Nursing a cold

I have a cold so I’m spending a few days curled up on my sofa with my favorite blankie (from Victoria Quilts). I had lots of practice doing nothing when I was on Taxotere, but this is a whole lot easier.

I haven’t posted much in the past week or so because my Mom was here visiting. She came out and walked with our Saturday morning group and, of course, out for brunch afterwards.
Mom took the picture below of me, Meridy and Mary when Meridy had us over for lunch. (That's a lot of Ms!). We look damn good for 3 people with cancer, don’t you think? Meridy went to Montreal yesterday to consult a doctor about whether she's a condidate or not for a procedure with radio-active beads inserted into the liver to cut off the blood supply to the tumours. Mary (the trooper that she is!) is heading off to Europe inbetween Taxotere treatments.

Positive thinking

Several years ago, Kevin, a work colleague was diagnosed with cancer. He came to me, still in the deer-in-the-headlights stage of dealing with the news, because he knew that I had had breast cancer and just needed to talk.

I mostly just listened, but I remember giving Kevin this one piece of advice: I told him that he shouldn’t be afraid of his emotions and spending some time on ‘the dark side’ (as I like to call it). People were going to tell him to 'just be positive’ but he shouldn't try to live up to the expectations of others.

Not that I think that positive thinking is a bad thing, but I told Kevin that my experience was that the pressure to be strong for yourself, as well as for everyone else, can just be too much to take sometimes. Since my own diagnosis, I’ve needed to spend some time grieving to really put things in perspective. It’s a natural response to having a serious illness and fighting it can sometimes just make it worse.

Sue Hendler wrote about advice from others to ‘be positive’ in her last column in the Kingston Whig Standard. There are some interesting comments from readers posted in response to her column. I tried to post my own comment but couldn’t figure out how (damn technology!), so I’m posting it here:

I’m not surprised at the different responses to Sue’s latest column. The emotional dark side of living with cancer can be uncomfortable, or even painful, and we want to pretend that if we just stay positive, everything will be OK. Of course, people are well meaning when they say to ‘be strong’ and ‘think positive’, but it’s not realistic or even healthy to try to live that way all the time. Sue is showing her own strength and courage by sharing her feelings and experiences in her columns. Fear, sadness and anger are all natural emotions when dealing with a serious illness. I find it interesting that the last commenter doesn’t seem to be aware that some of those same emotions come through in what she/he wrote. People who love Sue will not turn away just because she is honest enough to say what is helpful to her and what is not.

If you would like to read other columns by Sue Hendler, click on her name in the labels below.

Weekend away

This past Sunday found me up early to catch a train to Belleville. Part of the adventure was in navigating the public bus system (which I have taken about 3 times in 10 years) to get me the short distance to the train station.

The train trip was pleasant, with thawing fields of straw-like vegetation along the route indicating that perhaps spring is truly on its way.

My mom, who drove from Niagara Falls, picked me up at the Belleville station and we had a picnic lunch beside the Lake on the Mountain, overlooking the Glenora Ferry. We stayed the night at the lovely Merrill Inn in Picton.

The afternoon was spent checking out the local shops and then we met Mary & Eric for dinner at the Carriage House in Bloomfield.

On Monday we headed to Ottawa, stopping in Kingston on the way to meet my email-buddy, Sue. We've been corresponding for some time now, so it was nice to meet up in person. We had a great visit, talking about many things we had been writing about in our emails (and Sue in her newspaper column and me on my blog), but it was great to be able to do it face-to-face. My only regret is that I forgot to take a picture of the two of us, so you’ll just have to imagine us smiling ... and looking quite stunning, of course! :-)

Don't burst my bubble!

Fans of Seinfeld may remember “The Bubble Boy” episode, where George gets into a fight with a man living in a plastic bubble over the correct answer to a Trivial Pursuit question.

I’ve been thinking of myself as living in a bubble lately -- only in a good way. Mine is a protective Zen-like bubble that I’ve created for myself to avoid stress, conflict and anything else that causes me grief. Inside the bubble, I feel calm and safe.

I know it’s not realistic to live your life in a bubble. But right now it feels right: it’s what I need to do to take care of myself.

I think I’ll stay here for awhile.

Comments

I love getting comments on my blog! I've had lots of comments about Dance with my Father: some at the bottom of the linked story, some by email and some in person. Thanks to all of you who have given me encouragement or let me know that you have identified with something that I've posted.

To add your comment:

- click on comments at the bottom of the posting

- type your comment in the box

- type the characters you see in the Word Verification box

- if you don't want to log on, scroll down and click on Anonymous

- click on Publish your Comment

When you post a comment, an email is sent to me with a copy of your comment. Anyone who looks at my blog will then be able to view your comments. Feel free to include your name at the end of the comments, or not, it's up to you.

The kindness of strangers

The reporter from the Grimsby Lincoln News got it right after all…

The write-up in the paper about a recent event held at Curves in Fort Erie where my mom is a member said: Curves offered free manicures, massages and makeovers, with all donations going toward Lynds' cancer treatment.

I thought that the money was going to the Canadian Cancer Society, but I just got a card and a generous cheque in the mail to help with my treatment drugs from the lovely ladies at Curves. I certainly wasn’t expecting that, but it will come in handy. My monthly injection alone is over $600. I’m lucky to have a drug plan that covers most of it, but I still have to pay $131 out of my own pocket each month.

A huge thank you to Patricia Walsh and the members of the Fort Erie Curves. The women who attend there are doing wonderful things for their own health through their membership, and I appreciate the efforts they went to to help me out (and they’ve never even met me!). It’s a wonderful example of the generosity and kindness of women!

Bloggin' is good for the Noggin

My email buddy Sue (who writes a column about her cancer journey in the Kingston Whig Standard) emailed me about my recent post about my dad. She asked me how it felt to get my feelings out by writing about it. I’m answering her in this rather public way because I want to share with others the benefits of writing about our experiences.

As I’ve been finding with the whole process of blogging, it was a release to write about my relationship with my dad. As you might imagine, it was a rather emotional exercise, but it felt really good to express my thoughts and feelings about something that I've been working through for most of my life.

I did a little digging on the internet and found out that there have been studies about the benefits of journaling (or blogging) through our cancer experiences and that there are even courses that you can take on doing just that. According to Ezinearticles, “A study published in the journal 'The Oncologist' in the February issue of last year supports the notion that expressive writing is effective in easing the stress of cancer.”

Some of the benefits I’ve had from writing this blog have been:
- It helps me to process my thoughts, feelings and emotions
- It helps me keep friends and family up-to-date on what’s happening with me
- It’s an opportunity to make connections with others with similar experiences
- It serves as a record of both my medical and emotional experiences
- It helps me express myself as an individual, rather than a statistic
- I get to be creative and show my ‘quirky’ side

And I don’t have to worry so much about the quality of the writing, because after all, it’s just a blog, right?

If you want to try writing as part of your healing, you might want to check out the website Writing Through Cancer, where a weekly writing prompt is posted to help you get started.