Lisa Bonchek Adams

Sunday morning.

A different kind of strength: shave the few soft but strong hairs that are finally ready.

Now gone to the floor.

No tears.

Necessity.

……….

You’ll be seeing more posts here in the near future about some of my feelings over the last two months. I’m starting to feel more like myself. The vertigo is lessening with the decrease I’ve been able to make in the pain medication, as we’d hoped. I’ve reduced the pain meds by 20% and the hope is that as the radiation effects start to kick in I will be able to decrease more. It’s been five weeks now since I finished radiation. I needed these Fentanyl patches desperately while the tumors were out of control. I could not have done it any other way. But certainly we all want me only using the amount I need to control my current level of pain.

I will be going back to meet again with my palliative care doctors this week to reassess my pain meds and talk about the plan for the next few weeks. I was thrilled to see that my last post about the importance of early palliative care and its definition (not end-of-life pain management… but instead total patient care pain management) was so well-received by patients and doctors alike. I encourage both sides to really form a team and focus on all side effects that patients are having with all kinds of treatment.

Patients function better not only emotionally but also physically in that they will heal better if their bodies are not weakened by pain. It takes trial and error to find the right drugs and the right amounts. It takes patience. Most palliative care doctors are experts in patience, I have fortunately found. I know that is not always the case and I always receive emails and comments from people who have had distressing experiences with their care. I am so sorry for that. I am hoping by relaying my own experiences, readers who have not yet found help with pain will have strength to ask again or pursue help if they’ve been unable to.

I’ve started my second month of chemotherapy (Taxol). I do three weekly treatments in a row and then have one week off each month. I had my first infusion of my second month on Thursday. I haven’t had any additional reactions to the chemo so I’ve been able to have the sessions done rather quickly (30 minutes for the 3 pre-medications and then 60 minutes for the actual Taxol). Sometimes I go alone and sometimes I have a friend join me. I am developing a routine and it has worked well so far.

We still have a lot of snow on the ground and on sunny days like today the brightness is astounding. We are all anxious for Spring but it’s just not here yet (more snow due to arrive this week). I am thinking of my snowdrops and daffodils just waiting under the snow pack. The photo at left is from last year… can’t wait to see this in the front yard again soon.

For today I’m sporting a head scarf and getting used to seeing a new reflection looking back at me in the mirror.

………

Make the most of this day. Whatever that means to you, whatever you can do. No matter how small it seems to you. Don’t waste it.

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June 18, 2010

There. I did it.

This picture shows me one month after I finished chemo. Peach fuzz growing. Eyebrows gone. Eyelashes gone. Both pencilled in to hide their absence.

This is the only picture I have of myself bald. When I was a shiny cue ball it never occurred to me to document it. If you look closely at my left eye, you’ll see a tear resting on my lower lid. I had just stopped crying. Long enough to put on makeup and flash that killer smile. I was just about to get my tissue expanders out and have my silicone implants put in. It was right before my 38th birthday. That’s what I told my plastic surgeon I wanted for my birthday– to be done with that next phase of my reconstruction.

It was hard to go in for that particular surgery at that particular time in my treatment regimen. When the staff came to wheel me in I had to remove my scarf. My surgeon hadn’t seen me bald. The nurses, my father, my doctor… all of them saw my head then. Of course it was run of the mill for them. They saw cancer patients all the time. But for me it was another way my dignity, my identity, my humanity were being stripped from me. I donned the fabric shower cap gladly, happy to have something (albeit flimsy) to conceal my naked head.

Only moments before, I stood in the bathroom with my plastic surgeon while he marked my body once more with his ubiquitous purple Sharpie pen. We talked again about final details of my breasts. I realized how these conversations had become so routine between us. While the subject of my breasts was no longer one that even caused a pause in chatter for us, I didn’t want him to see my head. Somehow it was more personal, more private, more embarrassing to me than the fact that he not only saw, but touched, drew on, and even photographed my breasts on a regular basis during reconstruction. Those interactions were scripted. Defined. But my head? I hadn’t realized he was going to see that. And there was embarrassment there. It wasn’t happening on my terms.

So today I am taking control and doing it on my terms. When Melissa Etheridge performed bald at the Grammys in 2005 (before I was even diagnosed) I remember thinking, “She is strong. She is real. She is brave. She is beautiful.” What she did in that moment was important. I bet it was liberating to her. So I’m going to try it. It’s too late for me to try it in reality (and I don’t want to pull a Britney Spears and shave my new hair off to be bald again).

Today1 is the 2 year anniversary of the day I finished chemo. So, in celebration, I’m taking off my metaphorical scarf. I’m going bald here today. I want to see how it feels.

1. June 18, 2010 [↩]

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