Taxes done!

I seem to be waking at 5 a.m. every day drowning in phlegm, so I guess it's as good a blogging time as any. Several people responded to my request to share their thoughts and feelings about how best to approach a terminally ill friend or relative, some in the comments section and some privately. The responses were thoughtful and heartfelt and honest, and included some from people who haven't been in touch but have clearly been reading my blog. That's one of the weird things about blogging: people feel they have been talking to you, but you haven't been talking to them. I appreciate the candid comments a great deal -- thank you.

One friend talked about the "goodbye" factor -- people want to visit a sick person to say goodbye. She compared this to her own experience of sending her son off to Afghanistan; should she have a gathering to mark his departure, and if so, would people be coming to say goodbye to him -- not see-you-later goodbye, but maybe-you-won't-come-back goodbye?

Someone else said that my desire to turn away visitors and be on my own for a while made her feel less guilty about not having spent enough time, in her mind, with her mother while she was dying. As I mentioned, the compulsion to be with the dying person 24/7 is natural, and often necessary, but ignores the fact that an adult can be alone with themselves for at least some part of the day, and may want to, depending on the person and the extent of the illness.

I have got a ton of things done in the past 10 days while my mother cleaned and cooked and waited on me like a butler. The taxes are finished (I'm getting a refund!), the trip out west is almost fully booked, a bunch of paperwork and phone calls have been completed, but I still have much estate planning to do, including visits with my lawyer and my financial advisor and my family. Dying is a lot of work.

Meanwhile, my friend Hugh sent me this article that made me hopeful about how much time I have left; clearly the doctor is just guessing about my prognosis, and one simply never knows. I have been eating everything under the sun lately, theorizing that at this stage eating healthy is a waste of my time and that gorging on chocolate and sour cream and butter and all manner of prepared convenience foods is satisfying to my soul, a key factor in sustaining my mood. But another part of me says I could extend my life if I were more rigorous about my diet. There are researchers who swear that eating dairy and sugar simply feeds cancer, but I can never bring myself to trust them. Depriving myself at this stage seems crazy. But I think drinking milk, for example, is exacerbating this phlegm problem, which seems connected to the paralyzed vocal cord and my difficulty swallowing. I'm really hoping that I can finally sustain the required treatment pretty soon; five months of this hoarse voice and choking fits has been hell.

How do I feel? Walking is difficult; I had two semi-falls in the past two days, partly because I trip over my semi-paralyzed feet quite easily. My forehead is peeling from the skin burn that seems to have arisen because I went out in a convertible with the top down on a sunny day without sunscreen right after having my head radiated. My face is still red and fat from steroids (and the brownies and apple turnovers), and my scalp is completely shaved with a little stubble. Very stylish. I'm still deaf in one ear, and talking is a struggle. In a crowded place with a lot of ambient noise, especially if someone is pushing my wheelchair and I'm facing away from them, I feel like I'm in an isolation bubble -- can't hear, can't make myself heard. When I stand up, I feel like my legs are made of ice. It's kind of what I imagine it would feel like if one had hypothermia. What makes it worse is the vertigo: the feeling that I'm swaying and on some really powerful sedative.

But I'm still managing with the walker and still getting down to the basement for showers and still getting in and out of the house, and that's what matters for now.

Pollyanna moments:

• Some amazing tropical flowers from Scott in a big planter, and pussy willows and tulips and orchids from others.
• Diane took mom and me shopping at Winners and I finally bought some pants that kind of fit me now that I've lost weight (except my belly is so distended on top of my vanishing legs that nothing really fits properly). Then mom and I managed to get me up to my bedroom (not without a fall that bruised my hip nicely), where I tried on tons of clothes that I haven't been able to get done up for years. It's like acquiring a whole new wardrobe. I always called them my breast cancer recurrence clothes, and I'm determined to go out looking well-dressed.
• Have booked Mom, Joan and me into some swanky hotels in Vancouver, Victoria and Gabriola Island, and plan to book our flights today. Please, please let me feel well enough to go on April 25.
• I can hear birds outside my window.
  
• Matt arrives from Red Deer tomorrow!
  

Retreat

In lots of ways, my many visitors have been what's sustained me in the past while -- they make me feel engaged with the world, cared for, and distracted from my sadness. However, I'm starting to feel as though I have no time to myself, and I have a lot to do -- my taxes, estate planning, the usual sickness bureaucracy, stuff I want to write down and communicate to my family. And just time to read a book or jot down some stories. I'm still strong enough to run my own life, and like everyone's, it takes a lot of running.

