What I Have Become

To my "cancer colleagues", as I have just now named you, do you ever feel like once the treatment is done you feel like you should 'hush, hush' and let the "real" sickies step up to the plate and share their story? (To everyone else, are you tired of hearing about cancer?)

I think I started to feel like that. My treatments are done, I'm not dying faster than usual, and I have more hair than I did six months ago. Therefore, I need to zip my lips and let it go. Let someone else shine and take the spotlight. Let someone else tell their story. And on and on.

But here's the truth... I'm a cancer survivor, and in many ways, I will always be a cancer patient. Cancer is written on my skin - quite literally, considering the number of scars I have from it. It is written in my heart (okay, also literally because of the chemo, but I mean this more metaphorically). I have been touched and I have a different perspective on life.

I think we hear that a lot. "I have a new perspective on life." "I see things differently now because of xyz experience." "This has made me stronger." "I'm a better person now."

Well, you know what? I don't discount that in anyone's circumstance, but we cancer (or MAJOR life experience) folks, I think we really DO have a new perspective. At least for me, it's a more holistic change in view than it ever has been. I've had nasty stuff happen in my life, things that I wouldn't wish upon anyone else, but those things changed a portion of my perspective. Cancer put my entire life, my entire world, everything and everyone around me into perspective.

I started to learn what really matters in life, why we really are here and how our bodies play into that process, and the promise of eternal life we are given by our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I gained peace and a testimony that my life here is part of a huge investment and process. This isn't "it," this isn't the end. This is a very tiny portion. And the things I used to think mattered most, matter very little now.

My life has forever been changed. I really hope I don't fall back into my more lackadaisical feelings about every single thing and being around me.

I know, I know. I keep saying that. It keeps coming through. But it's true. It's so, so very true.


Something very interesting happened to me recently. Two of my closest friends came to me with personal and huge things (for lack of a better word at the moment) happening in their lives. I happened upon this information all within the same week and my grandfather passed away at the end of that week. It was an emotionally overwhelming week. Not the point here, though...

For the first time in over a year, I was leaned ON. A friend in need (well, two) truly counted on me and leaned on me. We shared tears together, we exchanged stories and experiences, we laughed, we loved, we mourned, we hugged, and we sat around with puffy eyes together. It was exhausting and liberating. I learned while they learned. I helped when they needed me. My heart was so full, and still is. I experienced yet another aspect of the Atonement. My testimony on particular subjects increased and burned within me. I further understood that we are ALL children of a very real, loving Heavenly Father, who is always looking out for us and has our very real and personal interests at heart. I was exuberant toward life and wanted to share my love with others, especially my friends. I came out of my sometimes very dark hole and felt so much light and warmth.

And I realized that while I have scars and I'll always be a cancer patient and survivor, I'm a human too. I'm real. And I matter. And I can talk about my cancer and be immersed in the craziness that the stupid thing involves and THAT is who I am. I am a new me. I am still my friends' friend. I am still Adrienne. I'm still a mom and a wife, a friend and a teacher, a neighbor and even sometimes an enemy. But I'm new. I'm different. I'm changed. I'll never be the same. And that's okay. In fact, that's good. This experience that I thought would last a year (or maybe five, you know, with the doctor's appointments and all) and then put it in the books and consider it a "thing of my past", will never just go in the books. It won't go away. It is forever now a part of my identity, who I am, what I have to offer, and what I can and will become. My really awful diagnosis with an evil disease has made me an intensely better human being and, hopefully, a better daughter of God, wife, mother, sister, daughter, and friend.

Cancer has made me me. And your big thing in life has made you you.

Well, Hello There

It's been three months since I blogged, and it was about two months before that the last time I was blogging "regularly."

I do apologize to anyone who cares, including an apology to myself for not tracking the last few months.... So here goes some post-chemo story-telling.

Like I said before, I finished radiation in August and my mom came to visit in September.

