Kicked by an Angel

When I embarked on this cancer journey a year and 7 months ago, I wrote about the terror of standing on a cliff, looking down and not being able to see what was at the bottom of the canyon.  I knew I had to get down but I wasn’t quite sure how I would do it or what obstacles I would encounter along the way.  Like any experienced hiker knows, the only way down is to start walking, so that’s what I did, taking each obstacle as it came into view on my path –surgery, chemo, heart problems, my children’s reactions, exhaustion, doctors appointments and more surgery– never looking too far forward, always concentrating on the issue at hand. One foot in front of the other, each step getting me slightly closer to the end.

Well, I am happy to report that as of this week, I have finally reach the bottom of the gorge. Two days ago my oncologist walked into her office where I sat waiting for my chemo treatment and announced, “Bet you never thought you’d see this day !”

I was completely caught off guard. “Huh? What? That’s it?  Are you sure?”

Dr. Anderson left the office to double check that her numbers were correct and came back to confirm that yes indeed this would be my very last chemo treatment. All right then.  Bring it on.

As I sat in the leather lounge chair receiving what would be my last drops of Herceptin through my port, I was filled with a mix of emotions — a combination of relief and let down.  I had had no time to prepare for this momentous occasion.  I was robbed of the 3 weeks of anticipatory excitement-building that often is the best part of any occasion.  The Senior Prom is OK, but the lead up is what is really great–buying the dress, getting a tan. Vacations? Having them to look forward to is the key. Looking forward to something is always way better than the actual event.  To make matters worse, my favorite oncology nurse, Heidi, who had been with me since the beginning, was on vacation, so a virtual stranger hooked me up to my last infusion.  She was nice — but she didn’t know me like Heidi knew me. 

So when the IV line beeped, signifying my bag of medicine was empty,and my port was de-accessed, I headed for the elevator, said goodbye like any other day and walked through the garage to my car. I left that building that I had visited every 3 weeks– sometimes more often than that even– for the last year and a half. I left that building, the halls of which almost 2 years ago signified a beacon of hope in an otherwise bleak forecast to my future — I left, looking for  a parade in my honor.  Of course, there was no parade; just the garage attendant who took my money and stamped my ticket like he had every other day.  I drove home.

The next day, amid a deluge of rain, I drove back to the Hospital District.  This time I was headed over to the Brigham for another milestone in this crazy cancer hike — the final mile. I was scheduled for my first mammogram since being diagnosed with Stage 2 Her 2 neu/er/pr positive Breast Cancer. The rain served a perfect distraction for my drive down route 93.  I needed to concentrate so as not to hydroplane –being nervous about my mammogram was not an option.

The great thing about having had a mastectomy is that a mamogram takes half as long.  They only need to squash one side into a virtual breast pancake and x-ray the insides.  The other side — my silicone fake breast is spared the embarrassment and pain.  Not that the cancer can’t form around the implant, it’s just that the machine cannot detect it.  That’s where Dr. Christian comes in.

It was wonderful to see my surgeon, Dr. Christian again.  He  bounded into the exam room with my mammogram results in hand, ” Terrific news,” he said, his Johnny-Carson eyes twinkling. Dr. Christian uses words like ‘terrific’ and ‘swell’ all the time without it sounding goofy and he makes me want to use those words too. 

“You look terrific,” he said.

“I feel terrific,” I say, letting the word roll off my tongue like Tony the Tiger.

It was all good news.  After he examined me, he gave me a clean bill of health for a whole year and sent me on my way.  Again, I looked for the parade as I walked to the garage attendant, paid my bill and headed for my car.  It was when I sat in the driver’s seat that it hit me — this journey is over.  Seriously over.  And the tears came as hard as the rain outside.  The tears came in waves that wouldn’t stop. They were tears of overwhelming relief that I had come through this very scary thing —  I had survived, I had kicked it’s ass. I realized sitting in my car that I had barely cried throughout this battle.  Only a little when I was first diagnosed but hardly at all.  I was too busy concentrating on each step of the journey to let myself feel what was happening.  I was too afraid that if I had fallen apart at any time during my treatment that I would not be strong enough to see it through to the end.  I needed all my strength to fight.  But there, in my car, with it all behind me, I could cry.  And cry I did.

When I got home I called some friends to go out for drinks.  I brought them to the bar I now work at.  The place where I was still not sure if anyone liked me. We ordered martinis and everyone who worked there came over and congratulated me.  The bartender Jim said, “Hey Fran, is this your parade?” as I sat at the bar with my girlfriends.

