My brain hurts from the past four weeks

Wow wow, so much has happened since my last post.  I have wanted to write for many many days now; however, every time I wanted to, something got in my way such as the kids, work, Ginger our lovely dog . . . no really, Ginger would sit in my lap all curled up and I couldn't get my laptop near me.  There was emotion.  My emotions have been running so high lately for so many reasons, that when I want to sit down and type I mentally am not in the appropriate state of mind.  Yes, writing is very therapeutic for me, but there have been times these past four weeks were my emotions have been debilitating.  I am confident this is part of my cancer journey and I will get through it.  Just like we all make it through these trying times, but boy, does it stink.  I am learning I need to be patient and still allow myself some "give up" days.  These days are needed as I am physically and mentally still not 100% and my life continues to evolve and get back into a pattern day by day.

The physical part I will have to say continues to improve daily.  My chest is healing nicely.  It doesn't look any prettier, but the positive is that the scars are healing and we see no sign of infection.  This is absolutely great news (focus on the positive).  I also ended up seeing my oncologist, Dr. Amir.  I thought this was our first appointment since they have given us our all clear news; however, I was wrong.  Due to so many hospital stays because of the infection, we actually missed our oncology appointment to get the final pathology results from the bilateral mastectomy.  When the doc walked in the room and started with that news and possible pre-cancer cells still being there, you can imagine my heart dropped.  I have been so used to bad news compounding, my brain was swirling for whatever, three minutes, while the doc left the room to get the results, about that evil cancer still being in my body.  The good news is that once he returned he immediately shared with us that I am clean!  So now the goal is to continue to focus on healing from the chemo.  Right now the biggest issue I have is fatigue as well as sore muscles/bones.  But now that my chest is healing up, I am going to get back on the horse, er bike, and start riding again.

You may be wondering, or maybe you are not, but I am going to tell you anyways, how does this all make me feel mentally?  Is my mind going in the right direction?  Well, let me tell you.  The thing I am having a difficult time shaking right now is the thought of reoccurrence.  It's in my mind daily.  I continue to read about reoccurrence and secondary breast cancer, and it freaks the shit out of me.  I wake up in the middle of the night with a sore shoulder and my mind goes right to thinking "Is this cancer?"  After a day back in the office with heals on I feel like my ankles are broke due to the pain, and I wonder "Is this cancer?"  Moments sitting on the couch I feel sharp pains in my chest where my scars are healing and my mind jumps to "Is this cancer?"  I am confident this is normal as I have discussed with a few experts in the field and they have reassured me my feelings are normal.  They have also told me that this is one of the biggest issues to deal with once you get the all clear.  It is important for me to not let this debilitate me.  I must watch this closely and if I feel like it is getting in the way of me healing physically or mentally, I need to be strong enough to reach out for help.  This is a tough thing for me to do, as I am sure it is for many.  Going to see a specialist to help me get through the psychological issues of post cancer . . . come on, who wants to go see a psych doctor?  Well, I need to remind myself I have about 10,000 days left on this earth, give or take (by the way, I just threw that out there without doing any math so I may be way off).  And everyday I let cancer beat me is a day I will never get back.  Bobbie, remember that!

Now on to work.  I am on week four back in the office on a gradual return to work plan.  It's been extremely busy for me which has been great.  I have also had the opportunity to catch up with so many people and give lots of hugs.  Timing has been good  for my return so I have been able to meet with my staff, coworkers, brokers and clients.  Some days it feels like I have been gone for years, and of course, there are days I feel like I haven't missed a day.  Many days are positive and fun, but I would be lying if I said there have not been tough days.  While I was out they had to have someone step in my role for me, so you can imagine how difficult it is for both of us with me returning.  Who does what?  Try not to step on each other's feet.  When is the appropriate time to take a project over.  How do we communicate effectively to the staff and our clients how this works and where they should go for assistance.  The other hurdle is we are still in the process of going through a very large integration within a very soft insurance market.  This means we need to be nimble and fluid.  Things are continuously changing for the better, but yet they are changing.  And change takes time to manage through and be comfortable with.