So for the next couple of weeks, while my mom and then Matt and then Isabella are staying with me, I'm going to try to keep visitors and callers to a minimum. I am so lucky to have so many friends and relatives who care to drop by and phone, and I specifically reached out for their aid, but...there you go. The recent news I received needs to be digested and planned for.

(Plus, I'm planning a trip to B.C.! I'm hopeful that in a month I won't feel worse than I do now. It will be luxury all the way, and I'm having so much fun spending the money. Shangri-La Hotel in Vancouver! Spa treatments! First-class plane tickets!)

It's been interesting to contemplate the nature of visits to a terminally ill person. I'm keenly aware that when my friend Adele was sick, and when other friends were dying of cancer, I was pretty convinced that they could never be left alone with their thoughts, or with their disabilities, and that I had to be there with them as much as I could. I realize now that I may have been imposing, that people can be alone with their circumstances sometimes, that my ego was probably bound up in my visits and calls. Of course, it depends on your relationship with the sick person; I won't turn my immediate family away, ever.

A cousin of mine died of lung cancer a couple of years ago; he was just a year older than I, and when we were little we lived next door to one another and played together a lot. But we weren't close through our school years, and I don't think he even liked me very much. Much later, we saw one another at a family funeral and had a nice talk. When he got sick, I called him and then visited him in a hospice. At one point, I said to him, "This is a little weird, I guess, to have people suddenly get in touch with you when you're sick whom you haven't seen in decades. Why do we do this?" I had had my first bout of cancer treatment by then, and I knew a little about people's reactions.

He kindly said that he knew people cared and he accepted their need to get in touch. Of course, when you're one of 26 cousins who all like each other but were never close, you want to acknowledge the family ties and honour your aunts and uncles and parents and grandparents and somehow pay tribute to childhood memories and relationships. That's one motivation.

With friends, I know the call or the visit makes one feel useful, and helps one deal with the uncomfortable subjects of illness and dying. There's a push-pull impulse -- you want to visit the sick person, you'd rather not, the visits are morbid and fascinating, or boring and helpful. There's such a powerful combination of ways in which the visit is good for the patient and good for the visitor -- or the opposite.

In my case, I really do need help a lot, and visitors have all been put to work fetching things for me. But now I need to hunker down, and I'm lucky to have my mom staying with me 24/7.

I also know about illness fatigue, and that after a friend or family member dies, one often feels a great sense of relief. I understand that perfectly; after Adele died I felt energized for a while because I no longer had to worry about her, or about whether I was helping her too little or too much.

I would love to read some comments from readers of this blog about the delicate dance around visits and calls to a sick friend or relative. What kinds of emotions and practicalities come up for you?

Shit just happens Part II

So I stayed up half the night blogging and reading many of the thoughtful comments that were appended to Dana Jennings's blog post about the uselessness of the words people employ to talk to and about people with cancer. Almost everyone agreed with him, but many were big-hearted enough to acknowledge how difficult it is to know what to say in this situation, and that the foot-in-mouth syndrome springs from a real need to be kind and helpful. I can't stress this enough, perhaps because I have been guilty, and continue to be guilty, of saying some of the same things that people say to me when I talk to people with cancer, things that aren't helpful. But who gets training in how to deal with this? We're all trying to do our best, both ill people and their friends and family. Some people can't deal with it at all and fall off the face of the earth when you most need them; I'm sure the lack of language to address the issue is a part of that.

I will copy here some of the comments people wrote in response to Jennings that I could empathize with:

Survivor never much appealed to me as a descriptor of my medical condition. If I knew I was going to survive, then cancer would not be such a scary ordeal.
When I refer to myself, and when I write about other young adults with cancer, I call us patients. In all of its clinical lackluster, it best fits the role I play in the cancer community and the role cancer plays in my life.
I know I’m brave (though I have no other choice to be). I know I fight (with my doctors and the system more so than the disease). I know I have a medical ID number, make appointments, wrestle with insurance, wait for good or bad news, white knuckle my way through pain and live with a lot of gratitude for the parts of my body that are still healthy. That is the work of a patient. When I talk about my cancer life, I call myself a patient. The rest of the time, I’m Kairol.
http://everythingchangesbook.com/

