musings, losings and recreational boozings

Another beautiful opportunity for you to learn a lesson from my life that I am genuinely trying my best at (most of the time)..

If you were to rewind back to May of 2014, you would have found me starting my first go at Tamoxifen, a hormone therapy drug that I was supposed to take for up to 10 years, in hopes of keep my estrogen levels low and the chance of cancer returning even lower. I could not wait to start. As it turns out though, combining starting survivorship, reentering normal life and screwing with your hormones isn't the most fun a girl can have. It started out really challenging, reached a somewhat manageable point, and then all came crashing down on me. I suffered as silently as I could through the fall but by December, after weeks where I would sometimes go up to 3 days without sleeping a wink, crying for 4 days straight over NOTHING (one time it was about the Bering Strait. No JK.), hot flashes and a hoo-haw damaged so badly that things like sitting and walking were very painful, I finally asked for help. "Help" came in the form of an antidepressant that was all wrong for me, and I became the farthest thing from Kayla. While trying to give it the full 3 week adjustment period try, I made some very poor life choices, hid from friends and family, and even went as far as trying to convince medical professionals that I should be admitted into a mental hospital in fear of just how far I'd feel myself slip away (turns out I didn't fit any of the criteria to be admitted, yet because it was Christmas time I also would have to wait until the new year to receive any attention).

So I made the decision that if the usual help wasn't available for me, I'd have to just help myself. That was the first time in my life where I think I truly decided that I wanted to live. For me, there has always been a difference between doing things to stay alive and deciding to live. This was a decision-to-live moment and that was the day I went cold turkey off the anti-depressant and the hormone therapy. (Note: This is not advisable for the majority and not the lesson I am offering here.) What followed was beautiful. I eventually got off the couch,  my laughter grew more genuine, my thoughts became clearer, I found real enjoyment, I slept without medication, an interest in sex returned, "normal" seemed nearby... And for the first time since May 2013, I started to find myself again.

With a returned joy for life, I was able to think long-term once again. For months I think that I would have been fine with cancer returning. That's really fudged up. But I think it's pretty true. It's not like I wanted to suffer again but I didn't care to live either. Those days were somehow behind me though and everything felt lighter and better and my life was a real gift once again. And not just a gift for those around me but for myself too. I fell madly in love with my friends and my family and a wonderful man (Jeff) and an incredible woman (me) and I wanted to do everything in my power to be around for all of them. I wanted to be around for my family, to see my friends continue to make me proud, to have adventures with the babe-a-rama I'm lucky to call my boyfriend, to raise a family and to grow old, saggy and gross.
The best way I knew how to do that was to make certain dietary and lifestyle choices and return to Tamoxifen.

My previous medical team was nothing short of amazing and I am forever grateful. But here's a lesson for y'all... When someone tells you you have to do something, even if it greatly alters your quality of life in a negative way, YOU DON'T HAVE TO DO IT. Desperate for someone to tell me that being off of Tamoxifen was ok, I finally came clean to my cousin who is a top-dog oncologist at Dana Farber in Boston. Her response was not what I wanted, and without much coaxing, we decided to switch my care out to Dana Farber, placing me in the hands of the doctor you'd consider the "expert" for YA with breast cancer. Hence my recent Boston visit. We won't be moving to Boston, but from now on we will be commuting there for care.

Sometimes "good" care isn't good enough. When you're a unique case, you need the best. My new medical team is GREAT. Love them, felt very empowered, informed and confident that I was in the best of hands. I especially liked the way my doctor sat right next to me and affectionately rubbed my arm or called me "a baby".. it was very maternal and I noticed how much she really cared. Our final plan though included trying Tamoxifen again, this time we only had to give it "the college try" (3 weeks) before deciding to continue or not. Since last December, another option has come out for younger women with the kind of breast cancer I had, so she said if Tamoxifen didn't work again we'd try something else. And suddenly I couldn't wait to give it another go. Couldn't wait to do everything I could to get more of this whole wonderful life thing!

