Dance like everyone's watching

June - or Junevember as the creative, over scheduled parents like to call it... Is one thing after another. In a good way. This year we didn't have any graduations in the household (although my nephew did graduate high school!). We *only* had soccer, dance, dress rehearsals, chorus concerts, band concerts, the dance recital AND tonight - the intensive dance banquet! Other than field day and teacher gifts... We're in the clear until the 4th of July. 🫠

Can you guess that I've cried over plenty of things? 🎶 I get so emotional 🎶 - but in all fairness, universe, you have my child sing a collection of Les Miserables songs for his final chorus concert? Like ever? I felt like I was floating in space - watching my 17 year old child sing songs that I watched at 17, knowing they were one of my departed father's favorites and I'm not supposed to ugly cry in the auditorium?? 

And our dance recital. There was less crying for me because last year was my big "overcome cancer" moment when I got back on stage for a tap routine. This year was more of a celebration and gratitude that I have such a welcoming place to go several times a week. 

I can't recommend dance or any group exercise enough when recovering from an illness or surgery. Three breast surgeries really messed up my arms, sides, chest and any sort of flexibility. Going to dance and learning a routine is the best kind of physical therapy..I don't think I'd be this far along in recovery if I wasn't having fun pretending that I'm actually good at hip hop. 

My sweet Delphine is a dance pro - by the recital, her group has performed more than a dozen times on stage and from my perspective, it is a bonus to dance for our family and friends. 

I did have a little post- recital melancholy because all that work AND time together is just... Poof.. over until we meet again in the fall. Thank you to my dance friends and our teachers and for everyone that purchased our fundraising goodies throughout the year. You helped create this for an 8 year old who promised me she'd never stop dancing. 🤞

Too...Much...Water

Middle age is an interesting time to learn and unlearn things. Simple things like how much effort it takes to learn how to use a new phone, or in my case, a new Kindle (first day I could NOT figure out how to get out of my book and back to the home screen). Or when the supermarket gets updated and you don't know where tomato paste is! 

It's a time to Embrace nerdiness or character traits that still aren't particularly useful. I'm fully invested in building miniatures - when that's the last thing I "have time" for. And I find that I use my dictionary more than ever. Does anyone else just pass over words they don't understand or you've read/seen it a million times without bothering to know what it means? I used to do that all of the time. When I finally, lazily, press the word to open the dictionary - it is worth it! I had probably read the word 'nadir' twenty times before I took the effort to learn its definition - and know I see the word everywhere. 

Idioms too. If you have to Google it .. I'll wait! Because I just had to in order to include it in my writing. I was getting it confused with colloquialisms. (I'll still be here after you Google that one too!) 

Bite the bullet. Costs an arm and a leg. The last straw. Under the weather.

We've heard and said these things so often that we don't think or really hear what we're saying. And once you really *hear* it, you can't unhear the meaning. 

I've written in the past about some really unhelpful idioms that cancer patients hear a lot. I've had my issues with people that say "getting old is a bitch". We just regurgitate sayings without thinking of the audience or how negative or dismissive they might be. 

But over the last couple of weeks, the term "carrying water" has been a recurring theme. What does that mean exactly? Can you envision for yourself the water you are carrying for other people? For our culture? For things to stay the same and to keep us busy serving something other than ourselves? I carry a lot of water for people and ideas. I also carry a purse with snacks, gum, water and activities because I'm a mother. But the entire cultural norm of carrying a purse (AND the car keys) as a woman is carrying water! Why didn't anyone else bring a bag??? 

Carrying water is the unappreciated mental task of keeping track of groceries, schedules and what time dance class starts. Carrying water is remembering birthdays. Carrying water is knowing the truth and watching everyone else pretend. Carrying water is staying small or keeping your opinion to yourself to let an insecure man feel good about himself. Carrying water serves the patriarchy.. Carrying water serves the status quo.  

And now I can't seem to look at the words carrying water. 🫠🫠🫠

My point is that we carry so much in order to keep things going, whether anyone notices or not. Because it's "easier" to stay quiet until it isn't. I'd like to put the water down; I wish I could stop caring about what is ethical or right for one minute and just be as selfish as many people are! 

I encourage you to look around and see what you're carrying for others. Be it the weight of responsibility to maintain a relationship, be it the snack schedule, be it the cleaning. It's ok to carry what you want, of course, because there is beauty in being a responsible, functional adult. But it's all about actually choosing what you carry.

