Fuck You, Cancer...

Almost four years ago, my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. I wrote about what an ass her surgeon was here and about my own fears of medical procedures here. I didn't write much about cancer but I did know two things: it sucks, and the treatments are hard to get through.

Because of this experience, I've innocently and ignorantly thought that this was what cancer was like: It is really, really sucky, and then it ends and you can go back to your regularly scheduled life.

I haven't written very much about my childhood best friend on this blog. I did write this post four years ago as I was expecting her to visit my appartment in the big city all those years ago.

In that post, I mentioned her mother. Her mother was a wonderful figure in my childhood, one who I admired and who I thought was very, very cool.

A year ago, my childhood best friend's mother was diagnosed with cancer. I did my best to support my friend T, and the cancer treatments ended. Hurray! Life could go on as normal!

Two months ago, her mother was again diagnosed with cancer. T (Which is what I call her in real life... My T) told me about her mother's state and level of care and I was nothing but confused. When you get cancer, you get treatment, right? And then you go on to live your regularly scheduled life.

Right?

A little over a week ago, I was at my first horse show with Sargeant and my phone kept ringing. I didn't recognize the number, so I didn't answer. The number kept calling and after the show I was left alone with a beer, my thoughts, and my ribbons and the phone rang again. I answered it and it was a voice I didn't recognize saying "Amanda?"

I didn't know who it was so I answered as though I knew who it was and the voice continued to say "I'm sorry to bother you when you're riding, your dad said you were at a show. I'm sorry to bother you..."

And I recognized the voice as my T. The girl who was my main person from the age of four through twenty two. And I knew it was her but it didn't sound like her and she continued to speak

"But my mother died this morning and I didn't want you to find out from the papers. You can keep riding, I know it's important to you..."

And I froze. I just kept saying "What? What!" into the phone.

I said I needed to be with her and to sit with her so my mother and I immediately left the barn and my mother dropped me off at her appartment. We sat in silence, numb and scared, together, drinking diet pop and smoking cigarettes, tears rolling down our cheeks in a state of terrified wordlessness that I cannot describe.

My best friend lost her mother. The girl I grew up with no longer has a best friend, a confidante, someone to shop with and someone to tell all her thoughts and fears to. Her mother was someone you could have beers with, someone you could tell about the guy you're dating, someone you could joke with, someone who made you feel like you were the smartest person in the world.

She always laughed at my poorly placed jokes, she always told me I was the smartest person she knew. She was always on my side, always in my corner and I could tell her just about anything and it wouldn't stun her. And no matter what I said, she supported every word of it. But this is not about me.

The girl I spend my childhood and teenage years with has lost the most significant player in her life.

I have no idea how to support my friend through this, how to say anything that would mean anything of value. I don't know what to do except to sit beside her in stunned silence because this is not what was supposed to happen. This wonderful, exhuberant, intelligent, caring, hilarious woman is gone from this Earth and my friend will never talk to her again.

I've deliberated over posting this since I heard of her death. Since I've known that she is gone I can honestly say that there has been an emptiness inside me, thinking of the horror my dear friend is going through.

Learing About Life...

My mother and I have recently gotten our hands on a copy of the first season of Third Watch. And so, we've been sitting on the couch and watching episode after episode.

Tonight we watched an episode in which the characters asked each other when they learned that life doesn't turn out the way you want it to. And I thought to myself, what an interesting question.

For the last several years, I've been meandering about in this life wondering when it was going to take shape again. I was once a person who had faith in this life, that with hard work one could make happen what he or she wants to make happen. I once believed in true love *swoon* and endings that truly were happily ever after.

When I was nineteen, all of these ideas blew up in my face, slapping me swiftly and soundly, and left me laying in a heap on my mother's living room floor.

I can proudly say that it has been some time now since I've lain in a heap on the floor: My more recent breakdowns are apt to leave me on the couch with Dixie or in the barn with Zydo than they are to leave me on the floor. (This gives me hope, because clearly my breakdowns of late have been of a lesser variety than breakdowns of the past. I now lay on the couch in a heap; read: I've elevated myself up off the floor an on to modern-day furnishings.)

Because I am such a curious person, I had to ask my mother when it was that she learned that life doesn't turn out the way you want it to. She blinked at me several times, and answered by saying that she supposed she learned that when she was fifty three.

