Give me a head with HAIR, long beautiful hair...

Hair is always an issue with women, isn't it? well, I guess it is with men too, after all, its seems that the cure for baldness is like the Holy Grail (I think I just saw something like that in a movie...).

At any rate, hair- I'm in smack in the middle of peach fuzz phase and it ain't pretty. I shed the wiglet and hats that I have been wearing since April while at Omega and am now venturing out onto the streets with my fuzzy noggin exposed for the world to see. I've learned a lot about hair, I remember before I started treatment that the doctor told me I'd lose mine about 2 weeks into chemo and I thought "whatever, that's the least of my concerns", little did I know how much of an effect it has on you. And it's not a simple vanity issue (although I was sort of astonished to see just how vain I could be), the biggest impact it has is that being bald is a constant reminder of cancer. You are no longer able to have it slip your mind, not even for a minute; you catch a glimpse of yourself in a mirror or reflection, develop the habit of constantly touching your bald head, your head is incessantly switching from hot to cold, you're putting on a cap to stay warm, yanking it off because you are sweating, you find yourself putting together one odd getup or another before you leave the house, it's all just weird, and what it manages to do is make you feel that much less "you". And then you lose ALL your hair. There are upsides to that one here and there, no waxing or plucking needed, you can save a ton on shampoo, but then there is the loss of eyebrows and eyelashes that makes you look like an alien. I joked with my husband all the way thru it about how I used to used to gauge things by whether or not I was having a good hair day and then it became whether or not I was having a good brow pencil day. Boy, eyebrows... don't get me started on eyebrows, I don't know exactly how I got to be such an expert but I am able to draw a mean eyebrow, I'm an eyebrow virtuoso. I kept threatening to paint them in showing a different emotion every day- the surprised brow, the furrow, the sad droopy brow... and then there is the lovely experience of being out of the house and inadvertently wiping your brow and taking half an eyebrow with you. But I have to say that all those years of reading vapid beauty magazines paid off in a most unexpected way, I suddenly remembered all the tips on correct brow shape and I have to say it helped. When I get the C-Tribe website up and running there will be a link specifically dedicated to eyebrows :) I guess guys are a little out of luck when it comes to brow pencils, but hey, they can get away with baseball caps 24/7.

On a serious note, the loss of your hair looms large during this process, I would advise anyone not to discount the effect. It's another one of those deeply isolating and lonely things that cancer brings with it. Either you cover it up as best you can, as I did until now, mainly in an attempt to not bring cancer with me into every conversation, or you show your bald self to the world, and the world doesn't know where to avert their eyes to quick enough. And your friends will try to help by suggesting you embrace the wig and hat routine and "have fun with it" (bless their hearts), without realizing that the mere fact of having that conversation makes you feel like more of an oddball.

But what has happened in the last week is that I have been walking around feeling quite liberated with my fuzzy head out in the open air, and I have actually managed to have cancer slip my mind a couple of times, that's been a sweet relief. I have quite a way to go before I start to have my real hair back, and I think that maybe somewhere in the back of my mind getting my hair back gets equated with getting my identity back but that's not going to happen. Life is in the middle of making me forge a new identity, I'm a work in progress.

Umbilical Cord Syndrome

These were his words: "you have an astronomically high cure rate... 95%... forget cancer and live your life", that was from my oncologist yesterday, I sat there in the exam room that I knew all too well and couldn't really digest what he was saying, thank God my son was there with me, thank God he knew enough to ask him to elaborate, thank God he was there, period. I was way too nervous. My rush of tears, he said, were evidence of "Umbilical Cord Syndrome", when patients are afraid to let go of treatment, no matter how miserable it has been. And he was right, that's what I was feeling. Going to the hospital for treatment had become routine in my life and even though you dreaded it at least you felt like you were fighting this thing inside you that might start to grow again without it.

Although I gotta say that today I'm not missing that cord much, I'm sure the feeling will come up often as I move forward, but today I've sort of spent the day retracing my steps, and re-living all the love and light that has been sent my way by so many wonderful people in my life. And I feel like a little kid, all antsy to go out and do things. I could ramble on a long list of goofy things I want to do and do right now!

But "forget cancer", that's not one of them... I don't know if I will ever get to such a Zen place where I can be grateful for my cancer, but I do know that my life is richer for it, I have lived an intensity that I had never lived before, certainly through bad things like I had never experienced before, but I am also content with the knowledge that I will now feel that deep of an intensity through all the good as well.

