October 9 - Yesterday

Yesterday was a great day! I drove for the first time. Granted it was with a huge pillow between my chest and the seat belt, and probably at granny speed. Parking is still a little tricky, involving 6 point turns. Anyway, I took my 3 year old to preschool, which is big in the me-doing-something-functional department and the yea-Scott-doesn't-have-to-do-everything arena. I went for a little walk, then had the afternoon to rest when Scott took the kids to the lot.


I took a shower, which is still a tiring, weird-feeling contortionist activity because of the nerve damage on my chest, back and arm pits. Then started the daily wound cleaning. I thought things looked a little gushier than usual, so I used an extra sponge and looked close in the mirror to check for signs of infection - and promptly lost it. As in heaving, uncontrollable sobs in a heap on the floor. For half an hour - I'm not exaggerating.

What would trigger such a gut emotional reaction in my otherwise rational and practical self? Stretch marks. Yep, silly little scars that indicate rapid skin stretching. Harmless, faded pink tiger stripes. And on the lower half, so not even in the cleavage area. Still.

Oddly, for me, I needed to talk to someone about it, and didn't want anyone to tell me rationally how petty I was being. You know, "at least the cancer's gone and you're not going to die", or anything. I called my aunt, who also had breast cancer in her 30's and happens to be a women's psychologist. So I cried for another hour and she said all the right stuff. I was better for a minute, but called Scott to warn him about the hormonal emotion zone at home just in case. Then I took 2 antihistamines and tried to sleep it off.

Well, the short nap did not even out the hormonal tears every time I opened my mouth, but we got through kid bed time. Then I cried through a re-run of House and an admittedly sad chapter of the book I'm reading (History of Love). Over the course of the next 4 hours I took Valium, Tylenol, Benadryl, Vicodin and Ambien to try to sleep. I was so incredibly sore - probably from all the sobbing - that I was up all night anyway.

Yesterday may have been the day the machine broke down. I'm sending it back for robotic repairs emergently!