How is it possible that eight months have passed
since I last blogged? I just reread my
last post (typos and all) and caught myself reading with my eyebrows raised in
surprise. My last written “deep
thoughts” were in early December and so much has happened since then. Monumental things? Not necessarily. Just the natural progression of life. The gift though is that through this blog,
this journal of mine, I have a timeline set up as a quick reference to who I
am, a map of where I have been and the life I have been living when I wasn’t
looking.
Now that we have weathered the storm of cancer, I am
able to look back and see more clearly the path I have traveled. Like standing on top of a mountain looking
down over the journey I have been on.
My world changed in an instant when I received word
that I had breast cancer. The even flow
of our everyday life seemed to come to a halt.
And yet, I see now it never stopped.
Life continued on. The path I was
on was just different from what I had expected.
I had breast cancer but I never stopped being a mom
or a wife. Holidays still came and
birthdays still marked another year passing.
My kids still grew and my house still got dirty. Life was still there. I was just distracted.
So where has life led me since I last blogged months
ago?
Christmas came and went. With each passing yuletide holiday, I notice
more and more that I must be growing up.
I long for the Christmas Eves that I lay nestled in my bed, too excited
to sleep, imagining the wrapped wonder that must be awaiting me under the tree
that hadn’t been there when I snuggled in for the night. Now I spend the holidays with shopping check
lists, wrapping gifts at the last minute, rushing here and there, only to look
around and realize that too soon it is over and I feel like I missed it.
My daughter, Mallory turned 11 in February. Every day she becomes more beautiful. She goes at a dead run all the time, always
ready for the next thing, always on the move.
She is the spitting image of her father, which just means I have two of
them in the house. This year she will begin the sixth grade. At the end of the school year, we will attend
the sixth grade clap out and I expect my heart will break a little as I watch
her walk down the hall with her classmates, knowing that my little elementary
baby girl is now a junior high student.
It seems only yesterday that I brought her home and was gluing tiny bows
in her goose down soft hair with KY Jelly. Now her hair hangs long down her
back, framing the face of an “almost teenager”.
My son, Ryan, just turned 16 in May. When it came time to get his license, I
practiced driving with him, tried to teach him the things he needed to know…
.blinkers and brake lights, stop signs and speed limits. My nerves sat on edge the day his daddy took
him to take his test and I prayed that he would pass. This was a milestone that as a parent you
look toward, the progression of the life that you brought into this world. Crawling, walking, talking, reading,
driving……leaving. The leaving part
didn’t hit me until he came home with his license tucked nicely in his
wallet. This milestone reached. The next ones take him a little further from
me each time. In two years he will be
considered an adult. Kelley and I
married at 19. It’s hard to imagine that
in the blink of an eye, my handsome son will be ready and willing to step out
into the world as a man of his own, and not just my sidekick. He is a handsome young man, blue eyes
shining. He is creative and thoughtful,
generous and kind.
I am blessed with two children, as different as
night and day. Their different interests
round out our world in the perfect way.
We attend Mallory’s softball and volleyball games, watch her cheer and
listen to her endless inventive ideas.
And we attend Ryan’s band concerts and school plays, spending our
evenings listening to the sounds of him playing the songs he learns in Band
class on his tenor saxophone or “Amazing Grace” on his guitar, an ear for music
that allows his fingers to lead the songs in his head to the instrument in his
hands.
The release of my book, Me and the Ugly C, has been such a blessing. Now that I have had the opportunity to share
my story with others as not only a cancer survivor but also an author, I have
been asked to speak at different events such as the library, at some Relay for
Life events, church and a breast cancer support group that was discussing
blogging and journaling. Although yes, I AM a people person, I am not a PUBLIC
SPEAKING kind of people person. But I
have made the choice to be bolder and take opportunities when they are given to
me, each of them a gift that I don’t want to miss. I have done some book signings, was able to
be a part of a video done by the American Cancer Society that was being put
together to raise money to make improvements to my home during radiation, Hope
Lodge, and will soon have an article in the New You – Inside and Out magazine.
My months are littered with doctors’ appointments.
Once every three months I drive to St. Louis to see my oncologist, get my lab
work done and receive the shot that has shut down my ovaries, preventing the
estrogen fed c-word from having anything to feed on if by chance it decided to
attempt to return. It was the lab work
in March though that took us back to a place we never wanted to visit again, a
place of uncertainty and fear. My liver
enzymes were high.
“It’s probably
just the medicine,” the nurse, Danielle, said.
“But just in case, Dr. Pluard wants to schedule a liver
ultrasound.” Always obliging and
cooperative, I said “OK, sure,” as nonchalantly as I could, not ready yet to
consider the possibilities of what this might mean. It was when Danielle called again on our way
home and said that an additional blood test they had done came back OK but that
Dr. Pluard now wanted not only a liver ultrasound done but also a bone scan, I
asked the question that weighed so heavy.
