Editor's note: Norma King joined the breast cancer sisterhood in July 2011. In August she had a lumpectomy; and began chemotherapy in October, an apt month for scary adventures.
I know it's a bad chemo day when I want to ram the semi in front of me because it's in the way.
Really. This kind of attitude spills over to phone calls from idiots who don't know I'm on the no-call list and so-called customer service that originates from the Himalayas.
It's been 13 weeks since I showed up for my first chemotherapy cocktail. My husband took my photo as I lounged on a lovely wooden bench in the waiting room. I was smiling. Inside the small treatment room at the cancer center I "put up my dukes" and had him take another shot. Oh, my goodness, even John Wayne would have known to get out of the way while the getting was good.
Now, four rounds of chemotherapy later, four times feeling like an alien had inhabited my body, I'm a wiser woman. Was this how Superman felt when he was exposed to red Kryptonite? (It was GREEN Kryptonite that would kill him; RED Kryptonite made him sickly and came with a variety of — you guessed it — side effects.)
I shouldn't complain. But I do, and any amount of sympathy, accompanied with pizza, is appreciated. I have to admit, though, I have it so much easier than some folks do on chemo. My main complaints, besides periodically hating people who drive Corollas and Kenworths, are muscle aches, fatigue, tingling in my feet and tastelessness.
I don't mean I dress tacky and my furniture would look good in Hoarder's Circle magazine; I mean, chemo messes with the taste buds. Try metallic casserole or burned orange juice. Even the beloved chocolate tastes like something my friends and I made with mud and sprinkled with pine needles when we were youngsters.
But, this is not a column about bad chemo side effects that nobody wants to read.
So I'll enlighten you on some basic fallout that comes with chemo, like my hair. My grandchildren are fascinated with their bald grandma. Cami grins mischievously when I pull off my hat-of-the-day at her request. Her sisters are more sophisticated and have told me, "You look better with the hat on."
I have enough hats for a first-grade class. It's like Hermione (i.e. Harry Potter) put the Geminio curse on them — they just keep multiplying, thanks to good people like Mary from the bank, Walt in Utah and my daughter, who recognizes a good hat when she sees one.
A Canadian writer friend, Bonnie, asked me if I needed a toque. A toque? Sounded like something to burn off the light fuzz of hair trying to grow back on my scalp. I looked up toque and found U2's The Edge in a rockin' knit cap.
So how does somebody get a name like The Edge? Would everyone please call me The Write ... or maybe You're Right would be just as good. By the way, I found some revealing photos of The Edge online and I think he's bald, too.
There is a good side effect, though. It's meeting cancer survivors who have refused to buckle to chemo's Kryptonite : Like 75 year-old Ardith, who never missed a day of work during her treatment except when she was hooked up to the chemo IV; and Amy, who taunted her cancer cells and refused to let negative influences enter her life. Both are now strong, active women with hair.
A piece of advice from Ardith Palier: "Maybe cancer happens for the best, maybe it happens to tell you you're not invincible. It's going to take more than that to lay this old dog down. You never know what's going to happen to you, but God's looking out for you."
I like.
To reach Norma King, send email to thewriterupstairs@sbcglobal.net.
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