To Be or Not to Be

This is nothing new. For most, something snaps when they're at "death's door," as it were. Suddenly, there's a sense of urgency to everything and bucket lists are made. My bucket list was short and simple. No, there was no jumping out of planes or swimming with dolphins. All I wanted was to do was to go forward the trip to Miami Beach that had been planned and confirmed long before I was diagnosed with cancer.

Was this wise? Foolish? Risky? Irresponsible? Did a cancer patient have any business being in Miami Beach, revelling in the sun?

What was I thinking, going at the onset of my chemotherapy treatment? I wasn't. I didn't want to think. I wanted to forget! For one week, I wanted to pretend I wasn't sick. I wanted to be vibrant, fabulous, and alive in Miami Beach, Florida! So, armed with my meds, suntan lotion, and flip flops, my boyfriend and I threw caution to the wind and headed for Miami Beach, two weeks after my first chemo session.

. . . Oh, but sometimes desire and intention overtakes ability and capacity . . .

Soon after landing Miami Beach, things went awry. That familiar pain on my left side and the swelling of the leg visited once more (Oh no! Blood clots!), accompanied by a blinding headache and profuse bleeding. Immediately, I regretted my being on vacation and being thousands of miles away from home and my doctors. So much for forgetting I was sick. And talk about feeling foolish, vulnerable and scared! So, instead of going out on that perfect balmy Florida night to start my carefree vacation, I hid under the sheets with fear and loathing that I had made the wrong decision after all.

. . . Although, ability and capacity CAN match up with desires and intentions . . .

During my phone consult with my oncologist the next day, the swelling on my left leg and the pain on my left side had subsided. Apparently, that long plane ride aggravated the swelling. But after being stretched in bed overnight, things got better. So, my doctor told me to not overdo anything and keep to my Coumadin and Lovenox therapy everyday. Okay. So, I wasn't going to die. That was that. Time to start forgetting and start partying like it's 1999 (well, actually, it was 2009)! No more fretting. When life deals you lemonade, sip mojitos!

. . . I denied cancer to dance and revel like I wasn't sick. . .

But, the irony of this all, of course, is that the very thing I was trying to get away from was with me throughout our vacation. I really couldn't get away from it, could I? Especially because, right on schedule, my hair started to fall out in big chunks! There was hair everywhere but my head. And really, there probably was no worse place for this to happen than in Miami Beach, where every woman (it seemed to me) was perfect and beautiful. I was warned about it and knew it was coming. But, nothing really prepared me for the reality of hair loss. Nothing! It was horrific. I felt like a deformed monster. Oh! And there was nothing like hair loss to snap me back from forgetting. There were times when I couldn't bring myself to get out of bed and face all the fabulous beautiful people of Miami Beach. Thankfully, I came prepared -- thanks to my boyfriend who bought me a chic short haircut before the trip, a fabulous cowboy hat plus a few scarves just for the occasion (He's got me!). So, with a little courage and disguise, I still managed to go and enjoy myself even though every morning, I hated what I saw in the mirror.

. . .Even though cancer insisted its presence, I kept covering it up to forget about it. . .

Though, on our last morning in Miami Beach, I woke my boyfriend up and told him it was time -- time to face cancer head on. No more forgetting. No more pretending it wasn't there. So, we walked hand-in-hand into a Supercuts right in the middle of Washington Avenue to have my head shaved.

Those Dodgy Clots

So, what started all of this? How did I get get here?

It's, thanks to these "cute" little things

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What are they? Raspberry jellies? Little red underwater corals? Lychees? Nope. Blood clots -- dodgy little blood clots! And thank goodness for them. Yes, I did say "thank goodness" for them, because they paved the way to my cancer diagnosis.

It's not really certain when they started forming. But I'm sure that my very quick, tiring trip to DC to witness our 44th president's inauguration had something to do with it -- long airplane rides, overexposure to sub-freezing temperature for long periods of time, walking, standing around, walking, and then walking on and on from the crack of dawn until late into the night. My left leg started to hurt and swell a little in DC, but I dismissed it as just a bodily reaction from this new, tiring environment.