My goal has been to over communicate to ensure that we manage properly through all of these issues, but of course because we are dealing with human beings and we all have feelings, I probably have upset someone during these past four weeks.  As such I continue to remind everyone we are all trying to find our new balance in this environment, and not take anything personally.  We all have the same goals - do well for the company, ensure our employees, clients and coworkers are happy, and most importantly make sure we are happy.

During these past weeks I also had my WICC breakfast.  The humbling feeling that overwhelmed me as I entered the room was just spectacular.  We had a bit over 400 guests.  Every time I have the opportunity to share my story, I am so grateful.  I was on a panel with a cancer researcher and an individual that works on providing grants on behalf of the Canadian Cancer society.  And our moderator is an amazing woman who has given umpteen personal hours to working with WICC and making a difference in Canada for cancer.  She's truly an angel.  When I first sat down with this high caliber panel I would not be honest if I didn't tell you I was a bit nervous.  These people have given their life to make a difference, and I am just a patient that has experienced cancer.  I was a bit worried how I would fit in to this panel.  But remember I said we had an amazing moderator?  She made the panel discussion seamless, and as I listened to these experts talking it dawned on me that I was on this stage for a reason.  Of course it was to share my cancer journey and insight, but it was more much more to me.  I finally was able to determine what I want to do to ensure that I do my part to make a difference in the realm of cancer.  I will definitely share more with you as I go forward with this endeavour.  Stay tuned!

Oh wait, I almost forgot.  Something else major has occurred in the past four weeks.  I would be remiss not to bring up the US election. Wow oh wow, who saw that coming?!  For me, personally, I am sad about the results, as I have been a Hillary Clinton supporter for many many years, and of course I wanted her to win.  Yes, it would have been great to see the first woman president, but to me it was more than that.  I am not going to get into the reasons why, as we all have our own reasons for supporting candidates.  This is the reason that makes the US of A an amazing country.  Our democracy.  

Now that the election results have passed, a few things have saddened me way more than the President Elect.  The first is that the US has a great democracy, and so many people chose not to vote or write in someone.  There was a very low voter turn out rate, and if we think about it, there typically is never one candidate you side with 100%.  But we need to never forget all the people before us that fought to provide us this opportunity to vote.  No matter what we need to vote.  If you don't like the candidates or the job they are doing then stop complaining and take the opportunity to do something about it.  I know we are all busy and this just adds more to your plate, but if we want to make a difference we must.

The thing that makes this election different as well as future elections is social media, and this is the part that continues to sadden me as days pass.   Social media provides an outlet for people to share ideas and opinions.  For us all to learn, grow and connect with people around the world!  How fucking amazing is that?!  However, I am sure many of you have noticed as well, this also gives individuals an opportunity to be downright mean and negative towards people with different opinions.  You remember 15 years ago if you wanted to be an asshole to someone you had to do it to their face.  That stopped and made you think, didn't it?  It was more personal.  Now people hide behind their keyboards and just spew out negativity.  This absolutely makes me cry time and time again.  We all need to do a better job of giving ourselves a reality check when it comes to this.  I say to myself . . . move away from the keyboard.  Wait 15 minutes, and then say to myself, do I really need to say that?  Will this make a positive or negative impact?  And of course, how would this make me feel if someone wrote this to me?

As the results are not what we wanted in the Goldie household we must focus our attention on our children.  Greg and I have been spending days teaching our children to be respectful of outcomes that are not what we wanted.  Also, President Elect Trump will be the President of the United States, and no matter what we feel about him, it is our duty to provide him with respect.  Additionally, we need to remain positive about his ability to do a good job for our family and friends.  They deserve this.  But, of course there is a but . . . if Mr. Trump hurts or feelings or says or does something we do not like, we need to talk about it with civility.  We cannot keep it bottled up.  That will not do any good.  We need to understand why we feel this way, and then determine if there is anything we can do ourselves to make the world a better place.  Our children deserve a better place . . .