The Day Arrives

Ha! I was back to being Vainessa. I knew there were too many worse parts of chemo for me…the vomiting, the nausea, the lack of control of what was going in my body, but most importantly, I was going to lose my hair. Well, not really lose it, I knew where it would be – in the trash!

Despite all my worrying, waiting and wondering…the day arrived.

I brought my mother and my aunt with me to the oncologist’s office that day. These are two of the funniest women I know. My mom has always made me laugh at the most dire times of my life. I remember when I was twelve and I had my appendix removed. Oh, those stitches hurt, all across my belly, making it hard to laugh or take a deep breathe. When my mom came to visit me in the hospital after the surgery she brought me a joke book. A funny joke book…what kind of person does this to their child…I’ll tell you…the kind of person that loves their child so much that they can’t even imagine them ill or in pain, oh, and a funny person.

We were quite the site. Laughing and joking in the waiting room, other patients were chiming in with us and laughing along with us. I think it should be a rule in doctor’s offices that there be live, humorous entertainment that the doctor MUST provide. After all, they have no problem making us wait endless for them at the very least they should provide us with better entertainment than outdated magazines that are at best palatable and at worst, insulting. Give me some humor. On that day, everyone appreciated the humor of we three women. After the phlebotomist drew my blood we were shuffled to a small room where we WAITED some more. Isn’t it the truth though, all of this doctor stuff is about hurry up and wait.

While we are waiting a woman from the big waiting room comes up to our room. I thought this was a little over the top. We were funny, but not that funny. Why was she tracking us down?

“I was told I should be in this room” she announced. Now I got to tell you, I was impressed. Perhaps she thought if she said it firmly enough we would leave.

“Come join us,” I offer, the consummate peacemaker,” there is room for more.” I lied, but it was a desperate circumstance, I wasn’t giving up my room!

“I’m Lisa, this is Phyllis and Emelia,” I offer.

“Hello,” she responded. Nothing more, no name, no nothing! Where did she go to finishing school? “What are you in for?” she asks. Realizing her mistake immediately she offers, “I have too much blood.”

Shit! My brother-in-law, can’t make enough blood. We found a match! Call the guards, let’s get her over to Adam’s we can set up some sort of Frankenstein castle and make the swap. They will both benefit and we can get the hell our of the doctor’s office…back to reality.

“Oh, really. I just need chemo,” if she only knew what I was thinking. I could see it now, her with one aluminum hat on and Adam with the other. Flip the switch and IT IS A-LIVE!

“Can I ask what for?” You can ask.

“Breast cancer,” is my solemn reply.

“I’m sorry,” her solemn response…everyone’s response.

Flip the switch…

The nurse arrives to inform us that by sharing conversation we are in breach of our HIPPA agreement and our guest must leave. (For more on HIPA see ridiculous rules to protect insurance companies and doctors made to seem like they are protecting your privacy…(read the small print!) Ha! It was my room.

Enter the oncologist. Time to go to chemo, any questions?

Yeah, just one. How do I get out of this? No, really, just lead me to the place I need to be.

And so, it begins. I go into this 10 x 15 room with four other chemo patients and my mother and aunt in tow. There is not much room, but we make do. I think how odd that we are all sitting in a small circle in varying stages of cancer cure and no one says a word, so I begin by saying hi to the guy next to me and before I know it my mother and aunt are shaking everyone’s hands and saying hello.

“Let the games begin.”

Waiting for Chemo...

Waiting, wondering, worrying are never as good as you think they are when you start out. Anticipating and waiting are just playgrounds for your imagination to create the best and worse scenarios for you to rehearse. Wondering…well, when I think of wondering of think of it more as the awe-aspiring…but it usually ends up being more head games of what if…which brings me right back around to worrying. I have often quoted the story about Jesus when he visits his friends Martha and Mary. Mary stops everything she is doing and sits with Jesus to talk with him about what’s up in his life and travels. Martha on the other hand is so concerned about having a guest and wanting to do all the right things she is bustling about getting food, cleaning up and basically ignoring Jesus just to make a nice display for him. Martha begins to complain to Jesus about Mary’s obvious laziness and Jesus replies, Martha, Martha, you are worried and anxious about many things, but only one thing is required and Mary has chosen the greater portion. I quote the story to remind myself that worrying doesn’t do me any good. I quote it…I try and remember and I worry anyway!

It was like this waiting for chemo. Sometimes I would not even think about it. “Oh, well I start my cure in six days!” I would laugh when people would ask. But then as the day drew closer and the reality got more real, I began this waiting, wondering, worrying thing. Some nights I would stay up all night watching TV because I couldn’t sleep. Then other times I would just bark at my kids or my husband for no reason. I considered every cliché you can imagine. “This is the easy part.” “Your hair will grow back” “It is only for a short time.” “You’re alive.” All shit. The fact is some suited up doctor who is very nice, by the way, is going to pump chemicals into my body that are designed to stop cell division. If I remember my high school biology right, that is the ‘stuff of life’, cell division. Well, it is a necessary evil. I weigh the balance, risk my life…save my life…easiest choice that is not really a choice.

I think back to one day in the hospital when I discovered Vain Lisa…let’s call her Vainessa. I never thought of myself as the type who worried much about looks. Well, gee, it all came pretty naturally all of my life. There were three things about my physical appearance I could always count on – I have a nice face, great boobs and beautiful hair. Oops! Something changed!

While still in the hospital, I woke up one morning and decided I should take a look at what’s happened to me. Courageously, I head off with my walker to the bathroom. I am so cool, I’m thinking. How very enlightened of me, to look at my wound and begin the healing. Hehehehe…what did I know.

I arrive in front of the mirror. I begin with my face. My hair is much shorter now, but, frankly, I like that, my face looks very thin, I look a lot like my sister (who is about half my body weight and I believe twice as beautiful as me). I gaze at my face in disbelief; I have NEVER looked like my sister. I begin to wonder about what they did in that surgery for eleven some odd hours. I digress….back to the matter at hand, enlightened one. So I look at my shoulders…God, they are skinnier than I remember, too…how long have I been in this place?!

I am wearing the equivalent of a straight jacket for a bra..it has zippers, hooks, and Velcro…they didn’t want one of these girls escaping, I guess…

I pull up the Velcro to release the strap of the right side, as the cup starts to fall away I begin to cry…I’m afraid to look. Well, shit…I look like a darn Christmas tree with drains hanging off of me like balls on a tree. My coloring is all wrong, I am much too thin…oh my God…I have cancer! I HAVE CANCER! Shit! When did this happen? All at once I am aware of the term Frankenstein. I am overcome with the reality of what has happened…no great boobs…soon no more hair…and it really does matter to me what I look like…not just to other people, it matters what I look like to me! Enter Vainessa. Where was she my whole life? Was I always like this?

I became aware of someone knocking on the bathroom door. “Are you okay, Lisa,” called the day nurse,” I need to check your vitals. Do you need any help?”

The irony of all this came crashing in on me and I just burst out laughing.

“I’ll be right out. I was just finishing up.”

I’m not such a long way from that day now as I approach the next phase of this process, my chemo, my cure!