The Adventures of BaldyLocks -Cancer Blog

Fun Day

2011-12-14T09:30:00.000-08:00

The mountain and I had a date a few days ago. We haven't seen each other much since I started working again but I plan on making it more. There's nothing like the view after my own two feet have taken me to the top.

Still Struggling

2011-11-10T13:12:00.000-08:00

I can't believe I'm still struggling. Things are going so well, yet it doesn't take much for a complete setback. I guess it's not a complete setback but it sure feels like it.

I had my flu shot a couple of weeks ago but before it could kick in my son had bronchitis and gave it to me. I'm pretty good at avoiding illnesses that pass through the house but this one caught me. I lost my voice for 6 days and had the worst sore throat. I went off to a clinic and then a few days after that my Dr. They swabbed me for strep but I guess it turned out to be viral rather than bacterial. I have been immobile for a week. Partway through after being on penicillin for a few days without improvement I started to get scared. Not much scares me but my mind does wonder when I get bruises.

I never had bruises even though they are the most common symptom of leukemia. So when I get them they make me wonder. Unfortunately being sick this week has paralleled my experience of when I was diagnosed and almost died. I found myself keeping my phone with me in bed in case I couldn't get up and needed to call for help. I even felt afraid that I might die in the night. I'm sure all those that have had cancer can relate to what I'm saying. What seems on the outside to be an irrational fear, becomes very plausible in a post cancer reality. This last week has been too, too similar to what was almost my very last week.

So I was able to tell my Dr. my fear and she helped assure me that it's most likely a flu.

So now that I've survived the week, I feel tired because I know what comes now. It's hard to get my body back to being like it was after even a week of being sick. It's always uphill. Why are things always up hill these days? So yesterday I managed to wash my hair. Today I managed to get dressed and I'm hoping to make it out of the house for a walk. At times like this I want to run but I'm back to baby steps. God I hate baby steps.

Inspiration

2011-11-07T13:48:00.001-08:00

Starting Fresh

2011-11-02T22:09:00.001-07:00

"She's doing the disabled thing again"

2011-10-04T20:06:00.000-07:00

I've been working a lot lot, even when I probably shouldn't be. I say yes a lot even when I know it might knock me flat. I like to at least try.

The last few weeks at work (job #1) I've been covering for someone that has left even though I know I can't keep doing it, as well as working job #2. I've also been to a few outrageous parties (whole other story) when I probably should have stayed in bed. The only problem is that missing out on life isn't worth it so I try to mitigate the suffering that will follow. My days have been like this, work-work-work-work-rest/suffer-work-party-suffer-rest-work-work-work-work-work-suffer-party-suffer-suffer -work etc. I'm not complaining, this is the best things have been for years.

Yesterday one of my best friend's flew the coop. She has run off to Tokyo for a couple of years and we had a send off party for her. It's also my birthday this week. I've been slooowing down as the days go by.

So just now I went to wash my socks for work tomorrow. I found myself staring into a washing machine full of unclean towels. Then I looked into the dryer and there is a load of clean and dried boys things. I couldn't find the energy to switch them so I called both of my sons. They usually ignore me these days, now that my needs aren't so acute. They used to help me around when I was ill.

There must have been some sort of tone in my voice that they remembered because they both came running. They found me on the floor of the laundry room where I had sunk from exhaustion. Now that I'm working, the laundry has piled up to epic proportions. I just don't have the energy for it but I need clean socks for tomorrow so I don't repel my coworkers.

As I lay there concealed in mountains of bluejeans and T-shirts mumbling that I need clean socks, I heard my youngest say, "She's doing the disabled thing again."

They snickered at me, rolled me out into the hallway and switched the laundry.

Work Update

2011-10-03T11:25:00.000-07:00

Things are moving so quickly. I have been getting habituated at work. It's been hard and hard on my body but I love it. I love being needed again. I love that I fit in.

I figured out the source of my extreme anxiety and stress. There had been an accident with a tiny neighbor child weeks ago and I was the first one one the scene. I was quick, calm and efficient but I did not know if the child was alive. I had just gotten ready for work and was boiling some water for tea when it happend and I heard the screams from the mother.

I ran out side with my phone and called 911. I attended the scene and helped as much as I could. Then when the paramedics came I went to work. It all spiralled down for me from there. Miracle upon miracles, the baby is okay. I have seen her smiling little face since and cannot believe she was alright. She had fallen on a spike that went 3cm into her little head right next to her eye. It somehow just punctured her nasal cavity and when she gets a little older there may hardly be a scar.

As for me my memory tanked and I couldn't concentrate at work enough to remember anything. I began making mistakes and feeling like I was going to be fired. Anxiety took me right over and I didn't want my kids to be out. My heart has been quickly pounding over next to nothing. It's unbearable at times.

Well, I was diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The recent accident wasn't the cause it was just the trigger. The original trauma came when I was a girl. When I realized what was happening to me I felt a little better but it still continues. I'm hoping there's something that can be done.

As for work I'm glad to know it wasn't the reason I've been faltering so badly.