I learned that my side burns and neck hair were from the steroids I was given during chemo - NOT from a "broken" thyroid. :) In fact, I went to the OB for the good ol' annual check-up and they wanted to run some blood tests to check cholesterol and whatnot, since I've never had it tested before. Well, apparently those blood tests also included a thyroid levels check and my thyroid is all hunky dorey. So that's good. :) I do have slightly elevated cholesterol, but I'm guessing most of the reason for that is my diet and lack of exercise in the last year...

My hair is a lot thicker and I still have cute little baby hairs growing in, so progress is coming! :) My hair is A LOT different from a year ago, but it's better than it was six months ago.

A few weeks ago, before I got my hair trimmed. Long and thick enough to use hair ties!

Top: When we chopped my hair last year, Bottom: tonight. About 11 months difference.

My curly post-chemo hair, getting thicker and longer every day. Growing out a curly pixie cut is awful!

I have been struggling with a lot recently - depression, anxiety, confusion and frustration about me. The heart problem I thought I had turned out to actually be a giant anxiety attack - caused by the physical stress on my body from chemo plus the emotional and mental (and physical) stress from the car accident. Since then, I have discovered that when I am super anxious, the muscles in my chest get tight (not uncommon), so I have had those muscles massaged and I have actually learned where to find the trigger points so that if I feel the anxiety coming on, I can start to work it out and keep it from escalating.

I'm still going to various appointments relating to the car accident - manual therapy (massage) and chiropractor once a week, physical therapy once a week, and now I will go see a wrist specialist because my dominant wrist where I had a mild ligament tear has not improved, so I will probably do specialized wrist physical therapy. I also have at least one school/work meeting a week and am going to counseling. Counseling is helping me a lot - working through holding onto the burden of lost/betrayed friendships, handling the emotions of the loss of control from everything that has happened to me in the last year, etc. Lots of great things are happening because of it and I'm grateful for it. I know a lot of people are very judgmental about counseling/therapy, and this is definitely my own business that I am putting out on the Internet, but I believe that it is just that - MY business and MY choice and it is helping. I have one hell of a year and it has helped SO much to work through it all with an objective person, who happens to be a professional. ;-) Our old bishop is a marriage family therapist and he recommended the place I'm going to and man, I'm grateful.

I got strep throat in December. And Patrick got it. And then we ended up around extended family who had it and didn't realize their sick symptoms were strep, so our kids got it too. That was fun.

Christmas in Idaho, a wonderful holiday and break from life. 

I'm in a cancer support group for moms on Facebook and a mom in the group recently finished her treatments. She was asking about how quickly the weight comes off and stuff like that. I'm six months post-chemo and five months finished with all treatments (chemo/radiation) and I still don't have all of my energy back. I started going to the gym a couple of months ago and working out at home. Then I fell into a funk and stopped going. I'm starting to feel better and more into it, so I've started working out again. Since I finished my treatments, I've actually gained an additional five pounds - well, really, I gained that in the last couple of months. It is sooooo incredibly frustrating to have the extra weight on my body brought on by a life-saving treatment. An outsider probably sees it differently than I do. It's so frustrating and difficult. I am surrounded by people who are getting fit and healthy and losing weight and blahdy blah blah blah, and I don't even have the energy to work out regularly. I don't even have the energy to take care of my house. I thought that, for sure, by now I would have the energy to make my house beautiful again and not a total disaster zone. But it isn't true.

My oncologist told me not to expect much for the first year and that I may not even be 100% a year after finishing treatments. I might be even at like 70-90%. It's bizarre. Such a strange thing. One minute, I feel like I have loads of energy and the next, I'm totally pooped. I don't have the energy to wash the dishes or even start a load of laundry, let alone work out. And when I do have the energy, sometimes I don't have the desire. I feel in a funk a lot - and I'm taking a medication for the anxiety, but sometimes I just don't WANT to workout. Sometimes I just want to lie on the couch and eat ice cream.