My Suburban Mom Crystals and Woo Woo Healing

My kids make fun of me for being a millennial on a daily basis, even though I'm not technically in that generation. If my outfit is lame? Millennial mom fashion. If I make a bad music selection? Uggh, so millennial. But the worst is when I start talking about crystals, the chakras in the body and Reiki. I bring it on myself, but that's when the teenagers start ripping on me that I'm just like every other white suburban millennial woman. Especially when I start to tease them that I'm dipping my foot into witchcraft and drinking moon water.

But I disagree! I don't think most adult women my age are *that* into crystals. Or Reiki. Or are they? Any input from my friends in this category?!? 

Since my surgery last December - I have taken a big step towards completing my active treatment and reconstruction. Anything can change, but my treatment continues to be some oral medications and upcoming transfusions for bone health. I'm not "done" EVER, but I'm also not preparing for the next surgical event. That's when the mental healing really needed to begin. All of 2023 was pure crisis mode and I let a lot of boundaries slide. But survivorship and my new frantic sense of time has changed me in ways that I'm still finding surprising. I have no tolerance for unequal relationships. I have no space to manage others emotions. I have taken really big steps back to focus on taking better care of myself. I need to find my own strength and be my own support in places where I've been habitually put in third or fourth place. People that have always been in crisis mode themselves and I have spent a lot of my life reacting to harmful behavior and trying to find my own sense of peace. 

My reading and podcasting this year has focused a lot on emotional health, family dynamics, reparenting myself and woo woo stuff like self healing through Reiki and chakras. I don't believe that any of it is more important than proven therapies like chemo or good nutrition - but there's a lot to be discovered or understood about the minds effects on the body. 

I went for Reiki one level training in February and it was fascinating. This is after I had an amazing Reiki session at a cancer retreat (Mary's Place by the Sea) in January. The practitioner was a nurse who added Reiki to her healing. When in a session, the healer typically works from head to toe - checking in with chakra centers: crown, throat, solar plexus, etc. She went over my throat several times and asked if I'd be trying to say something important. 

The answer is: YES I HAVE. To put it generally, I have tried to explain my new challenges about cancer and survivorship and ways I was trying to protect myself to a few people in my life... And not only were they not understanding, they were aggressively uncaring. The "new" me was rejected. I was frustrated that I've been given very little grace to even think about freaking out that my mortality was/is threatened and how difficult it is to live in my body now. Menopause aches and pains, PTSD, trauma, grief, fear. All of the things that may not LOOK like cancer, but certainly cause a lot of anxiety and sadness. The basic response was that I'm arrogant, selfish and since I don't look sick, I should just return to normal. Hah!! There is no fucking normal. 

So I'd desperately been trying to explain myself. Which was showing up in my throat chakra. I've also learned since then that it is the gateway for problems or imbalances that are happening in lower chakras and it manifests through the throat too. 

I see some of my mistakes now, that I was over communicating. I won't make that mistake again. I have really stopped trying to explain myself or my motivations - and now my answers will simply be yes or no or that doesn't work for me. I know who actually is willing to listen and those that just want access. 

And let me talk about my new appreciation for crystals ! Delphine and I had an amazing trip to Arizona where my Aunt & Uncle took us to Sedona. I had no idea is it a spiritual mecca and we learned a lot about crystals and stones. That's where I picked up my Amazonite bracelet, which is meant to help clear the throat chakra. I wear it every day as a reminder to think slowly and clearly about whether I'm speaking up to appease someone else or if I'm fully justified in protecting my sacred little family. 

I've also started to wear rose quartz over my heart to help it heal. To help myself remain open when I've really felt blindsided. It's very easy for me to hang on to hurt because I haven't had the greatest experiences where those that hurt or betrayed me showing any remorse or need to change. We're supposed to let people be who they are, right? I'm trying to hang on to the belief that people aren't mean spirited on purpose... Hard in the world today. 

What's next? A few books about Buddhism and Jungian psychology are on my list. Maybe I'll get a Tibetan singing bowl and start rolling in the grass in my yard! Who knows!?! All I know is it can't hurt me. And if I'm already embarrassing my children with chakra candles and crystals - I might as well make a true spectacle of myself!! 

