It’s my mother’s birthday today. I think she almost forgot, given where her head has been lately, and I just want to send a more public shout out to her that she has been an amazing help and source of support and strength for me and I am so grateful for her—for each and every one of her 68 years, since they’ve brought her to this time, this place, here with me. Thank you, Mom. Happy Birthday. I love you.
We’ve just come back from my first walk since surgery, and it felt good to be out breathing in fresh air, and seeing some real signs that spring will indeed share her colors and new life with us soon. The road was muddy underfoot, and water was draining everywhere, the beaver pond in our back woods overflowing with melting ice and stream water, filling the vernal pools and rushing through the culverts here and there. Flocks of little songbirds alighted on trees, still bare against soft skies, and filled the air with their choruses. The crocuses are busting through the old leaves and debris that has mulched and littered the garden since fall, and Daisy’s tennis balls and Luke’s golf balls are suddenly appearing in the cruddy mud-lawn, unearthed by the melting snow, their bright yellows and whites seeming stark and surprising against the dull blahs of the March palette. It seems old man winter may pay us a visit tonight, to make everything seem pretty again, with a dusting of snow, just in time for Luke’s overnight as part of his regular Thursday wilderness program in Dummerston, Vermont—I suppose sleeping on snow is more comfortable than mud? I imagine it’ll be quite lovely when they awake, all snuggled together in the shelter they’ve been building all winter, and the breakfast they cook over their camp stove will be even more delicious than anything they’ve ever tasted before. Luke learned the fine art of carving venison (against the grain, always go against the grain) a week ago, and they’ve been promised some for breakfast. Dominick has opted to come back home tonight after a long day romping through the woods, working on his carving, making cool forts with his friends, and expending an amount of energy that I can only dream of…
It’s day two for me at home. After a tumultuous afternoon and evening yesterday, I was happy for some peace in my belly today. There’s a good reason the nurses in the hospital always ask their post-op patients if they’ve peed or passed gas yet, or enjoyed their inaugural bowel movement (would you rather I say poop? caca? bm? #2?). The anesthesia drugs, as well as the pain meds, slow everything down—so that all systems relax and take a breather. And often times, it takes those same systems a while to get back in the full swing of things. Such was the case with me, and yesterday afternoon, after having taken a few Senecot-S meds, I was having the worst cramping of my life—it actually felt like labor pains, contractions that came every five minutes or so, and lasted ten or twenty seconds. Finally, though, it cleared me right out, but I wish I had taken a different route, and after talking to my plastic surgeon, Dr. Pitts, who graciously and kindly took the call herself, I realized I should have called her first (duh, Liz), rather than suffer the consequences of my impulsive intake of senna, an herb known for its troublesome cramping side effects. The trick is to be able to take the Vicodin, which bloats my belly and slows everything down but takes the pain away, away, and still be able to keep things moving. Hence the walk this afternoon. And maybe some Milk of Magnesia later tonight. Oy. This is just not like me. Too much information? Sorry!