So many things I have experienced in the last year are beyond foreign to me. It seems so surreal. I'm grateful to have a few friends who are there for me through the good and the bad and who I owe my life to for their support in this last year. I pray that I won't ever have to give them support for the same reasons they have given me support, but I do know I will give them anything and everything that I can. I love them and they are very treasured friends. My patriarchal blessing tells me about the friendships I will make in my life and that I will have life-long friendships I will treasure. I'm grateful for those friends who have been stronger than me this last year and who let me rant when I feel fat or sad or upset and who boost me up when I need it. I'm grateful for the friends who have treated me like I'm totally normal and, yet, supported me like the sick I have been. I'm grateful for their kind and honest hearts and how absolutely giving they are.

My friend, Leah, and I at B.O.'s Christmas shindig. 

Aaaand that was a side rant I did not expect. So anyway, it makes me sad that this woman will probably go through many of the same things I have gone through, particularly mentally and emotionally, in the last year. I wish she didn't have to. I wish I could take that from her and I wish she could go back to being totally herself. And I hope that she does have more energy and drive than I do. Like I said before, finishing treatments does not make you the same you you once were, and I really thought that I would go "back" to being "me". I'll never be that version of "me" again. That scares me. Well, sometimes it scares me and sometimes it brings me strength. I am a better person. I know more than I did before. I have experienced more than most people my age and it has given me a unique and special perspective on life. Sometimes that is really challenging because others my age don't understand and don't have this view. I think that is part of the reason I have lost some of the friends I have lost. Or, at least, I think it has added to it. At times, it is frustrating to have this perspective. Sometimes I wish I could be carefree, but ultimately, I'm incredibly grateful to have a perspective that allows me to KNOW that spending time with my kids is more important than doing dishes and that life is short, but of great value. I know now that my body isn't everything - it's a vessel and it carries my spirit through this life. I know that it is important, but that it will be made whole in the life to come. I KNOW these things now. I'm still learning and growing from this "experience". Sometimes I hate learning from it and I wish we could move on. But I'm still learning. I'm still growing.

I've avoided this blog, really. It's been a hard six months. Really, really hard. The last six months have made chemo and radiation seem like a cake walk (to me, at least). I haven't known what to say, what to share, what to keep in, and sometimes, I haven't even really known what I have been experiencing. It's been really rough. If I can help anyone with cancer, I want to help them with this part of cancer. It's been the hardest part so far. I know there is a lot more to go and maybe that opinion will change, but this part is so hard, so mysterious, so confusing, so traumatizing, so bizarre, so... challenging.

And there I go on another side rant. My scalp doesn't itch anymore - I use Head and Shoulders shampoo now. The advanced formula kind. I love my baby hairs. Most people find them to be super annoying, but I adore them!

We had family pictures taken in November. I wanted to have pictures taken throughout the year, so we did another shoot in the Fall. There was also an art exhibit/gala thing in October (I think October) featuring Heal Courageously (the organization who took our photos in July) and we attended that. It was really emotional to see the photographer, Anna, and Michelle, who runs Heal Courageously. I didn't realize it would be so emotional, but it was. It brought back so many feelings, and yet, I also felt like super woman for having gone through that.

I absolutely LOVE this photo - I think it perfectly expresses the end of our 2013 and so much more. I LOVE it.

Me in November (crazy to think that just a few weeks later my hair went crazy curly!)

Oh, and speaking of Heal Courageously, they were featured in the Utah Cancer Connections magazine and they wanted a photo of a family, soooo... we were on the cover! :) And then had a couple of photos inside. So we're on the cover of a magazine, albeit a cancer magazine. Haha. :) Patrick has a regular customer at work who saw it a the doctor's office and wanted us to sign their copy. That was weird, but cool I guess. Random, right?

So anyhow, now we are getting ready for Patrick to go to training for Army National Guard. He'll be gone for a while... more than I want him to be gone. And I'm teaching. And life is life. And I think I'm ready to blog more often.

We got tickets to the Christmas devotional that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints does every December. We ended up sitting REALLY close to the front (possibly thanks to my handsome hubby coming straight from drill and still being in his uniform from their inspection... It was a beautiful devotional and I love the date night with our friends.)