What Squishmallows Mean to Me

We live in a home nearly filled to the brim with stuffed animals, toys, stuffies, Barbies and Squishmallows. I can blame part of the clutter on five children.. but if I'm being honest, a LOT of these items are special to me. Many of the stuffed animals are mine! Looking at you Sesame Street beanie babies! We have a large Big Bird that has been with us since before we were married. I'm basically a large child looking for excuses to buy more stuffed animals. 

The recent trend with Squishmallows might be the hardest because they are huge!! I know friends that have developed entirely new storage solutions to deal with the influx. They are soft and the perfect amount of squish. 

After my most recent reconstructive surgery in December - my tissue expanders were replaced with the "final" implants (I don't want to jinx my luck because implants can fail or leak or become infected at any given time). The hardest adjustments I've had to make since August 2023, with my mastectomy, is learning new sleep patterns. Every single night, I attempt to move back into my most comfortable position. I could sleep soundly with my arms above my head and on my stomach..  that's just been impossible and uncomfortable since then. Every. Single. Night. My body tries that position and fails. 

After the mastectomy, I had drains and severe stiffness. Imagine how C3PO would lay down... That's how I felt. After each fat grafting procedure, I also had pain in either my stomach or sides. I tried pillows propped between my knees and wedges and a large body pillow I could twist. The most useful items I was given were two bolster pillows from the Pink Pillow Project. Filled with microbeads, they gave me support between my sides and my arms. But they have been used and abused! 

Enter the breast cancer scene: Squishmallows!!! I raided the supply in my youngest children's room and voila, my new best friend is Lil Gouda! I can hug him against my chest and still roll from side to side, being annoyed that I can't sleep the way I want... But he's just the right density to help. 

So please, add Squishmallow to the list of "what to buy for the cancer patient in your life". 

The Case of Information Gatherers

It's so interesting to look back on the last two years of my life and observe from a distance. My feelings are less frantic and raw. I can put space between my feelings of sheer terror that my life was over and recognize the trauma for what it was - and how time, can give you perspective. Time does not heal necessarily, but it makes you feel like you've got some bullet proof glass and a lock on the door. 

Cancer clarified. It made a lot of noise fade away and a lot of concerns about daily inconveniences take their proper place in the long (I hope) arc of life. So while I can put petty problems aside, there are other "small" things that I can no longer tolerate. I don't have time or energy for one sided relationships now. I don't need to be polite to balance out rude behavior. My favorite quote of the week is Kendrick Lamar "I can't fake humble just because your ass is insecure". I don't need to make myself smaller to get the love I deserve! Cancer showed me who has my best interests at heart. Cancer showed me where and who my attention is deserved. Cancer showed me that my best energy and devotion is reserved for myself, my spouse and the children I brought into this world. Everyone else can hop on board and share in the love - or I match your energy. Cancer showed me that while illness is isolating and lonely, I can be so proud of my inner Alexis that always has my back. 

Illness clarified the difference between two types of questions - information gathering versus true curiosity. It's hard tell. Both will show concern. Both will seem genuine. The problem with information gatherers (synonym to grief tourists ) is that they just want to be in the know. They want to be in a position to broadcast your information. While that is helpful in times of crisis or to give the aggrieved a break from repeating the same details over and over, there has to be a limit. When your personal details are then being used as a means to connect with others or when they share that information with people you'd *never* confide in - that's not really helpful by any means. It's gossip with a cancer flare. 

There's a surface level understanding to information gatherers. They don't really ask "how are you coping"... They want the side effects. They want the nasty details. They want drug names to Google and the worst want to use your pain as a way to gather sympathy for themselves. I hope all patients with chronic illnesses find the wisdom to spot the difference between genuine concern and morbid curiosity. 

I've been happy to share details that could help another person. If you ask - I'll certainly tell you whether I still have nipples or not (I do! Thanks for asking! 😊). But there's an element of the gossip train that doesn't sit right with me and I know this is a feeling in the cancer community. Ask the patient how they are FEELING. Ask the immediate caregiver how they are FEELING. Don't get the information third hand, write a "you're so strong!!" comment on social media and then forget to actually speak to the person going through treatment. Don't use our personal details to make it look like we have a close relationship. 