And now I'm sitting here at my computer, baffled and wondering as to which is worse. Is it worse to live your whole life the way you wanted to live it, and then find out through cancer that things don't go the way they are supposed to? Or is it worse to wake up one day, young and with a sparkle in one's eyes, to be whacked about the head with the fact that sometimes, shit doesn't go down the way you think it is supposed to?

And I'm sitting here focussing on which is worse, and really, I think the question is which is better....

Like, with my newfound cynical self, am I better off and less likely to be tripped up by foolish ideals?

So, I really can't decide if I'm better off for having learned the hard lessons fast and young, or if I'm worse off for having the youthful idealism slapped out of me at a young age.

At any rate, it's been a long, long day here at The Ranch, and perhaps I'm not really interested in mulling these thoughts over at all. Perhaps I just need to curl my lazy self up into my luxurious flannel sheets and drift off into slumber, thinking that nothing really matters at all; as long as you have a cozy and safe little haven -- one that you can call your own-- to curl up into at the end of the day.

Updating on Dixie and My Perpetual Laziness...

I've neglected my blog lately not because I'm a total LazyAss but because I've been drowning in work and school. I've even been pretending to be someone who puts on clothes and gets out of the house to be social.

I did that last weekend, put on a forty dollar tank top and eighteen pounds of makeup, styled my newly-cute haircut, and walked through a perfect mist of perfume before I went out. I ended up in a bar where most of the patrons were wearing Jogging Pants. And I spent the whole night thinking, Like, where was this bar when I was all depressed and couldn't get out of bed? Because no matter how much my life reminds me of a giant pile of ass, I think I could ALWAYS make room for a public facility that promotes drinking alcohol in one's jammies.



As promised, a picture of Dixie looking hilariously pathetic in her lampshade collar. Unlike when Copernicus had her surgery, I DID NOT invite my friends over to laugh at Dixie while she got stuck on the furniture around the house. I really have matured that much in the last two years.



Dixie feels like I do about the mornings, and the Thursday after she got home, she was not pleased to be greeted by me toting a camera. She didn't have much to say to the camera, other than a pathetic, beagle-y little look that said "Please, Dear God, why didn't you shoot me behind the barn rather than subject me to this humiliation?"



She is feeling completely back to her old self again, and once more lives to lie unconscious on the couch with me. We take a nap every day together, Dixie and I, and that is how I justified a dog being worth as much money as we spent on her. I figure, hey, I never get out of the house, or go out to dinner, or take myself to a movie or buy new clothes. I come home and nap with my dog. And really, if I can get four more years of napping with my precious little Muppy Wuppy (And yes, I do call her that, out loud and often, and frequently in the presence of others) then it is an amount of money worth spending.



Here is a close-up of Dixie's incision and how beautiful it is. I've been on a farm my whole life, and I've been privvy to many an incision. And I know how my mom told me to quit calling her surgeon an ass on the Internet, and after I called him an ass a few more times, I vowed to stop.

But, we were discussing him the other day, the stupid fuckwit that he is, and I realized, Hey! It's been a long time since I called him names on my blog! And my mother and I were admiring Dixie's incision as she lay stretched out on the couch, and my mother said "Wow, that's a perfect incision. It's beautiful. I only wish my scar looked like that."

Yes, that's right. A frickin' VETERINARIAN made a better scar on my DOG than a surgeon managed to make ON MY MOTHER.

And I have to say that I'm quite glad that Dixie was in such capable hands, and that if we ever have to deal with cancer again in this family?

I'M CALLING THE DAMN VET.

And then there was rage...

I'm enraged right now, for reasons that I'm not sure my mother would be happy about me posting on the internet.

My mother has cancer, and this is no secret from anyone. I've been very open and honest with everyone I know regarding her condition: It sucks. She has cancer. But we found it early and we are currently undergoing radiation in hopes of deterring a recurrence.

My rage is not directed at cancer, exactly. Of course, if this had never happened, I'd never have to deal with this type of rage to begin with. But she does and life is the way it is. I learned young that you can't change circumstance, although you can say no to that last shot of tequila which can change curcumstance altogether.

My mother's doctors have been a bunch of assholes. I'm tyically very patient with people who are providing life-saving therapies for the people I love the most, but in this case, I just need to vent.

