How am I?

I had my first “every-three-months-for-a-while” checkup with my oncologist 2 days ago, and it was largely the no-news-is-good-news kind of appointment. I did have various small complaints to discuss with her, but nothing she was concerned about. For those of you who may be following the medical details of this blog, for your own sake or someone else’s, here is a run-down of some of the more mundane aspects of my recovery, 3 ¾ months after surgery, and 4 ¾ months after my last chemo treatment.

Hair: Nearly normal most places, though still pretty short on top!

Diet: Still following the very-low-fat diet, tracking calories on myfitnesspal pretty closely most days; doing a lot more home cooking than before.

Weight: 20 pounds less than my all-time high, and holding steady at a very healthy weight for my height

Wardrobe: Just replaced 5 pairs of size 12P pants with sizes 8-10!

Sleep: Off all sleeping aids, but interrupted by hot flashes at least once a night, sometimes considerably more times per night (attributed to chemically-induced menopause, expected to dissipate eventually); Chinese medicine seems to help a bit.

Sensation:

Chest still numb above the incision lines and part-way under the arms on both sides

Considerable achiness in joints after sitting or lying still for any length of time (attributed to chemically-induced menopause, expected to dissipate eventually)

Hot flashes during daytime too, doing lots of layering-unlayering-layering-unlayering

Libido has been pretty low but seems to be gradually recovering

Workouts: Swimming 30-40 minutes about every other day, and walking, sometimes with weights, most other days; doing private pilates sessions to work on old & new issues with alignment, posture, and hip/knee/foot pain, before returning to the kind of personal-fitness-trainer regimen I was on before

Strength & stamina: Not yet back to where I was before the chemo, but not bad. Pretty darn good for most purposes (e.g. was able to walk the 21,742 steps of the optional side trip to Petra in Jordan the last day of the Israel tour a month ago), though I still feel like my aerobic capacity gets maxed out a lot sooner than it used to when I exercise hard for even a short period of time

Skin: Weird, unexplained sustained “goosebumps” on neck & arms that appeared after surgery and persisted for a couple of months had mostly disappeared and seem to be making a comeback in recent days

Various side-effects of chemo (acid stomach, constipation, altered taste buds, etc.): have been gone a good long while

Daily life: Starting to get “back to normal,” though I’m finding the whole concept of returning to normal, etc. a little weird and anxiety-producing, especially the part about returning to being nearly as busy as I was before my diagnosis. I appreciate being healthy and feel like I want to do most of the things I used to be able to do, but don’t exactly like returning to the condition of my to-do list being longer than possible. It reminds me of the first time I had a full-time job; incredulity that “they” really expect me to put in this many hours?! I imagine what I’m experiencing may be sort of like coming out of retirement. Given that I have the incredible privilege of not actually needing to work for a living, I have to keep reminding myself that “they” is ME.

This week I’m not working much given the Christian holiday, and given that I have beloved family visiting from CA – sister Rachel, brother-in-law Andy, and niece and nephew Margalit and Nathan. We are catching up and laughing, doing ceramics, talking tech and politics, and have various other fun activities planned. Though this part of the family doesn’t celebrate Christmas on Dec. 25th, we do remember our mother/Nana Ellie, who was born on that date in 1939, and died in July of 2006. We also plan to do the “traditional” Jewish activity on Christmas, eat Chinese food.