Finally, a trip to California

You might remember (or not, I swore I wrote a post about this but maybe I never did), but right before I got my diagnosis I'd booked a family trip to visit my parents in California.  It was also my 20th High School reunion.  That was painful to write.  Anyway, we postponed the trip because I was going to be right in the middle of my chemo treatments.  We finally got our re-do.

We left on Wednesday, April 30 and flew on Virgin Airlines.  I'm not a fan of the airport but Virgin made it as pleasant as possible.  The flight was an eventful as it can be with a 4- and a 2-year old trapped in a flying box for 6 hours.  Overall, it could have been worse, but we were "that family" a few times.  The upside is the flight attendants soothed us with free alcohol so that helped.  A lot. Plus I was able to watch TV off and on--I got my Bravo reality show fix and it was delightful.

Overall, the week was great and went by too fast--the girls got a ton of time with my parents, I got to visit old haunts and see old friends.  Aaron and I even got to escape to wine country for a few days.

The visit didn't start off hitch-free.  We stayed in a hotel so we could have a place to decompress at the end of the day.  When we checked in, they told me they didn't have a room with double beds because there had been some "incidents" and not all of the double bed rooms were available.  I was soooo tempted to ask what they meant by "incidents", but I figured ignorance was bliss in this case.  So I pleasantly (because I am nothing if not pleasant...ha! that's a joke, I wasn't very pleasant) asked them how they were going to solve this problem, because this was a problem.  They offered me a room with a King-size bed.  Um, one bed for 2 adults and 2 kids?  That's not going to work.  They could offer me a free room in addition to the room with the King bed.  Are the rooms adjoining?  No?  Well that doesn't help us either.  But I took the free room (which we never stepped foot in) and we all cozied up in the King size bed.  I was next to Belle, so that was a little better for Aaron, who was next to Addie and who is a kicker, flailer and head-butter.

The girls woke up at 5:30 the next morning.  I got them and me ready as quickly as possible.  While I was in the shower, Addie started crying.  What now?  Oh...she'd taken off her diaper and pooped.  On the floor.  Now we were that family again. We hosed Addie off, cleaned off the poop and I took them out to breakfast so Aaron could get a little sleep.  We left a path of destruction at breakfast and killed time until Target finally opened.  Addie pooped again (why does this child poop so much?) so we went to a Safeway to buy diapers (because of course had I brought any with me on our morning adventure?  Of course not).  Throughout the Safeway visit I'm trying to control my wild children.  You might not realize this, but I am attempting to raise children that are well-behaved (at least in public).  The cashier told me to relax.  If I wasn't so desperate for diapers and if I'd known where another store was, I hesitate to think about what I would have said or done to that cashier.  Instead I gritted my teeth, paid and left.

So, Target.  My mom had sworn up and down that we didn't need to bring any clothes for the girls--she had it covered.  Great!  Except for the fact that when we got there it was in the 90s and she had flannel PJs for the girls.  And all of the daytime outfits were pants and long-sleeves.  Not a skirt or dress or a pair of shorts to be seen. Oh well, eventually it would warm up in New England (right?), so we could use it then.

The girls ended up staying with my folks every night after that first night.  I was a little worried about the girls wearing out their welcome before Aaron and I headed out to Wine Country, but my folks and the girls all had a blast.  We saw old friends, spent time with my folks and saw a ton of other people that I hadn't seen in ages.  On Sunday and Monday Aaron and I escaped to Wine Country.  It was really nice to get away.  Sadly, one of our cats died while we were gone.  But that's a whole other story entirely...

New beginnings

As I mentioned in my last post, a few weeks back I did a 5K with some friends.  Actually, now that I look at the calendar it was almost a month ago.  While the day didn't go quite as I had hoped it would, it was still a good day overall.  I was very pleased with my pace (7:42 miles) and the gesture of my friends getting together to celebrate the end of this hellish journey was great.

A few weeks ago I had my post-treatment check-up with my oncologist.  It was the first time I had been back at BI since the end of treatment on October 1.  I was unprepared for the anxiety that visiting the oncology department made me feel.  Obviously I don't have great memories of the place, but my feelings still surprised me.  As much as I like my oncologist and as much time as I'll be spending with her for the rest of my life (or until she retires, which will hopefully happen first), I still wish I had never met her.

We have finally rescheduled our California trip.  We had just booked our trip to California when I got my diagnosis.  It feels like a re-do in many ways.  We head out at the end of April.  I'm very much looking forward to it.  Aaron and I are also going away to Provincetown on MLK Jr. weekend.  No Iceland trip planned yet.  This is mainly my fault because work has been so busy and I haven't really had time to think about it.

As my hair continues to grow back, one of the nice things is I don't necessarily feel like I'm "the woman with cancer" anymore.  I've ran into old friends and met new people who compliment me on my hair without knowing about the last year (at least I'm pretty sure they didn't know) and it's so nice to just accept the compliment and move on.  Sometimes I've said something, but increasingly I don't say anything.  Well, I guess I say "thank you" for the compliment.  Also, people make eye contact with me again.  When I had my scarf, nobody would look at me in the aisles of Trader Joe's or in the hallway outside of work.  It was a very strange feeling to feel invisible but know that people were probably looking at me when I wasn't looking at them.

A lot of people have asked me if I'm going to keep my hair short.  I really have no idea.  I feel like it's in a very awkward phase right now.  I'm back to having to spend time on it in the morning.  It's not a bad problem to have, just something I haven't had to deal with for several months.


We had a good Christmas but words can't express how happy I was for New Years.  I actually started this post a week or two ago but never finished it.  As I read on what I've written in this post I can't help but think how boring my life has become.  Well, as boring as my life gets I suppose.  I love boring!

Halfway through radiation

Earlier this week I reached the halfway point through radiation.  While it can feel tedious, it's gone by more quickly than I thought it would.  I think I've even befriended all of the staff that insisted on calling me Rachelle at the radiation office.  Well, the machine technicians at least.  Still not so sure about some of the nurses.  Three more weeks to go and I'll be done with "active treatment".  The Tamoxifen has been uneventful, which is good.

I still have mixed feelings about getting my ovaries removed, but for now I'm back to focusing on treatment.  One thing at a time.  A few people have said to me, "That's it?  You have no other thoughts on radiation?"  No, not really.  Compared to everything else I've gone through this year, radiation truly is a cake walk (I hope I didn't just jinx myself).  Is it a pain in the butt?  Yes.  But besides feeling a little more tired than usual, there's not much to report.  Also, I'm not even sure my fatigue can be directly attributed to radiation.  I suspect it could also have to do with the fact that I'm able to push myself at workouts again, I'm trying to get my running back up, I work full-time and I have two little girls to take care of.  And I'm just worn out from the last eight months.

When I said I needed a vacation, I initially meant just Aaron and me.  But I think the girls could use a vacation too.  Well, maybe not Addie, because she seems the least affected by all of this.  But I'm sure she'd enjoy a vacation anyway.  As I was telling some friends last weekend, the last time we left the country was for our honeymoon.  I just want to leave the country.  It sounds nutty, but we're leaning towards Iceland.  In February (although maybe not for the girls).  Shockingly, you can get good deals to go to Iceland in February.  But I change my mind quite a bit, so we'll see.

As much as we need a break, we also just need to get back to true normalcy.  I think I'm acting more like my "old self", but Belle still knows that I'm going through treatment and I think that continues to cause some anxiety for her.  I think we need to get back to our regular lives for at least a little bit before we jet off anywhere.  So we'll see.