One Day at a Time

From the One Day at a Time TV show......

This is it. (This is it.)
This is life, the one you get so go and have a ball.
This is it. (This is it.)
Straight ahead and rest assured you can't be sure at all.

So while you're here enjoy the view.
Keep on doing what you do
So hold on tight we'll muddle through
One day at a time, (One day at a time.)

So up on your feet. (Up on your feet)
Somewhere there's music playing.
Don't you worry none we'll just take it like it comes.
One day at a time, (One day at a time.) (4X)

So when I was doing radiation, I found that the two hours in the car, Monday through Friday for 5 weeks, were eased by listening to music. I have this CD that has 70's and 80's TV theme songs on it, which by the way I LOVE, and I listened to that a few times. Although I didn't watch One Day at a Time all that often, years later that silly theme song has brought me comfort. That and the American Hero theme song, but that's another story for another day.

Why is this coming up, you ask? Simple. Tomorrow is another 2 month check for me. Same old same old, blood draw, meet with the doctor, treatment, yadda yadda yadda. I know I must drive my poor doctor crazy because I know I ask the same question over and over, just in different ways. Recurrence, the cancer coming back, if it comes back do I lose my new boobs, how do you know if it's there, blah blah blah. And he patiently answers me every time with "We have to go by what symptoms you have." Ok, that satisfies me, for that month. Then I start to think, well hell, symptoms?!? I look back a year and a half ago and the only symptom I had was a lump, if that's even thought of as a symptom, and I am the one who found it. Hells bells.

I try to keep a positive attitude for every visit, but there's a part of me that fears if I let my guard down like I did for the first biopsy, something will happen. I vowed never to go to another doctor appointment blind like that again. My quote is "Prepare for the worst, hope for the best", and so I do that. I think I have said if before, but I think it is too important to not repeat. Cancer does not go away when you are done with treatments. Yes, I do have hair (what to do with all the curls?!?), I do have new boobs, I look healthy, but that damn cancer lingers there, and rears it's ugly head every so often. Like this weekend....

It has been a while since we have gone to a wedding. Maybe two years or so. We went to a wedding this weekend, and everything was perfect. The weather was great, the bride and groom were beautiful, the pastor's sermon was truly amazing. You could feel the love and support in the church. But here was the hard part for me. The bride's mom had died of breast cancer years and years ago. I could not help but sit there thinking "I hope that I see my girls get married." Her dad has since remarried, but her mom's presence was there. So much so that in asking who gives the bride to be married, the answer was all of them. How neat. How compassionate. How moving. How important.

Dion and I went to the State Fair today (We dropped $75 and all we have to show for it is a big Nemo stuffed animal). We used the Park and Ride system, which worked out quite nice. On the bus was a pregnant woman, and even though I have had 3 pregnancies, I couldn't help but stare at her big belly. I guessed she was about 7 months along. I watched as she rested her hands under her belly, watched as her husband looked at her and smiled, watched as she shifted in the seat trying to find a comfortable position. Dion looked at me and said, "The last time we went to the fair, you were pregnant." That was true. I was about 3 months pregnant then. I also had cancer and didn't even know it. Talk about putting a shadow over everything...."Oh, that's before I had cancer, oh, that happened when I had cancer, hey remember that? That was before cancer had invaded our lives." That seems to be the way I classify everything now a days. Pre, during, or post cancer. I even look through pictures and think in my head, "Before cancer". Will that ever go away? Who knows? Back to the pregnant girl. Part of me was sad looking at her, knowing that it would not be wise for me to get pregnant again. I don't even think my stomach could handle the weight of any more massive babies because of the reconstructive surgery. I look at Nadia, and think to myself, Nadia is the age Claire was when she was born. Weird.

I have been thinking about the meanings of our children's names. First we had Casey, our miscarried child, whose name means Brave. Next came Claire, whose name means Brite. And last is our little Nadia, whose name means Hope. I knew that I wanted each of my children to have names with special meaning. I never knew how much they would effect me, and never have names caused me to think as much as these three little ones have.

So, I am off to Mayo tomorrow with lots of thoughts and fears going through my mind. I just might have to pull out that CD and listen to it, for old times sake. One day at a time......