The wait

I finally have a surgery date!

But it isn’t until mid July. Gah! That’s over a month away!

By then it’ll be two months since the mass was found and I was medivac’d out (yes, that is a picture of the almost 15cm mass over on the right).

It seems obscene to wait so long, but what can I do.

The thoughts swirling in my head:

• these are the experts and they must have triaged me to be not as important for a good and hopeful reason. They do have all my tests and scan results.
• if they didn’t, that really sucks. I hope the delay isn’t just due to a long wait list, or someone’s vacation
• I feel like any of my dogs would have had surgery within a week to remove a mass
• is it spreading like wildfire right now?
• will this delay change the outcome?
• is there anything I can do?
• people really have a lot of unsolicited advice for me, everything from supplements, to diet, to fighting for a sooner date. I know everyone means well, but sometimes I just have to let the calls go to voicemail and texts and emails sit unanswered to get through the day
• my sister’s wedding is less than 2 weeks after the surgery date. I guess I’m officially not going to make it now

My mood is all over the place. From weepy to angry to normal. The wait day after day for a phone call with a surgery date was terrible. At least now I know when it is.

But how to get through the next month? I’m still working, however I’m off the front lines and am working away on projects, taking client tickets only when I’m up to it. My coworkers and team lead and HR team are so kind and generous. I work mostly from my new recliner in the living room. Sitting up in a desk chair for too long is painful on my abdomen since this mass is already pressing on everything enough as is.

I have no idea if this is going to have a good outcome, or if this is my last summer. Not something easy to wrap your head around. Although who ever knows if it is their last summer? You don’t.

There are lots of ovarian cancers, I don’t what which type I have, if it is even definitely ovarian cancer, or what the staging or spread is. With a month ahead of me with no treatment, just discomfort and pain, I need to try to live! I haven’t left the house much in the last month. I don’t have the strength to walk Hank – he pulls too much. Some days I can walk a bunch of blocks, and other days I feel like I can walk about 1 block.

I can’t eat much at a time, because it feels like there is no room in me left for food. Still room for ice cream from time to time though 🙂

Today I did more than I’ve done in a month, maybe combined. I went to the Farmer’s Market, bought some flowers (the last of the local stock of bedding plants) and planted 5 hanging baskets. I hadn’t intended to plant flowers because I thought I’d be away for surgery, but turns out I’m here, and I love flowers, so flowers it is.

Then I got an ice cream and sat on the bench overlooking the Yukon River and talked to a tourist, Jill, from Kansas City for 45 minutes. Then I came home, mixed some soil and fertilizer, planted the 5 pots, put up the shade cloth for Hank in his new outdoor kennel, found him a pail and filled it with water, and sat outside in a lawn chair absorbing some sun. Life goes on. I have to go into this surgery happy and otherwise healthy. If I’m just going to rot away in my arm chair, then I might as well call it quits now.

I’m able to manage the pain pretty well on 3 extra strength Advil a day now, and maybe 1-2 days a week I need the hydromorphone pills too. My pants and shorts are getting tight from this growing… thing. Pajama pants and shorts are the most comfortable. I promise I’m not wearing them around town (yet).

Summer is super short in Dawson, so I’ve decided I’m not missing it. Sure I might not be able to ride in a vehicle very far (bumps are killer) or haul firewood, and I probably shouldn’t cut the grass or weedwack, or drink a bunch of summer beers, but I’ll do what I can, especially if Jeff isn’t looking 🙂

I know you really came here for pictures, so here are a few:

View from the bench while I had that ice cream today.

Sometimes I just have to lie down and cuddle Sally. This was after we watched squirrel and bird videos for cats on my iPhone.

Hank’s new outdoor kennel!

His first outdoor snooze in his new kennel.