A second opinion spirals me downward

A friend in the community checked out a lot of doctors when she had breast cancer and worked with an oncologist in Santa Monica who was the only one to offer her a different treatment that resonated with her. He really seemed to know his stuff. So, I felt that if anyone was gonna be able to dis-agree with the treatment I was getting, it would be him.

He gave me the thumbs up and concurred with the TAC protocol. And during our very informative, long meeting, I got the 'overall' picture for the first time. He explained that some oncologist work with what is immediatly in front of me, and others do 'overall' picture. I thought that I was looking at a kinda 6-9 month window. He tells me I will be on drugs for at least 5 years because I am ER/PR positive. How the chemo might really kills my eggs and shut down my cycles for good. And I left thinking that it would be better for my long term health to go into early menopause and not continue to cycle.

I left there sombered and grateful for the overall picture and detailed information - as well as having a confirmation that I had chosen the right Oncologist to begin with.

In this sad state I started calling friends for support as the soft tears started coming down. I am being called to look directly into the gate of never birthing a child of my own not because of the cancer, but because of the chemo.

And I started to research the alternatives. There is the "oleander pill" that kills all the cancer. There is the intense 30 day cleanse that includes an cold sheet bath once a week that claims "There are No Incurable Diseases". There is a place in Mexico I could go. A retreat in San Diego.. the list was endless and I was trying to escape my pain of loosing my choice.

I floundered around, I called my peeps, I cried, I got angry, I stared into space for a long while.

I was back in that "What's the point" place. Really, what is the point to go through all this? I come out the other end, and what? I end up with permanent neuropathy from the chemo and can't catch babies? I loose the choice to birth my own child and never get to experience the wonders of pregnancy and childbirth, which is so very close to my heart and soul? I least I thought is was close to my soul. Maybe it is closer to my ego than my soul.

When I dive deep, I can go really dark. And I have years of navigating these dark places in myself, and I'm still here, so I know I am not going anywhere, but the dark times are not a joy. But I don't go it alone. I have great friends and family.

And as I sat in this place, I could start to feel for the first time the true difference within myself of what everyone calls "The Ego". If I was really honest with myself, it is The Ego, the "I" that wants the experience of pregnancy and childbirth. Who am I fooling, "I" don't want a child. Not now. Not in this moment. I can barely take care of Molly, my much too clever for her own good, wild child, cocker spaniel whose curiousity might get her killed! What would I do pregnant with a kid?? And single? And were would the kid sleep in the 10' by 12' room?? How could I be a single mom, midwife and writer when my flat doesn't even have a proper kitchen? drama. drama. drama. drama.

Look at Oprah? and what about Jesus? The both seem pretty content without kids.

I know in my gut that this choice is a soul choice. I can stop the chemo and go alternative right now and save my eggs (I'm pretty sure I just ovulated again). And the alternative ways may or may not kill the cancer. Either way, I will still have to deal with this boulder in the road further on down the line. The choice to birth my own child or not is being asked of my soul and is not going to be determined by chemo. My choice is that I can face this issue head on now or deal with it later. Either way the letting going of birthing a child of my own will still be there.

I feel like I am staring once again directly into The Queen of Death. She is asking me to embrace her as I let go more of my self, as I make more space for my Self.

I hear the words of my wise business partner, Ana Paula, circle through my head, "Elizabeth, I don't believe God does anything half way. God DEFINATELY has a plan for you, and you will be shown. Maybe not now, but you will be shown."

I talk a salt bath and I sit quietly. I start to meditate. I listen. I journey with my spirit guides all around me. They are all joyful and celebrating. They take me up, up, up into a large library. I know from my spiritual studies that I am in the Akashic Records. We fly through the shelves until we stop at a large, grand book. It is my book, the book of my life, and they open it up to the present question. The book opens to the page and is turned around to be shown to me and I eagerly look for the answer of what I am to do. I look and this page, along with all the rest of the pages, they are blank.

"Great!" I gripe at them, "What am I gonna do with this? I can't even read it!"

"It doesn't matter. It is the essence that matters. Everything is already done. It doesn't matter what you choose, it is just a matter of how you get there. It is already done. "

I come back into my body, into the warm water of my bath, and I know without a doubt, that my way forward forward is the chemo. And I give myself the space to mourn the loss of an idea that I can smell, touch and taste so that I can embrace my reality that is unfolding in front of me.

I forgot my hat!!