“Yup, it is, ” I said, “No sense waiting for someone to throw a parade in your honor, might as well make your own.”

And so I did.

There is a Sunday morning quiet in my house today . I can hear the buzz of weekend cartoons being watched by my blanket-wrapped son in the other room , the rain is falling outside the screen door and I have no where in particular to be at this moment.  I’ve been struggling the past week with what to write here. Often an incident in my life will spur some inspirational piece or an overheard phrase will fit neatly into my life situation allowing me to expound upon it enough to seem coherent and relevant to the rest of you. There has been nothing like that the past few weeks; instead I feel that I can’t get a clear handle on my thoughts. So I guess I will just write about recent events.

The big news around here last week was my 15 year old son, Calvin’s, knee surgery.  It was odd and nerve-wracking to be on the other side of surgery for a change.  I did not like it one bit.  I did not like seeing my son get wheeled into surgery nor did I like seeing him coming out of anesthesia, loopy from morphine.  After getting a second opinion at Children’s Hospital from the renowned orthopedic doctor, Dr. Micheli, we opted to have the surgery done at Children’s instead of with the doc he was seeing at Excel Orthopedic in Woburn.  This doctor actually gave us attitude when we said we were seeking a 2nd opinion.  Imagine!  

He said “They aren’t going to tell you anything different. Dr. Micheli is old…in his 60’s.”  Imagine!  

Sorry but this guy Micheli works on the dancers at the Boston Ballet as well as having written 3 books and co-authored 15!  Neeedless to say, we went with him.  What Cal has is OCD and here is an article by his doctor on precisely how rare it is and exactly what needs to be done Article on OCD.  

Originally Dr. Micheli thought Calvin would need screws put in but once they got in there they realized that they weren’t needed.  What they did do, was drill through the knee cap (good healthy bone) through the back to the bone behind the knee which was dead, in hopes that the dead area would re-generate and start making new blood cells. There is an 80% success rate with this surgery and hopefully his knee will heal enough to get him back to sports by next winter.  He is on crutches for 6 weeks and then it is going to be a slow recovery with rehab. Cal has been out of commission since January and as I told him, it is going to be a long road back — not easy, since he has been inactive for so long and will need to stay inactive for a while longer — but with patience and perseverance he should be able to do it.

I think that it sucks being 15, a jock on crutches and in constant pain from knee surgery.  Any one of those things alone are bad enough, but roll them all into one and you get a level of frustration like trying to pick up mercury with a pair of tweezers.   “I need my life back,” he just said to me. He has his whole life, that is what he doesn’t know, to him this seems like an endless progression of boring days with nothing to do.  One good thing has come out of this though; around the 3rd day after surgery when the pain killers were making him needy and we were all still very patient with him, my usually narcissistic son said to me, “I wish that I had had my surgery before all of yours, then I would have known how hard it was for you and I would have been more helpful.”

It was a beautiful moment of self-discovery and empathy which I immediatly ruined by saying.” Right, like when you brought all your friends to the house constantly and asked me for rides everywhere, and had me cook you meals…is that what you mean?”

Sorry, Mother-of-the-Year here couldn’t let an opportunity to pile on more guilt slip through her hands while adding a little more salt to his very sore wound. So sue me.

In the midst of waiting on Calvin and getting him back to school and dealing with his physical and psycological needs –all these people that I know passed away. My friend’s Mom, died while laying out in the sun, another friend’s sister-in-law died in her sleep at age 43, and a classmate of Calvin’s 17 year old brother died while taking a nap. All of these deaths were blamed on either a heart attack or possible blood clot.  Both of these reasons are disconcerting to me and because of the Tamoxifen I am on which can cause blood clots in my legs and the whole business of my faulty heart valves, I am having a hard time getting to sleep.  It’s not that I can’t sleep, it is that I am actually afraid to fall asleep.  I find myself jerking awake just as my consciousness passes the threshold to a deep sleep.  I am having this freaky fear that I am going to die in my sleep.  I was actually going to ask my husband last night to please stay awake and watch me for 10 minutes to make sure I didn’t stop breathing, but since he was already sound asleep that didn’t seem fair.  No sense having us both awake all night.  Eventually, the exhaustion takes over and I unknowingly do fall asleep.  I am hoping this fear will lessen over time and doesn’t evolve into a full blown neurosis.

