A weird post after a long week!

I have promised myself I am going to write more often.   It is very cathartic for me and often I am able to express myself much more completely while writing than I am when meeting people face to face.   I don't really feel like writing but know that is usually when I should be doing it.

I can say that for the first time, at least since the last time, I am in pain.     Not excruciating pain, but that uncomfortable feeling one gets when you sit too long in a position.   A stiff, ache.    Then every once in awhile I move a certain way and I get a 'stitch' of pain that stops me.   Like the tumour is caught on something and I have to shake it loose.     I find this not only annoying but a little disconcerting.   I don't remember pain before.     I also notice that I seem to be favouring my right leg when I walk, especially up and down stairs so that can't be a good sign.     Hmmmmm....guess it is time to do something.

I have so many other things that I want to do in the next while, I can't figure out how I will possibly fit in anything else.....especially something as unattractive as surgery.   It will really put a wrench in my other plans.    That may sound funny, but in many ways that is how I see it.   This disease is serious but I find it very intrusive too.    Seems to rear its ugly head at the most inopportune moments.  That does not mean for a moment that I don't take it all very seriously.   I think there are many people who think I am too cavalier about my cancer.    Not at all!   I am more than aware of how serious this is and what could ultimately happen.    I am not unaware of the fact that I could die.   As a matter of fact, that is something I think about a lot.    The only thing I refuse to do is go around as if there is a death knell ringing my ultimate demise.    When I am alone, I think of all kinds of morbid things...like should I pre-arrange my funeral, what is going to happen to my animals, should I be cremated or buried.    Really important questions....only not really great coffee/knit clatch talk.   Also, many are quite uncomfortable with death chatter.   So, I enjoy my time with others, laugh and have fun, but often go home and think about my reality.

In some ways I am writing this because lately there have been a few people who seem to think that maybe I am not taking this  seriously enough.    Years ago when I had an accident and I had spinal cord damage, I had a similar situation.     I was very seriously hurt and needed a lot of care.   I was in physio for seven months learning to walk again and still have residual paralysis on my left side.   At the time the doctor felt that I wasn't taking my limitations seriously enough....he was worried that maybe I had not accepted my situation.     I had to tell him that 'oh I know what's going on, more so than even you do"   I just choose not to let it be what dictates my behaviour and moods when I am out in the world.    Why would I?    I love being with people, I love being out and about, what would be the point of being in a constant state of worry, sadness, when I am in situations that I love to be in.   I have lots of down time at home all by myself to do that.    I know this way of being makes some uncomfortable, so I just want to reassure them that I do have my sad moments, and I am taking all this very seriously.   I just don't want to be that person either, that everyone sees in the grocery store aisle and turns the other way....you know the ones I mean....the ones you no longer ask "how are you".    The fact people still ask, I see as a good thing,....I must be giving the right answer lol :)

I didn't realize how much that was bothering me.    That last paragraph came out of somewhere very deep down.   I realize that my way of being scares people even more than the cancer.   If I am morose and sad, look sick and battered, then they too would know when they are sick......you look sick you are sick.    One thing I have learned about this horrible disease.....it has a very good way of masking itself.    You look great and the world sees you as healthy, but inside it is eating you alive.    If we could tell people had cancer by the way they looked, it would be diagnosed so much more quickly.   The reality is that cancer doesn't give itself away until the 11th hour.....when you start to look like you aren't well it is already most probably too late.      I get this "you look great" all the time, and have to smile to myself.    Most times I just say thank you and move on but recently I did something I shouldn't have........Please read this smiling as that is how I am writing it......it really is funny

There is a person that I see on a regular basis and although I have said hi she often doesn't acknowledge me.   That is fine, some people are shy and don't like to engage in idle chatter with strangers.....I have no problem.   So I stopped saying anything and we would pass each other without a word.    Then one day recently I was out walking the dog and she was passing by......out of the blue she said "you have lost weight, you look great"....I said thank you and then she said "have you been trying to"   (read she obviously thought I could lose a few pounds lol).....I stopped and smiled very nicely and said "actually no, I have been sick  lately with cancer".......(bad girl bad girl )   and the look on her face was hilarious....she tripped over herself and came right over and gave me a hug.     I felt terrible (only briefly) and thanked her and went inside.   I do not know what possessed me to do that but maybe it was a number of things.   Our obsession with weight, body image, diets, etc.   I believe that only in North American does skinny signify health....anywhere else in the world it would mean hunger and malnutrition.   

So as you see, I am not always the nice person.   I do have a dark side that periodically appears.    And it can be very nasty....so just content yourselves with the fact that I choose to be pleasant and nice........and hope you never have to be on the receiving end of my not too often but not too  nice morbid sense of humour.   I really was trying to be funny but realized that she didn't think it was.........it must be that Irish blood that runs through my veins......very faintly but oh when it raises it's ugly head!!!!