F-T With No Vacation

This time, I wasn't going to tell anyone at all.

I was going to disappear for six months, run away, go into temporary hermitage, a la J. D. Salinger. I'd deal with this quietly, privately, glamourously, a la Jackie Kennedy Onassis. I'd hire the woman who voice-overs all of the healthy cereal commercials in a zen-like voice to record my voice mail message: "Laura is away on a spiritual retreat. She will return to her offices of Life Administration in six months, upon which time she promises to return your call. Have a great day. Om shantih shantih shantih ..." Beep!

When you're a young, otherwise healthy woman in your twenties who's been dealt the cancer card five times during the course of just four and a half years, well ... it gets tiring. And although I have had three other recurrences since my primary tumour was diagnosed in 2004, I guess I never really felt like I had cancer until now. Cancer had certainly interrupted my life, and the five surgeries (those two lung mets especially) and intense radiation course (hello chronic fatigue and rad burn) I had were definitely no walk in the park. But spirit somewhat broken and crippling fear of recurrences aside, I was always able to recover in due time, adjust to a new scar, put my hiking shoes back on, and get on with it. This time I do not feel so lucky. Even though I was technically a four-time cancer Survivor, I feel as though every part of my life until now has been "BC" (Before Cancer), and I am now about to enter "AD" (After Diagnosis).

Why? Because every other diagnosis until now had felt like a blip. "BAM! [Sound of truck hitting me] You have malignant synovial sarcoma in your neck. We'll take it out, follow-up with post-op radiation, and you will be fine." Then: "BAM! You have a secondary lesion in your lung. We'll take it out, keep a close eye on you, and you should be fine." ... Then two more BAMs, but they still felt like blips, because I knew the cancer would be out, I'd heal, and go on otherwise unchanged. It was like my military service. I'd cry, scream, get myself together, and live through the fear, anaesthesia, pain, blood transfusion, barfing, and healing process. I'd learned the drill, and eventually, I knew more or less what to expect.

But I don't know what to expect from AD. I don't know the drill. And what I thought was just a series of blips has turned into more of a blip blip ba do bah blah blah blah blam. In spite of my devotion to healthy living, twelve years of vegetarianism followed by a strictly organic vegan diet, a very active lifestyle, a lifetime of not smoking, and a family history that does not include cancer ... I have cancer for the fifth time. This time it is on my (remaining) right ovary. It has engulfed my right ovary (I had such high hopes for that little gal!), as my gyne oncologist put it, and thereby destroying my fertility in the most dramatic of fashions. AD is pretty bad. I feel like the Sabine Woman statue outside of the Uffizi (only instead of marble Adonises, I am being engorged by ugly, green little synovial cell monsters who refused to die). It is violently robbing me of my fertility (and I was going to be such a cool freakin' organic hippie earth mum), my freedom for the next six months, and that last shred of naive optimism I cherished so very much. A life-altering surgery and subsequent adjuvant chemo were two things I had always feared a little bit, but never imagined I'd actually have to endure in the near future.

Fig.1 Anarchist Green Little Synovial Cell Monster

Because I'm healthy, god damn it! I take such good care of myself. I eat organic kale and friggin' seeds, and clean the floors with vinegar, for crying out loud! I'm angry and shit-scared! Why is my life always being put on hold while all of my friends are moving forward with theirs? This isn't supposed to happen! Because I feel like this:

Top of the Mountain Girl isn't supposed to have cancer.

1 in 2.3 men and 1 in 2.6 women will experience cancer in his and her lifetimes. Regardless, I don't know how or why I got such a rare kind of cancer which accounts for just under 1% of all cancers -- and an even more rare form of that cancer, at that ... a subtype which represents just 8% of that very cancer. The odds of my having this cancer in the first place are so mind bogglingly low that it makes my brain hurt. On top of it all, my particular case of synovial is behaving in ways my oncologists have never seen before, baffling them to the point of making me a subject in their weekly Tumour Review Board. They have no model to follow when it comes to me, and none of them have ever seen nor heard of synovial metastasising to the ovary before. Great. I always wanted to be special, but not in this way.

But this is the card that has been dealt, and I have decided that I cannot ignore it any longer: cancer is a full-time job. Whether one is post-diagnosis, pre-op, post-treatment, or in 'remission,' the reality is, cancer is with you for life. I can count on my amazing, rock star, top-notch oncologists at Princess Margaret Hospital to rid my body of these physical malignancies the best they can, but one cannot ignore the emotional malignancies cancer creates. Cancer kicks you in the ass and knocks you down, and it can hit you when you least expect it. I call mine my "stalker," or perhaps, "some secret assassin / waiting to strike at you," as W.H. Auden put it, is the best image. In order to deal with cancer you need an army of soldiers around you, and that is what I intend to gather during my newfound, full-time cancerployment: veggies, raw food, organic cookbooks, wellness guides, friends, family, art ... this keyboard. I need it all.

Last Tuesday, I wanted to crawl into something that looked like this:

But I know that I can't. And I know that I might be in "Spiritual Retreat"-default to zen message 50% of the time, but I'm not sure anymore that isolating oneself is the healthiest idea. Having cancer is isolating enough. Being part of a demographic (15-39) that accounts for little-to-no attention in the corporate cancer world as well as in the realm of clinical trials -- a demographic that has not seen its survival rate improve by even 1% throughout the past thirty years -- is alienating and frightening. And it sure is freaking lonely in those patient waiting rooms, where I am often the youngest person there by at least thirty years. I don't have much in common with the eighty-year-old man with prostate cancer sitting beside me in the onco room reading Reader's Digest.

Cancerployment is my way of understanding and chronicling what I am going through, and also of providing my friends and family with a way of keeping track of me. It's also a humble offering to anyone else out there who is young, going through cancer, and feeling as frustrated and isolated as I often do. I felt totally alone until I discovered Kris Carr and her "CrazySexyCancer" movement (Google her). Reading something from another young cancer Survivor's perspective is more than helpful. It's freeing.

So, I started this blog. My EMSBF (earthy manliness supportive boyfriend) would like to take credit for the idea, because of the following 'phone conversation we had today:

EMSBF: What are you doing right now?
ME: Oh, just some writing.
EMSBF: What kind of writing?
ME: Kind of like, a blog ... you know, about this stuff. I think it would be helpful.
EMSBF: Did I have that idea?
ME: Huh?
EMSBF: Did I suggest that you do that?
ME: No. I mean ... do you want to take credit for the idea?
EMSBF: Yes. You know, I probably did. I might have. Say it was my idea.

EMSBF and me

Lastly, this is for Earthy, who's stuck by me through it all, and held my hand when I was scared.