I don’t mind the word survivor, or even victim (if used in past tense); they’re used for, say, accidents or heart attacks too. But the battle imagery does seem to be unique to cancer and I disliked it when I was going through the cancer, and to this day. I can’t think of any time in my life when I had to be so passive. How on earth that made me a fighter I will never understand. I accepted and I cried and I endured and I did things to help myself such as nestling in the arms of support groups, and I came out the other side…. a survivor. But I didn’t fight it anymore than a heart attack victim :) fights his or her heart dysfunction.
— Debra Anderson

As for bravery? My standard response is “Don’t mistake lack of options for bravery.”
Bless you Dana,
— mary

I do agree that it is better to say nothing, or very little, rather than say the wrong thing. I had a friend avoid me because he didn’t know what to say. I called him on it, and he blurted out, “I’m worried about you, I’m scared you’ll die, I want you to get better.” I appreciated that MUCH more than the people who told me I’d make it because I was a strong fighter. I’ve wanted many times to ask that person, “Okay, if I die does that mean I was weak?” But there is this strange self-imposed etiquette when you have cancer and someone says something stupid to you. You can’t upset them, you have to comfort them.
Just once I’d like to read an obit that said, “After a sensible acceptance of her cancer, Jane Doe passed away at home under hospice care.”
— Alice Payne

People have been telling me lately that I'm their hero, that I'm so brave. I remember saying that to my friend Adele in the 10 months between her cancer diagnosis and her death. She replied that she had no choices, so she could hardly be brave. But some people do display more equanimity during an illness than others. I think it's important to distinguish how people live and how they die. You're alive until you're dead, and if somebody wants to admire something about the way I live now, that's fine. But to ascribe to me a strength that will help me "beat" cancer; or to think that I have any happy choices in anything that's happening to me; or to describe me as being enjoined in some kind of war that I can win or lose based on my character -- it's all silly. How I live each day is all that matters -- it's all that ever matters for all of us. And when friends and family look at me and say, "I couldn't do what you're doing," well, guess what, if it happens to you, you won't have a choice but to "do it." And you'll probably continue to be much the same person you were before, except that you'll have to cope with a sometimes deadening passivity.

I'm fortunate to have friends and family who listen, offer specific help, make themselves available and don't mind my bossing them around to reach things for me, make my bed, fold laundry. They're free with hugs and laughter, and that keeps me going.

Pollyanna moments:

• I had a marvellous day yesterday after a slow and difficult start (hard to get out of bed sometimes). Two old university friends took me out for Indian food in the wheelchair, and then we got in a BMW convertible and cruised out to the Scarborough Bluffs with the top down in the wonderful 20 C weather, exploring some lovely neighbourhoods and looking at misty Lake Ontario. It was glorious. In the evening Helen helped me go out to the spring concert of the Metropolitan Community Church (there's another performance tonight), in which my friend Karen H. was singing -- she and I were choir buddies in Rainbow Voices when it was still running -- and there were some great guest performers including the wonderful gospel/blues singer Jackie Richardson. I had a great time.
• My sister and her kids visited me for two days and we went through some old keepsakes: my old Girl Guide uniform, "mod" neck chokers I wore in the hippie days, the white confirmation dress my mother sewed for me, the back brace I wore when I was 9, the first blouse I sewed in Home Economics class, stuff that I guess will get tossed when I'm gone, though maybe my niece will take some of it. I got to watch a lot of strange (to me) TV with the kids: iCarly, Sponge Bob Square Pants, Home Alone. And we went down to the Beach with the wheelchair, and walked in the sunshine. It was such a treat to feel the warm air, even poisoned as it is with exhaust fumes blasting off Lake Shore Boulevard, followed closely by the lovely east end sewage treatment odour. That's my Toronto.
• Liz brought me homemade chocolate chip cookies, homemade mushroom soup, great bakery croissants and pain au chocolat, and chocolate gelato. Nothing tastes quite right at the moment, but I still manage to worry down lots of food.
  

Shit just happens

As before, I defer to the excellent blog of Dana Jennings to tackle a subject I've touched on briefly here: the words people use around cancer, such as "battle," that seem so useless when you're actually in the situation. I really don't want an obit that says I lost my battle with cancer, since it's not an even battleground, and it's not really a battleground at all in the sense that a human being can't actually win against what are really random circumstances. I know that completely contradicts what some people believe about optimism and the human spirit, but I don't believe that people who "lose their battle" were somehow not sufficiently strong or positive -- or that those who declare they will beat their cancer, and do beat it, have some magic weapon the rest of us don't have. Barbara Ehrenreich's book Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America deals with this eloquently. As does Jennings's blog.

