Three years later...

So I recently got a nice comment from somebody who reminded me that it's been three years since I updated this little blog of mine. So here is what happened since the cliffhanger I left you with three years ago....

The cancer was back. I learned that it was actually a different strain of cancer (strain? type?). It was back on the same side, no spots on the left.  My surgeon was all about a double mastectomy and so was I! Here are some highlights from that:

• Double mastectomies are no joke. They hurt like a mother, and you realize very quickly that you have zero ab muscles. (Kids! Do your crunches!!!)
• I took 6 weeks off of school. That was really hard! Luckily I left my class to a good friend who did an awesome job so that wasn't any added stress.
• Drains are the devil. Daily tasks like a shower led to some creative moves. I'd like to patent my "pin your drains to swimsuit bottoms while you shower" move. I shared it with a friend at work going through the same thing and she found it a game changer too.
• Expanders are the WORST. They are uncomfortable and they feel like the most foreign things in your body...probably because they are. When you get them expanded your whole chest feels stretched to the brink.
• I ended up getting a staph infection around one of my incisions that didn't heal very well. Fun fact: if you've had radiation your skin changes and doesn't heal as well. This ended up extending the reconstruction process about 6 months...
• You can't sleep anywhere but on your back for like 4 months. That was terrible for this stomach sleeper.
• Nobody really tells you that your breasts will have zero feeling after these surgeries. Well maybe some people get that feeling back, but I don't. I can feel the pressure if someone is touching them, but don't really "feel it" if that makes sense. That has led to some funny " you've spilled something on yourself but you don't know because you didn't feel it" moments...

So by June 2016 I had finished everything and had my new tatas that, fingers crossed, won't try to kill me this time!

Having implants has some big pluses:

• You get to make fake boob jokes....a lot.
• I don't have to wear underwire bras!
• They are a conversation topic
• You have a fun card to keep in your wallet that identifies them

So that's my update! I still see doctors every 6 months. I have now been put on tamoxifen for 10 years,  5 years down. And I am still terrified every time I have an ache or pain or think I feel something funny. Pretty sure that's not going to go away. Oh! and I turned.....40! My body hurts thinking about it...

Thanks for reading!

I'm baaaaaack....(Unfortunately)

Hi to all those out in the cyber world that might read this blog. I'm kinda thinking I'm talking to 3 people (all of whom I know) but greetings nonetheless!

I recently turned 37 and thought to myself, "Hey! You should write an update post". And then it slipped my mind. That is, until the doctor called.

Four days after my birthday I had my latest MRI scan.  I have become kinda "cocky" with these scans and checkups. I had just seen my surgeon and oncologist two weeks earlier, they saw/felt nothing, so I wasn't worried. The next day my surgeon called.

"Hey Jenn, I bet you're guessing something is up since I'm the one calling you." Actually no, no I wasn't but not I am!!

Turns out the MRI showed a spot that they want to check further. It's 5mm and on the same side as before.  I crumbled. Thank goodness I was home so that I could have one of the ugliest cries of my life. I'm talking crying so hard my hands started tingling from lack of oxygen. The cats looked at me like I was a crazy woman. (Let's be honest, they look at me like that most of the time.)

So a week later I have calmed down and have come to terms with it. Of course this "thing" could be lots of different things. Lymph node, scar tissue, tumor.... I think I'm being a big pessimist since last time I wasn't very negative and it turned out bad.

My biopsy is Wednesday morning.  It's a MRI-Guided breast biopsy which is new to me. It sounds like a long time in the MRI tube. Sigh.... Then I'm off to get a mammogram. I love how they squish the hell out of your boob right after poking around in it. Sounds like a great way to spend my Wednesday morning!!!

So, hopefully my return to this blog will be a short lived one. If you stop by, say hi! And maybe send some positive vibes my way Wednesday (August 12th) morning. :)

Anniversaries

I am about as single as they come so anniversaries have never really been something I've had or celebrated.