Yesterday was the first day that I forgot my hat in public.

I made a choice - I either hunch my shoulders and hide myself (which is hard to do when you are 5'10") or I drop into my beauty, elongate the neck and Rock It!!

No one in the pizza shop knows that I'm having chemo. For all they know the girl in the skinny jeans is just a wild child who boldly cut her hair off as a fashion statement!

Who knows, I might be starting a whole new trend!!

More proof I am on the right track...

It took a LONG while, but we finally I have the definative results for the cancer. I do not have lobular cancer, I have ductal cancer with lobular tendencies. (YEAH! - this means a better prognosis!) Ductal is more 'garden varitity' cancer. It is not all over the place like lobular.

That is the good news.

The strange news is that I am triple positive: HER-2 positive, Estrogen sensitive and Progesterone sensitive. What does that mean exactly? Well, the good news is the HER-2 has its own drug that I take after the chemo that takes care of that protein. And on that drug I can NOT get pregnant. And then I will take more drugs after that to deal with the ER/PR positive. The bad news, it is more aggressive. The slide confirms what I knew to be true in my body... having the chemo in my body ASAP was not just an emotional urgency, but also a physiological one. The aggressive immediate chemo was 100% right on. The cancer was moving fast.

And even though we picked the right protocol for the mistaken 'lobular' cancer, it is the perfect protocol for agressive ductal cancer.

For me, this is yet another sign in the road I may 'not know' but I when I listen to my intuition, I am right on track.

Feeling myself going down....

This round of chemo I actually felt myself 'go down'. It is bizarre to feel the white blood cells in the body bottem out.

I felt myself moment to moment get more tired. I cancelled my afternoon and by noon my eyes were shutting themselves and I was in bed.

The think yellow coat on my tongue was nasty to look at and taste. And I felt my body start to use up the fluid reserves that it had.

So, I drank lots of coconut water to make sure I was staying well hydrated and got some deep shut eye (with out the need of ambien, thank you very much!)

By about 4pm I could feel that I was on the other side of the curve. And at 5pm I checked in with my body and slowly got out of bed. I knew I would be fine teaching class, as long as I did not do a ton of moving around.

This round I was on Levaquin (and antibiotic). I am so grateful for it! It has given me a sense of security as it offers support for my body as the white blood cells bottom out.

I'm really proud of myself for how well I am learning to hear my body. 2 points for E. Bachner!

Out with the old (job) in with the new (job)

As I don't spend any time reading the papers, my friend have to let me know that America is something like: 700 million - or is it billion? dollars in debt. And that the trickle down place of the debt might put us back into "the depression" of the 30's.

I'm 'aguffing'. (that is a word? yes?)

And I don't get it or my life?

If people are truely in alignment with 'god' by listening to their intuition and hearts, and living creatively expressive lives, and loving their jobs, and celebrating life, and appreciating this physically beautiful planet, and taking responsibity for their choices, and doing some healing work on the self to love self and others, and are grateful of the time we have here.... why are we in this financial situation? Oh, that's right, I keep forgetting that not everyone lives or strives for those ideals... we have created a government that perpetuates fear while it offers no support for health and a lot of people on this planet (including our government) have this funny belief that 'god' wants us to fight and kill each other... in god's name!!! Bizarre to me....

So, here I am with cancer and chemo on one hand, and a wonderful job that I love to work at on the other (that is a picture of me at 'work' with a big huge smile on my face :) . Problem is, that my job has ungodly hours and this healing process demands sleep. I am not working, not because I don't want to work or I don't have business (I have a recession proof job - people will always have babies), I physically can't!! And that is very very frustrating to me.

Next, in my eyes, my job is a big fat ZERO as far as monitary/health benefits are concerned. (for all those concerned, the spiritual and emotional benefits are off the chart fantastic!!) It is very simple and old school in it's philosophy: I work, I get paid. I don't work, I don't get paid. I do 5 births a month, I make descent money and am physcially, emotionally and spiritually exhausted. I do one birth a month I make not good money and I have a 'life'. Where is the passive income in being on call 24/7 and catching babies? (redundant question, please don't answer in the comments section)

What do I do now that I can't work? Apply to Starbucks and serve coffee??

"Hi. I'd like a part time job at Starbucks with benefits. Oh, and I'll need days off when I feel like it because I'm going through Chemotherapy. And it isn't that I'm slack and don't want to work, but sometimes I need to sleep because all the healthy cells are being killed by the chemo, so I need to sleep or I will get sick and end up in the hospital for a few days - and then it will really cost you in sick days. Do you have any openings?"

