Beauty Is In The Eye Of The Biscuit

“Remember that the most beautiful things in the world are the most useless; peacocks and lilies for instance.”  -John Ruskin

               

                As a child I had no time for beauty.  If I had known John Ruskin I may have offered him a filthy handed high five as I ran giggling for the woods.   Beauty was as useful as a unicycle without the seat…confusing and painful to conquer.  It required dresses and tight fitting shoes.  It required baths and sleeping with rollers.  It required clean hands and brushed hair.  And then once you obtained this state of physical attractiveness you had to actually focus to maintain it.  You had to smile and sit still.  You had to watch as all the boys ran outside and played ball.  You had to play nicely with the other girls as they set up “house” or “wedding.”  The whole idea was absurd to me.  I didn’t easily fit in.  While most girls played “house” I played “homeless person.”  While most girls played “wedding” I played “post apocalyptic survival,” and having brushed hair or a dress didn’t help your chances in either of those games.

                My life revolved very little around how I looked.  My wardrobe mostly consisted of my brother’s passed down clothes.  My hair was usually a stringy tangled mess, and although it’s embarrassing to admit now, I managed to go an entire summer without bathing or brushing my teeth.  I privately mocked girls who put actual energy in to how they looked, because I felt beauty was not the key to life.  Living was. 

                As I entered my teenage years, however, beauty began to change for me.  I began to feel self conscious about my previous complete disregard for physical beauty and for a few years I went in the complete opposite direction.  I felt more like a line out of one of Chuck Palahnuik’s books:

“If I can’t be beautiful, I want to be invisible.” -Chuck Palahnuik

               

                I spent two and a half hours getting ready for school each morning.  I had to wear the perfect clothes.  I had to have the perfect makeup.  I had to have the perfect hair.  I made sure there was enough time in the morning to run to my friend/neighbor’s house so we could compare ensembles before heading out for the day.  It was what I call my vain period.  It wasn’t a good day unless I felt beautiful, and beauty required many reassuring looks in the mirror to make sure nothing was out of place. 

                I am not saying the two are connected, but this was also the time period where I had the most friends in my life.  I was young.  I was beautiful.  I was liked.  I believed this was all I needed in the world, and I forgot about that happy little girl who didn’t care what others thought. 

Luckily, however, life decided to teach me a very valuable lesson packaged as a spider bite; a spider bite that would cause massive swelling of my body, bruising, weight gain and large red hives randomly for the next two years of my life.  Suddenly almost all of the people who I thought were my friends were not.  They were making fun of me and attacking me if they weren’t ignoring me, and I couldn’t understand what had happened.  I was so infuriated, because I was the same exact person.  The only things that changed were superficial qualities that didn’t matter. 

At first I begged to look normal again, but as I examined the changes in my relationships and the pain of my condition worsened I begged for something else.  I begged for my life in exchange for my looks.  I wanted to make a deal that I would carry the hives for the rest of my life as long as I could live again.  I felt that no matter what I was going through I was still a beautiful person and anyone who didn’t agree could go to hell.  My deal was never accepted.  Instead, life led me to a cure and I regained my normal appearance and my life.

“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and it may be necessary from time to time to give a stupid or misinformed beholder a black eye.” -Miss Piggy

                It is with Miss Piggy’s words in mind that I have lived ever since.  I am exactly who I am, and anyone who can’t appreciate that does not get to share in my life.  I wear what is comfortable.  I shave my head if I am tired of my hair.  More often than not I leave my makeup under the bathroom sink instead of on my face.  Certainly I deal with a normal amount of insecurities and I would be lying to say I didn’t, but the point is that I have learned to mostly live comfortably in my own skin.  I’d even go so far as to say it isn’t because I feel I am beautiful, but instead it is what creates my brand of beauty.

                So many people say, “You’re the only person who could pull off a shaved head.”  I completely disagree with this statement.  I honestly feel that anyone would look great with a shaved head, if they would feel comfortable with it.  What separates me from others is that I honestly do not care if I have hair or what others make of my lack of hair.  I don’t feel my hair can make or break how beautiful I am, just as my outfit can’t or my makeup.  As long as I feel comfortable and confident, people will see me as beautiful.  As soon as I start to question those things, I feel the world questions it with me.

