The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.

It seems that things rarely go as planned, or at least, not exactly as planned. My plan was to have my breasts removed, reconstructed shortly after that and be blessed with perky new breasts and be cured of my cancer. I was to be done by the end of the summer….well, that’s not how it’s going to go.

I am going to have to go through chemotherapy. THAT was NOT part of my initial plan.

When I got my initial diagnosis, I was told I had stage zero, estrogen sensitive, non invasive, DCIS cancer. I did my homework, talked to the doctor, and thought the surgery was going to be the hardest part of this process. Chemotherapy was never part of my plan.

The breast tissue was all removed and analyzed for the exact cancer location and type. The unexpected result of the tissue analysis was the presence of a secondary cancer that wasn’t detected in the biopsy or in the MRI. The MRI showed an area of what was thought to be a fibrous benign growth. Once it was analyzed under the microscope, a 1 cm by 6 mm triple negative, invasive cancerous tumor was found. This kind of cancer is more aggressive and more likely to come back. The good news here is that my tumor was so small that I’m actually considered in the gray area that I don’t necessarily need chemo, but as a precautionary measure, it’s recommended that I go through a minimal course of treatment.

In addition to the breast tissue, I had 4 lymph nodes removed. These were checked to see if there was any progress of the cancer outside of the breast tissue. Three of the nodes came back completely clear. One came back indicating the presence of keratin (if I understand this correctly, it’s a protein that indicates cancer) in less than 200 cells, but in these numbers, is still considered a clean lymph node. Again, this is considered a VERY small number, keeping me in that gray area.

Today was the day that I first met with my oncologist to get the full chemo plan. I’ve known for a couple of weeks that I’d have to go through this and have been doing my best to process all of it. I have a tendency to jump to the worst case scenario, but the reality of all of this is that it’s really not going to be nearly as bad as I first thought.

I can hear you saying, “But Kim, you are going to put poison into your body. You don’t even like to take pain meds,” and you’re right. I don’t. I would much rather find a better way. The fact is, this is the best way to guarantee my survival. I am blessed with a strong and healthy body, besides this cancer crap, and it has helped me tremendously in my healing so far. I’ve surprised all of my doctors with how well I’m healing and my range of motion with my arms.

I have a grand total of four treatments, one treatment every three weeks so it’ll be all done in 12 weeks. Roughly 12 weeks from now is Labor Day. And roughly 13 weeks from now is the UW Marching Band Alumni Band day. I will be there. I won’t march, but I’ll be there. All. Damn. Day. This all figured into when my first day of treatment was to be scheduled. A girl’s gotta have priorities, right?

I’m going to lose my hair. And my eyebrows. And my eyelashes. BUT I won’t have to shave my legs for the next few weeks, so I’ve got that going for me, which is nice.

The quest has begun for the world’s coolest wig, hat and bandana….or are they called do (doo? dew?) rags? Either way, I’m looking for some sort of kick-ass head covering. I’m probably going to just shave it off before it starts falling out in clumps. Maybe I’ll look badass…maybe I’ll just look bad. My children have certainly done their best to help. My nearly 12 year-old daughter has graciously offered to let me borrow her green and orange St. Patrick’s Day wig and my 15 year-old son thinks I look smashing in a Darth Vader helmet. Thanks for your help, kids….

The upside is that all of this temporary. It’s just another hill to climb and another means of finding my strength. I’m going to still be here, years from now. I’ll have some interesting stories and memories and a unique view of the world…post cancer. And as my son says, a better view of my toes…at least for the time being.

Our lives are made in these small hours. These little wonders, these twists and turns of fate. Time falls away but these small hours, these small hours still remain. - Rob Thomas "Little Wonders"

This is my first post that I'm starting without a topic. I don't know where this one will take me, but I suppose that it's much like anything in life; sometimes, you just jump in with both feet and enjoy the ride and hope to learn a lesson or two along the way.

My surgery was just over a week ago. Perhaps I should recount the events of the surgery and my progress to date.

I arrived at the hospital on Thursday, May 29 at 5:30 am, with a 7:30 surgery start. I was happily surprised with a visit from my friend Theresa (at 6:30AM on her day off!!), who just happens to be a surgical nurse at the hospital. She spoke highly of my surgeon and my anesthesiologist so I knew I was in good hands. (Just in case you're wondering Theresa, that was just beyond cool. I was so humbled that you came by to see me, the morning of my surgery. Thank you for being there and thank you for being my friend. xo) At 7:25, I was rolled into the operating room. I looked around for less than a minute and remember exactly nothing after that. Around 11:30, I woke up in recovery.

