It has been brought to my attention as of late by a few friends (Dawn & co., Anonymous Alaskan Cowboy) that I have been more than remiss in updating this blog, post-escape from the hospital. I will go one step further than their kind words of concern about my well-being and possible disappearance from the face of the planet and say I have been doing a crap job of keeping this thing up. I don't even have a litany of reasons or even a short list of reasonable excuses. What it boils down to is that I just haven't felt like it. I have felt like wrapping up in my fleece blanket in a recliner and watching TV while my heavy painkillers did their work on the cystitis that raged in my bladder when I got out of the hospital. After that, I felt like knitting furiously on a baby blanket for incoming niece Beezus Skeletor while wrapped in my blanket, in the recliner, fighting the effects of steroids which were fighting the effects of the angry graft-vs-host rash camped out on my face. More recently, I have just felt ponderous, cabin-feverish, and very invested in reading all the books on my Kindle and watching all of Fringe. (I'm thinking of making a stamp of my own face -- for once, not a friendly acquaintance -- in the vein of the Etta "Resist" posters. I don't like the idea of white, arrogant men in suits bossing me around and invading my privacy.) So really, the tl;dr of it is that I just haven't felt like writing. Lame.
What would I write? I guess I could have been writing about my outings, maybe my personal revelations. My outings have been mostly going to the grocery store or Target for the usual mundane needs like Ovaltine, winter squash, and skinny jeans in my new, post-steroids/sitting-on-my-ass size. I don't like that before I started having energy to move about more than just around the apartment, I was on both steroids and a higher-calorie diet than I am used to. Don't "world's smallest violin" me when I tell you I went from a 0 to a 3. I'm upset about it. But I digress. I have made three different ferry trips to Bainbridge Island; I took a 4-week ballet barre/Pilates class to repair the wasted muscles and lack of coordination from all the medical hoopty-doo; my dad and I took an adventure to my favorite camp and then on to the Bavarian Village of Leavenworth; Older Brother and SIL joined me at EMP, once I finally learned I could get a member pass for the weekend through the clinic.
As far as personal revelations, I will maybe wait until another post this week or next to get into that. I've recently/repeatedly had some frustrating conversations with someone about the ideas that have formed in my head since Day 0 on life, satisfaction, priorities, and emotional health. I have noticed that some people celebrate growth and some people find themselves very out of the loop and upset that a person's perspectives going through such a trial as mine not only are spared the stasis chamber, they get turned on their heads. But I hate to ramble in vagaries and much as I hate to be on the receiving end of vague rambles of someone else's nonsense loop so I say again I will leave that for another time. I don't want to lose you before I get to the news portion.
Here is the latest in almost-cancer news:
- I have marrow churning out 30-40% cells (ideal is 50-60%, which is where I am expected to be, right on-time this summer) and completely disease-free. Did you catch that bit after the parenthetical? My marrow is free of all that almost-cancer crap that required the bone marrow transplant. I don't have to live in fear of acute myeloid leukemia! Victory!
- My Hickman line is being pulled on Thursday afternoon. The tubular portal to my heart is finally leaving me. I can't wait to take a shower without having to hold Aquaguard against my armpit because the stuff refuses to do the one job it was made for.
- My last day in Seattle is this Friday. After a mid-day clinic appointment, my mom and I will head south to her place in the sticks where I will stay through the holidays and get back in shape to the sounds of goats and the creek and the rain. My goal is to turn a soft 115 lbs into a toned 112. I have a stationary bike to use for cardio and a set of resistance bands for strength.
- It looks like Industrial Design is in my future, if I can figure out how to atone for my defaulted loan sins satisfactorily to qualify for grants and loans again. Despite being tired of Seattle's size and cost of living now, there is a very good chance I will come back up here for school. I had my hiatus, my five-plus years to deconstruct, rebuild, and reassess what I can do to experience satisfaction and success in goal achievement.
- My hair is growing back and the skin on my face has gone bananas again. The windrash look I am sporting with my obvious eyebrow and eyelash growback (head hair stays under the beanie) makes me more self-conscious than I have been since I was fourteen. I try to not let it get to me and instead celebrate the happy in seeing my eyebrows look stronger and perhaps needing a wax, plus all my eyelashes still looking 1/4 length but all present and accounted for. Sometimes it's tough to look in the mirror and see a reflection that is now familiar but still fails to look like me. Someday the ship will right itself, I'm sure.
Well the Ambien has finally kicked in, so that's my cue to go to bed. Thanks for being here!