                I’m not suggesting that every woman stop caring about clothes, makeup or hair.  I’m just saying it is what has worked for me.  Other women get confidence out of those things and if so, then they are also the source of their beauty just as the lack of them is the source of mine.  Anything that can make a woman feel comfortable in her skin is a wonderful thing. 

The trouble I am running into is that I am losing that confidence once again.  As I watch my appearance change in the name of cancer I am reminded of the quote:

“No object is so beautiful that, under certain conditions, it will not look ugly.” –Oscar Wilde

It isn’t the same as when I was a teenager.  I feel I am missing more than a good hair day or the perfect outfit, but even with that thought I feel I am fooling myself.  All of my concerns are still residing on the same sliding scale of outward appearances, so what does it matter how far down on the scale they are?  Instead of being self conscious about my makeup, I am nervous about how much my skin is drying and breaking out.  Instead of being worried about my hair (which is nonexistent at this point anyways) I am scared of losing my fingernails and toenails.   Instead of thinking about my clothes I am always aware of the fact that I no longer have breasts and that even if I decide to go on the long, painful and incredibly expensive journey of reconstruction, it is something I am not eligible for until almost a year from now.  Which brings me to the fact that, yes, as a matter of fact, I actually am thinking about my clothes.  I lied before.  How can I not be thinking about them when they all fit so differently now?  Suddenly I wish my clothes were a lot more girly and prettier.  I think somehow this will make up for my lack of a figure.

 Every day has become a battle to look in the mirror and find peace in what I see.  I find myself making excuses and reminding people that I look differently before they see me.  Is it so they will be prepared or so that I will be prepared for the look I’m already assuming will be in their eyes?  It’s the same look I see in my eyes every morning as I’m getting ready.  A look of loss.  A look of illness.  A look of discomfort.  A look of insecurity. 

I am not counting this as a permanent change in my perception of my physical self.  To be fair I am only eleven days out of surgery, and each day has become slightly easier than the last.  But I also know I have five more months of appearance changing treatments ahead of me.  What do those months bring for my self image?  Will I learn to accept the characteristics I find so trying?  Will I obtain natural peace or will it be one I have to fight for everyday when I look in the mirror?  Would a new wardrobe offer me comfort?  Will I opt for months of pain and money to have back what I have lost or will these scars become a part of my previously comfortable skin?

I know that each of you reading this will want to tell me that I am the same person.  Each of you will wish to tell me that I am beautiful.  I appreciate your thought and your intentions, but I want you to know that what concerns me at this point is what I think of myself.  What concerns me is how long it will take for me to feel comfortable in my own skin so that I actually can be the same person I was before.  I know I am beautiful.  I just need to figure out what that means to me now…

“Beauty?...To me it is a word without sense because I do not know where its meaning comes from nor where it leads to.” -Pablo Picasso

A Pound of Flesh

                The days before surgery are very strange.  You know a part of your body will only be attached to you for a little while longer.  It is such a bizarre thought that you don’t know fully what to do with it.  Do you mourn?  Do you throw a going away party?  Do you focus on saying goodbye or distract yourself and not focus on anything?    I mostly went for distraction. 

                I received a lot of phone calls leading up to the surgery, and I am sure I sounded more like a robot than I did a person.  Everyone had the same questions, and I felt so detached from the situation it was more like rehearsing a script for a play than discussing my surgery.

“When is surgery?”

“Friday.”

“What time?”

“They don’t tell us till Thursday night.”

“Who is going?”

“Adam and his parents.”

“Anything I can do?”

“Nope.”

“How do you feel?”

“I feel how anyone would feel…I feel like someone who has cancer…someone who is losing their breasts in a few days…someone who normally feels like shit from chemo…someone who has a handful of days left to feel good and feel whole….someone who just wants to enjoy this small window of feeling normal…someone who doesn’t want precious moments of normalcy to be interrupted by asking them to get emotional about something that they cannot change…someone who will have plenty of time to consider how they feel as they lay in bed recuperating from surgery…”

                Okay so maybe I didn’t say all that.  I think I said,

“Fine.  Let’s not talk about it.”

