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Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Looking Within for Happiness – Life is a Highway

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When you are down, look to your children and your children’s children for hope and happiness – Fortune Cookie

I looked at my fortune tonight as my son and daughter read it over my shoulder.  My daughter asked me what it meant and my son gave me a wry smile as if I had been rooked by the fortune cookie gods.  It is so true to have not just children but to have faimly around you who give you that unconditional love and respect.  That ear that will listen or that smile that brightens a gloomy day.  You don’t have to have that kind of felling with all your children or relatives because it just takes one.

These past five months have had me running, literally, to keep my sanity and energy.  Our children while never less important in our lives have not always been given the attention we’d like to have given them.  As a parent you shield them from life’s problems so that they can approach life without barriers and without bias while tryig to provide them with the tools that will help them to survive barriers and bias.  one of my more favorite movies in the past 10 years is The Pursuit of Happyness.  It is a true story about a single father who did all he could to raise his child in a world that was unkind to him.  Ironically it is a story that took place right here in San Francisco and at the time of the real stroy I was a struggling young college intern right across the street.

I’m not homeless, but the emotional adversity has been rougher on me than I thought it would be.  Finally after 5 months, my wife’s parents are here to help.  The relief in my body is a bit of a shock.  I don’t have to worry about my wife every second of the day and the ability to focus more on my children and reconnect with them on more than just a “bedtime story” level is something I really want and need. 

This weekend we found an hour between the raindrops to toss a baseball around.  It felt good to feel that ball pop in my glove and sting my hand.  After an hour, my hand was burning from my 9 year old’s pitches.  It felt so good for it to hurt like that.  I also took my daughter to go to see the Nutcracker with my mother.  For her to get all dressed up and have a day out on the town with her grandmother made her feel special and the smile on her face was all I needed.

So back to that crazy fortune cookie at San Tung Restaurant.  It was the most honest and truthful fortune cookie for me.  To those who wonder about such things.  I am superstitious.  I take the cookie that is pointing to me and I never read the fortune until I have full swallowed the cookie.  At least that is the rule my cousins always told me to obey.

I explained to my daughter about what it meant and I told them how the game of catch and the Nutcracker were perfect examples of all that I needed to make my life better this holiday season.  I know they don’t get it and they’ll still want the latest electronic games and gadgets for the holidays under the Christmas tree, but should they get my good fortune someday when they are my age, I’m sure they’ll at least understand what I was feeling tonight.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Racing Down the Highway – Life is a Highway

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I’m Driving like Hell, Racing Down the Highway – Blake Shelton

Although the lyrics above are from a song about a guy who realized he let his woman get away without telling her how much she means to him (which is not my case), those words seems to express my feelings these days about how my life is going.  I feel like I’m spending my days on those things which I shouldn’t and not on the people and things that matter.  Have I lost perspective?  It’s so easy to find your way in life one day and then lose it.  Yes, just like driving without a map, going 85 mph and not talking to the other people in the back seat.

 As I write this I’m sitting in the 3rd Floor waiting room of the CPMC Carol Franc Buck Cancer Clinic waiting for my wife who is undergoing her 3 hour reconstruction which includes a brief procedure from her cancer surgeon to clear margins that will help reduce her chance of cancer returning.  This surgery will be about half the time of her original surgery.  It is a weird feeling as I felt so prepared for her original surgery that today’s procedure both of us felt so unprepared.  The results maybe aren’t so much about mortality I guess, but I feel like I haven’t given today’s proceedings as much attention as they deserve.  The same goes with the time I’ve had to spend with our kids. 

Last night we each had a brain dump of thoughts.  When we communicate it is almost like a game of chess with a time clock.  First me for 1 minute, then her for a minute, then me, then her, etc.  We race through topics such as how she ran into her friend Jessica at the Starbucks (Jessica is also a breast cancer survivor and an inspiration to my wife), how our son was nominated for a summer Young Scholars program, holiday dinner plans, coordinating pick up of her parents from the airport, etc.  This type of communication might not work for many, but it works for us.  Twenty-four years together will do that to you.  In the end we finally smiled and did a sanity check (maybe it should be an insanity check).  How are we feeling?  Are we prepared for this next surgery?  Is she feeling side effects from the hormone therapy? Apologies to each other are also part of the conversation.  These are mostly from me for the guilt of not being there as much as I wish I could, but she understands the stress we are all going through.  Who says love is about never having to say you’re sorry?