The surgeon was a complete and total fuckwit. If I knew what kind of car he drove and what a distributor cap looked like, his would be completely fucked up right now. We are done with him, thankfully, and once we were done with him I was glad to move on to the next set.

The oncologist, however, has not been any better. I have not met the woman in person, and from the stories I hear about her I am fairly glad. I'm pretty sure that if I did meet her, I would turn into a shrieking mass of hysteria, hair and run-on sentences abound in her office. I'd also surely mess up my 'breathe' and 'breath' while screaming to her about how I'm running out of breath. Or breathe. Whichever.

The problem is that I have all this rage in regards to the treatment these people have given my mother, and no one to direct it to. I don't know who to call and yell into the phone at, until I'm out of breath (breathe?) and my face turns blue; until my chest infection turns me into a dry heaving mass of confusion who no one can understand.

I only wish I were the type of person to write letters and make phone calls and yell into phones in my spare time. The problem is that my years in customer service have made me terrified to direct my rage at the innocent person behind the counter.

And so, instead of doing anything productive with the anger that lies inside me, I sit and I smoke and I drink beer and I wait for this period in my life to be over.

And my inability to provide comfort and stand up for the person I love the most only enrages me more.

The Season of Sickness...

SuperNan: Cancer

Berry Queen: Multiple Sclerosis.

Berry Princess: Inability to breath or stop coughing or move in any way without inducing a coughing fit that would kill weaker souls.


It's gonna be a good one....

And it starts...

A number of people have probably been curious as to why I haven't been seeking out some kind of employment since I finished school. I will fully admit that part, or even most, of the reason lies in the fact that I am a huge lazy-ass. The other part is that I begin my duties as a berry farm field manager in mid-June. The other part is that SuperNan begins radiation on this Tuesday the twenty second, and I want to be there every step of the way.

I feel a little bit bad for hogging up my mom at this time, but the two of us manage to have a pretty good time together. Our taste in music is generally the same, although when I start blaring out the Megadeth, she tends to run screaming from the room. I also tend to pop the clutch more than she does, and as a result she does ninety-nine percent of the driving when we go on outings together. I know that several other people want to take my mom to her treatments, because as cancer has taught me, there are many, many wonderful people out there who want to help out a friend or family member.

The thing is that SuperNan and I have a deep-seated understanding of one another's love for beverages from Tim Horton's consumed in a car with country music coming from the stereo. We know when to be quiet, when to turn up the radio, and when to chat about whatever it is we need to chat about.

At this point, life is getting kind of busy. I'm not sure if I'll have the same amount of time to post here as I usually do when I'm unemployed and sitting about the house doing nothing. I hope to get started on my plans for the barn and for my garden, and between that and radiation, who knows how much time I'll have for the Internet?

At any rate, I will be here as much as I humanly can be.

Life's Big Decisions...

I haven't made it a secret here that my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer this past January. So far she has done wonderfully with surgery and treatment, although I think her surgeon is an ass -- but I'm not allowed to diss her surgeon any more so I'll leave it at saying THE MAN IS A GIANT ASS. Sorry, Mom.

There are decisions that come along with my mother's diagnosis of breast cancer that I have to make for my own health. The first big decision regards genetic testing.

If I test positive for what is known as BRCA 1 or 2 genes, I will have a very high probablity of developing breast cancer later in life. They don't know when, and I'm not sure if they will know what kind. I really haven't looked that much into it thus far.

The implications of this testing can be as huge or as minimal as I want them to be. I can choose a variety of prophylactic measures to fight it, or I can use it as a tool to be aware of what type of extra monitoring my health will need in the future.

I do not do medical procedures well. There was an incident when I was a teen that required me to have a chest X-ray, an incident that involved a terrifying technician and one of those hospital gowns and me not being permitted to wear a bra. This incident left me weeping in the passenger's side of my mother's car for what seemed like ages. I was weeping because this strange man caught a glimpse of my back. Not my ass, not anything in the bathing suit region. My back.

I hate having anything medical done to me, I hate having doctors be near my person, I hate having others in my personal bubble. The entire X-ray incident left me feeling so insignificant and exposed, but for God's sake, the man TOOK A PICTURE OF MY LUNGS. He didn't even have to come near me, but it still left me shaken and disturbed.