I am still training for the Pan-Mass although scheduling and weather have made it more difficult than I thought to get in the number of miles we need.  Susan and I are up to about 30 mile rides but we need to do so much more.  I am a little behind also due to a possibly infected knee cap which is very painful and swollen which occurred from a fall I took on Lansdown Street after  attending a Red Sox game with my 12 year old son.  I have never been considered graceful and as we bobbed and weaved our way through the crowd in an attempt to get to our car which was all the way at BU I took a complete header and  face-planted on the sidewalk.  The mortification and embarrassment was only exceeded by the seering pain in my right knee.  Through tears I told Aidan that I didn’t think I could make it to the car, but with his help and courage he got me there eventually.  Ironically, moments before the fall, I had tried to put my arm around my son and give him a hug in public.  “MOM!” he said while rolling his eyes “Don’t embarrass me.”

Right. Sorry.  I’ll just take a spill among thousands of people leaving a ballgame and push you down in the process.  That won’t be too embarrassing.  Not to mention that most people probably thought I was a low-life drunken mother out with her son.  And to think, only an hour before I thought that getting hit on and asked out by a 70 year old man in the seat next to was mortifying.

Luckily, I won’t be going to any more Red Sox games this year. 

So that is what is going on around the Kolenik household. There is actually a lot more but I have to go ice my knee and help Cal get upstairs, and find a therapist for Aidan.

Maybe tomorrow I will find something inspirational to write about.

PS> The Header photos, this one and the last, are photos taken by my 12 year old son, who has recently taken a shining to photography.

I decided to cross-post this from the Mothers With Cancer post since this weekend is Mother’s day….Happy Mother’s Day to all my friends.  If any of you have blogs (or should; Sharon) than I am tagging you to continue this blog around the world.  Just post 5 reasons why you love being a mom.  Here is where it originated:world-according-to-mom.html

I was tagged by Whymommy at Mothers with Cancer to join in a cooperative effort to attempt a “blog around the world”.  The topic is “5 Reasons why I love being a Mother”. Now most who know me know that I am quite vociferous about all the reasons that I Hate being a mother; so this list may come  as a surprise to many, as I tend to keep those feelings closer to my heart. This past year battling cancer and cancer treatment has taught me quite a lot about the little people in my life. Not only has their compassion grown for me but I have slowed down a little to truly appreciate the wonders that make up their lives.  The fear of never seeing them grow up puts an extra special emphasis on the little things they do every day. Here are 5 of many reasons why I love being a mom:

1. Because there is no one in the world who loves you unconditionally like your children.  Oh they may battle against your wishes and fight tooth and nail to get their way but when it comes down to it; they think you are the bees knees.  

2. Turning the last corner of any road race or triathlon and seeing my kids cheering me on holding signs and screaming “Go Mom!”

3. The smell of freshly washed hair.

4. Swinging on swings, riding on merry-go-rounds, sliding down slides and playing in sandboxes, building with blocks, coloring in coloring books and doing handstands in the pool. These things would look silly and not be as fun if we didn’t have children to do them with.

5. Watching my children excel and love playing hockey, baseball, soccer, piano and gymnastics and the feeling of pride I get knowing they have so many more opportunities than I ever did.

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I also wanted to chime in on my roll call — Frances is present and accounted for.  Still getting Herceptin infusions until July, taking Tamoxifen, and on heart medication to quell the heart issues caused by the toxicity of chemo.  I did have a slight setback regarding my  breast implant.  I noticed it was looking a little awkward and ripply. My oncologist thought it might be leaking.  Oh GREAT!  so I met with the charming Dr. Plastic who informed me quite abruptly that there was no way it was leaking.  I reminded him about the unfortunate incident regarding the expander and how he poked a hole in that, but he insisted that it had only been 12 weeks since my surgery and that it was fine.

After we talked a little while and I told him that I was training again to do 2 triathlons and the Pan Mass Challenge (a 150 mile bike -a-thon to raise money for Dana Farber) he said “AHA!”

“aha?”

“You have lost weight, haven’t you?” he asked.

“Only about 5 pounds,” I said, “I’ve got about 10 to go.”

He told me that since I had lost some weight that now my left  implanted breast was a full implant size bigger than my own right breast.

I had told him before the surgery that once I was back on my feet and back to training that I would lose weight and that he should plan occordingly but I get the feeling that at the time, he (being a man) assumed I would want the bigger implant.

“Will you gain the weight back?” he asked me

“I certainly hope not!”

Anyway, I guess he will be able to do yet another surgery to replace the implant with a smaller one…the question is, though, will insurance pay for this?

Anyway, that’s where I am at these days…..plugging along….lopsided and pretty happy.

It seems our family has the uncanny ability to incur a Natural Disaster every time we take a vacation.  Last year on our camping trip, the floods came and the river we were camped on rose up and swallowed a car.  This year, on our trip to Myrtle Beach, the heaven’s were set ablaze.  I had no idea we were so powerful.

