A Little Denial With Those Fries?

All this waiting has not been so bad. The little lump in my armpit doesn't bother me so I am able to pretend it isn't there. Or pretend to pretend it isn't there. The big lump, I have convinced myself that, yes, it is definitely scar tissue. The MRI on Thursday is just a technicality. It is to prove what I already know.

I'm getting good at lying too. My parents think I've been at work. My dad thinks I went to Toronto mid week last week to see a concert (so what if they concert was actually Friday). When people ask how things are going or when my next Dr.'s appt. is I tell them everything is great and I have an appt. every 3 months and a CT scan every 6. I'm not due for another check-in for a while still, everything is fine!

I've told a couple friends but that's it besides the anonymous internet community. I just can't bring myself to crush people's hopes and expectations, especially if this is a false alarm. I'm planning on waiting until I have the results back from my surgery to tell anyone. If they are bad, I'll have to tell. If they are fine, no one needs to know I just went thru a month of uncertainty.

I sometimes think it is probably more painful for family and friends to watch me go through this stuff than it is for me. It's not because of the way they act or react, it is because I know how I would feel if it were someone close to me. It would be torture not being able to help, not knowing what to say, not being able to solve the problem, to watch me in pain or in emotional turmoil. Worse to be the caregiver than the patient I think.

Obviously this has been hard for me. But the brain is a miraculous thing. Able to adapt, able to perservere. And if all else fails, there are always drugs that make everything seem A-OK! A little Valium with those fries?

Life goes on as usual, and I love it! It is such a cliche, but you really do appreciate things more once you experience something like this. In a lot of ways, life is sooooo much more fun than it was for the first 27 years of my life, because now my eyes are finally fully open. Cheesy. But so true.

Today, sitting on the back deck, I was startled my a little birdie that zipped in out of nowhere and landed right by my feet. Silly little baby birdy was learning how to fly and flew right into the after-dinner coffee party of 6 big human predators. He must have been so scared. After about 30 seconds, he got himself together enough to scramble off the deck and into the lawn. The next half hour was quite entertaining watching mama and papa Cardinal encouraging little tweety to fly.

Poor little guy kept flying into the wood fence because he couldn't get up high enough. Luckily, he eventually figured out that he could just crawl underneath and into the next yard. I hope he got back to the nest ok. It really was amazing to see how Mr. and Mrs. C communicated and demonstrated to Baby C. It reminded me of a parent teaching their child to ride a bike. We really are so similar. If I was actually on Valium right now I might end this entry by asking philosophically, We're all just one aren't we?