Let The Scanxiety Begin
Does the fear of cancer ever go away? Does it ever ease up? Will I ever be able to get through a day without wondering how many more days I have left? I’ve learned a lot about life and priorities and happiness and success and letting things go this year. We all know life is short, but I have news for you… it’s really really short. I have no room left in my brain for negativity and no room left in my life for activities or relationships that don’t bring me joy. Oh and I’ve let go of the stress of trying to make everyone happy. I just want to surround myself with people who love me and do what makes me happy. I’ve realized that if I can eliminate those things and people that stress me out and bring me down, then I’m a much happier me. I want to live the rest of my days (no matter how many) as happy and as comfortable and as low maintenance as possible. I’ll always stress about my cancer returning, and therefore, I no longer have room for anything else that may add to that stress. Once you’ve faced death and narrowly avoided it, it’s much easier to say no. Maybe that’s selfish, but I think I’m allowed to be selfish - for a little bit anyway. Selfish with how I spend my time and with whom I choose to spend that time. I think this is the best way to live. Unapologetically and without excuses - just trying to be my best me with the people who deserve to be with me. I strongly encourage you all to try it too. It’s really freeing. Life is too fucking short. How’s that for perspective?
The past month has been great - so many things to celebrate and so many friends and family in town. We’ve really gotten to break in the new house and host several backyard get togethers - 4th of July, Trent’s 13th Birthday, and the Rothwell’s coming into town to name a few. My kids have gotten to spend a lot of time with cousins - thanks to Piper and Robin picking them up for beach days and Soak City! We’re thoroughly enjoying our home and I wish we could have been here throughout the entire quarantine, but at least we get to be here now. July was also the long awaited return of weeknight trips to LA, which we’ve missed so much. Thanks to Diana for inviting us to her birthday celebration at the Largo for some comedy and an amazing dinner in Hollywood. We almost felt like we were back to our old life - staying up late and laughing with our amazing friends. My OG bestie Lindsey came into town with her family and we got to hang out all together two nights in a row which was amazing! It’s always too long in between visits, but this one was perfect - just hanging out at our home with all the kids playing (mostly getting along) and us drinking wine and laughing about the old days. Lindsey and I have been best friends since 6th grade (circa 1993) and since we both married our high school sweethearts, we’ve all known each other forever. It was so awesome to see our girls become instant friends (at roughly the same age we were when we met) while the boys ran around like crazy animals, like they do. We always just fall right back into those giggling teenage girls when we’re around each other - it was so refreshing and uplifting to get to spend that time with them. I also got a visit from my friend and ex-coworker Kristina and her kids. I’m so grateful for these amazing friends of mine who have really been there for me through all of this awfulness.
I also “celebrated” the 1 year anniversary of the day we saw my tumor and my 1st chemo cycle and the day we shaved my head. I’m not going to lie - it was hard to see those memories pop up on my phone. All the pain and fear returning each time I saw myself in that hospital bed or hooked up to a Red Devil or with the PICC line tubes coming out of my arm or as my husband chopped off my locks. Last July was the roughest month of my life. I’m now a year past my 6 month prognosis - living on borrowed time - hoping I can steal some more. It’s just so scary and unpredictable and the reality is that it’s more likely that my cancer will return - just a matter of when. I hope I can hold off for a few years to let science continue to improve so that if/when it does come back, there will be some new great treatment option. If it were to come back now, it would probably mean stem cell transplants, bone marrow transplants, immunotherapy. I consider myself really lucky that chemo alone did the trick for me last year. I know so many other young people who didn’t react as well as I did to chemo and had to resort to those other options on their first go around. I don’t like knowing that eventually we will run out of treatment options - then it’s clinical studies and experimental treatments I guess. I know I’ll never stop fighting - but I totally see now how a lot of people do.
I have my next scan this week. Thursday at 5:40pm to be exact. This will be my first scan since finishing radiation which is probably the most important one yet. It will be the first scan since letting my body recover from treatment and will be really telling as far as if there were any lingering cancer cells hanging out waiting for me to drop my guard to give them time to grow. My oncologist is hoping that we’ll see a smaller tumor. He’s not expecting that it will be gone completely, but smaller means the radiation worked. This scan will be a CT scan as opposed to the PET scans I was getting while I was in active treatment. They determined from my last round of scans that the tumor was no longer lighting up (meaning there is no active cancer) and the issue then was just getting rid of the dead mass - so this CT scan will give us better images of the mass, where the purpose of the PET scan was to see more clearly how much the mass was lighting up. There are pros and cons to each type of scan - so I can’t say if I prefer one over the other. The PET scan required fasting (con), but the CT scan requires me to drink the disgusting contrast solution ( big con), but the PET scan made me radioactive so I couldn’t touch anyone for 24 hours, so at least this time, I’ll be able to hug my family right after (pro). I’m terrified of course, but that’s life - at least for me. I guess there’s something to be said about loving your life so much that the thought of leaving it is too painful to think about.
I haven’t been feeling great recently. I’ve had a cold for several days and the kids have been really congested too - of course fearing the worst, we all got COVID tests yesterday and we’re all negative. I talked to my doctor and he reminded me that even though I’ve been vaccinated, I still have to act like I’m not - since I’m immunocompromised. It will take years for my immune system to recover (if it ever does) so I’m so much more susceptible to any little bug, let alone the giant ones. I’m on a regimen of anti-viral medication that I take twice a day for the foreseeable future. It’s overwhelmingly terrifying to think about catching anything, especially COVID, and not having the immune system to fight it off. I certainly struggle with wanting to lock myself off from everyone to stay safe, but needing so badly to be around everyone because I almost died and I’m sad. I need the world to get better so we can get rid of this. Every time I have an ache I’m either thinking it’s CANCER or COVID - not sure I could handle both.
The day after my scan, we will be driving up to Yosemite for our annual summer vacation. We cancelled last year of course, so we’re doubly looking forward to this trip. This is better anyway because our best friends Rebecca and Kevin with their boys Sammy and Simon will be joining us too. It’s been 3 years since we’ve seen them and I can’t wait to spend some long overdue time with them. I think getting out of town and spending some time off the grid will be just what we need right now. More opportunities to make memories and laugh and relax. That’s all I want for the rest of this life.
