HER2 Support Group Forums - View Single Post - A teary and embarrassing moment

StephN · 05-28-2008, 12:16 PM

Dear Chris -
I LOVE your "dancing on the edge of a knife with bare feet" analogy. That is often what having cancer feels like and we just have to grin and bear it for the rest of the world!

Looks like you are afraid of losing your balance and not getting treatment was like taking away the little "balance umbrella" the tightrope walkers use.

Off the subject. At the latest Cirque du Soleil the highwire walker crossed it in ballet toe shoes!! Never saw that one before, but I was duly impressed.

About the time and place of the said crying episode. How COULD you know you would not get the wonder drug that day until they came back with your labs?? We are at their mercy and just have to try to keep it together hoping the numbers will be high enough to get treated that day. I had to put off a treatment once and I did not cry, but was quite discombobulated and stressed till the next week. My white count was SO low that I was fainting all the time.

So we react to news as we get it. And we can't always react with poise and grace. It's Ok to lose it once in a while. I know that one of the main concerns of our treatment staffs (especially for stage IV patients) is that we are not becoming a danger to ourselves.

Once I made an offhand comment in clinic that maybe it would be easier to drive off a bridge on the way home, and THAT got their attention. They sent a chaplain in to talk to me, but I really felt she was assessing my state of mind. Of COURSE I did not mean that, but they had no way to know ...

And so it goes. Which is why I keep a white out pen in my desk drawer. I just had to change an appt with my brain doc!

05-28-2008, 12:16 PM	#23
StephN Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2004 Location: Misty woods of WA State Posts: 4,128	"Reactions" happen ... Dear Chris - I LOVE your "dancing on the edge of a knife with bare feet" analogy. That is often what having cancer feels like and we just have to grin and bear it for the rest of the world! Looks like you are afraid of losing your balance and not getting treatment was like taking away the little "balance umbrella" the tightrope walkers use. Off the subject. At the latest Cirque du Soleil the highwire walker crossed it in ballet toe shoes!! Never saw that one before, but I was duly impressed. About the time and place of the said crying episode. How COULD you know you would not get the wonder drug that day until they came back with your labs?? We are at their mercy and just have to try to keep it together hoping the numbers will be high enough to get treated that day. I had to put off a treatment once and I did not cry, but was quite discombobulated and stressed till the next week. My white count was SO low that I was fainting all the time. So we react to news as we get it. And we can't always react with poise and grace. It's Ok to lose it once in a while. I know that one of the main concerns of our treatment staffs (especially for stage IV patients) is that we are not becoming a danger to ourselves. Once I made an offhand comment in clinic that maybe it would be easier to drive off a bridge on the way home, and THAT got their attention. They sent a chaplain in to talk to me, but I really felt she was assessing my state of mind. Of COURSE I did not mean that, but they had no way to know ... And so it goes. Which is why I keep a white out pen in my desk drawer. I just had to change an appt with my brain doc! __________________ "When I hear music, I fear no danger. I am invulnerable. I see no foe. I am related to the earliest times, and to the latest." H.D. Thoreau Live in the moment. MY STORY SO FAR ~~~~ Found suspicious lump 9/2000 Lumpectomy, then node dissection and port placement Stage IIB, 8 pos nodes of 18, Grade 3, ER & PR - Adriamycin 12 weekly, taxotere 4 rounds 36 rads - very little burning 3 mos after rads liver full of tumors, Stage IV Jan 2002, one spot on sternum Weekly Taxol, Navelbine, Herceptin for 27 rounds to NED! 2003 & 2004 no active disease - 3 weekly Herceptin + Zometa Jan 2005 two mets to brain - Gamma Knife on Jan 18 All clear until treated cerebellum spot showing activity on Jan 2006 brain MRI & brain PET Brain surgery on Feb 9, 2006 - no cancer, 100% radiation necrosis - tumor was still dying Continue as NED while on Herceptin & quarterly Zometa Fall-2006 - off Zometa - watching one small brain spot (scar?) 2007 - spot/scar in brain stable - finished anticoagulation therapy for clot along my port-a-catheter - 3 angioplasties to unblock vena cava 2008 - Brain and body still NED! Port removed and scans in Dec. Dec 2008 - stop Herceptin - Vaccine Trial at U of W begun in Oct. of 2011 STILL NED everywhere in Feb 2014 - on wing & prayer 7/14 - Started twice yearly Zometa for my bones Jan. 2015 checkup still shows NED 2015 Neuropathy in feet - otherwise all OK - still NED. Same news for 2016 and all of 2017. Nov of 2017 - had small skin cancer removed from my face. Will have Zometa end of Jan. 2018.