Back to the present, I’m sitting here waiting with two other gentlemen and have about 90 more minutes to go of waiting.  The smile on her face as she chatted her way through the swinging surgical doors are so typical of her, and so atypical of the image of someone going in for a major surgery.  The looks of concern on their faces tell me that their cases seem more grave.  There is a certain somberness in this room that hits me and reminds me of sitting in this room three months ago.  There is a déjà vu with the smells and sounds all around me.  I hope we never have to be here again.  Once again the stress and anxiety of the week have caught up.  The sleepless nights have me and I need to rest.

The next 90 minutes are going to be spent napping and listening to an iPod mix of inspirational songs.

Hopefully the next couple of days will let me catch up, slow down and give everything its proper attention.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight

Finding our Heart – Fighting for Life

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If you lost love, do you know where to find it? – One Republic

My wife has reached what I think is her second wind in this battle.  She has resumed her gym membership, gotten off all of her pain killers, started wearing bras again, watching old episodes of Sex and the City (the ones where Kim Cattrall has cancer and laughs about hot flashes), and strted her 3 years of hormonal therapy (Tamoxifen).  She gets her first OS shot in two days.

What else?  She has completed her shopping list for the holidays and is getting ready to send out the holiday cards.  She has an energy and zest for life I haven’t seen in a while.  She cracked me up tonight when she mentioned that when her 75 year old mother comes to visit for the holidays that she is going to drag her to the clinic to get tested for the BRACA gene.  All of this energy is so beautiful in my eyes.  I am thinking of the days when my wife wanted to just curl up and cry.  This was all a little over 3 months ago.

Now we laugh at Kim Cattrall in a bad bra and wig giving a cancer speech while suffering through hot flashes.  Obviously not funny to all but we are having to laugh at it knowing that we are just around the corner from all of that.  Somehow just commiserating has helped her find her heart.  Our heart.  We’ve lost it the past few months as we wrapped it in armor and tried to protect ourselves from the pain.  The armor seems to have been shed and we are coming out again just in time for the holidays.

I can’t take credit though for her recovery.  Its is all her.  Her fight, her energy, her love, her heart.  I’m so glad she has returned to me and our kids.  He’s been there the whole time physically, but her true being is starting to come back and the smiles in our house are returning.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Still Thankful – Life is a Highway

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“If I could, I wish I had the cancer, not my son” – mother of a cancer victim at the local pediatric cancer ward

This past weekend was a nice chance to sit back and be thankful for all that we have even though things are not perfect.  It has been a long four months but we are entering the home stretch.  We do have some issues and unfortunately I am frustrated that i can’t help my wife with some of her final decisions related to a clinical trial with bisphosphonates that could become a problem should my wife need oral surgery.

Other than that, life isn’t bad right now.  My wife has been able to get herself off of all her drugs and will be starting her Tamoxifen treatments tomorrow.  Her OS treatments start Thursday.  I will be having to watch her moods as these two new drugs entering her system might have an effect on her moods.  She is off of Ibuprophen and the Adavin.  Next Friday is her swap surgery and we will begin the recovery.  Its a lot to be going through with one’s body so I hope mentally she is okay.

I did have to tell our children that their mother was going to have one more procedure as I don’t want them to be worried when there mother has to go to the hospital again.  They are smart so we can’t fool them twice.  We told our kids that it is a smaller proceudre to check on their mother and make sure she is okay.

On a side note I took our son out this weekend and he got his first birdie.  I’m sure it will be the first of many.  What impressed me more was his low key manner and smile when I congratulated him.  He is learning to take life on an even level but I sure do hope that he learns to enjoy the many simple pleasures in life that he will have.

