pain is only temporary.  Because there will be good days after all.  My next blog will tell you all about those as well:-)  Hope everyone had a happy holidays!

It´s three days out since my last treatment and I gotta tell you… I am EXHAUSTED!  I´m guessing this is the cumulative effect of the chemo, but all of my energy seems to have been sapped away this time. The treatment went pretty similar to the other times, but it took a lot longer.  My doctor was out of town this week so I was somebody else´s patient, and everything just seemed to go a lot slower.  There is nothing worse than waiting around in a hospital after your treatment is done.  It´s as painful as watching paint dry.  I thought poor Jon was going to jump out of his skin. On the plus side, though, the nurses were more aware of my body´s reaction to the taxotere and had some preventative measures in place so that I didn´t pass out.  In addition to all of the anti-nausea drugs, they also gave me three different anti-histamines and decided to drip the chemo drug in for three hours instead of two.   It seemed to work better although I could still feel my body straining against the poison.  Sucking on a delicious Fox´s Mint (Thanks, Leah!) definitely helped cut down on the metallic taste of the medicine.

The after-care from this round was a bit more intense than the previous times.  In addition to three different anti-nausea pills that I take twice daily, I also had to go in to the clinic the day after for a shot to keep my white blood cells up.  It´s really important that I stay healthy and don´t get an infection, so I´m hoping that Jon´s kindergartners don´t pass on some hideous virus.  Actually, I am wondering if the shot is actually what is making my body so sore though, because man oh man- I can barely hold my head up or turn my neck. Luckily I´m still not nauseous but my entire body aches.  I think I could have run a marathon or two and not have muscles this sore.  Very strange.

Regardless, it is a beautiful day out: I´m so glad it´s summer and the garden is in full bloom.  I have lots of TV shows available on my Hulu Plus and some online Christmas shopping to attend to. Best of all, I have two adorable doggie-dos who are content to nap the day away with me on my couch.  Chingy is such a good cuddler and this couch is so comfy.  The three of us are quite the scene right now!   Well, sorry for the rather insignificant post, but I thought it best to keep you updated.  Good luck with all of the crazy pre-holiday schedules.  We have quite a busy week ahead of us next week so I need to save up my energy.  Ciao.

 

I know I should be finishing Part II of my post regarding the Timms family adventure in Chile, but today is a treatment day. I always feel introspective on treatment days, which means it´s a great day to add to my blog.  So I hope you will allow me to indulge in a little perspective-sharing before finishing the story about my family´s trip.

It is a warm summer day here in Santiago and I am sitting at the little table in the corner of my hospital room typing away on my laptop and listening to some calming tunes on the Ipad.  Jon is taking a nap on the much-too-small, pull-out couch, wearing his pink Team Eli T-shirt. Outside of my window is a nice view of the mountains, unfortunately, it´s a little/ (okay…. a LOT) smoggy today… so it´s a bit hard to make out their exact shape.  However, I am extremely grateful for the sunshine.  This morning was tough because I had to say goodbye to my best friend, Randi, who arrived at the beginning of the month.  We had such an amazing week together and it really made me think about the things that are most important in life…: To laugh often and love much.  There has been so much laughter and love this week that it still makes me teary eyed thinking about it.  I remember mid-week, while Jon was out watering his new garden, that he actually came inside to tell me that he turned down his music because he was so happy to hear me laughing again.  I guess I had been more depressed during my time between visitors than I thought… During her visit, Randi and I shared many, many laughs and also had some deep conversations about life, memories, hopes, dreams, and our biggest fears.  It really helped me to reflect on what I´ve learned from my journey so far.

What I realized is that I´ve become a much more stable, happy, and healthier person.  I know it sounds weird that having cancer would help bring you stability and happiness, but I truly think it has helped me to finally understand what is important in life and to cherish it.   I used to be such a worrier, always wanting everything to be perfect.  I stressed over little, inconsequential things.  On the other hand, I also used to act irresponsibly in my attempt to forget the stress.  My first marriage ended as a result of all that unhappiness and stress I was harboring inside.  I was never happy with what I had achieved in life, but always compared myself to everyone else, hoping to be better at them at this or that.  I was never satisfied with my job or my relationship or my friendships or my looks, when I should have been celebrating what an amazing life I DO have.  I guess I just always wanted to make sure I made the right choices in life and achieve as much success as possible.  Now I really just want to live life and enjoy it.  And what a fabulous life I´ve been living these last few months!  I feel kind of guilty about having time off to travel with my friends and family, but I have been given this opportunity and I definitely want to take advantage of it.

