28 Weeks Post Final Chemo

It's ten months to the day since my breast surgeon called and told me I had breast cancer. "I got your biopsy results back, and it is a small cancer." I guess she was trying to make me feel better with that "small" business. My oncologist also said, "Well, it's small," the first time he felt it. WHO CARES?? CANCER.

Anyway, now that December is here, I've been thinking a whole lot about how glad I will be to put this garbage pit of a year behind me. I'm not usually one for artificial milestones and all that, but god, 2015 has been the worst. But I decided that rather than listing out all the things that made it terrible - because everyone reading this knows about my big personal ones, and the sadness in my friends' lives is not for me to share - I should instead probably write a post talking about the things that made it good.

I'm absolutely not one of those people who thinks we should Learn Lessons from going on a Cancer Journey or some bullshit, but I have learned something whether I wanted to or not, and mainly it's that I'm living the life I'm supposed to be living. I know because when I found out I had cancer, I didn't feel like I had a pending list of items to take care of. I didn't want to change anything or do anything differently. I just wanted MORE. More time with Ben and my family and friends, more traveling, more books, more sitting around my house in pajamas with cats.

There is a sense of urgency now underlying everything and I'm not really sure I want it to go away. That sense of urgency is responsible for being six weeks from paying off our house, for making the decision at the last second to go to my 20th high school reunion and having an awesome time, for booking a trip to London next spring with my mom (sorry, Hillary), for realizing that if I've wanted to drive an Audi A4 for ten years I should probably just go ahead and get one. I mean, not until we pay the house off - I haven't lost my mind or anything. But after that.

It's like I'm constantly walking a line between wanting to live my normal life and also feeling like I need to treasure every second and take every opportunity to do everything interesting or fun. For now that feels okay, and part of me hopes I don't ever lose that feeling of conscious gratitude I've gained as a result of learning in one terrifying second how fragile the little life I've created actually is. Part of me is still pretty pissed off about that one terrifying second, though, and wants my naive little life back.

My hair is weird, and I am tired of talking about it, but here it is. 

I know I need to not cut it and just push through until it grows enough to not look like an elderly style, and I know I should be glad to not be bald. Essentially, though, having hair like this feels the same to me as when I was bald. "Oh, but I like it!" people say. Well, fine, but I didn't do this on purpose, and it's different from anything I have ever seen on my head before, and it's a constant reminder of my year from hell. Someone recently said to me, "Some people pay a lot of money for curls like those!" but of course I did pay a lot of money for curls like these. Like, way more than anyone has ever paid for a perm.

I have 78 days until my last Herceptin. I'm going to try to schedule my port removal the same day. I'm ready to move on. Yeah, it might come back. I might have cancer growing in my body right this second. But I need to try to at least pretend I believe it's going to be okay for a while.

What's Up?

Nothing much is up. After a second consecutive October of getting no sleep and having the DVR build up to frightening levels of to-be-watched television, the baseball playoffs are over, but this time the Royals WON. The Royals won the World Series! It's been a few days now and I'm still not over it. I keep watching Hosmer's slide into home in the bottom of the ninth on YouTube. At least I lived long enough to see that happen! World Champions!

Benjamin is tired of me making "at least I lived long enough to see _____" jokes and similar. I don't really think they are jokes, though, not completely. I still don't believe I'm done with having cancer. I believe it a little more than I used to, and I think I will continue to believe it more and more as time passes, but for now I haven't had a day yet where I believe it for the whole day.

I have six more Herceptin treatments, which doesn't sound like a lot but unfortunately they're every three weeks so that adds up to 112 more days before it's over. I like that I'm still getting an expensive drug pumped into my body, though (especially one that doesn't cause any side effects), and I like having the morning off work to read my book in a comfortable chair, so I don't mind too much. Ben gets to go with me to two of the remaining six, since he now works for the government and gets a million paid holidays. He's never been with me to a treatment before, so it will be nice for him to see what it's like. And to show off my handsome husband to the nurses.

My hair is quite something.

My head looks very much like my Grandma Dorothy's head, or at least it will in a few more weeks. Every week I take this overhead shot, and I keep expecting it to sort of start settling down, but each week I'm surprised how much it's changed in only seven days. I am really, really tired of discussing with coworkers how curly my hair is. It didn't used to be curly, did it? Isn't that weird how it's growing back curly? Oh no, not really, most times it grows back curly after chemo. Really! Why is that? WELL I DON'T KNOW CAN WE STOP TALKING ABOUT IT NOW.

Deep breath. 

Really, though. It was better being bald. At least everyone was too shocked into silence to make me talk about it six hundred times a day. I really would be better off living alone with Ben and Papaya on an island in the North Atlantic. Except then I wouldn't have access to the Duke Cancer Center, I guess.

Trip Report: Denmark, Day 8

Our last day! We were done with walking a hundred miles everywhere and by now were taking the bus as much as possible. This is the bus stop at the corner by our apartment. So helpful, telling you how many minutes until the next bus!

First we went down to Christiansborg Palace again so we could get some prints of the tapestries to frame. This is the canal around Slotsholmen, the little island where the palace and some other government buildings are located. There was tons of construction in central Copenhagen because they are expanding the metro to be more useful - right now it's just one line.

