Heaven on Earth

I just got home from a weekend at Harbin Hot Springs with 10 fabulous women all connected by Robin...what loving energy we had and what an incredible place! Thank you, Robin, for organizing the whole thing...let's do it again!
They had to drag me out of the hot springs to come home, but I couldn't kick and scream much because I was a blissed out wet noodle. Yesterday I had a Watsue massage.. the experience is wonderfully other worldly....very powerful.
Everyone walks around the pools naked, very nonchalant and easy. I was happy to have two full breasts and feel "normal". How will I feel after surgery on the 12th? Still so many unknowns. I got so much from the wonderful women with us, and being in a quiet beautiful place, naked in warm, hot, cold, hot, warm water for hours on end. It was divine, just what I needed.
I had been invited to go to Harbin numerous times and feel the fool to not have gone sooner. Friends, don't delay, operators are standing by, make your reservations now :)

Tomorrow I go to Dr. Lagios for a 2nd opinion on the pathology of the first lump. The 2nd lump will be biopsy'd after the lumpectomy, so it will remain an unknown.

Thank you to all who have called to reach out and send me your love. Between work, finding a new school for Ezri, dr. appts, and basic householding, there isn't alot of time to catch up with everyone as often as I'd like (who doesn't know that I love to chat on the phone?) Leon's been great picking up my slack in addition to all his work, so please feel free to leave us messages here and check in this way. He took the boys to LA and celebrated Ezri's 8th birthday today with family there. Thank you Mark and Leslie for hosting his party and for all who made it special for him.
Namaste
I'm feeling grateful to have so many wonderful friends and such a loving family.

One of many

Yesterday I was excited to paint and go back to my "home" dance. Anthony's theme was commitment, as he is engaged and excited about the future. I had started a valentines painting with one heart a couple of weeks ago, and last night it evolved into "commitment to life" as I painted breasts of any women and then my own, which would soon have scars and trauma and may need to be sacraficed so that I may re-commit to LIFE.
When it came time to leave my studio and I imagined placing the painting on the alter, I thought "what a downer, I don't want my own sadness to weigh heavy on the dance." In a stack next to me were paintings Ezri had done last week at Beth's paint camp. I took 5 with me and so mine was placed behind the tree of life and was only one of six. Of course, it worked out beautifully and I was so proud have Ezri's paintings witnessed for 2 hours!
(this site is very frustrating because it doesn't always let me upload images...so until it does...)

Drawings from Sunday Dance Feb 21, 2010

Getting serious

Hello loved ones,
Today I had an ultra sound to check out the 3rd lump, this one found on the MRI from last Friday. It is most likely also cancer. Cousin H was with me (thank goddess) because the radiologist called the surgeon Dr. ONeal and she saw me right away. She outlined all the strategies and we've schedule surgery for March 12th. A lumpectomy to remove both tumors and check the lymph nodes. The MRI also showed other spots of tissue that are suspect and she will take core biopsies while she's in there. She offered surgery on March 1st but that is too soon. I'm going to Harbin for a women's retreat on Friday, Leon is taking the boys to LA and Ezri's 8th birthday is Sunday. I'm not prepared to have my body disfigured and my whole life change that soon. I'll have 12 more days of being strong and agile, physically and mentally, which I need to figure out Ezri's school, work and maybe pull a birthday party together for him. He is being a good sport about being home all day with no friends. I need the time to absorb the likelihood of chemo and radiation over the next year and the possibility of a mastectomy if my breast is riddled with cancer. Ugh.

Strength

Ezri was expelled from his school and now we need to find a new one for him. He acted out 2 days after my diagnosis, became aggressive and kicked another student. It turned out not to be the first time and it was really shitty of the school. I've been so upset it has put my own circumstance on the back burner. BUSD placed him in my least favorite urban school and I refuse to send him there, so begins the maneuvering, appointments, evaluations and phone calls ad nauseam.

Danced yesterday with Maja at the helm, so very sweet. These are my drawings afterwards.

MRI and Pool Party!

I had an MRI yesterday. My inspiration friend LK met me there and while having Korean BBQ afterwards, my new wonder doctor O'Neal called me on her day off to say there is a 3rd lump close to the chest wall and near the tumor in the same breast. Monday she will tell me if they want more imaging, a biopsy or if they'll take it out in the lumpectomy. This is not easy or straightforward. I did find time for acupuncture. Cousin H's man Robt Zeiger gave me different imagery. I was trying to imagine the cancer flushing out. He suggested to surround it with smiley faces...contain it with love, so that's what I'm doing, keeping all the healthy cells happy so they can resist the cancer advances and keep it in check.