One of the first things I learned when moving post-surgery, is how often one uses the pectoral muscles. My first self-directive was to use my abdominal muscles as much as possible. Sitting up, lifting the arms, stretching, breathing....all heavily involve the pectorals. I've never appreciated them so much. They're currently working very hard to hold in place my expanders. 

The expanders were put in during the surgery, right after all of my breast tissue was removed. They are like small balloons, inserted beneath my pectoral muscles, that are filled with saline to create a pocket for my implants. Starting in a couple of weeks, I'll go to a local clinic to have them filled with more saline and little by little they'll make a bigger and bigger pocket. Right now, they're each filled with 250 ccs and feel like small boulders on my chest. I don't feel any pain with regards to cut skin. It feels more like muscle pain. My years of running have conditioned me to be somewhat impervious to muscle pain. I stopped taking the prescribed pain pills 3 days after my surgery and have only been taking ibuprofen.

The second lesson I learned is that nurses are a gift from God. When my children were born, I had a room full of strangers....doctors, nurses, medical students....so there is no shame left in my world. My secrets have all been exposed to the peering eyes of those I had never met. This was true again after my surgery. No one becomes more humbled than at the precise moment they need someone to help them use a toilet....and pull up or down one's underwear. 

The third lesson, one that I will be working on over the coming months, is patience. I don't have patience for myself. I have more patience for others, which I discovered when I had my children as well as when I cared for the children of others. I want to do what I want to do, but I've found that I'm undone by even the simplest of tasks these days. A shower is major undertaking. Making a meal exhausts me. My recliner is my best friend and my worst enemy. An active individual such as myself has no patience for laziness and this recovery process is akin to laziness.....a necessary laziness.

Lesson number four caught me off guard this weekend: Find the joy in a normal day. I wasn't expecting to be so content with a "normal" weekend; shopping, a movie in the theater with my family, a conversation with friends. Never underestimate the comfort that lies within predictability and commonality. I kept to my normal routine this weekend and it was wonderful. 

Life is an on-going series of lessons. I know there will be more for me to learn as I progress through this crazy cancer maze and I'm grateful for each and every one.

Every new beginning is some other beginning’s end.

Just a few more hours and it begins….or it ends. I think I prefer to see it as the end. The end of my cancer. The end of my worries about it spreading. The end of my life with my original equipment.

It’s time for new beginnings. I’m looking for yet another positive twist. I think this is that twist. New breasts. Perky breasts that won’t give me cancer. Yup, that’s my new outlook.

How do I get to these new breasts, you ask? I’ve had to describe this process dozens of times already, so here goes….

The surgeon is going to make a lateral incision across the center of my breast and remove my nipples and areolas. Then, remove the interior breast tissue and preserve as much of the exterior skin as possible. I’m not completely certain what the next steps are, but the plastic surgeon will be stepping in around this time to insert the expanders (The expanders are like balloons. They are inserted to make space for the implants), under my pectoral muscles.  I’ll be stitched up and sent home to recover and heal. I will be in the hospital only one night, for pain management.

After a few weeks of healing, I’ll starting going on a weekly basis to a local plastic surgery clinic for “inflation”. This process is accomplished by injecting saline into the expanders. I believe there is a port through which the saline is injected. Once the necessary space is made for me to have the implants inserted (I’m planning on the same size I am now, a generous “D”), I’ll have a 90 minute outpatient procedure to have them inserted. Silicone boobies. I never thought that would be in my future.

Then there is the issue of creating new nipples. I think I’ll have to describe this later, when I have more information on the actual process. It sounds really weird and I want to make sure I understand it fully. I’ll also be getting more tattoos, this time in the form of areolas. Yup, they’re tattooed on….crazy, no?

I was blessed with a “rack” and now, it’s trying to kill me. Time to trade it in for a new set that will play nicer with the rest of the team.

On a bit of a side-note, I need to make a HUGE SHOUT OUT to all of my friends, family and complete strangers who have been sending me messages, emails, posting on my Facebook page, calling me, giving me hugs and just giving me more support than I ever thought possible. Don’t get cancer, if you can help it. But if you do get cancer, or any other awful disease, have friends like I do, because I can’t have my strength without the encouragement of these wonderful people. I’m beyond blessed in this life. If this cancer is the worst thing that ever happens to me, I’ve lived a very lucky and amazing life.