I still make appearances at school and am really excited about helping out with the school musical “Rock of Ages” next semester.  It is definitely important to still feel connected to the community at Nido, even though I no longer have a classroom and someone else is teaching my classes.  The community continues to be overwhelmingly supportive.  This week I attended the athletic awards banquet and was greeted with many hugs, a few tears during my speech, and a message to “Stay Strong, Ms. Timms!” on the end of season video.  After the banquet we moved up the track where a few high school students had organized an all-school event called Light Up the Night to raise money for cancer.  The money will be used to buy airplane flights for me and Allyson Mills (another young teacher with thyroid cancer).  The event was really beautiful and over 500 people attended.  In case you´ve never heard of this event, teams of people purchase balloons filled with flashing lights and walk with them at night to support people with serious illnesses.  At the Nido event several student bands performed, food was sold, and students were painting faces and just hanging out on the field.  To see that many people (many of them complete strangers) gathered in one space, all in support of me, was a very humbling, terrifying, and truly wonderful experience.  Honestly, at first I wanted to run away because everyone wanted to talk to me, hug me, ask how I was feeling, and I just really didn´t know what to say or how to handle it.  But after I got my balloon and started to make my laps around the track I was able to find the appropriate answers to everyone´s questions and to ease a genuine smile back on my face.  Walking with Randi and Jon definitely helped with that.  I will never forget the way the night sky looked with all those balloons moving around the track and the sounds of the students having fun.  I guess breathtaking would be a good word to describe it.  To realize it was happening because I have cancer made it surreal.  The love and support shown to me by so many people is yet another thing to cherish and remember for the rest of my life.

The other thing I have to be thankful for is my current state of health.  Again, I know this sounds weird since I have stage four cancer, but I know it could be a lot, lot worse.  I can hardly believe that it´s already my fourth chemo treatment and that I´m still going strong.  Besides the scar and weird protrusion on my chest from the chemo port, the lack of hair on my head, and thinning eyebrows and eyelashes, I pretty much look the same.  In fact, this week I had three different people ask me (jokingly?) if I really had cancer.  Which I guess is a good sign, of course, since it means I must appear the same to them. Or maybe they were just impressed that a cancer patient was attending an open mike night event put on by the Nido faculty and actually performing on stage.  Apparently my rendition of Hit me With Your Best Shot, was a real crowd-pleaser.  I know it probably had more to do with my attitude than with my vocal abilities, but it was still fun to see everyone up on their feet dancing and singing along.  Other frequent comments that night included, “Wow!  You look so healthy!”  I know this was meant as a compliment, but of course I have interpreted it as, “Wow!   I can´t believe you haven´t lost any weight on chemo!”  Me neither, folks… me neither.  When I was first making my mental notes about the positive outcomes that may come from my treatment I thought, “Great!  Maybe I´ll end up with curly hair, and hopefully I´ll actually lose some weight!”  The weight loss is not happening though… I still have my appetite and honestly am so, so glad that I can still eat everything that I want to.  I know that many other chemo patients would be very jealous of my ability to continue to maintain a superfluous calorie count.     But still… you would think I´d be able to shed a few pounds, at least!

In general, my chemo side effect symptoms have been so minimal that sometimes I worry it is working at all.  Jon has to remind me all the time what a good thing it is that I am still able to function quite normally, and of course he is right.  Randi admitted that when she came down she thought I would be in much worse shape.  She was so happy to be able to cook with me, climb hills in Santiago with me, visit vineyards with me, and attend karaoke nights in Irish pubs with me.  And believe me, I am so happy that I was able to do those things with her.  So I guess the perspective I´ve gained is the following: Yes, I have cancer, but I still have life, and I still have laughter, and I still have love.  Thanks again, everyone:-)

I guess it´s about time for the report on the family visit to Chile.  (I know you´ve all been waiting with baited breath)….. well… It went swimmingly and made me love both my family and the country I call home so much more.  Last summer Jon and I had the grand pleasure of hosting both of our sets of parents (AT THE SAME TIME!), so mom and dad had already done a bit of traveling in Chile.  On that trip we visited the port city of Valparaiso as well as the beach resort of La Serena and the Elqui Valley: a sort of desert oasis area filled with cute little towns and the birthplace of pisco, Chile´s national liquor.  However, this was Ali´s first trip ever to South America so I was anxious to show her some of the great things to do in and around Santiago.

