Milestones & Mother's Day

This week marked three months since my cancer diagnosis and one month since my mastectomy. I've had somewhere around one thousand different thoughts and feelings fly through my head and heart since then -- sadness, loss, thanks, joy, relief, anger, guilt, gratefulness, loneliness, fear, hope, and more. A lot of great things -- birthdays, vacations, holidays, etc. -- have happened since then and when I look back over the last three months I see a lot of joy and blessings. There's also been plenty of pain, both physical and emotional. Going from just a normal healthy person to having this cancer label has been a trip I didn't anticipate. Aside from the pain of surgery and recovery I have never once felt sick because of cancer. Mine hadn't spread. It hadn't interfered with any other body parts to cause problems or symptoms. It had to go though, so I had both breasts removed and I'm still recovering and having pain from that. Breast reconstruction hurts. The expanders are hard and painful. The chest muscles have been cut, sutured, and are struggling to work right again. Nerves are trying to wake up and regrow. I'm spacing out my expansions to two weeks apart so that I can have a "good" week after I've had a fill and that's helped. 

Technically the cancer should all be out of my body, as far as we know. I've begun taking Tamoxifen, an effective and proven drug that dramatically reduces the chance of recurrence. So far I've had no side effects. Because I have a history of blood clots I'm also taking a blood thinner in an attempt to avoid clotting while on Tamoxifen. I've been going to the cancer center for blood work twice a week while we get my clotting level stabilized. In a few months, whenever we decide to do it, I'll have my expanders replaced with silicone implants. If all goes as we hope, a few follow-up appointments here and there for med monitoring (for the next ten years) and screening exams will be all that's left of my breast cancer experience. Well, that and the scars and the flesh that's supposed to resemble new breasts. :/ I feel guilty that I avoided chemo. I never had to get sick and worry about bigger things like infections from a compromised immune system. I didn't lose my hair or have a port. It's an odd mixture of relief and guilt.

My biggest fear when I was first diagnosed was that I would leave my kids without a mom, so I'm beyond grateful that I'm not leaving them anytime soon. I don't know that there's any greater gift I could have gotten this Mother's Day. My mom's been here for almost six weeks. I have not touched a single load of laundry or dishes in the last month. She's cleaned, watched and entertained kids, welcomed visitors, and just "been here" all without once complaining. I know it's not easy seeing her daughter go through this but she has been a rock. It would've been much more difficult without her. My other rock? BHE. Well, he's my rock all the time, regardless of cancer, but he's been unwavering though I never would have expected any different. Getting to celebrate them and motherhood to our sweet kids was extra special yesterday. 

This will be my last post before I take a little break from this blog. Life is busy right now with the end of school and beginning of summer, and while I still have this recovery/reconstruction/med business to bother with I have so much more fun, excitement, and joy to experience. I feel like the rest of life has played second fiddle to cancer for the last three months but now while I have a little break in this deal I need to participate in "normal" while I have the chance. Out of necessity, I've focused on myself for most of the last three months, missing milestones and big things in the lives of friends and family. I've been selfish, warranted or not, while others took care of us. I need to get back to caring for others now. I'll only have a few months of that before I have my second surgery so I'll squeeze it in while I can. We can't thank everyone enough for all of the prayers, calls, texts, messages, visits, food, favors, etc. that have gotten us through this time. Although it's not quite over and there may be unknowns to come, we are so comforted by our network of friends and family who have shown us incredible love and care through this. I don't know how we would've done it without you. Thank you!