Day after Completion: Gratitude

As I ran through my itinerary for today, I automatically thought, "drive to Scripps" and just as swiftly, I smiled because I don't have to enter that doorway again for a few months. Today, I had more important tasks like getting a manicure/pedicure and packing for Australia. No need for any more sauteeing of my right chest.

Yesterday I was literally flying on adrenaline all day. The excitement and realization that this nine month journey is over. I. am. finished. with. cancer. treatment. I've been through a lot in my relatively short lifetime, it has truly been a dramatic rollercoaster ride. But, I must say that this disease or crisis or shall I just call it cancer has been the most challenging experience ever. Maybe because it took so long to be over?

Next chapter: blissful, exotic, million miles away vacation. This trip will be such an opportunity to clear out the residue from treatment and a time for Todd and I to breathe after this incredibly difficult period.

I haven't really slept for four nights because I cannot turn off my brain. Flashes of faces keep passing in front of my eyes and I realize how many amazing people have blessed my life and supported and lifted me throughout this journey: Family, old friends, new friends, relative strangers. Todd has been a rock.

I grew much closer to some new friends and some friends faded away a bit. I know people say that you'll know who your true friends are through a crisis like this. True. What is so beautiful is that I really didn't find out anything on the negative side: it was all positive. It is more that some people you don't expect to step up do and others who you thought would be there 24/7 aren't. My life is much richer and fuller as a result of every single one of these relationships.

And, I must say that the Oakton High School Cougars have been incredible!! Shout out to everyone! Does this mean that we are all getting together over Thanksgiving in Northern Virginia? Or, does this warrant a celebratory reunion trip to Ocean City?

One sleep to Oz.

Yes, my hair is coming in salt and pepper. You won't see it again as I alreadyhave it covered.

Last Day of Treatment Eve

Finally, the night before the last day of cancer treatment. Coupled with the simmering excitement for this milestone is the huge anticipation for Todd and my trip to Australia on Friday. Three sleeps to the adventure of a lifetime!

Well, I am having a challenging time sleeping because I am so excited about all of it. Todd and I are zooming around in a flurry of preparations: walking shoes, trial size shampoo (yes shampoo people: I have an inch of hair), laundry, laying out outfits, going for increasingly longer walks to build up my stamina, choosing what to pack, and and and.

Today was full of positives: I stopped by Yoga Swami and completed the paperwork to start the weekly Yoga for Cancer Recovery classes on Thursday October 7th. It will be offered at 4pm on a donation basis. I have a key and everything so, it is on!

Then, I picked up my cast from Anne Krell, the beautifully talented artist who painted it. Check it out! If I haven't written about this before, several weeks ago I was casted by the ladies from Keep-a-Breast.org for an upcoming Breast Cancer Awareness event being held at lululemon Carlsbad. It was an interesting experience and I must say like nothing I've ever participated in before. This group raises breast cancer awareness using art: www.keep-a-breast.org. They are amazing.

In the middle of all of that, I taught two yoga classes, caught up with several of my good friends on the phone and online. Then, I returned home to be surprised by Todd with a pre-vacation/end-of-treatment present.

The second to last radiation was a piece of cake. This is the eighth week that I've driven to Scripps every weekday. I cannot wait to turn in my hospital bracelet. I cannot wait to not enter those gates. I cannot wait to stop changing into hospital gowns on a daily basis. I cannot wait until tomorrow at 3pm.

Freedom.

Countdown

Radiation #34 complete: check

Eyebrows fully grown in with no need for pencil: check

Eyelashes almost fully returned: check

Radiation wound 90% recovered: check

Travel-sized toiletries purchased: check

I cannot believe that I've only got two more radiations and I am done, done, done with treatment! And, then time to escape and run to the other side of the earth for two whole weeks. The next four days will be a whirlwind of preparations to set foot on that plane to Sydney Friday night.

Each day, I feel strength returning. Physical strength. Emotional strength. Mental strength. Yesterday, I had the best yoga practice I've had since I can remember. Physically, I was able to move in ways that I hadn't in quite a while. As a result, I could literally feel the lifting of tensions and stress and pain. Yoga is magic. I'm looking forward to the opening of my body, mind and heart as I practice more freely each day.

Okay, I can't focus to write. I'm too excited because we are leaving for Australia on Friday. Woo.

Six Sleeps to Oz

This photo is from March 26th, when Patti shaved my head for me. Who knew that I'd be eager to have hair this long again? Mine is growing fast but, I'm not quite to this length yet. Hopefully by next week! I'm sick of wigs.