To preface this entry, the four members of my immediate family had not taken a vacation together since 2003 when mom and dad drove to Prude Ranch in western Texas where Ali and I had, for some inexplicable reason, chosen to become camp counselors and horse experts at a real live dude ranch for the summer.  (Don´t laugh… I may still have the scar from when I was branded during counselor orientation/hazing as proof…)  Regardless, it was my final year of college, and the four Timmses decided to celebrate my graduation with an epic camping trip that took us from the hills of Fort Davis, Texas to Great Basin National Park in Nevada, the Redwood Forest in Northern California, and finally the deep blue waters of Crater Lake in Oregon.  Wow… that trip seems so long ago, but what great memories. Historically, most of my family´s vacations were either spent in England, visiting our grandparents, or in our pop-up Coleman camper traversing the United States.  In addition to collecting black brochures from as many National Parks as possible, my mother took great pleasure in introducing my father, sister, and me to the natural beauty and historic landmarks of my birth country.  In truth, there are few places in the world that can boast mind-blowing scenic landscapes like the good ol´ U S of A.  However, I must say that the Republic of Chile gives some of those scenic vistas a run for their money…..  I haven´t yet found a Grand Canyon equivalent, but I have seen the Chilean version of Napa Valley, the Big Sur, the Rocky Mountains, the lakes and volcanoes of the Pacific Northwest, as well as the Mojave desert.  Have I inspired more of you to visit me yet?

Anyway, in the years following my graduation from college, family rendezvous became more complicated and usually took place in Houston at Christmas time with various boyfriends,etc in tow.  These get-togethers were always fun, but usually much too short and packed full of visits with other family members and friends.  During the three years I lived in Dalian, I was fortunate that both my sister and parents were able to make it over to China on separate occasions.  I will never forget climbing on hands and knees with my mom and Jon on a steep and lonely section of the Great Wall during an April snow shower.  (Unfortunately we only saw the sign “Do Not Climb Here” after we had finished our perilous journey.)  Likewise, I remember with fondness an evening spent in the rice paddies of rural Ping-an where I forced Ali to sample baijiu (Chinese fire water) on the floor of the stilt bamboo house we were staying in.  This trip to Chile was not quite as exotic as our romps through Asia, but it was still a great deal of fun.

I will be honest, Santiago isn´t the world´s greatest tourist city.  I absolutely love living here, but it isn´t a cultural mecca like Paris, London, Beijing, or Rio.  Santiago is very modern and there aren´t a lot of important historic landmarks or jaw-dropping museums to visit.  There is the central Plaza de Armas, a few churches and palacios from the 1800´s, some art museums, and the Chilean Nobel Prize winning poet, Pablo Neruda´s, home in Bellavista.  However, there are some very interesting neighborhoods to walk around in, some delicious restaurants, some great parks, and of course, scenic views of the Andes (when pollution permits…)  What I like most about Santiago is that there are some amazing places to take visitors that are only an hour or two away by car.  The capital of Chile is the gateway to majestic mountain scenery, beautiful beaches, local craft towns, and amazing wineries.  I thought I would try to show some of that to my family.  So we headed down to the Colchagua wine valley in Santa Cruz where a friend of mine from school owns a delicious Italian restaurant called Vino Bello and a similarly named bed and breakfast.  It was very relaxing, scenic, and the wine was delicious.  We even took in a very random antique horse carriage race taking place at Vina Santa Cruz.  Who knew???

The second part of our trip included a jaunt to my favorite Chilean city: Valparaiso and the coast north of Valpo including the fabulous beaches of Cachagua and Zapallar.  But since this blog has taken me forever to write AND the computer just erased the entire second part of my post, I will have to postpone that…  Wait for Part II:-)