3 weeks later...

Day one was spent in bed. Day two was spent on the edge of a breakdown, quite nauseous with hot flashes. Day three began with tears that became sobs that threw all logical thoughts out the window. After a hysterical shower, I realized no one was home so I desperately tried calling anyone who would listen and just let me cry to them... My dad reminded me that it was probably the medication and that I needed to let my doctor know right away. I felt super guilty not being able to do this again. Like I had failed. Like I was letting people down. But my father's words reminded me that one pill wasn't going to be the deciding factor as to whether or not I would live a long and happy life.
"What good would this life be anyways if you spent it in tears all the time?"

I left my doctor a message relaying what was up, my boyfriend returned and after discussing it with him and my parents, we decided that it was gonna be OK if I stopped and they helped me not feel as thought it was a failure on my part. We all decided that consulting my doctor immediately was the best move. Jeff assured me that it would also be ok if I had to continue on it too. We'd figure it out.
Things are a lot less scary when you have someone else by your side.

Within minutes she responded to stop the meds immediately. If I could do a back-flip I would have. We'll go in for another visit soon and discuss another option, which included ovarian suppression and endocrine therapy.

I know nothing about this yet, no more details, so save your questions or google it? This is all the information I have. I was hesitant to share, like I have been recently, because the influence of outside opions sometimes really get into my head. Like the guilt I felt. I'm not going to feel guilty though about choosing quality of life over quantity of days. This will be much more enjoyable for everyone if Kayla is Kayla.

So I guess my lessons for everyone are to avoid settling for a life someone tells you you should be living, ignoring of how it feels to you. I've been way too guilty of this move in the past and that's just not a mistake you make when you realize what a lucky dog you are for getting a second chance. Seek alternative options and opinions, and make decisions with people who consider what you're saying while REALLY LISTENING TO YOU. Be an advocate for yourself. Seek those with your best interests at heart. And hell, if you're lucky enough to have a life, enjoy it. Whatever that means to you.

I feel a little rusty at this whole blogging thing. Guess it was more of an update than a lesson. Anyone want a free three months of Tamoxifen though?

Christmas is coming, have a beer. Cheers.

A letter to my little sister:

Grease tried to teach us that “the only man a girl can trust is her daddy.” But when you consider how real and common “daddy issues” are, I struggle to believe this is a universal truth. Others will argue that there are only two men a woman can depend on and their names are Ben and Jerry. The reality about those two though are while they might provide temporary comfort, those fuckers will leave you bloated with extreme dairy belly, feeling even worse about yourself.

Men are a different breed, they operate differently (and usually slower) than us, but there are good ones out there. They aren’t all bad, they’re just.. different. The point of this isn’t to bash men. The point of this is to help you through the unfortunate lesson you are in the middle of learning.

Every single person at some point in their life has found themselves in a relationship that left them feeling stupid. We gave too much. We were used. We ignored the obvious signals that something bad was happening. We silenced the voice inside telling us to get out. We’ve all done it. Somehow it’s so easy to let it happen. We’ll spend hours calling out our friends on the stupid choices they make while we make our own. We know what we’re doing is wrong but we do it anyways. Why? Because some lessons we just have to learn firsthand and we have to learn them the hard way.

When the moment of collapse comes along, when the reality of how we compromised too much of ourselves for another slaps us in the face (and it always does), nothing feels worse. It hurts so much more than any other kind of break up because when you gave up a part of yourself, you lost it forever. Everything you poured into someone else will come rushing back to you in floods of memories and secret moments, but the person never does. And most of the time we knew this was going to happen. Maybe it was nothing in particular that they said or did, but there was an undeniable feeling for quite sometime that this was how it would all end. For all the good you felt, it’s scary to think you’ll never feel it again. But I don’t know that you should. Some highs are as high as they are because of how low you fell before it. You can tell yourself a million times that an angel with a smile like that couldn’t be the devil in disguise, pulling you into to something you shouldn’t be, but we all lose our balance sometimes. And at the end of it all, you usually find that the worst part of it isn’t losing them, it’s losing yourself.