“So worst case scenario, what does this mean?” I
hated that I had said those words. Those
words played a part in my story before and I surely didn’t want to revisit
them.
“Best case scenario is that the Zoladex shot you get
has raised your liver enzymes.” She
continued on, her tone comforting in a way that was not one of pity or doom,
but one that gave me confidence that they were on top of the possibilities,
covering all bases. “Worst case scenario is that the breast cancer has metastasized
to either your liver or your bones.”
Heavy words delivered almost a year from the finish of the treatments I
had already endured. The thought of
another battle was almost too much to bear.
The liver ultrasound was requested by Dr. Pluard’s
nurse to be scheduled ASAP. The ASAP
happened to be four days later, almost at the same time I was to attend my
first speaking engagement at the Poplar Bluff Library. The event had been advertised for weeks. I had been channeling Bold Beck in
preparation, settling myself into a solid state of confidence in order for me
to have enough courage to even show UP at the event. Cancelling now was not an option for me. So when I told the nurse that wasn’t
possible, she looked at me disapprovingly and reluctantly scheduled it for the
day after. After Danielle’s call, a full
day was scheduled for me between the liver ultrasound and the bone scan.
The bone scan later revealed that I had shin splints
and stressed areas in my feet. But no
cancer. And now I know why it hurts for
me to exercise in which I have used to the grandest extent in my bucket of
excuses to not work out. I did get new
shoes out of that though.
The liver ultrasound results, however, were not as
comforting. A lesion had been found on
my liver and now an MRI was necessary.
I wish I could explain here what went through my
mind during this time. But the force
fields were up. My mind went into
protective mode. The possibilities were
too much to fathom. I was tired. And if the results we received from this test
were not in our favor, I simply didn’t know if I had it in me to fight
again. It was too soon. Too soon for me. Too soon for Kelley. And to imagine the horror on the faces of my
children if we had to sit down with them and turn their worlds upside down
again…I couldn’t. I quickly decided that
I didn’t want to tell my parents until we knew something for sure one way or
the other. So, aware of the testing I was
having done, when I spoke with them after the results, I never lied but I didn’t
divulge all the details. Just in case, I
wanted to spare them all. If this wasn’t
good, I just wanted to let them remain happy and at peace with what we had
already been through…just a little longer.
Again we traveled to St. Louis, eyes straight ahead,
focusing only on getting through another test…….another IV. I lay painfully still in the MRI machine,
fighting the urge to giggle when after I had been told to lie perfectly still,
a sneeze tickled my nose. Knowing the
movement would render the test unusable and we would have to begin again made
me cringe. But the image of me sneezing
and ramming my face into the top of the MRI machine that was inches from the
end of my nose got me tickled and made the idea of not moving almost
impossible. When that had passed, I
realized the error I had made in my choice of radio stations when I had been
allowed to pick what I wanted to listen to to help pass the time. You try lying in a tube and be perfectly
still when your head is filled with:
Jump,
jump
The
Mac Dad will make you, jump, jump
Daddy
Mac will make you, jump, jump
Kris
Kross will make you jump, jump
Yeah, it was wiggity, wiggity, wiggity wack. However, I endured and remained still until
the end of the test. We returned home
and received the call that the mass they had seen was simply a hematoma, a
collection of blood vessels that are completely harmless. The elevation in my liver enzymes was due to
the Zoladex.
This time I was blessed with the BEST case scenario.
But most importantly, after all these months have passed,
the one update I cannot leave off….is my hair.
As I type this, my hair is…..drum roll please…….pulled back in a real
live ponytail. It is not yet all the
same length but the hair on the top of my head is now below my ears, the back
rests on my shoulders. It is
blonde. My roots, however, are dark
brown. After all the trauma of losing it
in the first place, I have found I wouldn’t mind keeping a short hair
style. But my daughter asks me to grow
it long and so I will. Besides, the day
I look in the mirror and see that my hair is the same length that it was on the
day of the first step of Beck’s Baby Steps to Bald Project, I will feel the
satisfaction of knowing I really have won.
Those are the highlights of the last seven or so
months. All in all, I spend my days
spinning my wheels, running the race of procrastination that is at the core of
who I am. Every day I get up and start
my only true routine.
I make my coffee and while it’s perking, I grab a
cold Diet Pepsi and wash the sleep away with the fizz from that metal can. I sit on the love seat, turn on Dr. Phil and
grab my iPhone to check what new messages and emails await me, if any, then click
on my TMZ app to check what has happened in the celebrity world since I went to
bed. Now the coffee is ready and I fill
my cup. Two spoonsful of creamer, two
sugars. Back on the love seat, I return
a text, send a new one if it strikes me.