I do know that I need to build confidence at work and probably in life in general. Being unable to work for 5 years really affects your psyche. I often find myself second guessing my own judgment. I ask a lot of questions but now I realize I need to work things out for myself and know that I can come to the answer on my own. It's so weird. I feel like I'm reliving a part of my less secure life. I had times when I was young and made mistakes but grew into an intelligent woman who knows how to take care of things.

Feeling insecure is not something that I want to continue. As a person I am very confident and I know soon I will feel that in regards to work too.

"Just a bump in the road" is what a friend would say. My cancer would be just a bump in the road. Some bump.

Adjusting

2011-09-06T11:19:00.000-07:00

Thank you to everyone who has been giving me tips on where to find info and support on working again.

I've been having a lot of anxiety lately. I'm hoping it's just a phase that I will work through. I have had a good talk with a friend of mine and just being able to talk about it has improved things. Sometimes all it takes is the presence of someone you feel close to.

This experience has also made me realize it would be nice to have someone in my life. That thought pops up now and again. I'm not really sure how to reenter the world of dating but I know that I'd like to at least try. I'm sure there is someone who is a little like me, being busy with life wondering when I will show up in their world. That's what I like to think anyway.

Who Do I Call?

2011-09-02T18:21:00.000-07:00

I'm sitting here wondering who to call. I want to tell someone what a hard time I'm having adjusting to work. There's no one to tell, I guess. At times like this I feel like I'm the one in slow motion in a scene where people in the background speed by. People have lives, they do things when they get off of work and on the weekends. They get together, go camping, have drinks and do other things I'm not a part of. When I am able to make it I'm only half there.

Where I used to live with occasional nausea, hip pain from my bursitis, joint stiffness/pain and getting through my day, I'm now trying to manage all that while getting a lot of things done at work. I'm putting everything into being precise, effective and as productive as possible while having the uncomfortable feeling of failing at all. I ignore my pain. I wish to do better and put all my effort into doing so. Then I find I've forgotten something and stress wells up inside of me. It's okay but as each and every little minor mistake builds onto my psyche I wear it as a backpack. It gets heavier and heavier as the days goes by.

Friends have said, "Oh that's normal", or "Now you know what it's like for everyone else", when I talk about my failings. My memory was very much above average before, not so much now. The frustration I feel over it is completely overwhelming.

I try and tell myself it's okay, that not being perfect is okay. I've never believed that of myself. I have no problem accepting others as humanly flawed but cannot even conceive of it being me. I don't think I'm perfect, I just actively do everything within my power to minimize the imperfectness ( <---like in that sentence structure). I often make up the gap of normalcy and excellence with sheer will power and stubbornly refusing to stop until I've done %110. Always %110. That was always my mantra through simultaneously single parenting, working and completing my degree.

I thought I had learned something since almost biting the big one. I thought I had become easier on myself and learned how to be gentle. How can I still feel that way? I never used to dispair about it, I just worked harder. Maybe I should be in some sort of 12 step program for perfectionists anonymous. I'd probably try to be the best recovering perfectionist there, I'd actually kick everyone's asses in anti perfectionism. I don't know where this high achieving streak comes from....

Or maybe I do. I didn't have the kindest of childhoods. And I remember in elementary school, the boys chasing me with worms by shoving the worm directly in my face screaming that I was scared because I was a girl. I taught them a lesson by tackling them, taking the worm from them and then chasing THEM around with it. They screamed their sissy little heads off. They never did that to me again. I always had to climb higher, run faster and be tougher. So much for being non competitive. The problem with being competitive with yourself is that you're always the loser.

I just want to do well at work work and be valuable again. I feel like every little mistake or being a little bit slower than I would have been before, is me failing. Failing to be of any good to anyone.

I really used to struggle hard with this. Am I no different than I was before pre cancer?

Work

2011-08-23T20:32:00.001-07:00

I know I've disappeared from the blog front. I wish I could say I was out having great summer adventures and I am in a way. It's been taking everything I have to work at my new jobs. Jobs plural. I never ever do things halfway, I'm in a %125 or I'm out.

I'm so ecstatically, over the top happy to be employable again, you have no idea. Five years off for a naturally ambitious person like me is a slow painful experience. I felt irrelevant, unneeded, incapable and useless. I spent each and every day pinning about the day I would be well enough again for life. Five years is a hell of a long time to be trapped inside your own house with your personal demons (and I don't mean my sons).

I found that it was like a slow motion life-passing-in-front-of-your-eyes kind of gig. Every moment of my life, often painful ones, bubbled up to the surface. Truthfully they were things I had blocked from my mind with work. Keeping busy was like a drug to me before and this post existence is like being strapped to a chair forced to watch movies of my life, highlighting the mistakes, the losses and all that. Painful. I've made mistakes. It's hard to know what the worst ones may have been.

I've also done some things damn well.

I always seem to be going farther than my own capacity. Therefore one job turns into two. After the hellish first couple of months where I was in complete pain until I scraped myself out of bed to go back the next day, I've continued to go too far. I'm only working 3 shortish days a week and I have shifts of my other job tucked here and there. I decided to forego my summer for this grand experience and I'm mostly happy with it, except for the fact that I haven't gotten to enjoy any summer!

