Prematurely aging skin

For so many years I have been vain about my hair and skin.  No matter if I was overweight or slim, these were two constants, good hair (thick, lion hair) and my skin (smooth, no major wrinkles as I am aging).  Cancer has definitely affected both.  Now that I no longer color my hair, it is just wild and dry looking.  Thanks to Doxil, and its substantial side effects on skin and mucus membranes, my skin is even worse, so delicate like someone living in a nursing home and watching for bedsores.  One night recently I accidently slept on a wrinkle in my soft flannel sheets and woke up bruised and scraped.  With Avastin and how it affects healing, my hip is still healing, scabs still there.   My feet are peeling, hands dried and wrinkled, as if I was 80 rather than 54.  My face still looks good, but that is probably thanks to good makeup and skin care and staying out of the sun.  Everything is just dry and tired like the rest of me inside and out.  Still waiting for the chocolate cake cure.

Cancer discounts

Sometimes, maybe even often, I think that anyone with cancer, particularly the fatal kinds like pancreatic and ovarian, along with other diseases like ALS for which there are no cure, should be given discounts (for cel phone, utilities, food, clothes), front of the line in the supermarket, never have to wait on the telephone for assistance from anyone for anything, rather like having a full-time assistant or concierge, someone to just cut through all the nonsense and make my difficult life easier.

Runny nose avastin style

Somedays I feel like my grandmother with a tissue or handkerchief up her sleeve in her sweater sets as I walk around always with a tissue in my hand, pocket, sleeve for the perpetually runny nose everyone gets from Avastin.  It dries up the abdominal fluids created by ovarian cancer but seems to create fluids everywhere else.  Peeing constantly, congested, blowing my nose constantly, bloody noses, headaches from the congestion.  Ah the joys of cancer and chemotherapy.  Still better than the alternative but can't someone come up with a better solution?  Seriously??? A real one that is a cure rather than a delay?  Haven't we been fighting the "war" on cancer since the 60s?  Not to say that progress hasn't been made but definitely not enough in this epidemic.

doing the shuffle

No, it is not a dance but what my life has become in its limited way.  I shuffle from the bed to the bathroom to take a shower back to the bed to the kitchen back to the bed to the laundry room (thankfully next to the kitchen) and back to the bed.  Over and over, round and round.  From a woman who used to spent 8 or 10 hours a day in courtrooms all over the state it is a pathetic statement of what survival means.

A flashing life

That old saying about when you are on the verge of death your life flashes before your eyes.  Although I am not yet there, but in the process of dying (unless science changes in the next several years), it will be a long slow process.  On Thanksgiving I took out my charm bracelet to wear for the day, to remind me of the life I've lived, good and bad, and think about it all.  The bracelet came from one grandmother and several of the charms from the other.  The dog to show my love of animals.  The schoolhouse representing my love of learning and reading.  The figure skates for all the years I spent as a rink rat.  The piano for the years I spent playing and my love of music.  There is nothing for gymnastics but it was a shorter period of my life, but no less important.  My scales of justice representing my love of law and the practice of it.  The best highs of my life will always be times spent in courtroom battle, the experiences needed so I could get to the win.  My baby boy charm representing my son's birth and the demise of my first marriage, the difficulty in even convincing my ex-husband to purchase the charm for me on mother's day after my son's birth.  A sad time in my life.  A vintage puffy heart from my second husband representing true love, my soul mate, someone who brought joy and laughter back into my life at a time I thought it wasn't possible and perhaps would never find it again.  The Eiffel Tower representing our love of travel and everything French.  Although I dislike flying, it is a necessary evil of modern society to achieve my goal of getting to Europe and other places.  How I wish I was healthy enough to return to China, to see Hong Kong harbor at night again, to see Shanghai, Beijing and more. Now I just focus on making the most of time I have left and traveling when I have the energy to do it.

A lighter driving foot

Having cancer doesn't necessarily make one loose weight, especially with steroids in the mix, but it does change other aspects of who we are.  Since I was age 17 and driving, I always had the family heredity lead-foot meaning I like to drive fast.  Always preferred driving sports cars, especially manual transmission and will always treasure my memories of driving cross-country in my 3.2 litre six cylinder car with the stick, Ford Probe, with the liquid crystal display dash.  Still love cars, but now don't drive much anymore, especially on a chemo week.  It requires too much energy and focus.  But I do notice that when I do drive it is much slower, and much less aggressively.  The lead-foot has disappeared with the BRCA gene showing up.  Oh well.

Can't they find a cure that involves chocolate?

For several days this week I was craving chocolate layer cake.  Of course that craving got satisfied.  But got me to thinking that when the researchers do find a cure some year, it absolutely must include large quantities of chocolate, especially chocolate cake. Luxurious, smooth chocolate cake with chocolate icing.  It doesn't need to have flowers on it or anything special, just nice dark chocolate.  

killing me slower

Keep thinking about the Roberta Flack song "killing me softly" .  Can't say that cancer is killing me softly in any way, but it will kill me eventually.  On the current drugs, it is just killing me slower, like the doctor said this week, instead of cruising down the highway at 80, it is now going 5mph in my driveway.  Depressing but true.