Spring explosion - September 2021

 "Expect to have hope rekindled. Expect your prayers to be answered in wondrous ways. The dry seasons in life do not last. The spring rains will come again."

    ~Sarah Ban Breathnach

Kia ora whānau, it's lovely to have you here. September has been an explosion of life in so many ways: the garden is a riot of weeds, building work has brought tradies and noise and excitement, and I've finished chemo and am racing headlong into the next surgery - with all the planning and nerves that entails.

Before I crack into the episode I have exciting news - in February I'm beginning study of Archaeology with the University of Leicester part time via distance learning! It's childhood dream material and it's been a long process to get to this point. I have talked myself out of studying archaeology for 20+ years and finally got to the stage where I realised I didn't want to look back at the age of 70 and feel deep regret for not doing it.

I set myself a goal to write a blog post each month this year and that is still my intention, but at the moment I'm not sure if I'll carry on with the blog in 2022 and beyond as I don't think I'll have capacity with study and work. However, I was thinking it might be good to write shorter episodes that cover, for example, one interesting thing I learned that month and a quick life / health update. Or perhaps just more regular Instagram posts.

Craft

If you've been anywhere near my Instagram you'll know that building work is underway on the deck and laundry. We've had builders, a plumber, and a sparky here and it was rather overwhelming on the first two days as there seemed to be blokes everywhere and decisions to be made every 5 minutes. It made me appreciate that we decided NOT to build a house as it would be utterly exhausting!

Porch in Progress - it's absolutely the highlight of the year!

Their problem-solving and physical crafting is a joy to watch - seeing professionals who care about the job they do work together on something is so interesting. I've watched many YouTube videos on building decks and sheds but seeing it happen in 3d is something entirely different.

I've had another month of sewing as my sole creative outlet and it's been a bit of a breakthrough month. As much as I love the look of the two linen dresses I made when they are hanging up they just felt weird on, and I simply hadn't worn them. I made a skirt but when I tried it on it felt uncomfortable - it sat too high and looked wrong. A day or two later I put on my teal Cuff Dress, the fabric was bunching up and I didn't like the look of it. I realised that I'm short-waisted which is why dresses and skirts that sit on my natural waist sit too high and bunch up under my boobs. It was a HUGE lightbulb moment and now I can look for patterns that work for my shape. I feel like I'm 30 years late to the party but at least I know now!

A skirt that I love and have worn to death is an Icebreaker skirt that has a stretchy waistband like a yoga pant so it sits on my hips and is able to adapt to my changing body. I've drafted a pattern off the skirt and have made a first attempt and will keep tweaking till I get the right mix of fit and flare. It's incredibly satisfying drafting a pattern off a garment - it's a super simple garment but I'd like to be able to draft all my own patterns from scratch one day. I'm feeling really enthusiastic about sewing and am keen to buy more fabric and patterns but have decided to hold fire until after surgery.

Season

Spring has well and truly exploded in the garden and it's a green paradise here once more. Late September saw Ostara / Eostre / spring equinox here in the Southern Hemisphere - essentially the spring Easter festival that is seasonally misplaced into our autumn. A time of rebirth, new beginnings, greenery, eggs, new life. And ducks. Specifically mallard ducks.

I'm under no illusions as to how truly awful the mallard sex life is - but I still have a soft spot for the creatures. Paradise ducks are better parents and mate for life, Grey Teals (like Boots) are just adorable, even the borderline-pest Canada Geese are far less assholey - but still I fall for the mallards every year.

And it's so STRESSFUL! Entire families wiped out overnight, other mallards trying to drown the babies and chase the mother away, useless Dads that wander off after a couple of days parenting. And yet here I am, dashing outside at the slightest quack to feed and water and shower unrequited love upon them. My partner thinks I'm mad and I don't disagree.

Orphan twins - Anne and Annie!

Daylight savings is upon us and I adore the extra light in the evenings. We purchased a trailer with a cage and I think it's the best thing I've ever bought. It's so shiny and useful and I truly feel like I'm winning at life having a trailer of my own. Magical. I feel such satisfaction after filling a trailer with garden rubbish. I've not gone clubbing for decades, I haven't set foot inside a pub in many months, so my new fun is taking a trailer load to the greenwaste tip. Gardening is essentially pointless as it's never actually finished, but it gives me little wins every time I tidy a corner or weed a bed. I cannot WAIT to have enough energy to get the garden looking really fab...