Someone asked me the other day if I remember much of the last year. Clearly they don't realize the power of my memory. I can tell you the dates of: my diagnosis, my surgery, my port surgery, each chemo, the day I told my students, my port removal, the day Gary shaved my head, the beginning and end of radiation and probably more I'm forgetting right now. Many of these anniversaries are happening this winter.

These anniversaries are making me want to blog again. I always thought I'd just want to forget 2013. However, it's part of the story of my life (insert my humming of One Direction's song)*. Avoiding it doesn't make it go away and there are things I've realized in the last year that I'd like to get out of my head.

So hopefully there will be more blog posts from me. Yes, you are rolling you're eyes at me. Yes, I've said this before. But hopefully, there will be some people who keep me to this! (You know who you are). So if I have any readers here still.....Jenn's back!

*Hey, I teach high school kids. I'm hip with their music

Holly

*Disclaimer: I swear in this post. Cancer makes you do that. (Wait....what was my excuse before then?)
*Names have been changed


I have mentioned before that one of biggest regrets during chemo was not talking to other patients more. I kept to myself, brought friends, and always requested a private room.  On my very last day of chemo I met Holly. I had actually met her about a month earlier, but hadn't really gotten a chance to chat with her.

Holly and I had a lot in common. Both 35, both single, living in Holland, and both had breast cancer. Her's was stage 2, mine stage 1. She even worked with a parent of one of my students. If we had met under different circumstances, we probably would have been friends. She was very easy to talk to, funny and it made me sad that we had only just met.

She finished chemo about a month after me, but after figuring out that we knew someone in common, we would get updates on each other. I heard all about her reconstructive surgery and when she finished radiation. I'm sure she heard all about my crazy curly hair. I hadn't run into our mutual acquaintance in a while and had been wondering how she was doing.

Last night I got the update. Holly was recently diagnosed with non-operable brain cancer. Of course I was told this at parent-teacher conferences and proceeded to have to spend some time in the bathroom pulling myself together. The total meltdown happened on the ride home when I actually had time to process everything. Note to self: sobbing makes you dizzy so you probably shouldn't have been driving.

I didn't really expect the news to rock me like it did. But I'm sad/terrified/boggled for so many reasons:
  -It's not fair that not even a year after finishing chemo for one cancer, Holly has another. She thirty-
   fucking-five years old! Not that anyone EVER deserves cancer but this is a total slap in the face.
  -How did it even get there? How did they not know?
  -Why didn't the last chemo zap it? (yes I know, it probably wasn't there)
  -How do you even face your own mortality that young?
  -Why didn't we keep in contact? How can I help?
and absolutely worst of all,
  -She's my age, she had my cancer, she could be me.

Rational Jenn knows she is healthy. She knows that all of her scans have come back clean. She knows that he doctor told her Tamoxifen is good to be on. It's that irrational Jenn that lost it. It's irrational Jenn that needed a breakdown of every symptom she'd had before her diagnosis. Irrational Jenn started fretting about every single ache and pain she's had lately and convinced herself it was bad.

I realize that this will not be the last time one of these meltdowns will happen, but they are not something I am looking forward to.

I am sending thoughts and strength to Holly, her family, her friends, her coworkers and everyone else in her life.

Cancer, you seriously are a little beeeyotch!

Remember when Felicity cut her hair?

I know I'm not the only Felicity fan out there. Remember at the beginning of season 2, how she cut her hair and the fans thought she was crazy? Well so did I!

Ok where am I going with this? Well, it's a great segue into my latest hair update. I know, I know, I've made so many promises these last 6 months about how often I'd post pics, but once a month (ish) is still pretty good!

I like to refer to my latest phase of hair as the "Felicity".

The picture doesn't do the curls justice. Plus, I am amazingly bad at taking a pic of the back of my head, but trust me, it's crazy curly!

Here it is with a side by side with Keri Russell. Try not to focus on how gorgeous she is, but on her curly locks. (Hard I know...)