Even so, my days of two beautiful full breasts are numbered, which prompted me to take the plunge and go to an ecstatic dance last night in Mill Valley at the rec center. I'd been invited before but the thought of getting into a bathing suit in front of everyone hadn't been appealing. Now, having a new found appreciation for my luscious rack that easily fills out my bathing suit, I thought, if not now, when?

The dance was big and WAY too crowded with way too much talking and gawking (the fashions are so great in Marin that I and tons others can't help themselves) but ultimately worth it for getting into my body. Afterwards we stayed for the midnight to 2am hot/tub swim party and it was incredibly fun. I’ve been doing dolphin laps at the Y since I got back from scuba diving in Mexico, swimming under water with the fins as far as I can. I was a ballerina dolphin floating and flying in the water like a mermaid with handsome strong men supporting me and all seemed right in the world (and the hot tub was hot!) The night was a throw back to being young and free and fun, just the antidote for cancer. I got to sleep at 4am and up at 8am, and since I'm really not a teenager any more, I'm feeling really tired at 10 and will sign off.
Nighty nighters

Double trouble averted

Yesterday I met with a 2nd surgeon, Dr. O'Neal. I like her WAY better than the first doctor and at the end of the appt she gave me a hug and her home phone number, nice examining table manner. My loving cousins Hillary and Karen were with me and they will agree, she's a keeper. She found a 2nd lump in the same breast and felt a swollen lymph node in my arm pit. What a roller coaster ride this is! I awoke at 3 am could feel the layers of consciousness separate like a thick soup. At the surface, I remembered the possiblity of being cancer ridden that is my life right now and I could feel the adrenaline bolt me awake. I had to get up at 6am for a meeting at SFO, so it took all my powers of mental fortitude to steer clear of the fears and allow sleep to seep back in. I'm happy to say it took just over an hour, way better than taking the whole 3 hours I had left.
The good news is I had another mammograph- ultrasound this afternoon and the radiologist said the lump is positively a cyst and no unusual lymph node was seen. WHew.....now one invasive lobular lump seems like a cake walk, albeit by way of chemo invading my veins and radiation zapping my breast, but I promise to eat lots of cake in the process. Carrot Cake with real cream cheese frosting is my favorite, please. :) Thankfully this is a dance night and I can shake this all out.

Tomorrow I have an appt with a different surgeon, to hear the same words without an accent. The results of the core biopsy should be in so I'll find out what type of BC I have.

A big thank you to all who have offered to go with me to appointments. If radiation and chemo are ahead, there will be many opportunities for company.

Dance Medicine

Dance Medicine Sunday morning with Kathleen leading. There are oil pastels and paper at the alter, so I drew my breast with cancer in it and realized how important boundaries are. The lump needs to be removed along with any nodes that the cancer has spread into. Boundaries have to be defined and kept. To see this image drives "it" home, there is a cancer in my body. My breast is bruised from the core needle biopsy done last Tuesday and so is my arm where blood was taken twice. The trauma has begun.

Coming out

Met with my Core Conexion fellow women dancers last night for dinner and circle. How nourishing to be circled by women who can be present with what is and offer their own experiences and outlooks to assist and support each other. It was a challenge to say out loud that I have breast cancer, like throwing down a big gauntlet and saying....match that! as if it trumps all else. It is an opportunity to listen and receive, neither of which come naturally to me. what do I want to hear? what CAN I hear? I heard a lot of concern and I felt a lot of love. These women see me dance, and dance is the one place in my life where I feel free to trust my intuition and move as my body leads. I need more of that kind of trust in my life and I am so grateful to have a community that groks that.

Good News

I Do NOT have the genetic BRCA marker for cancer, as an Ashkenazie Jew and a mother who had breast cancer, I was tested. This means no need for an ovarectomy or double mastectomy. Still waiting to hear what type of cancer, but lumpectomy with radiation and chemo are in my future, which is not as radical as a mastectomy.

Apocalyptic:

1 : of, relating to, or resembling an apocalypse
2 : forecasting the ultimate destiny of the world : prophetic
3 : foreboding imminent disaster or final doom : terrible
4 : wildly unrestrained : grandiose
5 : ultimately decisive : climactic

— apoc·a·lyp·ti·cal·ly \-ti-k(ə-)lē\ adverb

what I know so far

Last Thursday I had a fine needle aspiration in Dr. Shim's office at Kaiser. Within an hour she called me to say it was cancer. It turns out that Feb 4th was World Cancer Awareness Day. My sister Debbie flew in and along with Leon and cousin Hillary, we tried to understand all the IFs and THENs. Now we are waiting to hear if I have the genetic marker BRCA and what type of cancer it is and whether it's ER/PR +/-.

Theme: Feb 3, 2010

The Fire Within

keeping the embers lit

stoking and stroking the fire

being an air head

cut off at the neck

disconnected from the fire

taking the flame for granted