And I don't have any problem with 'J.O.B.'. I'm the girl that ran out of money while back-packing in Israel and proceeded to wash dishes at a fancy restaurant to pay for her room and board.... I'm the gal that bought duty free 5 dollar vodka on her way back to England from Turkey and sold the vodka jello shots at the London Youth Hostel for 5 pounds each.... I'm the person that went back to school full time at 30 and put herself through two post graduate schools by babysitting, selling jeans out of the back of my car, gift-wrapping at a fancy store at christmas.... Basically, I have no problem working when I need to and I make the money that I need. It is VERY frustrating to not be in control of my income and just trust the universe that it will all work out!! I like to plan how it works out, and I literally and physically can't!! I have lived from hand to mouth before, so this is nothing new on the learning curve... it is just that I thought I had grow out of it when I got my last (of 2) medical board licenses.

Okay, so I can't get a J.O.B., so I'll spend my time resting and healing myself. Taking it easy. NOT! My 'healing time' is now being occupied by my new J.O.B. - insurance paper shuffler/medical bill translator. And quite frankly, I'm really not good at it.

'Insurances-esse' is the most ludacrist language. I think they write it that way so people just 'pay the bills' as apposed to question why insurance is not paying for me to get 'cured'.

I need a personal assistant to help me with the OVERWHELMING NEW paperwork that is a result of the cancer - BUT - I don't have the money for an assistant because I can't work!! And if I could work - I WOULD!! but I can't!!

And to top it off, everyone keeps telling me to be prepared for insurance to fight me on the claims for me to get cured of cancer. So then I'll have a new 'unpaid' job of writing letter to the health insurance to get paid? Like I have the time??

So basically, the insurance that I bought to help pay for me to get treatment won't pay for all of the treatment and I don't have any income - and if I did, I certainly could not afford the treatment on my income.

And instead of being able to spend the day supporting families or watch a childing being born - where I get paid an energetic exchange called money, or even relaxing and resting so my body can heal - to feed my body healing energy, I have a new job that doesn't even have shitty pay - it actually costs me in time and energy!

How did we co-create a world that works this way? I think this is the definition of insanity.

This makes no sense to me!!!

I am sitting in that place that I have heard so many people complain about. I am one of those people who now knows from the inside out that our health care needs to be revamped so that it actually Cares about Health!!

And what can I physically do? nothing. I can't physcially do anything to solve this riddle. As I said in my first page of the blog, I was tired before I started this journey. And worrying is not something I do in my life. I trust. Trusting is the only thing I can do.

sigh

So once again I surrender. And I have to trust that whatever cosmic alignment has gotten me into this absurd situation will also offer up a mgaical solution to the connundrum. As a midwife I witness this over and over and over again. Yes, miracles do happen, we just need to make space beyond our limited minds for them to come in. So, I do what I know how to do best: make space to be shown something greater than me, beyond what I could ever think of, because I know that what I could come up with is limited, and not an option in this moment.

Today is rumoured to be Saturday.

Thursday was a good day. No nausea. Full on eating of meals. My sister and I went for a sunset beach walk. In fact, I said to my sister, "If this continues, maybe we can go to a matinee tomorrow." God, I must live in some kind of chemo fantasy land...

Friday sucked. The lethargy leaves me flattened. I had my first round of vomiting. When the nausea hits I have to lie still and decide. "Is it nausea- nausea? or nausea - I'm starving to death - nausea?" "If I eat will the nausea disapear? If I take a Zofran will the nausea leave? or if it is hunger, will it carve a path in my belly?"

I take a Zofran, a Decadron and Ambien to sleep at night. And I do sleep.

I wake up hesitantly. Am I still nausea or could I eat? And I eat a beautiful egg sandwich coz I feel hungry. And then I get tired. I lie down.

When I lie in bed that is all I want to do. I can feel the edge of sinking into the abyss. I can hear a voice in my head saying, "Drink. Drink something. DO NOT get dehydrated." And then I lie there waiting for an impulse to motivate me to want to get better... "What would it matter? And if I don't drink? And if I don't move? Would I just lie here staring at the ceiling lamp forever?" There is a part of me that wants to meld into the bed and just disappear. I'm starting to get what the fight is for.... It is to fight for my midline, for my center, for my truth of who I am, for consciousness, for being heard, fighting for healthy support, becasue it is so easy to get caught up in someone eles's or some thing's battle and loose track of oneself.