That and I felt so confident like I was getting my feet again, that I booked the first two weeks of August working. I worked almost every day. Near the end of the two weeks I felt myself melting and my functioning took a nosedive. It was even noticed by my boss which felt like a real kick in the gut. I go to work and while I'm there I swing between, "I can do this! I can do this!", to, "Oh my god, they are going to fire me" I seem to even manage to tell myself they are going to fire me when I'm doing good job.

I have such high standards for myself that I do things well, but I drive myself to the brink of insanity. I guess I'm never quite good enough for myself. Anyway, I just got carried off on a tangent. I'm tired. I worked myself to the point on non functioning (did I say that already?) and it's been hard. Too tired to eat, too tired to drink, I crave goodies when I'm laid out like this. I have completely crashed. My house of cards has come down.

What did I expect?

I had my three days off hoping to recuperate and I went back to work in the same state. I managed to get through another week and am trying my best to recoup before going back again. I am on my third consecutive pajamas day. I even had a shower yesterday just to put them right back on again. If my other job calls I will have to say no, I'm kind of scared.

I need to get back to it and keep going, not just lay on the floor and become useless again. I've been too tired to even sit at my computer and respond to emails. The lousy thing is I didn't even make it a financially worthwhile compared to pacing myself through the month. I'm nowhere. Well, I'm not nowhere, I'm employed.

I love being employed. I know my limits now and won't push them again.

Well heck, who am I kidding.

Love

2011-07-31T14:46:00.000-07:00

Love has begun to be a thing that's simply a curiosity to me. Something that seems such a stranger that it's like an object I'd like to poke with a stick. I don't know if I'd even know how to do it anymore.

I see others in their relationships and it seems artificial to me. I see very authentic love and but it's like learning how to speak another language only from learning by a textbook but never hearing it. Or like having the wind brushing against your skin described to you without ever having felt it.

It's just been a damn long time, survival has been my only agenda for 5 years. I've noticed that people like to refer to someone single as being, 'desperate'. I've heard that many times but it doesn't make real sense. I like being on my own. Being single doesn't make one desperate.

I have thought about love and dating over the years. I've contemplated making a date to start caring about it, like maybe next year? or maybe in the summer or maybe in 3 months, yet those dates never seem to arise. Life has been so incredibly painful since cancer, why would I want to share that? I still end up having days of excruciating pain from graft vs host and I like to hide when I'm not well. I don't like anyone to know about it, I don't like anyone seeing it. I feel like and animal that crawls into it's den when it's ill, I'm not all that into sharesies.

I don't share communal food (like at parties), I don't want to share germs by being so close to anyone. The last few years has had my life on the line and I won't take chances being exposed to strangers. I was barred by my doctors from going on busses, movie theatres, airplanes etc for that exact reason. I don't want to have to explain what's happend to me, why I get so tired, explain what my limitations are or open up to anyone about having to have surgery on my vagina. It sounds like a complete nightmare.

It doesn't help that my previous loves left me hanging. I've never had someone that is by my side for me, would stand up for me, choose me over others or give me some emotional safety. I have learned through trial and error that the only one I can count on in life is myself. I can count on me, I will never betray myself or abandon myself. I believe in me. I can show myself kindness. I can get myself the things that I need.

I never want to be sitting in a hospital again clinging to life wondering, watching the door for him to walk in. Realizing that the person I had loved isn't bothered that I may die.

Victoria's Pride Parade

2011-07-17T10:32:00.001-07:00

As Canadians we love to celebrate our friends and family who identify as gay, bisexual, transgendered or anything else. A few years ago when I moved into the city I realized I was only a few blocks from the Pride Parade. I'm not a fan of parades and avoid them whenever possible but when I walked up to Pride I was overjoyed to see all manner of people, dressed in wigs, glitter, rollerskates and not wearing much else.

Music pumps as thousands of smiling parade participants and onlookers line the streets. I'm a huge fan of creativity and there is something special about Pride that allows people to be themselves, even if that is wearing a blue wig and body glitter.

That day 2 years ago I found myself with my camera, dancing down the street behind the last float with the best sound system. One of my dreams has always been to dance in the streets of Brazil, Victoria filled the bill for me. As the parade passes, the parade watchers follow behind and end up at a large field where there is food, a beer garden and lots of entertainment for all ages.

This particular year I managed to get one of my best friends to come with me and she had a blast. The float was traveling extra fast this year and I'm so tired from work that I could barely keep up to it's blasting speakers. She, on the other hand, managed to be pirouetting down the street. I joked to her that there was probably already video of us online as we were at the head of literally thousands of people. Glancing at the street behind us was a real trip. Anyway, the second she could, she checked and found this footage. I come into view at 32 seconds. I'm in black with orange flowers in my hair and she is the one spinning. Man do I look tired. The world famous Empress is in the background.

The really cool thing about it is two of my Adventure List items are right in front of us. I want to try burlesque with the Cheescake Burlesque troupe, which are the women in pink and red with the parasoles. I also want to roll with the Eves of Destruction, a roller derby team which are in the purple shirts and on roller skates.

We then hit the beer garden which has always been off limits to me as I have always been with a gaggle of small boys. Not this year! I was kid free except for my friends newly minted gay son. He found his friends and disappeared into the crowd leaving us to misbehave without him. As our children become older it feels like our roles are reversing. They get more responsible and give us heck for having fun, or that's how it feels. It's just weird when they give the "tsk tsk, there she goes again".

