Slept well last night… woke up feeling… not sick! Tired… but not sick! Before leaving for work, it was nice to be able to tell Ric I was finally starting to feel better. On the way to work, I found myself steering the car in the opposite direction again… to get some tea. I realized, however, it wasn’t just the tea. (From my office, to the bathroom, is the least attractive hallway in the building… painted concrete blocks. The rest of the building is very, very nice… but this hallway is a bit dreary.) I was headed to work, and suddenly saw myself in the hallway and stairway… holding onto the walls… and sick. That’s when I turned the steering wheel right, instead of left… driving away… in the sunshine.
I realized that because of three days of being sick after I got to work, I was beginning to associate being at work with being sick. I immediately reminded myself of all the times I go to work and feel good. And I recalled reading about associations that can be made during chemo. Someone wrote that they could no longer drink anything red after receiving Adriamycine, because that chemo drug is red. I remember thinking I was going to try to keep from acquiring negative associations like that. Never say never. (Actually, when I see the A drug go through the tube, it’s more of an orange-red… and actually quite ugly. Since I already see it as ugly… I’m pretty sure that exact color will never create a warm fuzzy feeling in me!) Of course, now I can see that negative associations can occur quite easily… but it is something to be on guard about. So wonder what my route to work will be tomorrow?
Wanted: R&R
Just because you have cancer, doesn’t mean other stresses stop coming into your life. No, there’s no special holding pattern that keeps away the struggles and concerns. And even a husband and wife who love each other completely… can get on each other’s nerves. Cancer has of course caused a lot of changes in our everyday life… and for the most part, we’ve adjusted really well. Sometimes, we both yearn for the old routine… and forget that this will be an unusual summer… and by fall our lives will resume to pretty much what they used to be. But sometimes we can only see what’s in front of us at the moment.
We had hoped to get out of town this weekend… it would be a good time… in between chemo treatments… but work keeps us here. We both need a change of scenery… a few days to relax and breathe some different air. There’ll be no time for a week long vacation till… October. Chemo treatments through the end of July… then seven weeks of radiation. By then radio stations will be in the ratings period… no vacations allowed then. What are we going to do? We need a break. Something will work out. I don’t know what… but somehow we’ll find a way. We have to do it for our sanity… and maybe our health!
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