And then I get up to pee. And in this moment I feel human again. Tired, but no longer a puddle of 'blah'.

My sister finds beauty in these darkened moments of stillness, so she snaps away.

Anna comes over to give me some acupuncture. My tongue has a think yellow coat and I can feel and taste it. YUCK!!!

The rumour is today is Saturday. All I know is there is light still outside and I'm actually feeling good enough to type.

As I take a moment to own my exasperation of not wanting to have cancer anymore as I sigh heavily with my hand over my head.

Stephanie kindly asks, "Do you want something?"

"Yes. I don't want to be the girl with cancer anymore."

Round 2!!!

Good news, I got my period today!!! 28 days to the day!!! YEAH!! Two points for E. Bachner's body!! I new I was ovulating... but I was so scared I was making it up and did not want to be dissapointed so soon. But I rejoice!! I don't think I have ever been so happy to bleed!! My OB/GYN said, "This is a very good sign that your body is not stressed!" Yes! This is also a good sign that I still have the choice... in this moment....

Sufi picks my pregnant sister up at the airport while I cross the ever lengthening t's and dot the never ending i's. I don't care how many pills I still need to pick up, endless errands that need to be run or calls that should be answered... I'm still gonna have my manicured nails when I walk into the infusion center!

Dr. G and I come up with the pre-med protocol in relationship with each other. No Benadryl, No on the Ativan, Yes on Aprepitant (the stuff for nausea/acid stomach), No on the Aloxi and yes on the Decadron. I'm also gonna use Frankinsence this time to help ease the many side effects of the pre-meds and chemo. (that is me sniffing and holding onto the bottle during the treatment. When I start to get overwhelmed by all the foreign substances going into my body I focus on the smell and I can feel my body shift and I become more grounded and less naseated/agitated). It seems to be working.

Like a pregnant mom who is both scared and excited for labor, I'm kinda jumpy with anticipation, "How will this round of chemo combined with this cocktail of pre-meds effect my body this time? Will I have more nausea? less? will I be more present? will I be begging for more drugs? "

I sit in a state of wonderment. I am in awe of both science and my body. I have ABSOLUTELY no idea!! None, what-so-ever!!! And instead of fighting this place of 'no control', I surrender to it knowing that whatever the challenge I can face it because I have such great support around me.

Sufi and I have both been noticing the energy of the hawks lately. The weekend I was diagnosed there was a hawk circling around and around where I was watching the sunset. (if you zoom in on the photo, I promise, the hawk is there) And it was not a fly by situation. Rima, the kids and I watch it for about half an hour just hang out, gliding, right over our heads, then SWOOP down it went to get its prey. We jokingly said, "Wow, maybe that is my animal mascot?"

I was joking until Sufi mentioned she kept seeing them too. And she actually figured out why the hawk was communicating to us. So, the hawk is not known as a sweet, loving, chirpy bird. It is a predator that preys on field mice and other creatures miles below it on land. The message was to imagine the chemo as the preditor, the hawk. The chemo would enter into my body with calculated accuracy and then swiftly dive to where it needed to grab its prey, the cancer. The prey in this situation might also be really, really small and almost unseeing to the naked eye, but with hawk vision the chemo would know where to go in my body and find the cancer and fill its belly with delight!

Yes, I am more 'woo-woo' than most (I have been living in California for over 11 years, cut me some slack). And if you dig around on cancer sites you will see that lots of people reccomend visualizations; but, none of them had any resonance to me because I know that I am not fighting a fight with cancer - that is the chemo's job! Yeah, the chemo is a 'toxin'. Yeah, the hawk is a 'predator'. But just as the predator has it's place in nature, so does chemo in the life of someone with cancer.

With each bag of chemo I tell the millions and trillions of hawks inside to "fly, be free, do your job and do it well! Find the big and tiny, ity, bity cancer cells and feast away!! Be direct in your flying! Be exact! Be precise! Be intelligent! Be clean in your attack!! And for god's sake, be gentle with my uterus and ovaries. PLEASE be kind if there is no prey there for you to eat!"

This message from the hawk on a new way of appreciating the chemo/cancer has supported the lessoning of my struggle with this so I can find even more space to be made for the health of my body. And for me, those are the kind of tools that are the most important.