Saturday, October 26, 2013

Feathered Friends

It could be chemo brain. Or just one of those things that, once a routine, you no longer recall how it all began. Suffice it to say that about four months ago I started picking up feathers on my walks. 



When I began chemo, it became especially important to me to move my body every day. At first it was walks up and down our little road in the woods. Later, I adopted Quail Hollow Ranch as my refuge and hiking place. I also began a ritual of walking by the ocean on chemo Thursdays. 

Somewhere along the way, in those early days of chemo, I began to pick up feathers in my path while on my daily walks. As the days and walks added up, I realized that I was making an important and amazing connection with our feathered friends. I began to find feathers every time I walked. Sometimes one or two, sometimes a dozen. Once, when faced with a difficult decision (whether or not to continue with chemo), I found an amazing array of feathers all in one spot along my path, guiding me to the right answer. 



As I accumulated a larger and larger bowlful of feathers, I decided that when I was finished with chemo I would do an art project with them. Perhaps I will make myself a pair of wings, that will allow me to take off and soar from this place, taking everything I've learned and incorporating it all into who I am now. I'll share more on that process when the time comes. 

I am looking forward to being done with chemo, but it will be hard to ever stop looking for feathers in my path. 





Thursday, September 26, 2013

Why I Chose to do Chemotherapy

So here's the deal. I'm not going to cite all the research. I'll only give you my statistics for a cure rate of my particular cancer. The thing is, decisions about treatment come down to feelings. After you've done all the research, spoken with multiple healing practitioners (conventional and alternative), read many books -- all those head-related things -- your decision comes down to your heart and what feels right for you. You meditate, pray, consult with the trees, the angels. You ask the universe for a sign (and get it). You sleep on it. Then you make a choice and move forward. Of course if you're like me, you revisit your decision and question again. And again. Especially when it feels like you're dying inside and everything feels all wrong about doing chemotherapy. 


"Big medicine." This is how I describe chemotherapy to my two-year-old son. 

After my mastectomy and axillary lymph node dissection, I was given a 50% chance of recurrence had I done no further conventional treatment. With hormone therapy and chemotherapy, that figure dropped to 20%. In other words, I now have an 80% chance of never having cancer again. 

Chemotherapy was one of my hugest fears related to having cancer. It is the one thing I wanted to avoid (probably why I needed to face it!). It goes so far against how I want to treat my body. It is the ugly thing that shows the world that I have cancer and am ill (Crazy! I am not sick!). But I chose to include chemotherapy in my healing treatment menagerie because I want to do everything I can to prevent recurrence. It is not the only treatment I am using, however, to create a healthy, whole me. It may have the biggest teeth, but I firmly believe that for my cancer, it is the combination of conventional and alternative traditional medicine that is the most powerful. 

How do you feel about chemotherapy? Did you know that Taxol (one of the three chemotherapy drugs I have taken) comes from the Pacific Northwest Yew tree bark?

Monday, September 9, 2013

Future Wings

I just have to think that -- along with everything in life -- there are multiple facets to this cancer thing. It isn't just a physical dis-ease. There are soul and spiritual elements which present an undeniable call for growth and transformation. Is breast cancer a spiritual journey? Is any dis-ease or illness a potential awakening? 




I discovered a lump and was diagnosed with Invasive Ductal Carcinoma on Good Friday, 2013. I had surgery on May 16, 2013. Left mastectomy. I began chemotherapy on July 5, 2013. Adriamycin, Cytoxan, Taxol. This is a blog about my experiences, treatments, thoughts, feelings, decisions... as I walk through the fire.