As my brain starts to come to life, I grab my handy dandy notebook that’s
never far away and write out my ridiculously long list of to-do’s. The list is long and filled with minor
chores. Thoughts of things I need to do
flash through my mind like a ticker sign and once that last word passes through
my cerebral cortex, I either can’t remember I wanted to do it or I feel like I
already did. The list is long but
mundane, sometimes even filled with things I have already done just so I can
use my highlighter to check them off, allowing me to start my day off feeling
accomplished.
By now Dr. Phil is over and I buzz through the
channels, trying to find something else to watch for a minute, needing a break
from the tiring task of my to-do list.
Nothing is ever on and then my eye begins to wander around the living
room. What a mess. I need to clean it up. I should put that on my list.
My little dog, Izzy, barks and I hear her feet
pitter pattering nervously in the other room and I realize she needs to go
out. So I put my notebook down and head
to open the back door. I step outside
with her and look around at my fenced-in backyard, disappointed that such a
beautiful space has yet (even after 11 years) been transformed into the
beautiful backyard oasis that I dream of.
I begin to think of all the things that we could do to it and I decide I
should really turn the television to HGTV for some backyard landscaping
inspiration.
But before I can get back inside to change the
channel, my outside dog, Nugent, sees me and barks for breakfast and the
chickens squawk because they’re hungry too and I’m ripped from the start of my
inspired reverie to feed my backyard farm.
I’ll just have to put that on my list.
By the time I am done, it’s 9:30 and I have
successfully wasted my morning and have yet to shower and get ready for work.
I’m going to be late again. Right on time.
My morning ritual of getting nowhere fast.
After visiting my friend and pastor’s blog recently,
www.semocc.blogspot.com, and
reading his post Where Are You, it
was that very question that has since then played on my mind quite a bit. He
wrote “There is a verse from the text
that I can’t (or God won’t) get out of my mind: ‘But the LORD God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?”’. (Genesis 3:9). God doesn’t ask many questions. Why would He?
There’s not much information the created can offer the Creator. Nevertheless, the first recorded question was
not from man to God; it was from god to man: Adam, where are you?”
And when later in the blog, he left an open blank in
front of those three words, “__(insert
your name___, where are you?, my heart sank a little as I put my name
in the blank.
Becky,
where are you?
From the moment I learned I had cancer, I cried out
to God telling him this was too big for me to handle and that I was handing it
over to Him. As I look back, I can see
the all the many times that He took the load too heavy for me to carry, how
many times the plan that He had ready for me came into play, how many times I was
weak and He was strong. One of the huge
blessings I am so thankful for during that difficult time, is the fact that
although I have always been a Christian, always a believer, I never felt until
then the true connection and friendship I embraced with God. Always He had been there for me, watching me,
loving me, protecting me. Yet it wasn’t
until I truly needed Him that I felt His presence so close and realized that not
only was He BIGGER than me, but He was always WITH me….ME….that I began to
accept the personal relationship that I never understood was possible. I had spent a life keeping Him at arm’s
length, stashed in the pages of my Bible, not able yet to open my heart to a
Father/Daughter relationship with the one who made me.
While I have been traveling at the speed of life, as
the tide of the day to day rolls in and out, it has carried me a little further
out. And with those words, Becky,
where are you? I have turned my head and looked behind me and with a
feeling of dread, realized how very far out I have drifted.
Where was God when I lay in that MRI machine
wondering if it was time to fight again, all too soon?
He was there, holding my hand.
Where was God when I attended speaking engagements
and was met afterward by people with tears running down their faces, touched by
my words……even when I had NO idea what I had said?
He was there, speaking for me.
After crying out to Him when my life was in turmoil
and being touched repeatedly by His grace, I have slipped away from His arms
and let every-day life and the peace of the passing storm allow me to become
complacent.
His mercy knows no bounds, His blessings
constant. He gives me this breath that I
pull into my chest……and this one…….and this one…….all gifts from the Father.
And yet I start my morning with a cup of coffee and
a visit with my iPad instead of filling my heart with His word and end my day
with a piece of a prayer, left unfinished as I close my eyes, instead of taking
the time out of the day that He gave me to thank Him from bended knee.
I am human. I am imperfect. I am flawed.
And I am FORGIVEN.
Becky,
where are you?
Father, when I heard you call, I panicked when I
realized how far out I had drifted. But
like the lighthouse stands as a beacon in the dark, leading the lonely ships
home, You stood there on the shore, your love for me shining so brightly that I
had no trouble getting back to where I belong.
Here I am, Lord.
Here I am.