My mother has faced medical procedures since her first suspicious mammogram that would leave me clutching a magnum bottle of wine, weeping on the living room floor. I have no idea how she finds the strength to go through each additional procedure because I would simply wilt away into nothing and cease to exist.

Initially I thought I would take the most drastic measures available to prevent myself from having to undergo any procedures at all, including mammography. Pain does not deter me from too much: It generally ends and if it doesn't, they give you really, really good drugs. It is the invasion of my personal space that makes me shiver and run.

The last few days, however, I have been re-thinking my desire to take the most drastic measures available. I don't know why. But I suppose that I need to give every option the thought and investigation it deserves.

I don't know how to become strong. I don't know how to accept that this life will undoubtedly be full of medical procedures that I can or can not deal with. I don't know how to stop the shaking that overcomes me when I think of technicians coming at me with a platform thing-a-ma-jig in which they want to squish my teeny, tiny little chest into. I don't know how to accept that other people, at some point, may need to have some sort of contact with my person, and that an incident like that alone is not reason to want to punch them in the mouth.

I don't know why I am the way I am. I don't know why other people in my space creeps my shit out, and I don't know why medical procedures especially make me want to cry. I suppose I need to find myself some sort of guide, some sort of system to work myself up to being stronger in this regard so that I can make the best decision for my future.

I'm going to have to spend some time figuring out what that guide or system is.

Oh, the weekend...

It was a long and twisty weekend that started off at the doctors discussing every malady I have, from the fact that my head is refusing to maintain a fair portion of the hair growing in it, to the bottom of my numb and tingly feet. I have an ear infection, I'm worried about the amount of medication I take, and I get to go for genetic counselling some time this summer to find out if I have cancer genes. Wheeee!

I'm not sure what's up with my right leg, except that it is numb and tingly and it feels like approximately five hundred pounds of dead weight hanging off my knee cap. I have an appointment to see a neurologist at this point, and I've already decided that I probably have brain cancer and I'm simply going to wither up and die next August. I already promised Mal she can have my cat.

So now that my affairs are properly in order, I need to go and rest up because between the wedding I went to, the barhopping I had to do, the insane amount of driving that occurred, and the copious amount of Diet Coke I drank to try and stay awake?

I need a nap.

When clothes get complicated...

I have never been a very good shopper. I grew up on a farm and as a result, my wardrobe is fairly standard: Jeans, T-shirts, sweaters, boots (Docs or work boots), plaid jacket. I've had many issues in my life complicate my ability to shop for attractive, fashionable clothing; namely, that I'm broke or that I have no idea what actually constitutes fashionable or attractive when it comes to clothing.

Other issues relating to my inability to purchase clothes are the result of my odd body type -- By the time I can wedge a pair of jeans up over my thighs, they gape at the waist -- and my enormous bone structure. I really think that I should have chosen a career with the NFL because of my enormous-beyond-what-should-be- physically-possible ribcage. Bras are all but impossible to find because of my near non-existent chest and huge circumference; and pants that are long enough to touch the ground and cover my ass appropriately? Laughable.

SuperNan has never had any of these issues with clothes. She is average height at around five foot six, has a normal bone structure, and her figure is proportionate to the rest of her. Sometimes I roll my eyes at her and growl "Damn you, lucky bi-atch!" under my breath. YES, I talk that way to my mother under my breath and she still lets me live here for free. I don't really get it either, but I'm not going to question such a wonderful thing.

Breast cancer has put a bit of a damper in my mother's wardrobe requirements. We have been shopping for months now in preparation for her treatments to begin. We have been searching high and low for breathable clothing that is non-irritating to the skin, loose enough to be comfortable, yet tight enough to be supportive, and of course, fashionable enough that she can show herself in public.

The Berry Queen taught me the three rules of shopping years ago. These are not rules so much as they are questions, and they are: 1) Does it fit? 2) Is it attractive? and 3) Can you afford it? Before you make any purchase, you must answer each of these questions with a yes, or else you must put the item back on the shelf and never devote another millisecond of your life to thinking about it. NOT EVEN ONE.

This whole cancer thang has kind of thrown a wrench into those plans because now there are about eight questions to ask for each article she tries on.

