Drain, drain go away.

Drain, drain, go away, never come back any day.

Poetry has never been my strong suit. Neither has patience. Seriously, this drain is by far the worst part of this experience thus far. Even worse than the radioactive isotope-thingy they shot into my boob pre-surgery. The injections are just painful but, this drain is disgusting. Worse then looking at the bandage and imagining my scar. Worse even then having to wear the blue mask in the hospital. Have I made my point?

Seriously. I had a moment upstairs when we were going for Sports Bra #4 when little black dots floated before my eyes and I almost collapsed. I made the mistake of actually looking at where the drain was emerging out of my underarm. Not a good idea.

The drain wasn't draining properly and I've been soaking through all these clothes, towels, and sheets. I called the hospital today and the lady on call asked me if I'd been "stripping the drain"....um, no. No idea what that means. Long story short: you are supposed to pull on the drain 3 or 4 times without pulling it out of the skin completely. Sure, that is intuitive. How would I know that??

Then, I'm supposed to stay compressed in the hideous sports bra to help the healing process, the internal stitches, etc. But, the stupid thing was so tight that I think it blocked the drainage tube. Another lululemon sports bra is toast. For my next outfit change because I couldn't breathe in the hideous zippered contraption, I decided to step into a slightly oversized lululemon bra and pull it up. Success! My achievement for the day.

I had a nightmare. Drugs will do that to you. I dreamt that they called me from lululemon and told me that they were putting my ambassadorship on hold because of all the upcoming treatment. I was devastated. After all I went through in the mystic tan booth.....

I feel like my life is on hold. I can't teach until this drain is removed. I feel like I can't leave the house until I go have the drain removed. Once the drain is gone, who knows what the future holds?

How can I not go insane? Taking it day by day is impossible when I look down at this drain, impossible as I cannot indulge in my favorite escape of reading because I have the attention span of a gnat, impossible because I don't know what they are going to tell me on Tuesday regarding recommended treatment protocols.

I'm not ready to "begin the fight" right now. I don't feel like activating my inner warrior to get fired up for battle. I'm exhausted. I've been fighting my entire life and I really want to just "be" for the second half.

And, by just "being", I mean publishing a novel, publishing more health and wellness articles and a book, succeeding on ExerciseTV, helping others through my teaching, living on a LARGE scale. I've finally found my calling after my forays through law, sales, charity work....damn it....I don't have time to deal with this disease. I have too much to do. I've finally found my man. I'm just getting started and this whole cancer bullshit is very inconvenient.

When I first got the diagnosis, I was very pragmatic: I will get the lump removed, get my radiation, which will be annoying and time-consuming, but, I will be done in time to go to Australia with Todd in May. Boom, boom, boom. Get it done. This evil drain is disturbing my plans.

A wise woman suggested to me that I sit back for the ride and allow others to fight for me. It sounds good. I am humbled by all the offers of help from those close to me and those who really aren't that close to me too. I am not sure how to sit back and allow others to do for me. Not in this sense anyway.