Fast facts (if you don’t have time to read the full post): I’ve been MIA all week from the blog. I apologize for my lack of writing. I’ve been in a lot of pain this week. The side effects have been kicking my ass! Whatever energy I have after work has been spent on me sleeping or just attempting to survive as a cancer patient with a full time job and responsibilities at home. I made it to chemo number nine this past week. We have seven chemos left and honestly they cannot end fast enough. My body is falling apart. I also turned 30, which felt anticlimactic in the grand scheme of things. Chemo number ten is this Thursday and my long anticipated charity art fundraiser is Friday.

TO THE LONG VERSION!

Existing this week has been fucking hard. Life doesn’t stop just because I have cancer. Everyone is like, “Why don’t you rest more? Why don’t you take more time for yourself?” It is hard to choose recovery and healing when capitalism runs the world and you have two demanding cats who are constantly up to no good. I’ve been drowning in pain and a never ending list of things to do. I’m exhausted and my body feels like it is decomposing. No, like literally. My thumbs smell like death right now because the nails are lifting off the nail beds. I was rubbing my eyes this week and I was like what is that awful smell?! I thought maybe I forgot to wash my hands after cleaning the litter box or doing dishes. You know sometimes the dish sponge smells a little ~off.~ It took me four days to realize the smell is coming from my thumbs. I am the smell.

I feel fucking disgusting.

And you can literally see the lift between the skin and the nail now. I just hope like a little bug or a piece of corn doesn’t get trapped in there or something. I am not sure how or why I think corn might get in there since I don’t encounter a lot of corn kernels these days, but it is a weird fear of mine now. Keep your corn away from me!

Since we are on the topic of how disgusting my body is on chemo, my feet and palms are peeling and I am constantly swollen. My fingers look like dollar store hot dogs (you know the kind… sketchy and not sure what kind of meat is really inside of the casings.) I feel incredibly uncomfortable in my own skin and very very ugly. Self esteem is like negative two right now.

Combine those symptoms with extreme back pain (thanks chemo!) and now bone pain (will explain why I have bone pain again here in a minute) and I am just a shell of a fucking human being. Seven weeks to go.

Okay so bone pain. I know, we thought we were past this. So somehow between last week and this week’s chemo, my white blood cell count PLUMMETED. I was once a stable potato and now I am a very immunocompromised potato. My oncologist was not pleased with that update in my blood work, so I am getting daily growth factor injections for three days. Remember I would get those on Fridays after the red devil? It is a fun little shot in my stomach (My favorite! NOT!) and it helps my bone marrow create more white blood cells. Downside is bone pain. And as I type not only do my nails hurt because ~I aM dYiNg~ but I also have extreme bone pain localized in my neck and hips. Love this journey for me.

My oncologist was also once again not impressed with the reduction of my tumor in my breast. Granted, she is just saying that based on her hand exam, but I trust she has touched enough breast tumors in her lifetime that she knows what she is talking about. She threatened me with a third chemo drug, but will decide on the fate of that threat when I see her in three weeks. I get it, she is on my side and my breast cancer is an aggressive fucking bitch, so she is being aggressive back to it. But my body is the battleground and this war is getting harder. Why can’t my breast cancer be nice and just succumb to treatment? Why does it have to be stubborn like me???

So basically I am in constant pain. You see me functioning, but I want you to know I am in pain. I don’t have PFMLA days to spare to take a day off to just be in pain. I need those for my double mastectomy surgery so I am hoarding them. Technically I do have vacation and sick time, but I feel like I already miss a lot of work for chemo. This is a very complex dynamic that I don’t feel like getting into right now. Let’s end this blog post on a less emo note.

FRIDAY! CHARITY ART FUNDRAISER! IT IS HAPPENING. I am panicking. I have so much left to do for it! And the state of my being is dwindling so I just need to make it through Friday and then I can collapse and not worry about anything else for the rest of treatment. I am so excited for the event, but also dreading how fucking tired I am going to be. I have chemo the day before, so Friday will no doubt kick my ass.

Also, in beautiful things that have happened: Moniker Bar created a special cocktail in my honor this week: the Captain Madison. A portion of the proceeds from that cocktail were donated to the Tri-Cities Cancer Center Foundation. I wish that was something I could include on my LinkedIn about me: one time a really awesome restaurant I love made a cocktail named after me that benefited a charity. What a wonderfully rare thing to say! This cocktail should be making one final appearance the night of the fundraiser. I just need to nail down the final details for that one. Stay tuned. Also side note, I love that it was named after my social media handle. I have been “captainmadison” for over… gosh 13 years? I love that it has become part of my identity in a way. I am the captain! Yet, I am in charge of nothing. Nice.

Here are a few snaps from this week!

Today’s song lyrics of the day are brought to you by Kanye West.

“Sasquatch, Godzilla, King Kong, Lochness
Goblin, ghoul, a zombie with no conscience
Question, what do these things all have in common?
Everybody knows I’m a motherfuckin’ monster”

– Monster, Kanye West, JAY-Z, Rick Ross, Nicki Minaj, Bon Iver