Hippychick 2.0

I'm still working on soaking up everything Omega... I know I said I didn't want for this blog to be a journal all about me, me, me, but I have got to share my experiences at the Omega Institute's Women and Power conference over the weekend, it was simply amazing, inspiring and exactly what I needed.

I have been thinking a lot about womanhood lately, about what it means in it's essence. I've been thinking about the physical self loathing that I absorbed into my life since I was a young girl, and then I look at that in the context of what happened to me, basically my female parts went bad on me, I had ovarian and uterine cancer, and now I have no ovaries and no uterus, not that I need those organs to feel like a woman but these are things that have been on my mind. So I think on some level I was going to the Women's conference to not only plug into a female energy that I know I missed but maybe also to learn about being a woman from other women. What I didn't expect, yet happily welcomed, was the instant empowerment that flowed from the minute the conference opened. As I listened to women like Elizabeth Lesser, Lateefah Simon and the amazing Gloria Steinem that first night, I found myself once again hungry for external definition when I simply snapped out of it- I DO know what woman means, I know what me as a woman means and what traveling thru this female life is; it means being open and loving and fearless and soft and strong and embracing a deep innate wisdom we are born with yet all too often doubt. I listened to, met, exchanged ideas with, and broke bread with some amazing women, there were all ages there and I was at the same time proud of my generation for things we accomplished and awed by the younger ones for things they are committed to. I made two wonderful friends, the sweet, loving, kind and accepting Teresa and the passionate and forthright seeker Maria (who also happens to be from Cuba to boot), two woman that were given to me for a reason, I know, and that maybe represent two facets of my very own self that I am to embrace, I'm so grateful to have met them.

And Omega the place itself is magical, there is an energy there that must come from years of people coming together to explore themselves and to explore things seen and unseen that gives it a living heart, it's like a big warm hug of a place. I was also happy to realize that the 60's are alive and kicking, in me and at Omega. I know I will be back, no doubt about it.

My mind has been spinning with everything I took in, we heard from Isabel Allende, Helen Thomas, the young founders of Feministing.com and World Pulse Magazine, a woman from Afghanistan who needs bodyguards round the clock because she has dedicated her life to building schools and even a university for girls in her country, the gifted and hilarious Sarah Jones, Natalie Merchant, Olympic medalists, and many others. And I have to admit I was feeling quite small and intimidated in light of the work that all of these women were involved in and working so hard for. And then Elizabeth Lesser did it again, she gave us all a gift as she did with her book, she ended the conference with the message that every one we heard from, all these women who have accomplished so much, are simply "making it up" as they go along, that that's what we all do, she said that what she wishes is for us all to just go out there and "make it up". Gloria Steinem repeatedly said to remember that we are communal beings, that we can't get things done alone, human beings need community, so very true. I realized that I need community as a woman and as a person dealing with cancer. My personal version of "making it up" will be to develop the C-Tribe as community.

Power

I have power on the brain lately, the particular radiation treatment I just went thru made me feel completely powerless, I am going to the Omega Institute for a seminar on Women and Power this weekend and I just picked up my copy of this month's Oprah Magazine and what's the theme? you guessed it, power. I just read something in it, "Real power is usually unspectacular, a simple setting aside of fear that allows the free flow of love... The process of spotting fear and refusing to obey it is the source of all true empowerment". The words of Martha Beck, page 57 in this issue, read it. I have often been blown away by Martha's books and columns, but more than anything I have been blow away by her personally. I attended a workshop run by her and by Koelle Simpson back in April, right after I had surgery and before I started treatment, and more than anything during that amazing weekend when I learned so much about myself and being in my own energy, a weekend when I met a small group of amazing people completely open and vulnerable to each other, more than all the powerful experiences we shared, is the memory of a conversation Martha had with us all at the very end of the workshop. We talked about presence, about mindfulness and about our connection; I was so moved by the pure goodness of this woman and how she completely gave of herself, how open her soul was to us all with the message that we are all one, we are connected. I know that probably sounds hokey to a lot of people but it was one of the most real and human experiences I have had in my life. I periodically plug back in to the memory of that day and I feel power.