Well tomorrow is the first day of December!  I can’t believe this year is almost over!  It has definitely been one of the more trying years in my life and I am going to be happy when it is over.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Being Thankful – Life is a Highway

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You share a bond and friendship that can’t be broken – Fortune Cookie

Given what we have been through this year, some might wonder how Thanksgiving might be different or how we can be thankful.  In fact, on my run tonight I spent a half an hour just thinking of all the people and things I am thankful for.  Well this Thanksgiving was different for me.  For one, I never before had a Thanksgiving where I didn’t sit down for a big Turkey meal with either side of our huge family.

In fact, today marks the 4 month marker since the day she was diagnosed with cancer and our world was set spinning.

The thought of almost losing the love of my life and the mother of my children at an early age to breast cancer has been a bit of a wake up call to me / her / us.  I am so thankful that she has been able to endure her skin sparing mastectomy to remove the cancer and has been given a new lease on life.  Today was spent “being thanksful” and thanking all those who have helped us to get through this year.  We also spent the morning helping out those less fortunate than ourselves.  Is not all about health and wealth.

To hear and see the stories of others we were able to see other people out there who are just as thankful as we are for what we have today.  In fact some definitely have more to be thankful for than us and I was happy to show our children how lucky we are.  This year though we have many friends, family, doctors, etc who are all part of the reason why we are thankful for their love and caring, for the health of my wife, and for the lessons we have learned from them to know what true compassion means 

In recent days we were happy to hear that my wife’s parents finally have decided to come out and see my wife.  I know it means so much to her that they will be coming to visit.  I guess we have one more thing to be thankful for this year.

Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Confidence is a Drug – Life is a Highway

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“I am Superwoman, Put an S on my chest” – Alicia Keys

Continuing my theme of letting go, my wife is starting to do a lot of little things which are showing her confidence and need for independence from going grocery shopping alone to resuming her exercise.  It is a simple thing sometimes but I can trace this renewed energy just from a simple invite from some of the “popular moms” in our kids school who asked her to join them for an evening out.  It really made my wife feel good to still fit in.  I know her confidence wiill ebb over the next few months as she goes through her recontstruction and deal with both the emotional and physical scars.

Interestingly enough we had the same conversation about confidence with our own children.  We want to teach them humbleness.  While both are well liked by their classmates we want to teach them to be humble individuals and help them for the inevitable day when they receive rejection and teach them how to handle it.

Part of gaining confidence is providing exposure to as much as possible.  As a parent it is our job to show our children as much as we can while providing guidance.  As we go through our lives our parenting takes on many forms that are influenced by our own experiences.  We sometimes learn by giving our children things that our parents couldn’t give us or providing many of those same experiences.  For me, I miss those moments with my dad and this weekend I was able to take my son to his 1st  Big Game (Cal vs. Stanford football), but it is was more than just a game.  As I say, it is always the experience of getting there, and taking a 9 year old to Berkeley is always an eye-opening experience.  Blondies Pizza, Top Dog, the homeless, Rasputin’s Records, etc are all part of the mystique after taking Bart to Berkeley.  For our son (and some day our daughter) the experience started with listening to the Cal Band. 

After listening to the Cal Band we marched up to the stadium with them.  The smile and laughter that he had watching the band made me tear up.  30 years ago that was me with my dad.  I only hope my dad felt as satisfied with giving me that same experience and I showed him the same amount of gratitude.  The casual conversation about the history of the schools and the area were part of a great day of bonding that hopefully will create many pleasant memories for my son because they sure did for me.

My wife and I are still being cautious about the post-surgery experience and what it will mean to us.  I think we know how it will be physically but psychologically we’ve been talking about some of our concerns and issues each night.  We will have to work through it, but at the moment we aren’t sure what those exact issues will be.  What we do know is that we have to be observant of each other’s behavior and let each other know when we observe anything.