But by the time I got back home, the pain and the swelling had escalated to noticeable proportions. So much so, that I found myself in the ER two weeks after my trip because my left leg was so swollen, it felt like my skin was going to break and the leg would explode. The first doctor who examined me suspected a blood clot that my lead to a stroke. So he ordered a whole slew of tests, including a CT scan and 2 ultra sounds (one performed by him and another by a vascular ultra sound tech). Two doctors, several tests and 12 hours later, I was released from the ER with no clot in sight, BUT with strict orders that I was to see my GP immediately.

My GP did see me post haste. Alas! The mystery wasn't solved there. With head shaking, I was sent to sent to MORE tests, including another CT scan, several ultra-sounds and a referral to a surgeon. At that point I didn't even understand why I was referred to a surgeon. I thought, if there's a clot and they fear stroke, shouldn't I be referred to a cardiologist? hematologist? or some other specialist? But a surgeon? Oh well...I wasn't the expert, so I went to see the surgeon. And again, thank goodness! The mild-mannered, good-humored surgeon who had looked at the ordered test results took one good look at my swollen leg, felt my lymph glands and stopped at one (the one is at the right inside of my upper thigh on my swollen leg). "Feel that?" he said, guiding my hand to the swollen node (I barely felt anything). "I need to take a biopsy of that."

BIOPSY. Not a good word in my vocabulary. BIOPSY=HURRY! To say that I was alarmed is an understatement. I'd always associated the word "biopsy" with cancer. So the notion started floating in my head and I wanted the biopsy as soon as possible -- the same day if possible. But the quickest they could do it was the next day. We made an appointment to discuss the results of the biopsy a week later. It couldn't come soon enough.

I did not make it to the surgeon's office at the appointed time. I ended up at the ER instead. The night before my appointment with the surgeon, I couldn't sleep because my side hurt. I thought it was gas, so I took some Gas-X. No comfort. So at 5:00 a.m., I got out of bed, took a long hot shower and had some relief. I made my way to work -- an unusual thing because I usually leave for work at around 7:30 in the morning. I was too obsessed with the biopsy and too uncomfortable to stay put. By the time I got to work, the pain to breathe escalated. It hurt so much, I couldn't even speak. Short breaths were torture. A co-worker wanted to call 911 because I looked that bad. But, I didn't want a scene at work. So I managed to go downstairs and hail a cab and mumble "take me to the ER" to him. He did a fine job, although he was definitely panic-stricken.

No sooner had I laid down on my bed in the ER when morphine was administered and the very harried ER doctor sent me through to another round of tests. (My insides may be cooked at this time with the amount of radiation it's been exposed to over the past couple of weeks.) Let me just say here that I don't know I survived the chest x-ray. I don't know how I managed to take a deep breath and hold it without screaming in pain. Oh, I know why...it hurt to even speak.

Despite all the fuss around me, all I could think of was that I wasn't going to make my surgeon appointment to discuss the biopsy. So I asked the ER nurse to phone him and let him know where I am. The first thing I was going to do as soon as I got out of the hospital that night was to call his office and take the first available appointment. I just couldn't stop thinking of the biopsy.

A few hours later, the same harried ER doctor returned and said "I have good news and bad news. Which do you want first?" I chose to hear the good news first. "Well, the good news is we found out what's wrong with you. And the bad news is that it's a blood clot, lodged on the lower side of your left lung." Aha! The first ER doctor of a few weeks ago was absolutely right! There was a clot afterall! So they admitted me to the hospital so they could break down those dodgy clots and make sure that none of it travels to my heart and brain. I was assigned an internist and spent 2 and half days in the hospital. I forgot about the biopsy, obsessed about those dodgy blood clots and learned a few new words: pulmonary embolism, Coumadin, and Lovenox.

Everything changed after that.....