The other words I have recently read that moved me came from Elizabeth Lesser, her book, Broken Open, is, in essence, a gift. I had purchased it a while ago, it's subtitle is "how difficult times can help you grow" and I assumed it was going to be another one of those smile thru your fear and sorrow approaches, I wasn't quite into that. But from the minute I started to read it I realized this was something real and it proved to be something very important to me during this journey. I not only felt the camaraderie with Elizabeth the seeker (although clearly she has followed a more direct and more sophisticated path than the one I have been on intermittently in my life) but her words are poetry for a hurting soul. I am blown away by the fact that this woman is able to and willing to open herself up as she has and touch people as she touched me. To be able to help someone come through pain is power, and I am grateful for her fearlessness. Elizabeth Lesser founded the Omega Institute and has spent a lifetime working in the field of wellness and personal growth, working on the delicacy and complexity that is the human experience, really. How happy am I that I'm heading there tomorrow?

Goes to show you how much I know...

OK, it's been over a week since I posted on here naively thinking I'd be doing a grand performance of the happy dance all over the place because my treatment was finally over; well, little did I know... I was a complete wreck. I was expecting relief, I was expecting a parting of the clouds, and while there definitely was some of that, what was there the most of was an overwhelming flood of emotions. I realize now that for the last six months I was holding back so much (mainly my whole life most of the time) and now it all came pouring out. Finishing treatment wasn't joyous, it was sobering. Finishing treatment meant release, but also fear, fear that even though treatment was awful I knew at least that whatever cancer cells might still be in me were being attacked, now that the attack is over what does that mean, that they are free to grow again? It's taken me a few days to digest everything, and I have come to the realization that I now go from attacking cancer with outside treatments, i.e., chemo and radiation, to managing it from the inside, from my head, from my spirit and my physical body. I will make my body into the best cancer fighting entity it can be thru nutrition and supplements, I'll keep all those great killer cells we all have strong and hungry, and I'll stay on the monitoring program of scans and blood tests until I hear the doctors utter that most wonderful of all C-words: cure. That's when I KNOW I'll do that pending happy dance :)

Phase 3

It seems I enter what I've heard be called Phase 3 soon- recovery, it goes from diagnosis to treatment to recovery (if you ask me each one of those phases their own "7 steps" thing- anger, denial, bargaining, blah, blah, blah...). The thing is that I have my very last treatment tomorrow, I'm done with treatment, I'm just letting that sink in. And I'm nervous about it because once again I don't know what to expect, the one thing I have learned by now is that I shouldn't expect anything, I should just feel, to allow yourself to experience everything step by step is the way to go, I think. And right now, at this moment, I'm feeling just a bit of sunshine beaming down on me but think I'm going to be obnoxiously happy tomorrow!

Been thinking some more

OK, until I completely figure out what it is I am supposed to do in terms of website, etc., I'm just going to keep writing down my thoughts, in the words of my amazing brother who I just shared this with I'm gonna just "be myself and keep the honest, open approach"...

The newly diagnosed- that's a very singular position to be in, it's a cloud, a fog, really. It is surreal and hyper-real at the same time, it's completely disorienting and frightening and very lonely. And you have Twilight Zone moments like when you find yourself sitting in a waiting room with other people clearly going thru chemo and you think to yourself "oh, those poor people, they have cancer...", as if you didn't too. There are a lot of resources out there for cancer information, too many maybe, there are a lot of quack type websites who will tell you that if you drink worm feces tea or suck on pine cones found on the northwest side of Mt Whatever that you will be cured of cancer, guaranteed, or sites that go on and on about early detection (how does that help you when you've just been diagnosed at your particular stage? it makes you feel like a goner is what it does), or sites that are so general they make you want to scream. So what do you do? I think one of the best things to do is to stay off of them altogether. There is just so much information you can process at a time, and at the moment you are busy dealing with the words you heard from your doctors mouth and the steps to come. I'm going to concentrate my efforts on those that are in the midst of this newly diagnosed whirlwind, because it can be easy to lose your spirit for a little bit, and it's your spirit that's going to get you through this. I'm not talking about the "you have to be positive" platitudes (usually said with the best of intentions, I know), but believe me, if you could THINK your cancer away I would not have gone thru what I went thru. And the flip side of this train of thought is this weird unspoken insinuation that you got sick or had a recurrence because you weren't positive enough. At any rate, what I'm getting at is that what does get you through things and what gives you strength is reaching down in your core, in your heart of hearts and realizing that in spite of everything that's being laid on you right now, in spite of the fear, you know that life is good, simply and solidly good, and that no matter what, no matter the outcome of things, you will be fine.