Linda Holman

 “As our body journeys through life, and life journeys on our body…. life will leave marks on us too. From the creases of our wrinkles to the birthmarks on our bodies to the tattoos we decide to place.”      ~ Lauren Klarfeld, author I don’t know if I have enough distance - either emotionally or through time - to truly “review” my year of cancer, but my archaeology study starts soon and I won’t have the time nor inclination to write any more blog posts. So this is it, most likely. Before I start I want you to know how much you reading this means to me... I get SUCH a thrill when a post gets read. Thank you, thank you! Naked and afraid The title “Repeatedly naked in front of strangers” tickles me, and is a phrase that sums up my 2021 - a large number of strangers (medical professionals, but still strangers!) saw my naked boobies, which was really very odd. I later realised how conditioned I had become to nudity when I accompanied a friend to a medical appointment ...

 "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 t...

 "In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt."      ~Margaret Atwood Kia ora whānau, I hope all is well with you. Meteorologically speaking spring doesn't start in NZ until the 1st of September, but don't tell the daffodils. This episode was originally going to be about the joy of spring, and how everything was progressively getting brighter and better, but it's actually going to be about the myth of everything getting brighter and better in a progressive and steady way.   Craft Buoyed by the success of my teal Cuff Dress I foolishly moved onto a new pattern without doing a practice run on cheaper fabric. I also attempted to bugger about with sizing which didn't go so well and needed some jenky alterations. I have ended up with a dress that fits, and as it's a wrap dress it'll expand and shrink with me, so all is well, but now I know to ALWAYS DO A TRIAL RUN. Brown bald rabbit I was fooled into thinking that because I ma...

 “From ancient times both Māori and European have, like many other cultures, enjoyed their new year celebration in winter. Winter is a natural time to pause and take stock, to reflect and make a new beginning.”      ~ Juliet Batten, Celebrating the Southern Seasons Kia ora whānau, thank you for being here. It is winter in the southern hemisphere and it's been an odd month of heavy rainfall (as in many places), cold nights but weirdly warm days. It has been interesting to sense attitudes around climate change finally shift as dramatic floods and wildfires stalk the earth, and I'm hopeful for a belated change in direction for humans as a whole. The season and chemotherapy have kept me tucked up at the cottage most days, and sewing has become my main creative focus. Craft I recently read a blog about how childbirth had affected the author's body and left her in a liminal state between her old life and the new. I relate to this as everything has shifted for me in th...

 "Of all the seasons, winter is the most conducive to the great art of dormancy. This art requires an appreciation of semi-consciousness: the beautiful and necessary prelude to sleep - a special pleasure in itself that is all too often neglected, under-valued or looked down upon."      ~Michael Leunig Greetings, dear ones. Today I write to you from both the warmth of my bed, and the midst of deep chemo-fog. Normally I'd wait for the fog to lift before writing but today I thought I'd just start moving my fingers across the keyboard and see what happens. So let's dive into June together. Craft Jewellery, finally! I had a burst of inspiration after repairing a necklace and bracelet for my Mum and so I made two crystal pendants and had an experiment with an idea I've been kicking around in my head for a while. Firstly, the crystals: these are the first two that I've made for a while that weren't straight copies of pendants I'd seen online. My re...

"The reason that women feel so pressured to "remain youthful" is because the maiden isn't threatening to patriarchy."      ~Bonnie Rose Flower Welcome Kia ora whānau and welcome to May 2021. This month's theme - The Crone - had me thinking about the shift from the abundance of early autumn to the stark beauty of skeleton trees, and my own shift into inescapable baldness. For my opening quote I struggled to find positive words about Crone-hood, but personally I welcome the wisdom and re-prioritisation that comes with the territory of aging and slipping the shackles of societal expectations. Craft May has been a great craft month! Jewellery still not getting a look-in, but knitting and sewing projects abound. I've started my other colourway of Lotus Flower Beanies , and I've been asked to make some hats for my wonderful friend's wonderful shop: SoulyNZ. They have been asked for woolly hats on the regular so I'm madly knitting up hats in m...

 "Winter is coming"      ~Stark et al. Welcome Kia ora whānau. I planned the episode themes months ago, before I knew what my life would look like in 2021. April's theme is fitting, as the month had a sense of foreboding and oncoming chill - the seasonal shift towards winter and my internal shift towards anger and anxiety. Early April brought a phone call from my oncologist to say that the Oncotype testing had come back with a high-risk score, requiring the full 6 months of chemo. This was not the news I wanted, and to be frank, I was extremely pissed off. Whereas March had a lightness and playfulness, April felt like I was being dragged headlong into a dark tunnel. I was still doing all the same activities as in March, but now they felt rather hollow and joyless. Craft The chemo news brought with it a desire to make hats. Many hats. I finally received my delivery of yarn and pom poms from B Knits and set about making Lotus Flower Beanies . It's glorious yarn...

Welcome! In this episode I'll go over my experience of receiving chemotherapy for breast cancer treatment. Chemotherapy differs from other treatments in that it is highly personal - while there are similarities in the drugs taken, each treatment is calibrated to the individual patient, and everybody responds differently to the drugs. So I'll focus less on my reactions to the treatment and more on outlining some general steps to inform you as you travel this path as a patient or supporter. Note: I live in New Zealand, and treatments differ from region to region, as well as being different in different countries. Your medical team are the ones to ask about your treatment plan, not randoms on the internet like me! 🙂 How did I decide to have chemotherapy? In my case I wasn't a clear yes for chemotherapy's benefits outweighing the risks, so I opted to pay for Oncotype DX testing , to know for sure if chemotherapy would be helpful to me. (Currently this isn't publicl...