One thing we did agree upon though is that leading into this Thanksgiving, we will not be at a loss for things we will be thankful for.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Learning to Let Go – Life is a Highway

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“Don’t worry, you just have to let go”

Every day we reach those milestones.  As parents we look for new ones every day. As caregivers we help people cross new paths.  Today was a simple one.  Just crossing the street. Yes, today our son crossed the street for the first time by himself.  As a parent I watched the whole thing and felt so proud.  Unfortunately my wife was not so happy.  I told her she was going to have to learn to let go and know that this was a great chance to learn especially under the watch of a parent.

Well this might seem trivial to some, but I think it is a learning experience for both me and my wife.  She has always been from a family that is very conservative and controlling.  It is a tendency she tries to avoid.  Although she admitted that what my son did was fine, she was still hyper-critical.  I reminded her of how her own parents invaded her life as she got into her 20s and how she hated it.  I told her she had better learn to let go before her children not tell her when they did something for fear of being nagged to death.  In  fact i reminded her that her our son is very similar to me and that I have been known to go my own way without telling my wife when I fear her overmanaging a situation.  I told her that I don’t want our children to be the same way.

I’ve been thinking about it and I myself have to learn to let go.  I have to stop treating my wife’s condition like she’s going to break.  Although I’m not blocking my wife from returning to normal.  I have been jumping to do things for her and need to let her get used to doing things on her own again.  I am preventing her healing process from accelerating.  Baby steps at first like crossing the street but I have to make sure she has that chance to spread her wings as wide as she feels comfortable.  I asked her if this was an issue and she said it wasn’t but understood how I was feeling and told me that she was okay and ready to get on with her recovery.

I GUESS LIFE GOES ON..at least for another couple weeks until her next surgery.  She did mention that she talked to another mom from the school who just found out that she has cancer too.  Turns out that she has the same surgeon that my wife and mother had.    Pretty small world and quite amazing.

Well that’s me.  Signing off and letting go.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

It Just Doesn’t Stop – A Loving Fight

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“Houston, we have lift off”

When my wife called to tell me that she had been called by the doctor with a date for swap-out surgery, I could hear the joy in her voice.  The fact that this was going to be the day for birthday all I could say was “Happy Birthday” and she giggled.  I was running the other night and realized that it had been two months since her surgery.  it seemed like ages ago when I was helping to strip her drains and bring her meals in bed.  Hearing her news I was ready to start thinking about life after cancer and was just thinking of jumping for joy.  It was a simple thing like when a rocket takes off into space and all the guys at NASA jump for joy over launching a space ship.  The tone of the conversation quickly dulled though when my wife told me that the mother of one of our son’s classmates was just diagnosed with breast cancer.

It hit me there.  This fight will never be over.  We are forever going to be meeting new comrades in arms.  It will be a daily reminder of how fortunate we are and how far we’ve come.

Oddly, someone asked me what I thought about the equal rights issues for the gay and lesbian community.  i told them I didn’t have much thought about it right now and they got mad.  I told them we all have out issues.  There are autoworkers who are going to lose their jobs, parents who have lost their children in a war, etc.  I just don’t know how people can be mad at others for putting their personal issues right now over other issues that many people are suffering with which are also equally important.

Back to my wife’s treatment, the next 5 years will be consumed by my wife receiving follow up therapy for her cancer.  Although very low on risk, my wife cares for our children and our family to want to do all that she can to beat this disease.

She has slowly taken herself off the Atavin and is getting off the Ibuprofen in preparation for her surgery.  She is back working on her consulting projects and although tired and taking mid-day naps, she has resumed most of her household duties although I still take the kids to school and do all the grocery shopping.  I watch her with the children and she is soaking in every moment cuddling with them at bedtime, reading as a guest reader in school, chaperoning on field trips, she has a renewed energy to consume life that I haven’t seen in a long time.

Yes, cancer is a Brave New World.