I can do anything, I just can’t do everything.

Yesterday was probably my last long run though my neighborhood for the rest of 2014. I’m struggling to let that sink in. Summer is my time to run. I NEED to get out and fill my lungs and legs with the oh-so-short season that is SUMMER in Wisconsin. I’m afraid that this year, I’m going to miss summer altogether. I have my last races of the season this coming weekend. Yes, races. Two of them. 10K on Saturday night, May 24 and half marathon Sunday morning, May 25. 19.3 miles in roughly 13 hours. I like these kind of challenges; challenges where all I have to do is talk myself into not giving up. Where all that I’m concerned about is getting to that next mile marker. Just one mile at a time….mind over mileage…..

I’m not sure what to expect with this cancer challenge.

Recently, my life has been all about the next goal…the next challenge. I’m 43 and I can’t sit around thinking that someday I’ll do this or that. Someday has to be now. My cancer is in the middle of my someday. How can I plan when things like cancer so rudely interrupt my living??

I’ve kept a pretty brave face so far, but let’s face it, I am afraid.

I’m afraid of all the things that I can’t do….that I won’t be able to do. Don’t tell me no, because then I’ll most certainly find a way to make it happen. The doctor will have a list of things that I cannot do. I don’t want to focus on those things, but I will have to. I’m going to be limited by something other than just my willpower.

This will be a problem for me. I know that I’m going to need help. I don’t regularly ask for help, I offer it. I have used the analogy of my house completely engulfed in flames, and I’m putting out the fire with Dixie cups of water. “No thanks, I’m in control, I have got this problem handled.” Well, clearly I don’t. I will have to overcome the challenge of needing assistance. I hope to do that in a graceful manner and accept the help that those around me will offer. I hope to not be bitter or angry. I hope to be gracious. Maybe that’s my new challenge: to accept the offers to help me during this time.

So back to my running…my main stress outlet will be on the shelf for a few months. I will need a new challenge; a new means of channeling my mental need to run and exercise. I gave this some thought yesterday. By the time my surgery arrives, I will have run just over 200 miles this year. (That’s actually rather low. I should be closer to 350 miles. I guess I’ve been busy.) My goal for the remainder of the year is to walk 250 miles. No racing. No pacing. No stopwatch to monitor my speed. Just the distance. 

Life is a marathon, not a sprint. I plan on enjoying as many miles as I can.

When something bad happens, you have three choices. You can either let it define you, let it destroy you, or you can let it strengthen you.

I feel as though I should be more upset about this whole thing; crying more, sad, melancholy, general malaise…..but I’m not. I’m not even all that angry. I’m just displaced and REALLY inconvenienced. This has been a huge inconvenience for me. I’ve had to miss work for appointments and imposing upon others to do my work for me. Work I should be doing. I’m responsible and I shouldn’t be expecting others to do my work. Damn you, cancer…you’re in my way.

I see this as a major problem. I’m just not upset enough.

I should be asking, “Why me?” but I’m not. I’m just saying, “Ok, let’s do this.”

What the hell is wrong with me? Why can’t I be as upset as those around me seem to be? I have a heart….at least I think I do. I see more sadness in the eyes and words of my friends and family than I do in myself. My wonderful friends and family…..I’m beyond blessed. Maybe that’s why I’m not more upset. I know I have a ridiculously huge support group. I suppose I could have kept all of this news private and only within the very immediate circle of friends and family, but why? I don’t need to keep it to myself to prove my strength and I certainly don’t see sharing my situation as a burden put upon others. I don’t ask for sympathy and I really don’t need the casserole brigade stopping by every day, I just ask for understanding. Sometimes, my head is preoccupied with this. I’m trying to stay focused on my immediate concerns, but sometimes I struggle with this. Please understand.

Cancer doesn’t define me. I am still me, I have just hit a bump in the road. To many, I’m considered a “Cancer Survivor”. Truthfully, I’m not particularly interested in that moniker.  It also doesn’t destroy me. I’m going to make my comeback shortly after this shit is taken out of me.  I suppose all that’s left is to have it make me stronger. 

I’ve said that strength and drive come from within and NO ONE can give you that motivation. It has no meaning if you’re doing it (whatever “it” is), for someone else. So, I find my inner strength, and find additional support in those around me.