Some of these shots were taken the first night of the fire, after we left dinner (where our waiter excused himself as he had to leave to evacuate his home). For a few days the sun was eerily obscured by the smoke and as we lay on the beach it snowed  ashes on our sun-screened bodies.

It was nerve wracking, especially when we heard that the National Guard was being called in and  that some of the highways were being closed and that the fire had burned 5,000 acres. Thankfully for my triathlon training, I knew that if it came down to it, I could swim out in the ocean for a while until they put the fire out.  Luckily it didn’t come to that since I didn’t have a plan for the rest of my family.

But, we survived, got some great photos, and even managed to get a tan through the haze.  Anyway, it could have been worse; we could have gone to Mexico.

As I sit here in Myrtle Beach listening to my kids’ laughter, I am ever so thankful that I am here with the ocean outside my window, sunburned and happy.  A year ago today I was bald, sick and miserable.  A year ago today I couldn’t see past the fog in my brain caused by all the drugs in my system which were given  to counteract the poison they pumped into my veins. This trip to South Carolina is my family’s favorite vacation– they tell me every year; and last year we missed it due to my chemo regimine.

 In the spirit of that, I thought I would share a piece I wrote on my family’s vacation growing up.  It was the year my father offered to run the Sagamore Lodge in hopes of purchasing it outright.  My dad always was a big dreamer. I was not born yet when this happened but I grew up surrounded by the stories of how great that summer was.  I wrote this for a class — we needed to write a piece from someone elses memories….This was mine.

The Greatest Summer I Never Had

It was a magical summer, kind of like Gidget meets Gatsby, the year my father, a part-time realtor, offered to buy and run the vacant Sagamore Lodge. Within hours of his decision on that June day in 1961  he closed up the house in Brighton, employed friends and relatives and drove the family off to what, from all accounts, was the greatest summer vacation my family ever had.  Throughout my life I would listen to these tales from Sagamore Lodge with a head full of wonder and a pocketful of jealousy.   My family seemingly lived a lifetime before I was born.

It was a stately old Inn that stood across the street from Sagamore Beach before you crossed the Sagamore Bridge to Cape Cod. Wide planked steps led to the clapboard gray wraparound porch which housed a dozen or so high- backed wooden rocking chairs. On most days the persistent sea-breeze caused these empty chairs to move on their own as if a ghost party of long ago guests still enjoyed the ocean view, sipping brandy, discussing literature.

My mother’s high heels clipped across the black and white marbled floor of the lobby to the enormous front desk where she, sun-kissed and fit, collected the money from the weekend guests or answered the phones. Eight year old Brian, barefooted and by her side, played cops and robbers in the foyer ready to hold up unsuspecting visitors with his dime- store cap gun. To the right was the dining room where they ate what Auntie Tina cooked in the massive restaurant sized kitchen: Spaghetti for the kids; lobsters, steaks, and shrimp for the adults. To the left, lay the sitting room with comfortable, Queen Anne chairs, musty from the briny air and a floor to ceiling fireplace that my father would light on cool late-August evenings.

Only a few rooms on the 2^nd and 3^rd floors had bathrooms.  Other guests had to use the community lavatory in the middle of the hallway. There was always a lot of comings and goings on the second floor. “Hanky Panky” my sister called it from the military fly-boys who used the lodge as a stop over or weekend retreat

In the basement lounge my father tended bar and entertained friends and guests lucky enough to fall onto his barstools. Joe Buckley was always ready with a joke as he poured you a “short one”. Sidecars and Manhattans were the drink of choice. His baby girl, pixie-haired Mary, not yet 5, sat on a barstool drinking a Shirley Temple and plunking confiscated nickels into the pinball machine. From his place behind the bar, my father could see through the open window, his boys, ten year old Michael and Paul, age twelve wrestling on the back lawn

After their morning routine cleaning guestrooms and making beds, the two oldest siblings, Maureen and Karen, ran the snack shop out the side window of the basement bar. The only burger joint on the block, there was always a line of neighborhood kids, pushing and shoving to be first, no adults around to maintain order. Karen flipped burgers while comely Moe adjusted her bikini and flirted shamelessly with the boys.

 It was Friday and all these things made my father smile.  There were 3 whole glorious days until Monday, when he would rise at dawn, kiss his sleeping wife goodbye, and drive north up route 3 to his sales job in Boston.  I wonder what he thought on those morning drives.  I wonder if he believed with childlike optimism that the magic would last forever or if deep down he knew this was one of the last summers he could keep his family together.