What matters more to me than being declared a winner or a loser is how I live the time I have left. I don't think I'd mind someone writing that I finished my struggle, because it is a struggle, and it will end. But you don't win or lose that one. Shit just happens.

Home again -- and prognosis

Coming home from the hospital yesterday was a bit weird. I was alone for a few hours and felt a little lonely. In hospital you feel like you're suspended while whatever you're there for is being done -- and you're certainly never alone in the crowd of nurses and visitors and patients and doctors. Even if you have no visitors, there are always people around. Plus, someone brings you a meal three times a day, which motivates you to get up. Somehow the fact that I am now officially palliative (12 months or less to live) didn't completely sink in.

At home, I can think about the new circumstance more, but I'm still intellectualizing it and trying to control it rather than feeling it. Or at least trying to control the few things I can control. I like to look at it as strictly a bureaucratic necessity. Once the paperwork is done, everything is in place for the future, and some extra things kick in, including some insurance benefits.

Today I met with my new palliative care case manager and my very nice nurse, and it looks like the locally available services are pretty good. I don't want to die at home, preferring a palliative care ward, but at some point I'll probably be on a waiting list, so it's good to know that I can get an increasing amount of help in my home when my condition deteriorates, and already I am setting up home visits with a doctor. Apparently there are some free complementary treatments available, like Reiki and massage, which would be nice. They'll even bring in a hospital bed for free.

I gave up the option of the rehab hospital because it was going to take a long time, but I'm on a list for outpatient care, and a physiotherapist will also come to the house, which may be enough to keep me on my feet as long as possible.

Last time I came home from hospital, I had pretty much recovered from radiation side effects. This time my only side effects seem to be extreme fatigue, which is making me simply want to lie down all the time. And I'm still quite dizzy. My legs feel weaker, and that scares me.

I'm planning a vacation to B.C. with my mother and a friend. What a crazy thing to do. Who knows how I will feel in six weeks. But it's fun to plan, especially something expensive (I want to fly first-class). Anyway, that's what cancellation insurance is for, and that's what money is for, and I can't take it with me.

Pollyanna moments:

• Last week I got so frustrated with the poor Internet connection in the hospital that when Geri suggested sneaking me over to the Eaton Centre to shop, I went straight to a phone store and bought a wireless modem turbo stick. Took a one-year contract! And had proper Internet (mostly) for the next four days. Who knows, I may need it again if I land back in hospital. Spend, I say, spend!
• A friend raked my garden this afternoon -- tulips are baring their heads (little do they know what the squirrels have in store for them).
• A beautiful, peachy bouquet of snapdragons from another visitor!
• I'm sleeping like a baby, pain-free.
  

Doctor dance

I've had six of my 10 radiation treatments so far -- still loathing the brain jolt and the instant metal smell -- and as usual I'm getting different stories from different doctors. I told my medical oncologist, Dr. Lee, that the brain doctor said my head tumour may respond quickly to treatment because it grew so quickly. Dr. Lee looked very doubtful. But Dr. Lee said my hearing should return; the radiation doctors said it wouldn't. She walked in yesterday and asked if it was getting better, in fact, even though Dr. Noguff says that, like last time, I wouldn't feel any positive effects of the treatment until a couple of weeks after it ends. Dr. Lee says she wants to send me home on Monday and that I shouldn't have much fatigue. Dr. Noguff says I will be very fatigued. Dr. Lee says that she can get me more home-care help through the palliative unit. The social worker says that can only happen if Dr. Lee is willing to state a prognosis, which she seems to be avoiding, maybe because she doesn't want to scare me. Some people are telling me all my hair will fall out (I had it buzzed off the other day). Some say only parts of it will. Some say hair loss might be permanent. It was ever thus.

I'm glad I'm in the hospital, though, as boring as it can be. The ambulance transfer for the treatments at the other hospital goes very quickly and smoothly -- much more smoothly than travelling from my house every day for 10 days would have done. They just slide me on a gurney, slip me in the ambulance (while I get 10 seconds of precious, smelly Toronto air on my face -- it's amazing how much I miss the feel of moving air), drive round the corner, slip me in for treatment (because the ambulance attendants are waiting, the technicians fit me in right away, and the treatment takes less than 10 minutes), then drive me back. It usually takes less than an hour door to door, and the hunky attendants are friendly and kind. Because I'm in a downtown 'hood I'm very familiar with, as we drive I enjoy gazing out through the ambulance window at all my old stomping grounds and remembering when I could navigate them easily and when my life was under my control.

