Text Messaging

me: “I had ice cream for dinner and now I’m bloated.”
Paul: “Haha, sucks to be you”
me: “Nah, it’s cool to be me.”
Paul: “Yea, you get to do all the fun stuff like tour Britain, grow bonsais, live with monkeys and fight cancer. I want to be you in another life.”

The Rebellious Youth

I went to Publix the other day wearing a pink bandanna that one of the oncology nurses gave me. I bought an assortment of foods, including mussels, garlic and white wine. Naturally, I had to prove that I was old enough to purchase alcohol and when the cashier was looking at my ID she said, “I never would have guessed;” assuming that she was referring to my age I said, “Yeah, I almost always got carded before, but since my hair fell out I get carded for everything all the time, even cold medicine.” She laughed and kind of made this sad face at the same time and said, “Well, at least it’ll grow back, right?” to which I replied, “Yeah, my doctor told me it might grow back curly, but that it should go back to normal after a while, although she’s had two patients whose hair never went back.”

The woman standing in line behind me who was in her mid to late 50’s and had previously compared her fatty foods to my significantly healthier foods said, “Mine didn’t grow back curly, and the doctor told me the same thing.” I told her that I was always perfectly happy with my hair and that I would love for it to come back the same and she told me that hers came back a little thicker, but who doesn’t want thicker hair? I agreed, and then she said, “Did your hair actually fall out, or did you just shave it?” I immediately felt like I had to explain myself and told her how my hair had been to the middle of my back and I cut it short to kind of adjust to less hair and then when it started coming out by the handfuls that I buzzed it because it was getting everywhere and that I found it much less traumatic to have tiny bits of hair all over my hands than having endless handfuls of hair coming out. She kind of nodded and then announced how depressing it was to have your hair coming out by the handfuls.

I signed my credit card receipt, the cashier wished me luck in everything, said it was nice to see someone so positive and told me to keep smiling (“you have a beautiful smile,” she said) and I left the store.

While driving home, I suddenly realized that the woman in line behind me was challenging me, actually challenging me to see if my cancer was legitimate, or as serious as hers was, or something… I don’t know.
Why would she do that? Why would anyone do that?

And then I realized it was just like everything else… just like every other damn part of this whole cancer thing… it’s the same reason doctors didn’t treat it like it was serious in the first place, the same reason that the Health Department blew me off, the same reason the biopsy surgeon’s office made me wait two weeks for a consultation, the same reason that woman gave me such a dirty look back in October for saying “at least it’s a good month to get breast cancer,” the same reason I can’t get financial assistance and the same reason that no one can believe that I have breast cancer: I’m too young, and I look even younger. I don’t look old enough to buy Tylenol Cold and Flu, never mind alcohol or to have breast cancer.

But hey, guess what, this just in: Cancer doesn’t care how young I am.

Why does everyone else?

The Dowside of Being Noteworthy

During one of my many visits to the Cancer and Blood Disease Center my oncologist said to me, “You are very unique, Joanna.” I laughed, knowing what she meant, and said, “Why thank you.” She smiled back and said, “It’s not a good thing when the medical community finds you interesting.”