I was slotted to show up at the hospital at 5:45 in the morning.  At first I was distressed, because I am not a morning person, but it turned out to be a real blessing.  I was so tired that by the time I got to the hospital I was willing to do everything and anything for the medical staff as long as they let me lay down in one of their hospital beds as I did it.  Time moved fairly quickly, because I was in an early morning-walking-talking-sleep coma and I wasn’t allowed any coffee to cure it.  Before I knew it I was ushered down the hallway, I was asked to say goodbye to Adam and his parents, and suddenly I felt very awake.

The goodbye is awkward at best.  You are standing with people who you love and medical staff who are watching and waiting.  It’s not a hallmark moment.  It’s a scary moment where you realize you don’t want to say goodbye, but if you do anything more than a quick hug and walk away you’ll find yourself crying and clinging to them in the middle of the hallway.  A moment where you want to linger, but you know any sentiment or emotion will only make the wait before surgery harder for you and the wait during surgery harder for them.  No.  You say I love you.  You give a quick hug.  You avoid eye contact as the nurse leads you away. 

I was in a hospital bed waiting for surgery to begin for what seemed like a long time.  Several people came in to see me and talk to me about what was going to happen.  My surgeon squeezed my toe and asked me if I was okay.  A nurse came to give me an IV and she smiled kindly and complimented my nail polish.  Another nurse offered warm blankets every time she walked by.  Everyone was very pleasant except for one nurse, who by all rights, probably meant to be pleasant.  I just don’t think she thought about what she was saying.  She asked me why I was there and I told her I had breast cancer.  She said, “We’ve lost so many women to that battle.”   I just stared at her and wondered if she knew how much I didn’t want to hear that as I wait for surgery.  I decided she didn’t know so I shut my eyes and waited.  Finally the anesthesiologist came.  He described how the process would work and explained they were going to put me under and that I wouldn’t remember ever leaving that room, and he was right.

The next thing I knew I was being woken up.  Anesthesia is a strange creature.  I only remember parts of the rest of the day.  I remember I was happy.  I remember there wasn’t much pain.  I remember having fun with Adam and his parents and thinking how strange it was to be having fun.  I remember the nurse was concerned about my heart rate being high.  I remember they sent me home after only two hours of observation and I was so happy to be able to heal at home.  People were freaked about that, because most people stay overnight, but I couldn’t have been more thankful.  Home is where I needed to be.

There are a lot of bandages and drains in place after a double mastectomy.  Care is very easy because you aren’t supposed to touch the bandages and the drains only need to be emptied every eight hours.  Pain medication worked well for discomfort, so the biggest factor involved is the “ick factor.”  I mean, you are leaking fluid out of a pair of holes in your body and that’s kind of crazy.

I’ve been healing very well.  Most people get the drains removed after 7-10 days.  Mine were removed on Tuesday which was only four days.  I also had the bandages removed on Tuesday which means I also saw my chest for the first time.

A lot of people have asked how I handled it when I first saw my chest.  The answer is very simple.  I cried.  I thought I would be prepared.  Before the surgery I looked at hundreds of post-operation photos so I wouldn’t be surprised, but I just don’t think anything can prepare you when it’s your own body.  I was horrified.  I was terrified.  I cried as much as chest pains would allow.

The good news is that I stopped crying, and as the shock wore off I was able to find some positive thoughts to carry me through.  I had seen so many post operation pictures that I can honestly say my scars are the most beautiful I’ve ever seen.  My scars are straight, clean and have no skin puckering.  My surgeon is a very talented man who left me with what would be considered a very attractive chest in the way of post operation chests.  This is a big deal to me.

I also heard the voice of one beautiful person saying, “They cut your cancer out.  The tumor is literally removed.”  What a wonderful feeling!  What a huge step in this long and exhausting battle!  Thank you so much for these sweet words T.L.  When I see my chest now I don’t think, “They cut off my breasts.”  Instead I think, “They cut out my cancer,” and those are much more beautiful scars to carry.