Meanwhile, one becomes unintentionally knowledgeable about one's hospital roommate. Mine is a 47-year-old recovering crack addict and new grandmother who's been living in a shelter nearby and has a terrible lung infection. She's smart and personable and a little dramatic, but in a lot of pain. Her transgendered best friend clearly cares about her a lot, but her scruffy young boyfriend is controlling and sometimes mean to her. I'm rooting for her to get her surgery over with and follow her plan to go to college. In these circumstances, you not only get to hear one another's farts and peeing and vomiting and moans, but also intimate details of relationships and impressions through visitors. A weird and sudden camaraderie arises, if only in solidarity as sick people.

The Internet connection here is abysmal, so I hope I can actually post this.

Pollyanna moments:
• A visit from friends with their adorable seven-year-old son, who has the most amazing eyelashes I've ever seen on a human being, and drew me a picture of flowers and birds. And his mom brought homemade banana bread.
• A green orchid that fits perfectly on my tray table.
• Many other visits from friends and family.
• I can walk with my walker to the kitchen and heat up soup myself. Last night when I did so, there was a woman with two toddlers in there; I couldn't tell whether she was their mom or grandmom, probably the latter, and she was African. As I lumbered past with my hot soup, she shooed the kids out of the way and repeatedly told them to "let the grandma pass." I felt a little old at that, but I judged it a term of respect. Of course I'm plenty old enough to be someone's grandmother. I've even stopped minding when the nurses call me Mrs. Brouse. I deserve some terminology that acknowledges my senior position! I've heard that in other languages, like German and French, at a certain age the Mrs. term simply signals that you're older, not necessarily married, and I'm on board with that.

Brain fry

It's not a thrill to be back in the hospital, but I'm glad I chose this option because my family doesn't have to worry that I'm not being looked after, and I don't have to arrange a gazillion (or 10, to be precise) rides to radiation treatments and back.

I met with a number of radiation oncologists on Friday. Apparently the cancer is spreading through my spinal fluid, causing the dural metastases in the lining surrounding my brain. They believe the lesions on the spine are sticking to the edges of the spinal cord and wrapping around the nerves (according to the careful notes Geri took!).

The good news is that the rapidity with which this big tumour has grown means it might respond equally rapidly to radiation treatment. Who knew. The bad news: I'm unlikely to regain the hearing in my right ear. I'm not sure about my equilibrium. Geri says she heard the doc say my balance would return to normal. The main purpose of the treatment is to stop the tumour growth and keep the symptoms from getting worse. There's a 70 t0 80 percent chance it will help.

To prevent new lesions from popping up, they decided to do whole-brain radiation. A month after it's done, they'll do an MRI, and if the tumours aren't shrinking, they can do a focused treatment called stereotactic radiosurgery, which is a one-time blast on the tumours themselves. Geri's notes say: A metal frame is screwed into the skull to keep the head still -- the doc says there would be no scarring. Freezing is local and there is no pain.

I'm also going to lose my hair again, at least the hair on my head (retaining my eyebrows will be a bonus). The brain doctor told me that your hair can disappear permanently in a strip down the middle, but Dr. Noguff said she'd never seen that happen. I've made an appointment for Tuesday to get most of it off, in any case. Other possible side effects: sore throat, headache, more dizziness and head pressure before it gets better, ringing in the ears and short-term memory loss that should return in six to 12 months. If I live long enough, I might get cataracts sooner than usual (not much need to worry about that, probably).

The surprise has been the treatments themselves, of which I've now had two. I've received a total of 50 radiation treatments this year alone, not to mention 25 of them six years ago. As I've said before, the treatments to my breast, armpit and spine didn't cause any sensations; they're like X-rays, and it's easy to believe while you're having one that it isn't doing much. The gradual onset of side effects -- and even improvement in your condition -- lets you know slowly that the treatment is real and effective.

For whole-brain radiation, a mesh face mask is molded to your skull; you are pinned down by it tightly during every treatment, looking a little like Hannibal Lecter, I would think. During my first treatment, I waited for the customary high-pitched whine of the beam, which I expected only to hear, not to feel. Suddenly I had the sensation that my brain was lighting up. It was subtle, but I had the definite impression that something had gripped my brain lightly. Even weirder, I could smell a metallic odour, almost as though something was burning. I mentioned to the technician that I could feel something, and she volunteered that patients claim they feel and smell whole-brain radiation. It brought home to me how powerful this tool is and what is really happening to me. Once you've radiated your whole brain, you kind of feel like the horse is out of the barn; there's no going back. It's not like I can do without my brain the way I can do without a breast or a few lymph nodes.

