I'm a pisces, but I had cancer!

Well, Monday officially marked my fifth immunotherapy treatment, my ninth round of chemo ever, and first of four rounds of this specific chemo, Carboplatin. The good news is that it's not as debilitating as the AC/T drugs. The bad news is that it's still chemo, and is bringing up a lot of old feelings, both emotional and physical. Emotionally, I'm burnt out on this shit. I'm sick of drugs and doctors and medications. I feel like after 10 months, I've done my fair share of gdamn cancer treatment, and all this extra stuff just seems, well, excessive. Physically, I've got the slightest undercurrent of nausea running at most times, paired with that familiar and persistent heartburn I used to get in the days after a chemo treatment. There's no sugarcoating it, it sucks. And I'm feeling down.  But of course, the down is always punctuated with the knowledge that it could be a lot worse, and the good folks in my life are always working to make things better f...

Greetings, friends, long time no type. Hope you all have entered what is objectively the worst period of the year in good spirits! Greg and I had a slow start to the year with our respective colds. After a period of recoup, we eventually left for Miami, which as you can tell from the below collage, involved good weather, good food and drink, catching-up with old friends Shaina and Bjorn (respectively), sitting by a pool for an afternoon, and lots of selfies. It was so fun, but way too short. I hope we can go back/get away again soon! Shortly after getting back from Miami, it was back to reality, at least for me*. And there is no harsher reality than the reality of more cancer treatment! Today, I finally met with my new oncologist, Dr. M. I really liked her- she was friendly, straightforward, and did not make me wait long. What I did not love, but what was somewhat anticipated, was that she recommended that I start an IV chemo regimen, called carboplatin, with m...

A quick post to say happy new year to all you friends and lovers out there. To say this has been a difficult year would be an understatement, and I close it out feeling how I spent a whole lot of it, which is sick as hell. Since last weekend, I came down with a terrible cold, and now Greg has caught whatever it is that I have. So that sucks. And because I'm too sick/tired/lazy to try and turn this into any kind of narrative, I'm about to throw an amalgamation of things that have happened over the last few weeks at you, in no particular order. I finished radiation, rang the bell at MSKCC, and had a great NYC day with Nicole: I made a ton of cookies for Christmas/Hanukkah with Katie, and a few on my own too (I swear the non-decorated ones taste better than they look):   I GOT macaron cookies from the Mazzella clan*:  We celebrated Christmas Eve with Martina and co., and had a wonderful feast of the seven fishes. We followed tha...

Tomorrow, I will be done with radiation. I know what you’re thinking- that went by fast! Well, sure, if you say so! It has been a whirlwind of a month, one filled with the standard busyness of the period between Thanksgiving and New Years, made all the more tiring by having to schlepp to the Upper East Side everyday to receive small doses of radiation to my chest wall. The bad news is, I’m pretty exhausted by it all. The good news is, it is mostly a tolerable tired, and the effects have been fairly minimal.*   Also, looking on the bright side, being in the city everyday meant that I could periodically do cool things before/after treatment. Like when I got to go on a private tour of the Yayoi Kusama exhibit with Aar and co. at David Zwirner a few weeks back: Throughout treatment, there was really only one day when I just couldn’t, so I came home, laid on the couch, and did this: BUT, just to be clear, that was after a few weeks of lots of things that kept me out ...

Since I recently kind of got sick of not posting on social media about this huge part of my life*, I believe there are a few new readers joining us- if so, welcome! Thank you for being interested enough to join in for my ramblings. So let's get this party started. Happy Thanksgiving weekend, everybody! Since my last post, I have been keeping on top of my daily radiation sessions- as of Friday, I've officially finished 11 of 25, or 44% of my treatments! It's been mostly uneventful/tolerable, but I did have a bit of a breakdown at my session on Friday. You see, every 5 days or so of treatment, my radiation techs** are required to take images of my chest wall. This involves me lying still, half-naked, and with my arms above my head in the exact same position on a very hard table for roughly an hour. Mind you, this would be very uncomfortable for just about anyone, but it is especially uncomfortable for someone not even 2 months out from a double mastectomy/axillary lymph nod...

Hello! It may have been the longest stretch of time I've gone without posting since starting this blog, and that is mostly a good thing. It means that I've had the energy to get back into the swing of things, and to be busy. I recently listened to  a podcast  by the woman who wrote the book I reference in my breast cancer awareness month post and she said something that really rang true to me. In describing her life pre-cancer, she said something along the lines of, "our life was full of well, a whole lot of life." I very much feel the same way. And getting back to a new normal, one with a whole lot of doctors, but also a whole lot of well, life, has been very cathartic for me. This has meant that:  I've been prepping my lectures for my class (and giving them once a week) and going grocery shopping and cooking us dinner.  I've been making carrot cakes for Grisha and celebrating him with all of our nearest and dearest:  I've been going to PT,...