So what do you do at the collapse? Collapse. There is no point in fighting it. Feelings demand to be felt, one way or another. Let yourself feel every way you need to. Maybe you put a time limit on it eventually, “I’ll only think of him at night,” and eventually you might stop thinking of him so frequently too. The trouble with real love though is you never really stop loving someone; one day you just stop needing them like you used to. And when that day comes, you do the single most important thing you can ever do for yourself. You make a promise. A promise to yourself that you will never again lose yourself to another.

Because real love helps us to develop into who we are and who we are trying to be. Real love betters us, challenges us and encourages us. Are they helping me to be the best version of myself? If not, revisit your current feelings. Let yourself feel awful now so you can remember this misery and avoid feeling this way again. Sometimes it happens more than once, but when you truly experience the cost of losing yourself and decide to never let that happen again, it’s actually pretty difficult to let it happen again.

How do we learn what real love is, so we can avoid this happening again? Start in your safe relationships. Your family. Your good, pure friendships. I learned about real love from my girlfriends. My sisterhood out in California is the most precious thing in the world to me because it was build upon pure, selfless love. The most frequent theme in our house is, “How can I help ____ to be the best version of themselves?” There is no selfish motivation, just genuine support. Identify these relationships in your own life and cling tightly to these people. Strive to build new relationships that function in this way. If you can learn this lesson at 20, you’ll be lightyears ahead of the rest of us.

I hope I am one of those relationships to you. If not, don’t depend on it. If I am, use me to lift you up. Just because someone wants to say some terrible things about you, it doesn’t mean you have to believe them. Just because someone wants you to feel like you aren’t good enough, it doesn’t mean you have to believe them. And just because someone wants to pull the rug out from under you and take away everything you’ve worked hard to become, it doesn’t mean you have to let them.

Here for you always because you are wonderful to me, you are good enough for me, and I believe in the woman you are becoming.

Sisters are forever.

Love you.

Always.

K

for what it's worth..

"For what it’s worth… it’s never too late, or in my case too early, to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit. Start whenever you want. You can change or stay the same. There are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things you never felt before. I hope you meet people who have a different point of view. I hope you live a life you’re proud of, and if you’re not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again." – F. Scott Fitzgerald

An important thing humans should do

Share. Share your happy moments and share your hard ones.
If you can start a conversation, it's worth it.
If you can lift another up, it's worth it.
If you can encourage others to share, it's worth it.
And if you can let someone out there know that they're not alone, it is so incredibly worth it.
http://www.elle.com/life-love/a27914/feeling-sexy-while-recovering-from-cancer/

a reminder to keep sharing

https://hackpackr.wordpress.com

it was all yellow

"Vincent Van Gogh used to eat yellow paint because he thought it would get the happiness inside him. Many people thought he was mad and stupid for doing so because the paint was toxic, never mind that it was obvious that eating paint couldn’t possibly have any direct correlation to one’s happiness, but I never saw that. If you were so unhappy that even the maddest ideas could possibly work, like painting the walls of your internal organs yellow, then you are going to do it. It’s really no different than falling in love or taking drugs. There is a great risk of getting your heart broken or overdosing, but people still do it every day because there is a chance it could make things better. Everyone has their yellow paint."

being human

"So I try to let myself cry when I need to. I've cried quite a few times over the past couple of months. I've cried because I worry my new body is going to feel unnatural. I've cried from the fear that I won't get married and have a baby before my ovaries have to be removed. I've cried when yet another ridiculous bill shows up in my mailbox. After my breakup, I stood in my living room and asked the universe why it was taking my breasts and my boyfriend away from me. I've come to terms with the fact that those moments don't negate my strength. They simply mean that I am human. This experience has also been a reminder to me that we can't always rigidly control our lives. "