Tangent #1, I biked to a friend's get together a few weeks ago and called to check in with my youngest son before I headed home. He had a fit when he found out I was biking home on the trail in the dark. He refused to let me ride home. He had such a fit that I promised him I wouldn't ride, put the bike in the back of a friend's truck and sulked as they gave me a ride home.

So we danced through the streets to the beer garden where we had a few drinks sitting on the grass watching the hilarity of the stage shows. My favourite was, Miss Vicky, singing, "I'm just a White Trash Drag Queen". Actually the best, best part of all was the security guard who didn't want to let me in without ID. I said in exasperation, "I'm 38 years old!" and my friend said, "Can our wrinkles please let us in?" BINGO! He reluctantly let us in.

Tangent #2 Last year I went to the beer garden with friends and didn't have my ID. When I got to the security guard and told him that I didn't bring my ID he said, "No problem, you definitely look old". If that wasn't embarrassing enough everyone in the loooong line behind me heard what he said and there was a collective ,"Ooooooooh," from the audience as they felt my pain and embarrassment. 'Burn', as my kids would say.

The revelry ended when her we found her son on the other side of the chain link fence giving us his "lets' go" face. We motioned that we'd be 15 more minutes, so he stood there staring at us for 15 more minutes willing us to leave. We could feel the weight of his scowl so we left. He was our gay muse after all.

In his hand were a pair of pink fairy wings so we know he had some fun when we weren't looking. My story would have ended there if I hadn't done a face plant on the concrete on the way home. My fall was one part exhaustion (I tend to trip when I'm tired nowadays), one part a new pair of shoes that were a bit trippy, and 2 parts alcohol. My friend's poor son not only was mad that his mom was too intoxicated to drive him home but had the job of pulling me off the pavement. "tsk, tsk".

I left Pride with fond memories, a free T-shirt and huge scrapes and bruises on my leg. Like I said to another friend's 5 year old daughter the other day who was showing me her bruised knees, 'when you have bruises it means your having fun.'

Walking Amongst the Working

2011-07-15T21:44:00.000-07:00

I'd say by now I'm semi-completely, officially one of the working. It's so real and happening that I feel like I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop. I'm really happy about working, more happy than I can even type out here. I had started to feel like moving on was a dream slipping away from me, day by day.

What I'm excruciatingly happy for right this second is that I'm not in excruciating pain. Usually I come home from working my short day at the job (Awesome!) and can hardly walk because the bottom of my feet and hip hurt so much it feels like someone beat them with a cane all day. No exaggeration. I wonder how so much pain can be inflicted by such a benign situation. It's not like I have cords of wood strapped to my back walking 40 miles up hill in bare feet all day but my body doesn't know the difference.

I get home and crawl up the stairs to my room where I turn on my Netflix. I don't move until the next day when I go and do it again except maybe to put on a load of laundry.

That's when to my delight, I discovered the intercom button on my phone. I now call my sons every few minutes to ask for something whether I need it or not. They bring me dinner, glasses of water, I sent one boy to fetch me a brownie and when he came back empty handed because they were out, I sent him up the street for a chocolate bar. I give them instructions on chores to do in the house. Why didn't I know about that button before?

Occasionally I like to throw in a compliment just to keep them on their toes. *Ring ring* "This dinner is really good, thanks.", "Uhhh, your welcome" *CLICK*

Sometimes I ring just to rub it in their faces that I have 2 jobs. Whenever they give me lip as I lay in my bed after the fifteenth intercom call, I say, "Oh yeah, try having 2 jobs you little loafer. Your leukemia cancer survivor, bone marrow transplanted, graft/vs/host riddled, vagina surgeried, medicated up the hoohaa mom is kicking your A.S.S in the J.O.B department. The satisfaction that gives me has just keeps on giving. I could do it all day but after a while they claim 'they didn't hear it ring'.

So today I'm not in excruciating pain. Half that. SOoooo, that would be awful pain if it's half of excruciating? I hope to arrive at regular pain in no time and maybe dare to dream of a mildly painful workday. If only. I'm so glad I have a high pain tolerance. It's been a life saver. That and the intercom button.

Captive

2011-07-14T19:37:00.000-07:00

Usually I feel like my bed is my little safe space where I can curl up and rest but sometimes it feels like an island I can't escape from. I can get so exhausted that there's nowhere else for me to go.

I have a collage on the wall that a friend of mine made with, "DREAM", written on it in silver glitter. I also have a print from Art and Ghosts, my painting and a photo of a girl who went to my university around the same time as me. She was a blogger that wrote until her last day about living with a double lung transplant. The photograph is so beautiful and inspiring.

At some point in one of my travels to my oncologists I managed to get a nice duvet cover and another time, an antique bed for $30. I've clocked a lot of miles here (not that way! {unfortunately}), might as well have it looking nice and feeling comfy. Still sucks to be so tired that I can hardly move. Luckily that is less and less all the time.

