{"id":1456,"date":"2008-09-18T07:53:29","date_gmt":"2008-09-18T07:53:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/2008\/09\/18\/mothers-with-ca\/"},"modified":"2008-09-18T07:53:29","modified_gmt":"2008-09-18T07:53:29","slug":"mothers-with-ca","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/2008\/09\/18\/mothers-with-ca\/","title":{"rendered":"MOTHERS WITH CANCER: SOME OF THE BRAVEST WOMEN ON THE PLANET"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Mothers_with_cance_croppedr\"<\/a>This is the logo from a blog called Mothers with Cancer<\/a>.  (We are twenty (or so) moms<\/a>
\nfighting cancer. Some of us have been in remission for years; others
\nare newly diagnosed, or battling a new recurrence. All of us have
\nsomething to say.<\/em>)  I’ve spent much of the past week reading personal and group cancer blogs for a project and I’ve been near tears for most of that time.  The sadness, the courage, the resilience in the face of multiple recurrences, the joy in small moments – there’s only so much of it you can read before you start to crumble.  Then you tell yourself that they’re living what you’re reading, and, out of respect, you force yourself to go on.<\/p>\n

In 1998 there was a big cancer March on Washington<\/a>.   I was around DC for much of it; because of my husband’s long-time work on prostate cancer advocacy I’ve been around cancer advocates and survivors for years.  But none of that, and none of them – brought truth to the words "you’ve got cancer" the way these bloggers do, as their realities become ours.  I’ve come to believe that we owe them our attention – that, as Willie Loman<\/a>‘s wife Linda said:  "Attention must be paid<\/a>."  And so it must<\/p>\n

You’ll find many of a legion of cancer bloggers on Mothers with Cancer<\/a> and many more on their individual blog rolls.  I urge you to visit their sites and leave a message.  They may not know us, but through their honesty — and their pain — we know them.  And we can’t leave them sitting out here alone.  Listen:<\/p>\n

The truth is, I am scared. I am trying to reassure myself with the fact
\nthat I have been feeling pretty good, that I have been biking and
\nrunning But I was diagnosed with breast cancer when I was feeling the
\nhealthiest and most fit that I had in years. And I was diagnosed with
\nliver mets three weeks after I returned to work, at a time when I was
\nfeeling strong, energetic and (so I thought) on the road to reclaiming
\nmy life from cancer.<\/em>   Not Just About Cancer<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

For the past few days I haven\u2019t been feeling that well.  I\u2019ve been
\nsleeping for hours and hours and hours.  I haven\u2019t had much energy to
\ndo anything.  In fact my pillow and blanket have been my two best
\nfriends.                                                                                                                                                  I\u2019m getting ready for my third round of chemo on Thursday.  I\u2019m
\nnervous that my blood counts will be too low for chemo.  That would be
\nhorrible.   I\u2019m going back to bed<\/em>\u2026     Clusterfook<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

1 week
\ndown, 5 more to go.  I like to count in weeks since it sounds better
\nthan saying 28 days.  I\u2019m enjoying having a few days off from
\nradiation.  I can\u2019t say I\u2019m all that fond of my new treatment.  The
\ncancer center has had some computer issues and I\u2019ve done a lot of
\nwaiting.  I\u2019ve also had this unheard of symptom all week long of
\nnausea.  Wierd.  Especially since all the radiation tech\u2019s tell me they
\ndon\u2019t radiate near my stomach.  That seems odd to me because if they
\nsay they can nick my lungs couldn\u2019t they also be nicking my stomach
\nwith those lovely beams?  Anyway\u2026..I finally asked to see the doc about
\nit on Friday and she said yes\u2026.that might be a possibility.  My theory
\nis that IBC patients have a much wider range to radiate and it\u2019s
\nsomehow hitting my stomach.   Anyway\u2026.we agreed to try some
\nanti-anxiety meds and see if it helped.  I will admit I am awfully
\nanxious about this whole \u201cburn my skin treatment.  If only it was irrigating therapy<\/em> rather than radiating therapy.<\/em>  I would much rather be hosed down than burned with lasers\u2026..sigh.    I am still nauseated today.  but heh\u2026.at least I\u2019m relaxed<\/em>.  Clergy Girl<\/a><\/p>\n

\n
 <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

Oh yeah, I still have that darn Stage 4 cancer and it\u2019s still sad
\nand scary, but I couldn\u2019t help but feel like God delivered some
\nhappiness in the midst of my sadness. Even small things can help
\nbrighten low spirits, like they did for me this evening. The sadness is
\nstill there, but it\u2019s not so overwhelming, not weighing me down quite
\nSO much. <\/em>\n<\/p>\n

There\u2019s hope.  There\u2019s always hope. <\/em>\n<\/p>\n

Love Life.<\/em><\/em>  <\/p>\n

BE BRAVE.     <\/strong><\/em> <\/strong>Just Enjoy Him<\/a><\/p>\n

See what I mean?  If you’re on hold or you have a couple minutes at the end of the day stop by and leave some encouragement for one or two of these remarkable women.  They need it. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the logo from a blog called Mothers with Cancer.  (We are twenty (or so) moms fighting cancer. Some of us have been in remission for years; others are newly diagnosed, or battling a new recurrence. All of us have something to say.)  I’ve spent much of the past week reading personal and group … Continue reading MOTHERS WITH CANCER: SOME OF THE BRAVEST WOMEN ON THE PLANET<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[27,7,52,29],"tags":[1211,838,471,1212,1213,44,1157],"class_list":["post-1456","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs","category-life","category-weblogs","category-women","tag-breast-cancer","tag-cancer","tag-health","tag-mothers","tag-mothers-with-cancer","tag-women-2","tag-womens-health"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4gBq8-nu","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1456","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1456"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1456\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1456"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1456"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1456"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}