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As an aside I just passed my 1,000 mile mark for running this year.  And when I took my car in today, I realized I’d only driven my car 3,200 miles this year.  Not bad.  I guess you can say I’ve lived a pretty “green” life this year.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Living in Limbo – The Highway of Life

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Is it making you laugh?  Is it making you cry? – Sugarland

Tomorrow is our follow up appointment with my wife’s oncologist.  I hope we can come to a decision on what we are doing going forward.  We really are in limbo here.  I feel as if we are being held captive by surgery dates, concerns about travel, medications, etc.  Holiday travel and just getting on with life and living it the way we’ve discussed is what we are looking forward to.  I’m already looking forward to taking her to see Elton John in Vegas for Valentine’s Day 2009.  Its one of those once in a lifetime shows that I think we need to see.  We just missed seeing James Brown last year and had tickets to see a show but he died.

As I mentioned in my last entry, this journey has really helped me to assess my love for my wife.  Each night when I run, I remind myself of all of our great memories and all the things I still want to do with her.  They say when you run, you can get a runner’s high.  Tonight was one of those nights.  I matched my highschool cross country times from over 20 years ago on our cross country course. I wasn’t even trying and I was a little shocked when I checked my watch.  It was a full minute faster than I’d been runing this month.  All I remember doing was listening some music by Sugarland and the next thing you know my run was over.  I barely even remember running up the steep hill near the end of my run.  I was listening so intently to the lyrics of one of their songs, I just lost track of my time.

Well eat your heart Dara Torres!  I too can do in my 40s what those half our age can do.  Now I just wish we could find the time to accomplish more in life.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Why the Analogy with Roads, Highways, Journeys, etc.?

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“Life is a Highway, I want to ride it all night long” – Rascal Flatts

People have emailed me and asked why I title many of my posts as Life is a Highway.  Well it is the name of a little song by a country band, Rascal Flatts.  I’m not a country enthusiast but I find the song catchy, uplifting and I found the lyrics to how I want to live life:

One of my main points that I live my life by is to enjoy the journey because sometimes no matter how great the reward is at the end, the effort and experience of getting there is more rewarding.  Whether it is driving across the country and enjoying the beautiful scenery, completing a huge task successfully with a group of people who show a great sense of teamwork, or fighting cancer and finding out who your friends really are, there are so many journeys that we all take each day.  The car, my car, Herbie, is also my vehicle that gets me around town.  to me there is no other car windshield that I ‘d rather watch people through as my journey crosses the streets of San Francisco each day.  I was lucky to be born in one of the most beautiful cities in the world and there is no use avoiding its rich culture and history.

Someone else asked me why I seem to write my updates late at night.  Well it is usually the first time all day that I take for myself and I often go running late at night.  It is so peaceful out and I run like I live my life.  I’ve always been a distance runner and when I run I love to soak in the surroundings.  I get to run two very beautiful streets at night which are now lined with holiday lights already.  Tonight I soaked in the crisp air, stared at the full moon through the branches, and window shopped along world famous Fillmore St. and Sacramento St. .  Window shopping is really cheap when all the stores are closed already.  Smelling the perfume of women walking home, men smelling like their fifth bourbon, and the smells of the fries from the Johnny Rockets burger joint all are spices of life that I soak in on my run each evening.

It’s not just my journey that I enjoy, but the journeys of others.

Why run?  Why run so late?  Running is for my life.  High Cholesterol runs in my family and I do it for me and my kids.  Blogging is for me and my kids too.  I was a terrible history student , but I do vow that I will not repeat my dad’s mistakes.   Although my dad was a wonderful dad, he kept his feelings to himself.  The stresses I think ultimately led to his heart attack.  Expressing myself is something I aim to do through my blogging.  My goal is to be there for my grandchildren.  I want to give back to them.  With our generation living longer than our ancestors ever did, I hope to be able to give to my grandchildren life lessons that my own father never got to provide to his own grandchildren.

I mentioned my wife’s cancer.  It has been a rough journey.  Someone asked me why I wouldn’t want to talk about such a horrible experience.  Well life has many bumps and we tend to suppress the bad memories and focus on the good ones.  For me this journey through cancer has been a great learning experience for me.  I’ve learned so much about myself, my love for my wife, and my respect for the limited time we have on this Earth.  I will never forget these days, the pain, the joys and the many people I may never see again.  And if I do, I can look back and hopefully see a person on these pages who has grown.

Alright, time to pull over and get some rest!