We stopped in at the Radhus, Copenhagen City Hall, because it was one of the few frequently mentioned tourist places we hadn't been yet.

It was pretty but I don't know what you are supposed to do there.

There's an old fancy clock to look at.

Then we went to the train station to set out for Malmo, Sweden, across the water. It didn't really seem like there was much to do in Malmo, but when you have the opportunity to take a 30 minute train ride to another country, you should do it! 

Malmo looked newer than Copenhagen, but didn't seem much different overall.

TGI Friday's, weirdly, is one of the only American companies we saw with a significant presence in Denmark, and we were dismayed to discover when having dinner with Morten's parents that Danes are unaware TGI Friday's is terrible. I guess they think this is what all restaurants are like in the United States. Ugh.

We found a restaurant in this square for lunch.

Swedes also give you blankets for outdoor eating.

We got cheeseburgers.

Fortunately the patio was very efficiently covered with interlocking tents, because it poured the entire time we were eating. Despite this being the forecast at the time:

Honestly! How hard is it? IT'S CURRENTLY RAINING. Update the forecast.

Anyway, it cleared off by the time we were done.

We walked through the pedestrian shopping area of Malmo, which was charming. Swedish people are definitely not as accommodating as Danes, though; we have never been to a less annoying city for being a pedestrian than Copenhagen, but this courtesy did not seem to extend across the water.

We ate some of these same berries in Newfoundland! But they are called partridgeberries there.

Malmo is similar to Copenhagen re: canals.

We took the train home mid-afternoon to pack up all our things. Last night in Denmark!

We had about a 40 minute bus ride to dinner. When I booked the restaurant I sort of didn't understand how far away it was, but fortunately the bus from our apartment went straight there. It was an interesting trip right through the center of town and then took us to some other areas we hadn't seen before.

Our last dinner was at Amass, one of the most highly rated restaurants in town - I wanted to have at least one other fancy dinner besides Noma. The chef here is American and has worked at Noma (and many other of the best restaurants in the world). 

They seated us right next to a half-wall looking into the kitchen, which was exciting! 

We got a set 5 course menu. First up was corn pudding with rye crackers.

There was also this delicious potato bread with broccoli chutney from the restaurant garden. Like Noma, they are really focused on local food here.

Danish tomatoes with white currants, really delicious.

This was squid and black garlic and nasturtium and flowers from their garden. Most of the squid I've had has been vaguely rubbery, but this was not at all.

Beets with Danish yogurt and herbs. The beets were a little dehydrated and chewy, very good.

And pork with thinly sliced apples, fermented grains, and wormwood.

By this time it was getting dark so the picture of dessert didn't turn out - it was caramelized whey ice cream with sweet potatoes and honey, and was absolutely fantastic. Then they brought us rosemary cake with rhubarb preserves and some chocolate crackers.

The next morning we were up at 4:00 and off to the airport on a metro train full of drunk people who hadn't been home yet, so that was fun. But we made it home without incident, and Papaya was happy to see us for five minutes before she went back to her normal life of sitting around doing nothing. 

Trip Report: Denmark, Day 7

The morning after Noma, Ben had come down with the cold, so we were forced to get breakfast that had a lot of fruit in it for vitamin C purposes. We got these delicious tarts at Torvehallerne, a newish food market near the Norreport train station with all sorts of different types of foods.

Mmm, bread. We decided we'd grab dinner here too, on the way home.

We set out via train for Helsingor, home of Kronborg Castle. Kronborg is famous as the setting for Hamlet, but of course Hamlet wasn't real and Shakespeare never visited this area. In reality, Kronborg was set up as a tax collection fortress. It's right on the water, on a narrow strait across from Sweden.

I liked how Kronborg was no-nonsense compared with the ornate palaces we'd visited earlier in the trip. 

There is Sweden across the water.

You can also wander around in the casements beneath the castle. There is a big statue here that is supposed to come to life and defend Denmark if the country is ever attacked, but since nothing happened when the Nazis invaded it's safe to assume the statue is in fact useless.

For lunch we walked back into the little town and got some smorrebrod. Ben ordered two (one smoked fish, one fried fish).

And I got a sampler plate, which turned out to be a terrific deal. I couldn't finish all this stuff.

In addition to butter we got this delicious spread, which we later learned translates as "lard with onions."

After lunch we got back on the train and went south a bit to visit the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. 

A big Yayoi Kusama exhibit had just opened the day before. 

I liked it but Benjamin thought she was obnoxious.

The best thing about the Louisiana is the building and setting. It's beautiful, right on the water. We wandered around for a long time and then just sat on the steps by the ocean for a while.

Back in Copenhagen, we stopped in at Torvehallerne to examine our options for dinner,

We ended up getting takeout Thai. I had big plans for saving money by cooking dinners on this trip, since we had a whole apartment, but we didn't ever cook anything except coffee.

Since Ben was feeling a little under the weather, this was another Stay at Home and Watch Arrested Development evening, which was fine by me. We walked at least 10 miles every single day and I was always ready to sit quietly by early evening!