Side note: not only am I impressed that I correctly put two photos in a blog post, but I actually combined two for a side-by-side shot!

People are shocked at how curly it is. Evidently nobody seems to remember that I actually had curly hair, I just spent hours straightening it.  It is, however, much softer, curlier and not as frizzy as it used to be. Ask me one day and I'll tell you I love it. Talk to me the next and I hate it. As of right now I'm going to keep it short for a while because that seems to be the consensus vote. (Thanks for the compliments by the way!) I am back to rocking my expensive Anthropoligie headbands every day which makes me happy.

At this point, most people who haven't seen me in a while don't have a clue that I went through chemo. Most just tell me they like my hair. I've seemed to move into the "she just has a short haircut" phase rather than "oh her hair is growing back in nicely".

There are still some awkward encounters, like when a former student yelled at me during a football game "Why did you cut off all your hair!?!?!?!" Umm......

So there it is, your monthly (semi-monthly?) hair post. And it didn't even take a reminder from Allie to get it! Jenn, for the win!

6 Months

So this week marks 6 months since I finished chemo. I know this sounds cliche, but it feels like yesterday that I was in the thick of it. Because it's been 6 months, I have a whole round of doctors appointments in the next weeks. I think that every 6 months I have to see all of my doctors and get new scans.

To say that I am nervous about these appointments is an understatment. I've had them on the calendar for two months and I don't think they've left my mind yet. As this week has gotten closer, I can feel the anxiety increase. I have no reason to think they will find anything, and I want so much to just confidently walk in there knowing nothing will show up. But, this whole process has made me believe differently. My mom said to me today "well, you're feeling fine aren't you?" I wanted to say "yeah, but I felt great when they found cancer the first time!"

I'm going to apologize now to anyone I snap at this week (my poor students....). It's coming from stress and nothing else.

Any prayers and thoughts you can send my way the next two weeks are greatly appreciated. I'll just be here trying to stay calm. :)

Money Matters

I feel like I've talked a lot about feeling thankful during this journey. Thankful for friends and family and their support. Thankful that, even during chemo, I never felt THAT bad.  But I heard a story yesterday that might have made my thankfulness hit an all-time high.

Another worker within my school district was diagnosed with cancer in May. This is her second round of cancer, as she beat it two or three years ago. I'm not sure what type she has, not that it really matters. She needs to undergo radiation, but has no insurance (she's not a teacher).  The doctors won't start her radiation until she puts a $3,000 deposit down.

When I started getting the insurance statements on my radiation I realized that each treatment was $609. It could be more if you had an x-ray that day or if you had to see the doctor. Here is a little math for you: 33 treatments at  $609 each is $20,097. 

I have saved all of my insurance statements since this journey began in December, but I have yet to add them all up. I could honestly be close to $100,000 in total between surgeries, chemo, doctors appointments and radiation.  With the exception of a couple of prescriptions and co-pays I have paid $500, which is my deductible.

I remember a day that my friend Jocelyn asked me about my bills and how much I've paid and then said "What do people do who don't have insurance? They just die, right?" Naive Jenn hadn't really thought of that, and just figured it got taken care of somehow. I mean come on, doctors really aren't going to treat someone with cancer? Oh silly Jenn....

We can complain that insurance is expensive, and I know that when my contribution to insurance went from 7% to over 20% in a year I was angry, but holy cow I have no problem paying for it now. I was the first one at the lunch table saying that we should switch insurance companies and go to something cheaper because "I never go to the doctor anyways." Yeah, the lightening bolt hit me on that one.

Between car and house payments, utilities, student loans and every other bill I pay every month I have no idea how long it would take me to save $3,000.  I know that entire time I would be freaking out that the disease inside me was growing and spreading and there was nothing I can do about it. I have no idea how she must be dealing with it.

So today, probably more than ever, I'm thankful for my insurance that has helped me get the best treatments in a timely manner and hasn't put me even farther into debt.

**PS I know I owe a regular post about hair and such and it's coming!