New Job

2011-07-03T11:15:00.000-07:00

I applied for a new job and got it! It feels like everything has changed on a dime but for the better for once. I felt like my soul was rotting away here in my home. I wanted to be out doing things but I had nowhere to go. The first job that I went back to (after 5 years) has been really slow because it's the summer. My stamina is still low but improving and I think my excitement about where I'm going is helping tremendously.

The last few years an idea had developed about the atmosphere I'd like to be in. It actually feels somewhat essential rather than a choice. I need to be in a creative environment working with other creative people. A place where my skills are used and appreciated. Somewhere, where I feel charged up to get home and do some creative work like painting. I thought that would mean me creating that for myself and being self employed.

I tried to rent an itsy bitsy studio space a few months ago but it disappeared as soon as I applied for it. It felt like another small loss in a grand series of losses. I started feeling like there may never be a better space for me, or any place on this Earth. I feel disjointed and like I don't belong. I live in a beautiful neighborhood in the most desirable place in a very desirable city. Gratefully I live in social housing now which has kept us from being homeless but we don't fit in here.

The neighbors don't speak to us and everyone keeps to themselves where I'm used to knowing the people around me. The energy here is bad. I realized why people here won't talk to each other when I had the SWAT team surround my house because the person two doors over was selling drugs and had the neighbor on the other side of me subtly terrorizing me because my son put a millimeter ding on his car door. Our spaces are squeezed together and I have plenty of dings on my car door from the other neighbors and I paid him to have it repaired but this guy went ballistic and threatening. I had to request to move my parking space and avoid him until the day he was hauled away by the police for battering his family. Not so nice.

I'm sure most of the people here are probably nice but we pass by with no eye contact after me trying for 2 years to say, 'Hi' to them. It feels like an alternate universe living here. Beautiful yet as a small complex we are unwelcome.

This loss of feeling in control has hit me hard.

So applying for my first job helped me feel a bit better. Applying for and getting the second has made me feel useful again.

I work part time for a small local clothing design company that is far better than I could have imagined. Where I felt listless, I now feel energised. I'm scared of not physically being able to keep up but so far so good. I'm happy and I honestly can't say when I last felt that. I suspect it was two years ago before I moved here. I need to get out of this place. Getting out of this mountain of debt is going to be one hell of a struggle but at least I will be able to try.

I need to instill a feeling of confidence in me somewhere. I'm so happy to say it has started.

He's Crafty #2

2011-07-01T21:00:00.000-07:00

Nobody loves like a Canadian.

Last year I posted about waking up to find my sons silk-screening T-shirts and dressing in full Canadiana to spend the day frolicking at the festivities. Click here to see last year's post.

This year my youngest son wanted to make a shirt for his love and he did a great job cutting out the stencil, then printing it.

They printed two of her shirts and he, being the ultimate gentleman, modeled it for us.

I've come to the realization that he has gained my aptitude of goofing off in photos. I guess I won't be showing that photo to his grandma.

One thing I'm really grateful for today is that he and her are like two peas in a pod. Even despite being the old cynic I am, I'd swear they were made for each other. He takes really good care of her and she puts up with his nonsense, a LOT of nonsense. But I'm so happy for them. They've been strong for over a year now and she feels like part of the family. She is such a sweet girl and I'm happy to have her.

Trying

2011-06-29T15:37:00.000-07:00

The last 2 months I've been exercising again. Every time I've been able to get a bit stronger since my transplant, I have a huge setback by getting sick. It got to the point that I was afraid to try. I actually have an instinct to stop whatever I'm doing to keep my heart rate down. That's because I've always exceeded my capabilities and ended up bed ridden from exhaustion. There is nothing I hate more than being kept down waiting for my body to recover.

I wanted to mention that the reason I have such a hard time recovering is because I'm one of those lucky folk that ended up with chronic graft/vs/host disease from my transplant. As hard as it can be at times, it's not as hard as I had imagined it would be. When I read my binder that the hospital gave me on bone marrow transplants it gave me the percentages of those who would die from the procedure. Then it talked about the percentage of people who may get acute graft/vs/host. Then it talked about the percentage of people it would be fatal for. Then it talked about the percentage of people who would get chronic graft/vs/host and the percentage it would be fatal for. It was like reading a horror novel even with the perky little clip art. I was convinced that I would not be one of the %25 that would suffer with the chronic kind. I was happy (if you can call it that) when I had the acute GVHD but then it continued on.

Comparing it to the fear of what I thought it would be like, it's not that bad. It's fearing fear itself, I guess you could say. The good part of the GVHD is that it helps ensure longevity. Also, exercise in transplant patients is shown to increase our life spans.

So for my mood, that's a tougher one. In the past I dealt with my anxieties my working 24/7 and exercising. Post cancer, that's been impossible. Every day now that I get out and do something like hiking up the mountain or up hills in my neighborhood, I feel a strong sense of accomplishment. When I get home I feel like I'm being swallowed up by my circumstances.

In my pre cancer life I had to deal with harsh realities and I have experienced depression before. I did everything I could with my doctor until she told me there was nothing more she could do for me. Then I started counseling, not believing in it but determined to find a way to ease my chronic anxiety. The counseling was very helpful. I also started working even harder to change my circumstances. The more I was actively trying to fix it, the more in control I felt, the stronger I felt, the happier I felt.