Less than a week to Australia! That means that I've only got three more radiation sessions and I am finished with my cancer treatment. I'm not sure when that lovely reality will sink in.

I'm thrilled to report that I feel much better than I did a few days ago. The evil cold/flu bug that drove me to my knees exited stage left yesterday. My underarm radiation burn is slowly healing: a few more days to go. Three days in bed. Whew.

Last night, we watched the Stand Up to Cancer telethon. It was quite moving and not a little bit disturbing for me. Seeing the statistics that 207,000 people will be diagnosed with breast cancer this year and realizing that I am now one of those statistics feels strange. Part of me must be in denial. I don't know how because every time I look in the mirror or look down, I am reminded. The scars last forever, even the ones that fade on the surface. How will I feel a year from now? five years from now?

So, I'm not sure what to call myself. Am I a cancer survivor? Or, is that name only applicable at 3pm on Wednesday, September 15th, when my last appointment ends? Do I say that I "had" breast cancer? that I "have" breast cancer?

I find it rather odd that they don't have a scan when your treatment ends to declare you cancer-free. I know that they want to do a mammogram in three months and possibly every three months for the next five years? They didn't find my initial cancer on my routine mammogram last September so, I don't have a lot of confidence or interest in having my boob smashed in the mammogram machine so frequently. I can only imagine if I hadn't found the lump myself in January and had waited until now to go in. How much would it have spread by then?

But, I feel lucky. A new friend of mine, that feels like an old friend, is in the hospital. She beat cancer several years ago and now she is ill and the doctors haven't diagnosed the problem yet. She is in her 30s. When I visited her today, my gut told me she'd make it through this new challenge. I know she'll beat whatever this is, even if it is cancer returning. She's too stubborn to let it take over her life. But, why does she even have to deal with it again? It seems so unfair.

So, I am lucky to have three more days. Maybe I will feel done when I leave Scripps parking lot and relinquish my Free-Parking-wristband. Or, maybe I will feel free when Todd and I are driving to LA to catch our plane. Perhaps it will register that I am finished while having High Tea in Sydney or petting a koala along the Great Ocean Road.

The sooner the better!

Yoga for Cancer Recovery Class begins October 7th at Yoga Swami

It is official: beginning October 7th, I will be offering an ongoing weekly Yoga for Cancer Recovery class at Yoga Swami in Encinitas on Thursdays at 4pm.

This class is open to anyone who is currently going through cancer treatment, who has completed treatment or is a caretaker of someone living with cancer. My intent is to create a safe community where we can come together with our shared bond and just feel better. As a breast cancer survivor, I can attest to how much yoga helped me.

Benefits of Yoga:

•Learn to handle the effects of surgery, chemotherapy and radiation

•Experience healing techniques for the mind, body and spirit

•Boost energy, improve mood, learn relaxation and breath techniques to combat fatigue, stress, and pain

•Restore flexibility, strength, range of motion, enhance lymphatic flow, digestion and circulation

Classes at Yoga Swami are donation-based. What does this mean exactly? It means that each week, you pay what you can. The suggested donation is $5-15. But, if you can't make a donation, that is fine. I understand the financial difficulties associated with this journey. I merely would like to cover my cost of renting out the beautiful space where we can hold class.

Yoga Swami is located at 912 S. Coast Highway 101, Encinitas.


If you have any questions at all, please feel free to call me or email me at claire@oceansoulyoga.com.

Please bring your own yoga mat.

Under the weather

How cute is Jake? Burrowed under the blankets. If you look closely, you can see me there underneath them too.

So, I guess the universe wanted me to slow down and let my radiation wound under my arm heal because Tuesday night I started to get very ill. Sore throat, absolutely no ability to breathe through my nose whatsoever, dizzy, weak, sick to my stomach. Great. The doctor did a strep culture yesterday and I'm hoping that isn't the case. I had to cancel my clients and classes for the rest of the week. I'm trapped in the house, trying to move as little as possible.

In other words, I'm miserable.

I don't get sick. Well, except for this pesky little bout with cancer, I don't get sick. I hadn't had a cold in two years before 2010.

So, I am a fan of the Neti Pot to clear out the nasal passages. The Neti Pot is a natural way to keep the sinuses and nasal passages clear and open. Sadly, I'm so congested that the Neti Pot isn't working! Nothing will flow through.

Picture this: it is 4am and I'm leaning over the sink with that bright blue Aladdin-looking pot pouring saline solution into one nostril and nothing coming out. Then, it runs down my face as I choke and try to breathe. Repeat. How can it not work?

From all the years of yoga, I am used to breathing out of my nose. This practice is not serving me well at the moment. Luckily, today I have the use of one-half of my left nostril so, I'm not going to suffocate.

