A bit lost for words...

Well I've made it through my third dose of chemo and my final dose of the dreadful Taxotere. This last one hit me hard, which is kinda why my posts have been few and far between. I just haven't had the energy or brainpower to get to the computer and type something coherant. Excuse me if this post is full of spelling and punctuation errors...my brain has gone on holiday - hopefully to some exotic warm island and will come back well rested, and tanned in due course.

I'm feeling a lot better today after spending Friday, Saturday and Sunday either in bed or on the couch (watching Food TV and making myself sick with hunger) and really not moving from there except to visit the pantry or the toilet. A combination of steroids and chemotherapy is DANGEROUSLY unhealthy as I want to eat and eat and eat and then I pay for it later on. The other side effect of watching Food TV all day is that I then was going to the pantry craving fois gras with mustard seeds and spring onions in duck jus and only walking away with half a packet of stale corn chips. (I've never actually eaten fois gras by the way, but I figured its so fancy and expensive it must be nice?)

My hair is alternating between growing and falling out and can't seem to decide what its doing either. I think on my next phase of chemo, which is a new drug, my hair will fall out altogether. So far its a nice fine fuzz.

My amazing and very good friend Alison arrived on Saturday from Aussie to whip me into shape and fill me with good food and less stress and help out until she is sick of the sight of us. This is a great thing and I continually feel amazed and blessed by everyone who does even the littlest thing to make life easier. This is mostly why I am lost for words, because it really really does mean SO much and I don't feel even remotely deserving of all it but am so thankful regardless.

Mostly its a mental battle. It's an ongoing frustration of not being able to get out and be normal, do normal family things. Everything has changed and I don't know if it will feel normal again for a long time. One thing I am learning is to see myself differently. This post here from a fabulous blogger Simone really began that process for me. Its worth a read because we all have to be reminded that in the society that we have these days, beauty really is on the inside. Yeah that does sound cliche, but I couldn't imagine in all my life that at the age of 30 I would be missing a breast, have no hair and weighing in heavier than I've ever been (I'll exclude pregnancy). During the day I can wear my prosthesis, put on make-up, chuck on Ginger and no one is any wiser. I can look normal, pretty and quite healthy. But at night I take that all off, put on my comfy pj's and look at myself in the mirror and get a fright every time. That's right, every. time.

Sure, I never expected to have the body I had at 19 forever. I expected to get old and crusty but I guess I never expected so many dramatic changes all at once. So what I'm doing now is getting to know the new me and striving to make sure my daughters especially see that it doesn't matter at all what the outside looks like. Being alive and living and loving is the main thing.