Where do I even begin?

To say the past 4 weeks have been hard, unnerving, life changing, healing and so much more is a huge understatement.

I got out of the hospital thinking, “oh, no big deal that I just had brain surgery” – well that no big deal caught up to me quickly and with a fierce force.

That following Monday, I had to jump right back into treatment and had zometa on top of it to boot.  Then after treatment that day, my mom and I went to speak with the radiation oncologist.  This meeting didn’t go as I had expected – there was talk of whole brain radiation, half brain and possibly ¼ brain – none of which I was expecting. I was expecting to radiate just the place that there was cancer.

I left there feeling defeated and scared. Brain radiation freaks me out for many reasons and if all truth be told, I don’t want to do it at all.  I will do it because Eric has researched the heck out of it and it is better for me to do some sort of radiation…but it still scares me.

Tuesday and Wednesday I was able to rest with no appointments, which was great. All the information was still sinking in and the doom and gloom was starting to sink in to.

Thursday was more treatment. I still hadn’t bounced back from zometa so I felt like I was kicked down again.

Friday, Eric and I went to speak with the CyberKnife Dr that my neuro Dr recommended.

Now here is the thing – I have been beyond blessed when it comes to doctors – their love and committment to me is out of this world.  So of course I was hoping to get the warm and fuzzies from this Dr – I didn’t.  He is very intelligent and has a great success rate at what he does, but his ability to talk to me in the words I need to hear…well, it wasn’t happening.

So we left there – I was even more confused and scared than when I went into this.

We went to eat at a local pizza place because it was after 130 and I was starving, and then the pizza wasn’t any good.  I started to cry. Yes – I was crying in the middle of the pizza place – it really wasn’t the pizza I was crying about – it was all this. I had been trying so hard to hold it all in, to hold it all together, to tell myself it would be ok – when in fact I don’t know that and I am having a hard time believing it. It sucks…big time.

Weekend came and went – I hung out in bed a lot. I was still feeling “floaty” and out of my head.  I could see my hands in front of my, but it took a lot to connect them to my thoughts – weird I know.

Monday was treatment again.

Wednesday I went to see my neuro dr to get 39 staples removed – yes, 39. It didn’t hurt as I thought it would – it was just uncomfortable. And after talking to him and the radiation, we decided to go with the cyberknife.

Thursday was treatment again.

Then we left on Sunday for Little Pink Houses of Hope retreat (more on that later) in North Carolina.

We are home now, treatment starts again tomorrow and hopefully I will figure out when/how long radiation will be. I guess I am now in the place of – if I have to do this, let’s do it and get it over with. It doesn’t mean I am less scared or even want to do it, but I know I have to.

All in all I am just “eh” about everything. I try hard not to put on a face of “oh it is alright” because in reality it isn’t – it sucks. Only very few people will actually see my real face through this and for now I have accepted that.  It is easier to put on the “oh it is alright face” but from that, I don’t think anyone really knows…not sure anyone really wants to know…it isn’t fun, it isn’t pretty and yes, it is very scary.