As for the underarm: I'm not going to post a photo because I had a few people so disturbed at the photo I posted of me without the eyebrows that I'm afraid I'd traumatize everyone. The doctor told me yesterday to just slather it with Aquaphor and it would be okay by the weekend. It doesn't look any beetter to me and I just have that greasy ointment everywhere.

It seems like whenever I'm feeling excited when nearing the end of treatment, some little snafu pops up. I absolutely need to be healthy because Australia is next week!! ONE week from tomorrow and I cannot be sick!

Mantras of the day: Open nasal passages, open!
Heal baby heal!

Yes I can.

"There are so many people out there who will tell you that you can't. What you've got to do is turn around and say watch me." - author unknown

Life is funny: this quote arrived in my inbox this morning and it resonated strongly with me. Perhaps it even triggered a memory or twenty of me saying just those words. And, many times I launched and I crashed back down to earth. Just as the naysayers predicted. But, many times I launched and sailed. Taking risks is inherent in my being, a part of my fabric and make-up.

Life is funny: this afternoon, the folks in radiation oncology were running behind. So, I sat in the waiting room conversing with a lady waiting for her husband to be treated for oral cancer and an older gentleman being treated for I'm not quite sure what. He'd had a tumor in his lung and it was pressing on his vocal chords. Thus, he sounded an awful lot like Clint Eastwood in his Dirty Harry days. He's also been going through experimental treatment over the last 18 months, had lost and regrown his hair twice, had numerous surgeries and drugs for perhaps three separate bouts of cancer.

I didn't catch his name, so I will call him Clint, in honor of the husky voice. Clint told me that when people say "cancer" to him, he translates it to "cure." When people tell him his time is limited, he tells them he chooses life. He also said he still goes to the gym three times a week and does what he can because exercise plays a huge factor in staying healthy and keeping the mental attitude positive.

So, basically the universe was giving me the exact same message twice today: once via email and once via an inspiring, strong man fighting for a cure. A cure for himself.

Interestingly, another man in the waiting room, commented to me, "You are too young to be here." And, I agreed with him. He then said, "Life isn't fair, you shouldn't be here." Again, I agreed. But, if any of us in that room awaiting treatment focus on the life isn't fair angle, we are going to have a tough time.

Life isn't fair. In my experience, I've found it to be true that some of us are given a lot to handle for no apparent reason. I look at my father: he's lost 3 of his sons, both his daughters have had cancer, he's divorced and his only living sibling just passed away last week.

Does Rene get depressed? Maybe. But, at 86, that man is still out walking his three miles a day, he goes to play petanque with his friends at Carderock two to three times a week, he travels back to France a few times a year to see his girlfriend and family: he is living his life. I inherited my stubborn bourrique (Corsican donkey) nature from him and I am proud of it.

He is one of the people who consistently told me that I cannot or shouldn't do certain things. I ignored him. And, I'm who I am today because of that slight recklessness, that defiance, that fearlessness in jumping into the unknown.

All my choices created who I am today, for better of for worse. I don't regret any of it.

Well, maybe law school.

Walking without a wig

This morning, I went for a walk wearing only a baseball cap. Well, I also had on pants, a top, shoes and socks, of course. But, since I now have a little hair, albeit silver, showing in the sideburn area and at the nape of my neck, I figured what the heck?

I went to the lagoon with Kirsten, as opposed to the beach where I might actually run into someone that I know. Baby steps. It felt good to not fuss with it. And, now that my brows and lashes are growing back, I didn't have to waste five minutes drawing on brows and liner either. I'm pleased to have that time returned to me. Of course, it is now spent on shaving my legs that seem to be valiantly trying to make up for lost time. I'm now really anxious for the hair to just fill in so I can go without anything at all! My fingers are crossed that my hairdresser can make it a pretty color pre-Australia.

My energy level is great and the only complaint I have is that the skin under my arm is still raw and weepy. Really horrible. I had to hold my hand on my hip and away from my body on the walk so I didn't rub it any more. Very graceful. It astounds me that they proceed so far with all of these treatments despite the severity of the side-effects. They saw how raw it was last week and basically just told me to deal with it. I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

This week marks the final free Yoga for Cancer Recovery class at lululemon Carlsbad. 9am on 9/9! I'm excited that I've got the new Yoga for Cancer Recovery class time firmed up for October. I'll be offering the class at Yoga Swami in Encinitas at 4pm on Thursday afternoons.

10 days to Australia....

