Laundry List

Bone Scan
Mammogram
Pelvic Ultrasound
Transvaginal Ultrasound
Pelvic and Abdominal Cat Scan
Chest xray
Colonoscopy
Excision
MRI

The Big Dilemma

So. The Big Dilemma. Do I talk about it? Do I not talk about it? Then I figured, hey its my blog. Its where I am allowed to express myself. I don't want my friends to be overwhelmed by me whining or being afraid. I don't want my husband to know how worried I am. And I need to kind of "let it all out". So. There you are.
I have this thing on my leg. Started as a freckle. Morphed into a bump the size of a nickle, purple and scaley. Yep. Its attractive. And its also skin cancer. Truth be told I knew it was skin cancer from the second it started to get all gross. Even then, it was Rick who had to force me to tell the doctor about it. I knew he was right. I knew I had to say something. But I also knew it wasn't going to be good. Just today I found a note that I wrote for myself in a book that said "DON'T FORGET LEFT LEG".
Well now, I can't forget it. The fucking thing has turned out to be more than I bargained for.
I went to see the dermatologist. The 12 year old Doctor explained it all to me. I went there expecting that the worst thing that they could tell me was that it was the bad kind of skin cancer. I'd need radiation and it would hurt and I would be fine but I'd have to wear SpH100 for the rest of my life.
What she told me was that the extrammary paget's disease is the skin cancer part. Its just the secondary cancer. Actually what I heard her say was the extra mammary patches - thank god for google sorting me out! I swear when she started explaining to me that this cancer doesn't usually occur without a primary cancer being present - the voices inside my head started to scream...."help me help me"! As she started explaining what kind of cancer it could possibly be: bowel, colon, gyne, breast - my head just screamed "no no no no no no no no no".
I didn't cry. I kept joking with her. She brought in Doctor Cold Hands. We should do your excision today - we need to do it right away. "fuck off - no way - no no no" But there isn't time. Go book the surgery - next available appointment.
Turns out next available is May 10th. I have weeks to wait. In the mean time - I shall be tested up the wazoo - quite literally - to see what kind of host cancer I have. I have cancer. Or do I? I do. Do I have to have a host? Not according to the internet.
Oh yes. I looked it up on the internet. I gave myself one day. One day to look stuff up on the internet. One day to panic. One day to cry. One day to freak the fuck out. Okay, I have had a few extra episodes, but for the most part I've been okay.
I've told people. At first I didn't want to. To tell you the truth, I was kind of ashamed. Its just one more lousy thing that has happened to me because I have not taken care of myself. I have done something else to fuck up my health. I have done something else....I have done it...
The people I told were amazing. I have the most amazing friends. The ones I didn't expect to cry with me did. The ones that I thought would be supportive weren't. The right people told me the right things. People are great. But people have their own lives. They only get to be so invested in yours.
My husband hates sickness. If one of our kids has a cold he demands to know how they caught it and who's fault it is. He has been mercifully NOT like that with this. He does think that is was a mistake in the lab and it is the incompetance of others that are causing me this stress. God I hope he's right. But last night he took me for Flaming Saganaki on the Danforth. If I could eat only one food for the rest of my life it would be sheeps cheese fried in olive oil, set on fire with ouzo and put out with lemon juice. He knows what makes me forget my troubles.
What's the plan?
The plan is to vent here - so if that sucks for you don't read it.
The plan is to write my stories until they are done - because IF and IF is a big IF something is really really wrong, I want to make sure its all documented.
And I need to make some plans - in a just in case kind of way. It would be stupid not to because - my kids. My kids. Goddamn it. My little kids. I don't want them to see me sick and I damn well don't want them to see me die. My heart hurts just thinking about it.

That's my dilemma and I've solved it. This blog is my new release - to help me work it out and sort out my head.

And the Oscar goes to...