I know medications for depression help people but they don't help me. I help me. The more I do to change what I've been dealt, the more in control I feel and the better I feel.

All through my transplant I reacted oddly to my medications, I turned into a big pain in the butt for my oncologists. I guess my chemistry is just different.

So I've been exercising for 2 months and am feeling stronger. I finally was able to go back to my old job but there are hardly any hours due to it being summer. I knew I need creativity in my life but I have been finding it so hard to be self motivated right now. I feel like I'm piled with impossible things.

So I applied for another job. It's in a creative studio atmosphere with other creative people. Somehow I managed to get the job even when there was a pile of applicants. So far I ride my bike downtown and get to work in a bright beautiful happy place. It's everything I wanted for my life but I'm working for someone else rather than doing it on my own. I hope I've found a way to fill those needs even if it's in a slightly different format. I'm flat out exhausted and in pain when I get home but I feel accomplished. I hope this new schedule helps me correct the imbalances that I live with right now.

When I got there on the first day I found out they had seen my website and knew that I had had cancer. I hadn't brought it up in the interview, not that I didn't intend to but it never came up. I felt it would have been like whacking someone on the head to bring it up out of the blue. Even though I ended up chatting with my employer about what I'd been through, there in that environment the cancer seemed small. It seemed like a small side piece of my life rather that the suffocating omnipresent monster blocking out the light. And that's what I'm looking for. Rather than seeing the ruined city, I want to see the sunset over the fields.

Changes

2011-06-27T12:12:00.000-07:00

My 5 year bone marrow transplant cancerversary is coming up quickly. I've been scarcely able to believe my life has changed so much in 5 years. Five years ago I had three young sons at home, I would get carded for liquor and I felt I had everything under control. I had a future, I had goals and a beautiful life spreading out in front of me. I lived in a beautiful place, had friends, savings in the bank and even a love. Everything was turning out correctly for my master plan.

I had worked incredibly hard for years to gain the opportunities that were laid out before me. I was applying for and expecting a big fat scholarship for my MBA degree which I was going to take over seas, giving my sons a new experience and view of the world.

I felt I could do anything, really, anything. The world was waiting for me.

Now? I see a big blank pace where my life used to be. In all my planning and preparing for success in my life, I had gotten to the age of 35 in my mind. I hadn't really developed an idea or concept of what I would be doing afterwards. Now I'm 38 and I could never in my worst nightmares have imagined this.

First cancer and then living with graft/vs/host disease. I have managed to finally get back to work and am very pleased about that but I still can't imagine my future. I feel like I am in the final stages of my life, how I would expect to be thinking in my 80's yet I'm 38. My body seems so old now. One minute I was on a date with a 24 year old (not my love) and then 6 months later I was getting mocked on the ferry by the same guys that would have been trying to pick me up before. How did I go from looking 24 to like a soccer mom in 5 years? My hair is thinner, wrinkles have moved in as well as 30lbs.

I really hate myself. I realize this is depression from long term illness creeping in but where the hell am I? What am I doing?

Instead of three sweet little boys who need me, I have one adult son, 21, and two self absorbed teenagers. They don't need me. They need their friends, their girlfriends and I am now the person that keeps them from having fun. This was a developmental phase I was completely prepared for before I became incapacitated, but now in this vulnerability it seems very difficult. One girl that's here often loves to make comments about how old and ugly certain people are. There was an actual comment once about, who cares if a commet killed us in __ years because they would be SO old anyway. The age they were talking about was 38. These stupid little comments shouldn't hit me so hard, but they do. I feel disfigured even though I look my age.

I have had a lot of adversity in my life but I plowed through, confident in the knowledge that I could tackle any mountain. Now the mountain is on top of me. The more time goes by the harder this seems. I was confident I would be better in a year, then in another year, then in another. Now I am not confident of anything.

I have read books on cancer and mortality, I have read books on recovery and loss, recovering art and creativity, I even recently read the entire set of Twilight novels. This in itself is a huge accomplishment because I couldn't read for almost 4 years post transplant. My brain was scrambled and the pages of words would scramble as I tried to read and retain them. As a child I would devour a novel a day.

I am a fixer. I need to fix problems that crop up in my life, I tackle them like they are marshmallow peeps in front of a hungry toddler. As much as I try and tackle this post cancer life problem, I feel like I'm trying to fill a bottomless pit with shovels full of feathers.

Betty Fox Passes

2011-06-18T20:23:00.000-07:00

I was really sad today to hear about the passing of Betty Fox. She kept her son, Terry Fox's memory and passion alive after his passing 30 years ago. My sons have had the honour of meeting her and her husband when they came to speak at their schools. She never gave up the hope and it felt to me like Terry Fox's mission was alive and well through them. I often saw her smiling face on TV when she was at the events in our city.

If anyone was a warrior it was her. She lost so much but kept on smiling and changing lives. Some people in life give so much and I am thankful for that.

R.I.P Betty Fox.

