Ok everybody… Join the conga line… Whoever goes second can dinky ride on a gopher! (I am a little sore… Ok… A LOT of sore… as usual post treatment so I will go cheats method of movement! hehehe )

Now by Gopher I don’t mean this:

Oh So Cute And Fluffy!!! (But I Don’t Want To Break His Back!)

I mean this:

 YEAH BITCHESSSSSS!!! Let’s Do This!!!

Anyway… Why the conga line?

I AM OVER THE HUMP!!! OVER HALF WAY THROUGH TREATMENT!!! HOORAH!!!

Happy Girl Yesterday In Treatment Number 3… Yes I Look Sickly (Hello, Chemo People!!!) And I Am Donning The Wig (My Head Gets SO Cold! This Provides Warmth) But Trust Me, I Am Stoked!!!

Yeah so it’s the usual… I am sore and sickly and tired etc etc etc… But things are so much easier to deal with when I have structure. I am good and cope so much better when there is a definate plan and I can work around it. I know what to expect, when to expect it and this is good with me. For those who love me, stay away in the first 7 days if you don’t want to see the Jeckyll and Hyde efffect
Ok so maybe it isn’t quite so bad… I just have minimal mobility Plus, the wig seldom makes an appearance…

This week I was rather amused at something new I learnt. Everybody told me Chemo would make me lose a lot of weight!!! RUBBISH! My dietician wanted me to put it on because you need to burn it off… I went to my Oncologist this week and have put on 3 kilos in a month! My jeans are tight… Bah humbug!!! I told her my concerns and she said to me…
“Honey, I think now is the time to break it to you… There are steroids in your anti-nausea medications… Steroids create both hunger and water retention… You were ALWAYS going to put on weight!!!… It will drop off as soon as treatment is over!”

God I hope so!!! Oddly I am still about 10 kilos smaller than I was through high school and the majority of my 20′s but bigger than I have been in the last 5 ish years…

At this point I chuckled. Steroids you say??? Interesting… I started to get images of steroid taking beef cakes… Then started to picture myself like this:

Well I Do Have A Nice Complexion

Could I use this to my advantage? To live out my dreams of a female body builder? To blend in with a big chunk of ham at Christmas time? My my family, my children so proud to see me flexing about, bald and wearing a Borat inspired costume? Hey, get cancer and go on one of those big “life altering cliched rampage” post treatment?
*grin*

Oh I kid! Instead the reality hit that I am more like this:

Does My Bum Look Big?

Ok so maybe this is an exaggeration ever so slightly… But this is the general area all the weight is going. HEY! Aren’t they in vogue right now? Between Kim and Coco, I would be stellar in the popularity!

On a more serious note, one of my favourite days is going in for treatment. I love being able to sit in a room with people just like me and comparing notes. I have soon learnt from others on what is important in life and how to make every day count. I love the positivity that fills a room full of people where hope seems to be the bleakest. I come back and I read Facebook and the trials a tribulations of those I know. 50% of me thinks that life goes on and it is all relative. 50% of me shakes my head and wonders how different people would be sitting in a room with these incredible and amazing people who inspire me every time I am there.

Men and women older than me and one case much younger than me, a teenager in fact, who continuously amaze me. We laugh about the bald heads, the older men about there new sets of dentures, the women who look to me and say “You are so brave to shave your head, we are letting our just drop bit by bit” … I don’t think it is brave, I was in pain and it helped Plus I am aero-dynamic!!!

We joke about needles, and yesterday I was one of two emergency cases. The needle broke in my hand and my hand filled up with chemo fluid causing it to swell like, well my arse at the moment The nurses and Drs were mortified and apologetic. I was amused and took the mickey out of the situation. I said to the Dr how he should never have listened to me when I demanded they put the needle in my left hand. I also joked at how problematic going to the toilet would be as well as my ability to float around the room like a helium balloon.

Well Hello Fat Balloon Hand…

The bottom line is, why let these things get me down? The process is crappy enough so laughing it out seems the only real solution. I love to laugh, and I love to make others laugh. Particularly those in real dire and grim situations.

What I would like you to carry away from this post is think about the things that stress you, then think about what it would mean to be in the situation these beautiful people are in (I exclude myself from this because I am comfotable dealing with what I have and doing what I can to get by). Then re-evaluate your stresses. You do not have to endure the gruelling pain these people are in, yet they laugh, they joke and they smile.

I think one of the best lines of all time comes from the movie Philladelphia which I often think of through this process:

“I’m not guilty, I’m not innocent, I am just trying to survive”

Bravo. So true.

Pain is merely pain, lack of sleep is merely lack of sleep, a cold is just a cold, a big bill is just a big bill, work is merely work… And whilst each thing can be horrible and a real big downer in your life… Take a deep breath, count to 10 and know that there are people out there battling in a way you could not comprehend until you do it.

I could be mad and angry about going through this… And there are times I definately feel that way (Most of the time privately with my family) and resentful… But on the whole I am so thankful to be going through this because the lessons it is teaching me, the compassion, the patience and the forgiveness of both people and life has made me a much stronger person. I have gotten to know some incredible people, some amazing and inspiring individuals and this I will NEVER forget.

Plus I would rather this be me than any of those I love… I would rather take it for the team

Love you all… xoxo