Cancer with a Smile

     I haven’t posted in a couple weeks.  Part of the reason is this last chemotherapy was very difficult.  Not only did it take me longer to recover, but I was much sicker than I have been in the past and experienced brand new side effects.  My throat was reacting to the drugs and it triggered my gag reflex.  Even after I overcame the nausea I was gagging for no reason on a throat that felt like it was covered in pepper. 

     This, however, is not the only reason.  I started to feel better a couple days ago, and I’ve sat down to write a blog several times.  Everything I write just hasn’t come out the way I’m hoping it would.  My words taste a little bitter this week.  My thoughts are running a little darker.  I expected they might, because I’ve also struggled with depression since my last chemotherapy. 

     Depression.  Maybe it’s my natural instinct to share little and smile a lot, but depression is a hard word for me to say.  My oncologist, who has seen every embarrassing aspect of my cancer, had to coax the word out of me before I’d admit it.  And you know what he said?  He said, “Yeah.  It’s situational.  I’m not going to prescribe anything.”  I sighed in relief, because him not trying to “cure” it told me nothing was wrong with being depressed.  I have cancer.  It happens.

     But I get scared when I’m depressed, and I’ve been trying to figure out why.  In my mind I already know it is okay.  This last chemotherapy I spent three days crying before I felt happy again.  This one was the longest, but it has happened after every single treatment, and while people called to check on me, no one knows except my husband.  For some reason I feel like he’s the only one who would understand.

     It’s funny, because in this blog I am willing to share intimate details about my body, my relationships and my treatments, but this will easily be the hardest entry I’ve had to post…and right now, that just feels crazy to me.  It is normal for me to feel depressed when I have cancer.  However, showing it fights against twenty eight years of keeping my emotions safely inside.  You may think I’m exaggerating, but I’m not.  Do you know how I reacted to the doctor telling me I had cancer?  I stared at him.  I said, “Okay.”  I let him talk.  I waited for him to leave and I shed approximately three tears before making myself stop, and I waited until I was all the home so that no one but Adam would see me break down.  I called my entire list of family and friends and told them the news without crying a single time.  I’m telling you.  I’m professional at holding it in.

     In the process of thinking about all of this I did come up with a few things that stand in the way of my emotional sharing.  I’m reminded of the old line, “It’s not you.  It’s me.”  You see, I’m going to list what I am afraid of, but it is important to me that no one assume they have made me feel this way.  More than likely I’ve never even given you the chance to make me feel this way, which also means I haven’t given you the chance to prove me wrong either.  I also haven’t told you what I need.  And that’s my fault.  So here we go…this is why I don’t want people to know I’m depressed:

1.)  I don’t like to make other people worry.

2.)  I am afraid that people won’t think I am strong, which is a quality I value.

3.)  I am afraid that people won’t think of me as a positive person, which is a quality I value.

4.)  I feel embarrassed to react with depression when I know other people have it worse than me.

5.)  I am afraid that if I show emotion once people will expect me to share those feelings regularly which I cannot do.  Specifically I worry people will start asking how I feel about things emotionally before I am ready to talk about it.

6.)  My depressions are very real, but also very short lived, and I worry people will not believe me once I am feeling better.

7.)  I am afraid of people “babying” me.  I really hate that.  I didn’t even like it when I was a kid and it has only gotten worse with age. 

8.)  I am afraid people will try to be overly positive.  If I am depressed and I happen to share that window with someone, the best thing they can do is get mad with me, get sad with me or make a joke.  Them trying to be positive makes me feel like my emotions aren’t justified which makes sharing them even harder.  This is also connected to number 3.  I am already a positive person, but I am still allowed my moments of darkness.  If someone tries to brighten my moment of darkness by being positive, I will feel like they don’t think I’m a positive enough person to already see those things.

9.)  I like to be people’s rock.  I worry if I show weakness they won’t lean on me anymore.

     I believe that mostly covers why I have trouble with the word depression.  I’m posting this list in hopes that if my readers already know my fears they will read my darker blogs with them in mind.  I will do my best to share more openly, which will also mean more frequently.  I want this blog to be an absolutely honest portrayal of what I am going through, and I cannot do that if I am worried about showing one of the biggest emotions involved in having cancer.