 Knowing whether someone is truly interested in your well being - it's intangible and undefinable. It's a feeling. It's hard to be a person who has been deeply changed by an illness and want people to show decorum, but not every conversation needs to start with, "what's hurting you this week?!?". I don't know. It's wild how interactions can sometimes be so insanely misconstrued. With all of the cancer scam documentaries that have been on TV lately -it's an interesting deep dive into psychology and illness and attention seeking behavior. 

Permission to Be Human

Lucky for me, one of my jobs allows me the freedom to listen to hours of podcasts and books and Spotify while sewing. An episode of The Huberman Lab podcast about regulating emotions led to this author and his work in creating emotional roadmaps and tools for school systems. Basically: we are NOT taught anything meaningful about our emotional systems and often we end up as adults (me!) saying, what are all these feelings and why am I not allowed to feel them? 

Even in the best scenarios, we are not doing a great job as a society teaching our children how to honor their feelings. I am guilty of it too. Who has time to sit down with a toddler and kick it out? That tantrum over a toy in the store isn't really about the toy... but the intense, overwhelming, unmanageable feelings that a 3 year old has that he *wants* something and the adults with the power are saying no. Teenagers are given a terrible reputation when 99 percent of the time, they are displaying absolutely normal developmental traits: distancing themselves, creating a separate identity and needing lots of time to self reflect. Families suppress and deny very real personality conflicts or dysfunctional behavior with the goal of "keeping the peace" when sometimes all people need is the space to come to their own conclusions. Enmeshment, emotional immaturity and needing to be positive all of the time are messages we give to kids, because well, either we were ill equipped to deal with tough emotions or we were bullied into suppressing them. 

And it isn't a fair system. Some people are given quite a bit of space to display their emotions while others in a family (or classroom) are not. The loudest, most difficult or quickest to react often use up all of the emotional space, leaving everyone else in react mode. Kids learn really quickly if their parents have space to hear their problems at all. This is a generational problem and cycle that seems to repeat itself until someone gains the language or understanding in how to stop it. 

So while it's not an excuse, I was not given a great "vocabulary" regarding emotions, how to feel them fully and then how to integrate those into life. I used to not even be able to name my feelings and I still express everything better through writing rather than verbally. One of the exercises in the book is to expand your personal vocabulary for feelings - sometimes we only know mad, sad or glad. But there's about a million variations of mad... and they all mean very different things. Irritated vs enraged, frustrated vs invalidated, exasperation vs annoyed, and so on. Anger at yourself vs anger at another person. We are so quick to tell other people, and ourselves, to turn off that negative emotion before giving the time to properly work through them. 

This book has been timely because I feel like my body and mind are having a reckoning. There are so many facets of grief, anger, frustation and joy that I have not been either given permission to feel or I didn't recognize they were there, simmering below the surface. I developed cancer - I got really sick because the chemistry in my body wasn't/isn't working properly. While I think the environment and genetics are a factor, so is trauma and my emotional health. 

A huge lesson in this book is about the concept of resentment and what it truly represents. Resentment is a different type of anger or disappointment, and kudos to anyone that either doesn't feel like they struggle with this or has conquered the emotion. Resentment is really a byproduct of helplessness. If you feel helpless to change or alter a situation - you are naturally going to resent the person, the circumstances or the outcome that you inevitably have to "accept". If someone in your life is rude, but you get to walk away or have the freedom to express yourself, you're not going to resent them. You have personal autonomy to do something about it. It's an entirely different situation is someone is rude or disrespectful and others tell you that you just have to accept it. One of my biggest frustrations in life is that some people just get by with lower expectations. The bar can be set SO low for others that it inevitably is left up to the "bigger person" to fix any and all problems. This dynamic makes sense in an adult/child relationship, because YES - adults should absolutely be held to a higher standard. But at what age do we expect equal emotional competency? (I think we all know the answer to that is never, for some.) 

 For kids with abusive parents, or when dealing with a chronic illness, or living under laws passed by a terrible politician or when part of a repressed family system... there's such a bad mix of resentment, helplessness and other people enabling bad behavior. 

The author talked extensively about his own home life and being bullied in school. And how important it was to his development to have an adult SEE that he was struggling. All it took was for one family member to acknowledge his pain to help him work through it. So the aim is to teach both kids and school administrators (and parents) how to better understand and communicate our feelings. We can't pretend that we aren't facing huge roadblocks with both outdated generational ideas about feelings, such as "What are you crying about, I'll give you something to cry about" or "Boys don't cry" blah blah blah and a new crop of kids that feel disconnected from each other due to social media. 