Shopping for clothes today and the last few times we've tried now tends to take up a bit more time than it typically used to. However, I have to say that all this clothes-picking, looking at each and every loose-fitting cotton summer top in the store... its been fun. We've laughed over the ridiculous things (You know, when you decide to go out on a limb, and when you get there, you realize it was safer near the trunk of the tree? Yeah.), marvelled at some of the things that my older-than-me mother can actually pull off and still look dignified in, AND we haven't given up altogether and called in a tailor to create clothes for her in close proximity to our television.

This whole cancer thing will be coming to an end in mid-June. I'm thankful that my fmaily has the positive attitude we have about it, that we've been able to laugh together and come together over dealing with this icky, icky thing. At the same time? I won't be sad to see it done with.

[Breast Cancer, Clothes for Breast Cancer, Shopping, summer clothes]

Telling Cancer to Fuck Right Off...

I’ve been hesitant to post this most recent development in my life for a variety of reasons. In fact, Dear Internet, I’ve been hiding a secret from you for months now.

Part of blogging that is difficult for me is the privacy issues. It’s hard to know what family idiosyncrasies you really want to post for all the world to see (And in my case, for all my family to see, because I think they make up most of my readership). I mean, I have no problem telling the world that my mother obsesses over her kitchen table like some kind of crazy person; or that my father has a vein in his head that nears explosion every time I tell him that I think I might just take up organic veganism as a way of life.

I’ve told some other more personal things here about my own life as they don’t pertain to anyone else.

This thing that I’ve been hiding affects my life; but in a much greater way, it affects the most important woman in my life.

This past January, my mother, referred to here as SuperNan, was diagnosed with breast cancer. From what I understand, this particular cancer is the best one to get of many subtypes. Breast cancer in and of itself is a very, very large umbrella and underneath that umbrella lays a whole host of information that I can hardly begin to understand.

Being newly diagnosed with cancer is a scary, scary thing. The sheer volume of information takes over your brain the same way opening my closet door takes over everything in sight: you will weep, you will stare in horror, you will lose small children, and your cat might just end up with a broken leg.

The thing about this avalanche is that eventually, Google can help you decipher it and turn it into manageable heaps that you can put in neat little categories: Toss This, Forget That, Pretend I Never Saw That, Bookmark This Handy Little Tidbit, and For God’s Sake Get Rid of That Picture Before My Eyes Fall Right Out Of My Head.

I’m graduating very soon and as a result, my job search will be put off because this year I’ll be accompanying my mother to radiation treatments in the City for five weeks. As far as timing goes, she couldn’t have picked better to have cancer: I’ll be done AND I’ll have a free place to live. Unfortunately for my mother, she not only faces cancer treatment in the next months, she also faces me and my hoards of hair barrettes, pens, and conditioning hair treatments moving back under her roof.

Oh, and she gets saddled with a foul-tempered cat who yowls. All the time.

As far as spirits go, ours couldn’t be better. Our family has a sense of humor that, to some, may border on perverse. However, having experienced the things we’ve already experienced in this life, we know that you get nowhere without laughing first

SuperNan is facing her upcoming treatments with an iron will and a near-constant demand for French Vanilla coffee from Tim Horton’s. She’s already had a lumpectomy earlier in February, and made it through with flying colors and a well-healed scar.

I think a part of me is glad that I kept this information quiet on the Internet until now. I’m calm about it, I have my wits about me (as much as the few wits I have can actually be about), and I’ve seen my mother looking this disease in the face and giving it her most serious “Fuck You.”

For now, Internet, I want to assure you that all members of my family are doing well. SuperNan has recovered from her first surgery and is ready to take on the next step in the process.

And because that’s the type of team we are, we’ll be doing it together.

If you'd like to do something for our family right now, here is what I would appreciate the most: Please go to your mom, your aunt, your older sister, an older cousin, and any female family member in your life. Tell her to run out, this minute, and book a mammogram as soon as possible. Then, tell all your friends, male and female to do the same.

We caught my mother's cancer (And by we, I really mean the wonderous Dr. Chuck and his team of experts. God bless having a wonderful doctor.) at it's earliest possible stage. We are very, very fortunate to have done so, and as a result, my mother's prognosis for the future is good.

Which is ever so relieving to me, because how would I ever buy shoes again without my trusty sidekick SuperNan?

Toonses