The First Phase

Two and a half weeks ago, I had an anaphylactic reaction to a bee sting. About a half hour after the sting, the palms of my hands and bottoms of my feet got itchy, hives appeared all over my body, and my lips and face started tingling and swelling. I took some expired Benadryl, which I'm thankful had survived my recent purge of expired medications, and we loaded the boys in the car so that Dave could drive me to the nearest emergency room. 

Once there, I experienced what had become familiar uncertainty. Do I mention it? Is it weird to mention it? Or is it weirder NOT to mention it? 

"So....I also have breast cancer. Just in case that matters?"

(It didn't, as it turned out.)

This story sums up my experience of this first phase of having cancer, between the diagnosis and becoming an actual Cancer Patient. If I hadn't had my routine scan last month, I'd still be walking around unaware, otherwise healthy, focused on the minutia of kids, work, laundry, life. And until this week, the week of The Surgery, the week I become a Cancer Patient, I have still been engrossed in life's little details and routine activities. It has felt odd to mention that I have cancer, like its a weird little fact that you spring on people out of the blue. Like my second toe is longer that my big toe. Does anyone really need to know that? Because after the cancer bombshell, its hard to talk about anything else. And I don't really feel like a Cancer Patient. 

And perhaps the irony will be that the day I officially become a Cancer Patient will also be the day when most, if not all, of the cancer will be cut out of my body. That all this time when the cancer was growing in my body and pushing out my healthy cells, I didn't know it was there. That I felt healthy and strong, but I was sick. That during the next phase, when I look like I have cancer, if all goes well, I won't actually HAVE cancer. 

But this week, its getting real. I am having a bilateral mastectomy this week. I have appointments other days this week in preparation. I'm not seeing clients. I'm putting up my out of office responder. I'm thinking about what I need to do to prepare, putting important things where I can reach them without lifting my arms, getting button down tops that I would never otherwise buy, getting as much laundry done now as I can. I'm getting reflective, quieter, shorter-tempered with the kids, sometimes teary. The transformation is happening.