Once more unto the breach, dear friends

It's been awhile since I updated. I am desperately trying to regain my normalcy as things are starting to settle back into a routine. Since this last update, there have been few things to update about. I feel like it's super mundane to talk about the readjustment to "normal" life. But that is what has me so tired out. I've spent ((counts fingers)) 9 months actively fighting cancer. My body has taken a beating. If there is a random, not-very-often-had side effect...I've gotten it. BUT. But I am still here. I still continue to thrive. What is resilience? It's such a buzz word in therapeutic circles. But, what does it mean to have it? How do you get it? Can it be lost?

Some of the hardest parts of healing are actually happening now, once the incisions are healed and the hair is returning. It's when on the outside I start to resemble Aug. 2013-Mary but on the inside? I'm still struggling to figure out who I am, post-cancer. NGL, dear friends...my bravado is shook just a titch.

This week I started radiation. I feel a bit like a child at this point. If I could (and my life weren't potentially at stake), I would honest-to-God stomp my feet and refuse to go. I don't wanna do it. I just don't. For so many reasons, but most of all? Because I just want to be EFFING DONE WITH THIS ALL. But if I don't do the radiation, there's a 30% higher chance of me having a re-occurrence of cancer in that area. My psych stats class may have sucked, but I do believe that's a statistically significant increase. I just feel like I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop. I've had such bad experiences throughout this (OMG, the nausea! Hospitalizations...all the crap) it's hard to believe that I might actually have an easy time of this. This may shock some of you, but I can be kind of a pessimist (I KNOW, shocking, right?!). I prefer to plan for the worst and be pleasantly surprised when it doesn't all head down the toilet. It's hard to remain pessimistic when it's (literally) life or death, though. And because of that, I feel as though I've been blindsided frequently throughout my treatment. Not because my doctors haven't shared their thoughts with me. Because I was unable to see anything less than an idealistic and happy ending.

But maybe that's the trick. Maybe I've just begun to adjust my definition of happy in this situation. In the beginning, happy = alive with my real boob. Now it's just happy = alive with my real boob.

At any rate, here's the update. I have 33 radiation treatments total. I go in M-F for about 15 minutes for about 6 weeks. I'm scheduled to be done late August. I've had many docs tell me that radiation will cook me "like a turkey" (No lie--even the radiation onc. Maybe that's one of the reasons I'm resistant?/sarcasm).

But.

But.

I will survive this. I will regain a sense of normalcy. And I will get my swagger back.

INVICTUS

by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chance

My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the Horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years

Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate:

I am the captain of my soul.

I aspire to achieve this. And e-cookies to those who recognize the line that titles this post (real cookies if I can get them to you)!

~M