So, I give myself and you the permission to feel. But I encourage maybe screaming into the woods instead of sceaming at each other. 

Read Me After Chemo & Love is A Cheese Grater

"It must be unimaginable dealing with cancer, but we all have things going on in our lives."

Yep! That might be the winning comment from 2024 that sums up what it feels like to be post-chemo, post-radiation and post- amputation. Certain people, I guess, are tired of me having a chronic, terminal illness. 

Said in my most sarcastic tone: OH REALLY? Other people have lives!?! I live with five young humans that definitely show me that other people have things going on. I hold a lot of space for other people's feelings and events and concerns, and honestly, that is a huge part of my identity and my connection. I love hearing about what is going on with my dearest friends and family ... But here's the thing. I will hold infinite amount of space for you if you can do the same for me. I don't even ask for an infinite amount, how about you just listen when I am clear and concise in the things that I need and what hurts me. 

Another issue I had this year was beginning to learn to protect myself from negative energy. I am sometimes barely holding on to my own positive perspective of the future. I am looking at my mortality closely. I am living in a body that has betrayed me and I can only hope it continues to work for years to come. And I have had a few people continue to say things like "Getting old is a b$tch" after me asking them to not say it. Getting old is a gift, from my perspective. 

Anyone that actually talked to me during a year of treatment (some could only muster a text or two), knows that I could and can talk about most anything. You're having work issues? Talk to me about it! Feeling stressed? Yes, I'm sure you are. Problems with being a parent and balancing it all? I know! I'm not going to respond with "at least you don't have cancer" because I'm not 12 and I wouldn't wish this on anyone. 

But if you clap back from my legitimate feelings with "you shouldn't feel that way" or "you need too much attention" - you are not worth my empathy or energy. If I tell you I am deeply fearful of dying young, don't tell me that it's not true. If I tell you it's hurtful to joke about a character in a movie dying in hospice... You don't get to tell me I'm overreacting by being offended. I'm the one sitting in waiting rooms at the breast clinic, hearing women debate hospice with their caregivers. I'll tell you once, but I'm not wasting any more energy than that. The only people that I'm responsible for are my children: it's not my weight to carry for other adults that lack communication skills or functional empathy. 

That's what so many cancer survivors need to read after chemo: how to DO and manage the after, when so many people are unwilling to listen to what your new reality looks like. It's not funny and it's more stressful than facing a chemo infusion. The side effects are not as visible as a bald head or scars left from cutting out all of your breast tissue. The sore, tingling muscles and fingertips. The major anxiety associated with every "normal" ache. 

Our brains are wired to focus on the negative, unfortunately. We do this to keep a watchful eye on situations and people that are unsafe. So a few mean apples have gotten more attention than they should. I should be focusing on the good, generous, kind people in my world. The reminders are everywhere, if I just look. Love has been expressed to me in so many unique ways. 

Love is a cheese grater. Sent to me because I said I shouldn't be eating pre-shredded cheese from the grocery store. Love is my Muppet mug that I carry to work every morning - sometimes with the herbal tea my friend picked out for me. Love is the "Sweary Motivational Quotes" coloring book that reminds me that You can F#CKING do this. 

Love is the basket of blankets made and mailed to our house. Love is my Mr Rogers talking toy. Love is the homemade jam from Chicago or the ice mask and pens sent from Australia. Love is breast cancer awareness socks and pajamas made to hold the God-awful drains after surgery. Love is a bundle of "get better soon" cards from my students, covered in stickers.

Love is gift cards for easy dinners. Love is a Golden ticket hidden in a chocolate bar. Love is a big Kool-Aid man t-shirt. Love is puzzles and late night texts and a friend who will walk with you in the woods. Love is taking time off of work to hang out on the couch. Love is hosting a "hat party". Love is healing stones and driving to cancer rejuvenation events together. Love is Googling "how can I help". Love is showing my immediate family that you think about them too. 

This post see-sawed between the awful and the beautiful. And isn't that what we are all experiencing? Everything. Everywhere. All at once. Because I have no choice but to move forward, whether my body complies or not. Whether I'm ready or not.