I guess the point of all of this is that I’m not sad because I know I have my family and friends there for me at every turn, especially those who have already been given a cancer diagnosis. Sadly, I have many friends and family who are in the Cancer Club. Who better to lean on, than those who know what it feels like; to be told those awful words, “You have cancer.”

The journey of a million miles begins with a single step...

I have taken a bunch of steps already, and now, it’s time to journal them. I have breast cancer. It’s really a tough thing to say out loud. I’ve written it about a million times already since my mammogram on March 13. It wasn’t real until last week, when I got my surgery date. It existed in a theoretical world, where I’m actually sick; this weird parallel universe where my cancer is something that scares me.

I’m not sick. At least, I don’t feel sick. But according to the biopsy, I am sick and this will kill me if I don’t do something about it.

So I’m going radical and having both breasts removed.

I suppose I should start at the beginning….my beginning is December 18, 1980. I was 9 years old and it was exactly one week before Christmas. I was in 4^th grade. That morning, I had a music concert. I don’t remember if my dad was there or not. I suppose my mom was because she attended everything. I remember what I was wearing….a cream colored sweater and teal skirt. I even remember my afterschool snack of Townhouse Crackers and Merkt’s cheese spread. I remember all of this, because it was the day my grandmother died of breast cancer.

Ever since that day, I’ve been waiting for the other shoe to drop. I’m built like my dad’s side of the family, so I guess I always just thought it was probable….again, in a theoretical sense. It wasn’t ever going to ACTUALLY happen, right???

I also remember that day in June, 2006 when my mom told me her news….”I have breast cancer.” My heart sunk, but for some reason, I wasn’t scared. I remember saying “What happens now?” The fact that I said that still shocks me to this day. You see, I’m a worrier. I am among the best in the business. I would freak out at everything that didn’t go exactly according to plan. I’ve gotten better, but I still like things as planned out as much as possible. Why didn’t I jump to the conclusion that she was going to die from this? I don’t know. Perhaps some higher power jumped in at that moment to calm me. If so, I’m grateful for it. I was able to listen to her and evaluate the situation with a clear head.

I know, me with a clear head? That’s just crazy talk….

So, back to my beginning….part two. Routine mammogram on March 13, 2014. Of course I was running late. Emma forgot her clarinet, had to run home and I arrived at the appointment 7 minutes late. They told me they could accommodate me, until I pointed out that I had some sort of lump on the outside of my right breast. I was sure it was just a pimple, but I wanted to make sure. This was the first time the attitude changed.

“Oh, well then this is no longer a regular checkup,” she tells me. “Now we need to clear this with your doctor. We may need to reschedule.”

Crap. Really? I’m sure it’s just a pimple but go ahead, call the doc….ok, you can still see me today? Excellent. They put on some sort of metal marker sticker thing on my boob where the pimple (yes, it’s a pimple for heaven’s sake) to mark it while taking the mammogram. Squish, flatten, contort, etc and the picture is done. Then, she takes 6 more. This is not normal. I know something is up, and I can see the monitor. I know what I’m looking at. It looks like sand in little lines in my breast. The doctor comes in to tell me that I need a biopsy.

Shit. I have cancer. Ok, here we go…..

Biopsy on March 18. This is quite possibly the oddest thing I’ve ever done. I’ve done some odd things, but this is a new level of odd. I lay down on a table with a hole in it. My breast hangs down through said hole. (Gravity, doing its thing, makes boobs, especially older, post-baby boobs, look kinda ugly. Move along….nothing to see here….) The doctor numbs the area. When I feel nothing, he takes a cheese borer and takes a few plugs out of my breast. The cool thing here is that I get to see the samples. I know, gross, but cool too.

Go home and wait 48+ hours until the doctor calls with the results. Right, I’ll just wait and be all calm and shit. Whatever. I already know. I do my homework and prepare myself for what I know is coming.

I am not a patient person. Well, sorta, but not really. When I want information, I have no patience. I called the doctor myself, unable to wait for him. He confirms what I already knew. Stage Zero (I had no idea this existed until this moment), estrogen sensitive (this is a GOOD thing), non-invasive (also a good thing), DCIS (ductal carcinoma in situ – my 2 semesters of Latin helped me here) breast CANCER. And there it was. The official diagnosis. At that moment, I officially had cancer. 

Me, a 43 year-old runner, who doesn’t really even get colds, has cancer.