The visiting nurse, Sarah, came back again this morning to change the bandages, which was a good thing, because I had bled through several near where the Jackson-Pratt drain inserts under my arm (the one place I have not yet looked) and the bandages had slipped down considerably, loosened by all my howling agony over the ridiculous cramping and rushing to the bathroom (outta my way! outta my way!). This time, I looked fairly square on at the wound, not yet in the mirror, but just from above, where just a few days ago there was the soft roundness of a breast, small, but curved, despite its recent run-in with the surgeon. Now, there is a small rounded stretch of skin, an incision that actually looks far better than I thought it would (and not nearly as long), and some swelling and bruising that hopefully, will improve each and every day. I looked down a second time, and saw that my pectoral muscle on the left side is very swollen and bruised, and is making little twitching motions, as if suffering from a bit of PTSD post-operatively. Since my pec is bugged, the muscles on the other side of my shoulder are bugged as well, and my range of motion is pretty shot right now, but I know that too will improve. The nurse has said she has ordered some PT and OT for me, at home, which will be very helpful. In the meantime, I keep smearing Arnica gel over the swollen area, with hopes that it will help. Sarah will be back tomorrow, at which time she’ll be training someone (my mother? Jim? me?) to change my bandages over the weekend. This will be interesting, maybe a little frightening, because I think I'll have to look a little longer, and maybe I will notice something else I didn't notice today. I think I can do most of it myself, but there’s much precision wrapping and laborious mummifying that has to be done, a bit like getting the Christmas lights around and around the branches of the tree just so, so I suspect I will need help. And then there’s the drain site. Do I really want to look at that? Since it’s open to infection, bacitracin has to be put on the gauze before covering it up. These are the things that typically make me faint dead away. Somehow, though, this is different. This is my new skin, my new shell. Time to get used to it. And I suppose I’ll have to look at the drain site, too, eventually. Maybe not today, maybe tomorrow. It won’t be there forever, so I’m not as intent on making its acquaintance. The new me, the transitioning me, is someone I have to get to know. But it was enough today to look down, not away, while Sarah took the bandages off, to take it in, to scan my left side, and to realize that I look, and feel, very different. More like a lizard, perhaps, than a human. Which is okay, I think. I like lizards, don’t you? I think it’s the absence of the nipple that is so alarming. And the lack of symmetry and balance, and the loss of the rounded softness there, makes me feel—and look—a little deformed, and well, mutilated. But there’s a happy side to it, too. I know this probably saved my life, and I am grateful for these scars. Though I’ve lost this part of me, perhaps, in letting it go, it has given me new life, and made me whole again.
It’s amazing how much better you can feel after you wash your hair. Sorry, can’t go out tonight, I’ve got to stay in and wash my hair! My mother helped me wash my hair this morning in the kitchen sink, and it felt so good to have it clean again, a bit bouncier in its usual springy wavy curl shape. There are more grays than ever poking through, especially on the top, where my darker winter roots provide a better contrast for those grays to be seen, spotted, and yanked. The last time I saw my hair dresser, she asked me if I had been under a lot of stress lately. “You’ve got a lot more grays than before.” Stress? Who, me? I figure I can accept the grays as part of my passage—and if they really start to bug me, I’ll highlight them the hell out of there. Right?
It’s also amazing how much better you can feel after a visit from a dear, old friend. My friend Dana Weeder, from Exeter and Williams, came to visit today, and it was so great to be able to sit and talk and get caught up and not feel like some freak in a hospital gown. And he brought flowers, too, lovely lilies that have filled the house with their beautiful springtime scent. And the best part was that he didn’t seem the least bit uncomfortable with this new, different me, this mastectomied, misshapen, me. Maybe because he’s an architect, he’s used to things being under construction? Thank you, Dana! I do believe that these little pick-me-ups—a visit from the nurse, a re-bandaging, clean hair, a visit from an old friend, a walk in the woods with your mom and your dog—can and will make all the difference in the world, and will be critical to my recovery.
It’s dinnertime, and now, well, I’m missing my boys. I am eager to be strong enough to resume our homeschooling adventures. I miss our math sessions in front of the woodstove, talking about the finer points of Homer’s use of epithets (zilrendrag the mighty lizard-dragon queen slew her demon breast cancer in a heroic battle of wits), practicing Spanish together, discovering new ancestors, researching ancient civilizations and creating our own, collaborating on stories using our Boggle-licious words, making art, just being together. Heck! I even miss yelling at the boys to stop playing basketball upstairs while I’m trying to write on the ‘puter! It’s been a long haul of interruptions and doctor’s visits and emotional releases and stress of all sorts, and it will feel blessed and charmed when we can regain some surety in our footsteps, walking through each day with more spring and direction. We are nearly Skyped, and will look forward to making face to face contact with those of you who are afloat in the Skype-sphere.
And wanderlust, that restless, roving sister of mine, has sprinkled her magic dust over me, igniting a desire to shed some clothes and old travel routes for the roads less traveled, where I might discover a new richness to life where before was lacking, and maybe, just maybe, that left breast of mine will re-flower, opening to capture light and love and all that fills our cups. It’d be lovely to see you all in person. So, day by day, bit by bit. Thanks for being there with me.
There is pleasure in the pathless woods. --Byron
Indeed.
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