For someone who is used to doing things half-assedly and never truly completing anything to the best of their ability, I am finding my recent completion of stuff quite disturbing. I feel an "episode" coming on!
I've managed to do my taxes not only from 2005 but from 2006 as well. On time. Sent in. Refund received. Off the hook until next year. This is unprecidented.
I've finished the course I was taking and found out that I am a solid B student. I was a B student in high school, a B student in University and now I'm a B student in Adult Continuing Ed at College. Woo hoo for consistency!
I've paid my bills, done some projects for the PTA and even started and finished a scarf for someone for Christmas NEXT YEAR!
I'm feeling a bit out of sorts though - and that tends to happen to me when this very extremely rare phenomenon of achievement occurs. Unless I have a dozen half done projects on the go, I get panicky about what to do and what to do next. Its the same reason that I read 3 novels at a time - what would I do if I finished one?!?!
What generally will happen next is that I will start to shirk thinks - you know - make plans and cancel them. Unless I feel like I really HAVE to do something or that it involves the kids - that I am obligated to do it - I won't.
I become the dreaded cancelling friend. You know what that is and you all have one. Admit it. You ALL have a cancelling friend who makes plans and then cancels at the last minute. I have one friend who I actuall make bets with myself how they will get out of the plans that we've made and let me tell you, I'm VERY good.
I don't mean to be this way. It could be part of my charm. It could be part of my mental illness. Who knows.
There are a bunch of things coming up that I actually want to do - I hope I don't fuck up and cancel them. I am taking bets that I will. My fear of something will win out. That niggling inadequacy will creep in. The overwhelming sense of not belonging that I fight against will tip me over and pour me out. My imagination will run wild.
All of this just so that I have more to worry about. I wouldn't want to make anything too easy on myself now, would I?

The long and winding road

When I was a kid my parents used to force my brother and I to go for endless long car rides all over hell's half acre. They just loved nothing more to sit in the damn GMC Suburban for hours on end and just "look at the colours". I hated it more than life itself.
As a matter of fact, I still hate to drive anywhere and look eagerly ahead to the star trek teleportation phase of the future.
On this particular weekend we were headed somewhere US bound - more than likely Port Huron Michigan as this was my Mom's favourite place for shopping at Target and going to the Sweden House all you can eat buffet (but I think we covered that one in an earlier blog!)
My parents piled our suitcases into the back of the giant ass 1970s suburban - this must have been about 1976 - and hurried us in to the car.
Brush your teeth! Comb your hair! Put your coat on! Tie your shoes! Get in the bloody buggery car!!!!
So we got in the car - didn't fasten our seatbelts because there were none - and headed off on the St. Clair family road trip.
When we hit London, the car had heated up to boiling and my sullen 7 year old brother was still sitting there with his coat on. I remember that coat - it was plaid with a corduroy beige collar - what a weird thing to remember.
"Take off your coat" my Mom said.
"No." my brother said.
"Take off the damned coat"
"No - I'm cold"
"You are not. Take off that coat NOW!"
And off came the coat.
Under the coat, my brother wore no shirt.
He cried and cried and insisted that my mother had told him to put his coat on but mentioned nothing about a shirt.
We ended up stopping in London at Kmart that day. And my brother got a nice new shirt. A cowboy shirt as I remember it.
Rewarded for being just that little bit dumb. But funny. Oh so funny.

Easter Dinner

Eleven years ago on Easter Wayne and I took the obligatory road trip from our apartment in Toronto to Goderich where my parents were. The had moved from their house in the metropolis of Stratford to a mobile home in a trailer park outside of Goderich – which is actually crowned “Canada’s Prettiest Town”. My family had morphed into actual trailer trash!
Wayne and I slept in the tiny back bedroom that barely fit a double bed. It was right beside the somewhat stinky toilet. Whatever. They loved the place.
My family is not religious. Not in the least. I have often joked that Easter is the holiday where we celebrate the day that the Easter Bunny killed Jesus and then came back to life to curse the bunny by hiding all his eggs every year. I think I’m right.
My brother hadn’t come home for Easter that year. He and his wife were living in Alberta at the time while he explored his inner cattle rancher. They did call though during Easter dinner.
Now, my Mom, in her tradition as the world’s worst cook, had prepared a fiesta of ham, scalloped potatoes, mixed veg, cabbage salad and rolls. MMMMMMM. Okay, not really mmm but okay. She never really cared to try, God bless her.
Anyway, my brother called during dinner. We passed the phone around the table and everyone talked to Craig. It is my opinion that my parents sincerely believed that the sun shone out of my brother’s ass and lit up the world. Whatever.
My Mother inevitably started to cry. She missed having my brother around so much and it was especially hard at a holiday – any holiday. She hung up the phone, and came back to the table. She kept crying and we were all just trying to be supportive, “you’ll see him soon” “at least he’s doing something he loves!”
And then we all turn and look at Wayne. My husband is eating his dinner. Not saying a word. And he has two baby carrots – one shoved up each nostril. And he’s just eating his dinner. My Mother laughed and laughed and laughed. We all did. And Wayne just looked at us and said, “what?”

Its an especially happy story for me because it was the last time we spent with my Mom. Shortly after dinner, we left to head back to Toronto. We never saw her again. I’m glad we left her on an insane note. It just makes sense that way.