Sweat

2011-06-17T17:08:00.000-07:00

I can feel the sweat beading on my forehead. I marched my way into the university career centre today. I'm an almni so I have access to their resources. I hadn't really planned that but next thing you know I am sitting in an office explaining my situation and asking zillions of questions. When my mind gets set on something, it's like winding up a propellor and letting it go. Without even planning to I get things in motion. Sometimes I think it's an obsessive personality, stubbornness or maybe a healthy mix of both.

So there I was. Next thing you know I got myself home and have been plugging away at the computer ever since. I typed up a resume and sent it into the place I have in mind. I've been thinking of applying there for a while and weighing the pros and cons. I eventually came to a big YES. I worry about my abilities and I worry about my health but I have to just do it.

I hate doing anything less than %100 and my grades from university show that freaky stubbornness and high achievement. I believe those are assets that a company would find very useful. It's part time so I hope that I can ingeniously schedule in my recovery time between shifts. I still can't handle more than the occasional shift of a few hours.

I just have to trust that I know my body and that it will endure this. I would have preferred to spend a week or so obsessively perfecting my resume so it's the best resume of all time but it needed to go in. It will have to do.

I think I'll go for a nice calm walk.

Resume

2011-06-16T14:27:00.001-07:00

How do I explain an empty resume? I'm trying to do a new one and although I've done a lot of interesting things, none of them seem to be resume worthy. My main occupation this last 5 years has been to heal. Doing my best to survive day to day also doen't quite seem resume worthy. I have a lot of experience in my life which does fit but it's all before the last 5. I'm a bit stumped on this one.

I feel like I wil have CANCER stamped on my forehead if I try and have an interview. I still stumble and stutter when I meet someone new and they "wonder what I do". When I tell them I'm an artist they always want to know, "do I make my living that way". And every time I'm not sure how to say, I've been knocked off my feet for the last 5 years due to having cancer and a bone marrow transplant.

There is always the caught in the headlights kind of look and the awkwardness that follows. They try and not let it show while I answer about some of the things I've been doing since then, which is what they asked about, and then the conversation trails off.

I let them meander away and then always wonder what I should have said instead. I somehow foresee this as how an interview would go. The interviewer feeling sorry or freaked about me.

Ramblings

2011-06-15T13:50:00.000-07:00

I read in the newspaper today an article that says people over 50 who are struck with cancer or another life threatening or chronic illness are susceptible to depression. The article then went on to explain why people over 50 who've had cancer are susceptible. It gave very reasonable sounding guesses and ideas of how we could help them combat the depression.

As I was reading it I was feeling a bit dubious about the extra sensitivity this age group has regarding cancer. Then my suspicion was confirmed when at the end of the article it stated that only people over 50 and who were living independently were studied.

So anyone under that age of 50 was just assumed to rebound better. Truthfully the entire study and it's assumptions are severely lacking when it doesn't include my age or anyone else. Am I really rebounding better? Am I not feeling the weight of the 5 years of post cancer life on me? I hate that these studies are incomplete and the outcomes are assumed. I hate that there seems to be a big black hole for having cancer between the ages of 18 and 50. I had so many appointments with my GP putting out fires and dealing with the aftermath of my stem cell transplant that the Dr finally suggested I should 'see someone' about living with chronic illness.

Just stating to me that I have chronic illness was enough to knock me off my socks. I'm sure that I could have come to that conclusion myself but my brain was so hell bent on getting better like I would shed a cloak and walk into the light.

So this recovery is a process. Processes within processes. Now at almost 5 years I feel so ultimately crushed, I have no idea what to do. It's like continuing to take it step by step forward when your feet have been cut off.

So where was I supposed to find someone to talk to about living with chronic illness at the age of 36? Almost 5 years and I still feel like a square peg in a round hole.

The only time I get to feel like I belong somewhere because someone can actually see me for who I am, is my main oncologist. That doesn't seem right. I'm invisible.

One of the most helpful things I've heard in quite sometime was Mathew Zachary from the i2Y Foundation state that he was 10 years out from his cancer and still felt lost. Life didn't make sense to him yet. I am so grateful for that small comment because we have such high expectations for ourselves and 5 years out/still struggling feels like a failure of the biggest kind.

Financial Armageddon

2011-06-09T13:54:00.000-07:00

My financial armageddon has come. I've been slowly slipping into debt with my medications that are over and above what I bring in in a month along with housing and feeding my sons and I. I've done everything I can to keep us afloat and am happy to say I just managed to get back to work. The back to work transition went smoothly enough but there have been some extra costs like work clothes, paying for parking etc. That along with a son graduating has put me under. I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to cut off my internet in a couple of days unless I can figure something out.

I know I'm not much different than anyone getting through these tough times but my circumstances have been extreme. Just because we escape cancer with our lives doesn't mean we escape all the aftermath. I've tried so hard, to be a good mother and to take care of my financial responsibilities. I want nothing more than to pay down my debts and be able to get ahead one day. I'm not sure if I'll ever get the opportunity. I escaped near homelessness 2 years ago but have run out of options now. Getting well enough to get back to work has been my focus but I'm still only able to work a very limited amount. It's just too little, too late.

My resourcefulness has finally hit a brick wall.

Published!

2011-05-31T22:24:00.000-07:00

I picked up a package in my mail today. It's the Cancer Connections book which I was just published in. It's the best present I've ever gotten. I clutched it to my chest like it was a new baby and I walked home grinning the biggest grin.