Health

...Which is a nice dovetail to the health section. At time of writing it's been three weeks since my last chemo and I'm feeling slightly more energetic but nowhere near my old self. I stopped the Paclitaxel after nine sessions - skipping the last three. It's not uncommon for people to fail to finish the full twelve doses as the side-effects can get pretty rough by the 6th or 7th session, which was my experience.

I was so glad to be finished but it meant my mastectomy was brought forward - eeek! Not only was this a shock but it also meant the cancellation of my yoga retreat and friend-visiting holiday I'd planned in November. But I know it's best to get it done asap and I will have a holiday in January.

Mine is a slightly odd case in that I'll have had lumpectomy > chemotherapy > mastectomy by the time it's over. Usually, if chemo happens before surgery it's because the tumour is too large to remove safely, so the chemo can shrink it to make things easier on the operating table. But my tumour was removed back in January, and the mastectomy needs to happen as a lot of pre-cancerous DCIS cells were found around the tumour. We can't wait too long between chemo and surgery as it risks the DCIS turning nasty, so December was too far away and the new date is late October.

This threw me sideways for a few days and it was hard to claw my way back to equilibrium. I think because the expectation was set when I was diagnosed that I wouldn't need a mastectomy I've found it incredibly hard to accept that I do. And my way through all this has been to just focus on what's immediately ahead of me without looking too far along. So, my focus has been on the next chemo and maybe the one after that - and once chemo was out of the picture all of a sudden the surgery became an immediate reality rather than a far-off event.

I know there are far worse situations to be in but that doesn't make this any less of a shit show for me. And I know that the people who care for me want to make things ok but it's hard to hear it characterised as a "boob job" as for me it's an amputation. I'm not in any pain, my boob is a bit odd-looking after the lumpectomy but I'd far rather have my own actual odd breast rather than a "mound" made from another body part. Yes, I know intellectually that this needs to happen but without pain and an immediate sense of disease in my breast it feels so wrong to have it removed. Sometimes I'm ok to joke about it but mostly it just makes me feel queasy and really sad.

I'll not get into details about the operation here, but will make the October episode all about it, so if reading the (literally) gory details isn't your thing you can easily avoid it.

I've met with both surgeons (it's two separate procedures done at the same time) and feel confidence in the teams, plus I got the excellent news that I'll have a private room post-surgery. I was feeling a great deal of anxiety about being in a shared ward when I'll be so vulnerable physically and emotionally - but due to the transplant needing my blood vessels to remain dilated I need to be in a very warm room, so an open ward won't work. Phew.

At the time of writing surgery is about two weeks away and while I am in no way looking forward to it, I have been able to drag myself back into the slightly less uncomfortable state of acceptance. I have shed so many tears about this but that's ok - I decided early on to feel all the feelings, and to be ok with not being ok. It's hard to be around people when I'm in that mode as I don't want to make them feel awful, nor do I particularly want cheering up, plus I'm keen to avoid getting any kind of cold or flu bug. I'm happy to potter about on my own or with my partner and I know that once this is behind me I'll be able to hug people with abandon and return fully to the world. Well, depending on the covid situation I suppose.

Most of the chemo side-effects have gone, apart from numb toes and an ever-present fatigue. I was hoping to start running again and get fit before surgery, but I've reprioritised to being as mentally and emotionally strong as I can be, and focus less on pushing myself to get fit. I've been meditating, doing some yoga, and getting out for a walk each day. Walking briskly for 30 minutes six times a week drops the risk of recurrence by 50% so that's a tidy little motivational statement I find easy to act upon.

I know that if I'm in a state of upset and non-acceptance mentally then my physical body will have a harder time healing, so I really have to watch my thoughts and avoid spiralling down. Counselling has been awesome, as has knowing that I will heal from this and that I have a great life to start living again on the far side of surgery. This too shall pass.

Looking at this makes me want to be a bee

So that's September. It wasn't even all the events of the month, but it's all I feel like writing about. It's been a mad explosion of a month with so much happening all at once, which can be a lot to deal with when I'm operating on somewhere between 20-60% capacity on any given day. I suppose my life is in tune with the season, a riot of growth and change and hope that can feel a bit overwhelming at times. Thank you for being here, I appreciate you lending me your eyeballs for ten minutes. :)