Anyway, I don't feel too bad as long as I keep still. The dizziness is hard to get used to and the deafness makes my head feel hollow. And I increasingly feel like I simply can't balance on my wobbly spine. When I sit on a hard chair, especially to take a shower, I sway like a palm tree in a breeze.

Pollyanna moments:

• Visits from friends and family, and a spin around the block in the sunshine.
• I wheeled myself to the Second Cup on the first floor to buy a treat -- an independent foray.
• I was served a half-decent breakfast this morning.

Back to hospital with my leaky brain

Quick post for those who want to know: I had the first of 10 radiation treatments on my brain tonight, and I'm headed for St. Michael's Hospital to be admitted for the duration of the treatments -- I'll be transported from there to Princess Margaret each day.

I'm not sure if I'll have any access to the Internet at St. Mike's, but I hope I'll be able to write more soon.

Have a good weekend!

Bad news -- and as much good as I can scrape up

Before he died of lung cancer, Warren Zevon told David Letterman that he'd learned from having a terminal illness to "Enjoy every sandwich" -- which is also the name of a Zevon tribute album. My brother reminded me of this last night, and it was helpful advice.

I received the results of my head MRI yesterday. I don't have brain metastases exactly -- the lesions are coming out of my skull and growing in the lining between the skull and the brain. One of them is 2x2x2 cm, which seems large.

It was not nice news to hear, but I wasn't surprised. In some ways it was a relief to discover a cause that neatly explains the symptoms, namely the deafness in one ear, the pressure headache and the constant disequilibrium.

On Friday morning I'll be seeing a specialist in the brain metastasis clinic at Princess Margaret Hospital; apparently there are radiation treatments that can work, I don't know for how long. I suppose it depends on the size and position of the lesions. If they're treatable, I'll be going through more of what I experienced in January, including side effects that make me very ill. Please, let me get some respite for a while after that. If there is no response to treatment, and the lesions get bigger, I'll start getting seizures, nausea, worse vertigo, vomiting -- God knows what else; weird behaviour and vision l0ss, I suppose. It will not be pretty.

I asked the doctor if she was prepared to tell me how long I'll live, and she said it's still impossible to say. Will this be my last year? Quite possibly, she said, but not necessarily. Seems to me that the speed with which these metastases are appearing is not a very good portent, though.

But I'm not going to think about that today. I'm listening to Oliver Schroer's stark violin, and Oscar Peterson's ringing piano, and Don Ross and Michael Hedges on guitar, and doing bits of my taxes in between other things, including a walk around the corner using my walker to mail a letter, with my neighbour accompanying me. Felt like I'd gone eight miles, and my back was killing me. My feet are not working well, but I've got enough strength back in my legs to get around by dragging them a bit. Anyway, the fresh air and sunshine were a treat.

Let's find some Pollyanna moments:

• Daffodils my mom received (which she isn't enjoying at the moment because she's in Kitchener) are glowing in the kitchen.
• My brother Paul visited last night and emptied the commode pot and washed the dishes and wheeled me down to Gerrard Street to have dinner at my favourite Indian place, which I hadn't visited in months.
• I still have a good appetite, probably due to the steroids. The doctor put me on a much larger dose of steroids yesterday to help control the swelling and edema on my brain, and if I'm not imagining things, I think my head feels a little better today. And I have the characteristic red cheeks already. Not cleaning out the fridge at 3 a.m. yet, or anything like that.
• Applegrove Community Complex has sweetly given me a volunteer award because of the seniors' writing workshop I conducted last fall, to be presented at their AGM on March 31. Who knows if I'll be able to attend, but I'm honoured and surprised. The workshop was very satisfying for me, despite how ill I felt the whole eight weeks, and I think my students enjoyed it, too. Wish I could do it again, but without a voice or two working ears and legs, I guess that's out for now.
  
• I don't have any pain in my hips or legs, so I hope the cancer hasn't spread there yet.
• My lungs and heart are still working just fine (I know, this could prove to be a burden at the end).
• The sun is shining.
• This week I'm having lots of visitors checking in on me while my mom is home in Kitchener. They've been so helpful, and because there is a risk I'll have a seizure, it's good to have company (though I treasure my alone time in between, I must confess).
  
• I'm still alive, and I'm not nauseated and my gastro tract is functioning pretty well.
• I actually managed to eat a sandwich at lunch today -- and I enjoyed it! Thanks, Warren.