George Clooney and I...

have an unlikely connection. Not one that I'm really happy about but, it was absolutely compelling and as soon as Todd and I returned from seeing "The American", I had to write about it.

By the way, The American was a disappointment. Slow-moving all the way through. I'd wait until it comes to DVD.

So, the epiphany that struck me during the film was that I have the exact same hair as George. Except that he has about 3/4 inch more than me. But, the salt and pepper color pattern, including full silver on the temples, dark through the center and silver in the front is identical. We even share the same little cowlick where my part will be one day soon. How did this happen? How can it be?

George is a silver fox.

I am not.

I cannot wait until September 16th when I see my hairdresser and have some pretty color slapped on there. I can handle walking around with a crew cut, just not the Cell Block 9 version.

12 days to Australia.

Grow, baby, grow!

The cancer recovery yoga series continues to go well at lululemon. The last class in the series will be Thursday September 9th. I'm so grateful that I've been able to offer this free series at lululemon Carlsbad. Once I return from Australia, it looks like I'll be offering a weekly donation-based class in Encinitas at Yoga Swami.

Today is the first day of a three day weekend with nothing really scheduled: lovely and relaxing. And, it appears that the sun is actually going to show through the heavy marine layer that has been cloaking San Diego since Thursday. Come on sun!

I can't wait for my radiated red skin to heal up! The skin under my arm has now blistered, broken up, rubbed raw a few times. It doesn't seem to matter how much ointment I slather on it, the location just sucks for healing purposes. I had the last radiation to that area on Thursday and the final 7 are just to the lumpectomy incision. I'm optimistic that the rest of the area will be healed by next week.

Todd and I are leaving for Australia in less than two weeks! I cannot believe it. The days are taking shape and so is my vacation wardrobe. I've lucked out with finding some shorts and walking shoes and a few other fun things that scream vacation time! Sydney! Melbourne! Great Ocean Road!

And, I am willing my hair to grow fast enough that Sheila, Sydney, Britney and Gisele are shadows of my past! I'd love to be able to go to Australia with a bare head and not worry about any wigs. Well, I'll be honest, I'm not simply willing it, I've got Ovation slathered on my head with the shower cap on top.

If you missed that photo from a few weeks ago, scroll back to see it. I look the same but, now I have my own eyebrows and eyelashes. A lot of eyebrows. It is amazing how fast the hair is coming in! At this rate, I will have Brooke Shields brows circa the 1980s. I've got an appointment with my hairdresser on the 16th, the day before we leave, to put some color on this head. I have no problem walking around with a crew cut but, it shan't be a predominantly silver one. No way. No how.

I'm so happy to be almost at the end of this ride. I found the lump on January 2nd and treatment finishes on September 15th. The light at the end of the tunnel becomes brighter by the hour.

Lucky #8

What a whirlwind of a day. Doctor's appointments, shopping and teaching. In that exact order.

Great news: I met with the lymphedema physical therapist for the first time in over a month. She was thrilled to see that my arm looks normal and has been holding steady for four weeks now. The proof is in the measurements, however, and I was eager to see what the percentage decrease would be.

When we first met in June, my right arm was 14.4% larger than the left. Then, I had a horrible reaction to the heated yoga room and it ballooned up to 21.9%. Simply gross. It took another month to get it down to 14% at our last meeting on July 27th.

Today, it is only 8%!! And, that is a 42% reduction in the size of my arm itself. Hello wrist bone! Hello elbow! Goodbye Popeye forearm! I think I may be able to wear jewelry on my right hand and wrist again after all. What a relief. I still have to wear a sleeve during the day and sleep in the night sleeve each night but, I will wean off of it after radiation and hopefully only have to wear a sleeve to workout.

Anyways.....

I promptly zoomed over to Nordstrom and put that newly svelte right arm and hand into action signing credit card slips. I lucked out and found some cute walking shoes for Australia, along with some Sanctuary shorts: all on sale. I need to be prepared for my trip, right?

Onto Radiation Oncology for full area treatment and new scans for the final 8 treatments. I have just one "full area" radiation left tomorrow. Thank goodness as my underarm is now officially raw and blistered.

Next, Dr. L came in and drew a circle around my incision and the assistant put wire around it, which felt very strange. The assistant then stuffed me into the CT-Scanner machine again so they could photograph the wired section of boob. The final eight treatments will be directed solely to this specific tumor bed area.

In addition to the CT-Scan photos, they once again took photos with a regular camera. Snapshots of me lying on my side, with a robe half-on, wire around my magic-markered breast cancer scar. I find these very odd. All I can say, is that once this blog is published as a book those photos better not surface on the internet.

I have a reputation to uphold.