People stared a little but I didn't mind. I swear I was glowing all the way home until I was able to open it and see where I was.

Beautiful. Since I've become so hyper aware of my own mortality, I've wanted there to be something that will live beyond me. Something that proves I existed. Not just as a mother but as me.

And here it is.

50/50

2011-05-28T01:03:00.000-07:00

Sounds familiar. And the plot feels completely real to me. I hate mentioning my chances but it's 61% of living a disease free life. Fuck that. But this movies sounds good.

Visiting the Vampires

2011-05-26T16:38:00.000-07:00

I got the deed done. It didn't feel like it had been six months rather than two weeks since I had my bloodwork done last but I sure caused them some trouble. Apparently I had been 'discharged' from the lab. By whom, I have no idea.

I restrained my self from making the same joke I make every time I go there despite it being a fresh new person I'd never seen before. The whole thing feels like second nature to me, I breeze through it like others would make a coffee order.

"One standing order with an add on, not on the arms, doesn't hurt, no tape. Thanks, see you in six months"

Hesitating

2011-05-26T15:03:00.000-07:00

I'm hesitating on going to get my bloodwork done today. It's been 6 months and I'm still so used to seeing the bloodsuckers every other week. I've noticed that I hate walking in the direction of the hospital in general. It's a beautiful walk through the tree lined neighborhoods. I go for walks quite often and had sort of wondered why I always choose a route that is away, when the reason struck me. Even now that I know and it's only a 10 minute walk I swear it's the longest walk ever. I'll put on my earbuds and just go.

Charity is Sexy

2011-05-18T11:09:00.000-07:00

I'm still working away at my projects for the Dancers 4 Cancer event. This will hopefully be the women's T-Shirt design. I hand drew it and then have struggled to clean it up with my mouse. Blending technology with hand done artwork is such an exciting way to create.

Dancers 4 Cancer

2011-05-04T11:27:00.000-07:00

The last couple of years I've been involved in the Dancers4Cancer fundraiser. I love their cause, I love their non discriminatory outlook and it's a hellofalotta fun. This year I've been lucky enough to get their site up and running, design their poster and now I get to design this years T-shirt. Click on the image to see it larger.

I feel I'm finally giving my skills some good use.

Here's the link to their site if you want to take a peek. Dancer4Cancer.ca

I may be designing a more custom site for them sometime this year. I've also been in talks with the dancers4cancer coordinator and have some exciting things coming up!

I'm Fine

2011-05-03T10:23:00.000-07:00

I'm fine. I've just been suffering the blahs lately. I've started blog posts here and there yet never hit the post button.

Spring is imminent, that should help.

Beauty & Power of Our Imperfect Bodies

2011-04-12T11:45:00.000-07:00

Diagnosis Day

2011-03-30T12:38:00.000-07:00

Five years ago today my life blew apart forever. I seem to be okay with not remembering this particular milestone but some one always reminds me.

Let's Do Something Good

2011-03-26T10:08:00.000-07:00

Save a life. Become a bone marrow donor.

OneMatch.ca -Canadian Registry

National Marrow Donor Program

Bone Marrow Donors Worldwide

My life was saved in 2006 by my brother who became my stem cell donor. I had a rare kind of leukemia, AML, which is quick and agressive. I lucked out that my only sibling was a match for me especially since there is only a %25 chance of that happening. Because of him, my sons still have a mother.

When there is no sibling match the doctors look to the bone marrow registries for an unrelated donor. The chance of finding an unrelated donor is much smaller than finding a sibling donor. The more people that are on the registries, the better chance everyone has. As I continued through my treatment several of the wonderful people I met who didn't find donors sat waiting. I will never forget them. There are people right now in hospitals around the world who will die soon if they don't find a donor.

Being a bone marrow donor is infinitely more easy than it used to be. Technology has leaped forward and in 2006, the actual harvesting of your stem cells was like a day in dialysis in a comfy chair watching TV.

Please sign up. Google your country and, bone marrow donor, to find your registry. Here are some links for Canada and a few others.

OneMatch.ca -Canadian Registry

National Marrow Donor Program

Bone Marrow Donors Worldwide

The registries all connect with each other worldwide.

From the OneMatch.ca, donors should be healthy adults between 17 and 50

"A person's best chance of finding a matching donor is within his or her own ethnic group, As such, it is important that the donors on OneMatch reflect Canada's rich ethnic diversity. It is also important for the future of OneMatch to attract young donors."

People with mixed ethnic backgrounds are the most needed on the registry.

PLEASE Tweet, Blog, FB, Post and repeat!

Let's Do Something Good

2011-03-25T20:43:00.000-07:00

Well the last few days have been crazy. There has been a very heated debate about a username I have been using on Etsy since 2007. I do not want to continue the debate because I believe there's a lot more important things to be heated about than a username. I realize that this is a matter that has a lot more importance to people than just me and how people knew me through Etsy. It's a debate that affects people.

As much as it saddens me to lose that piece of myself , I'm much more interested in using this forum as a platform for good. This blog is about surviving, creating and living, not tearing anyone down. There's never any good time to do that.

Life is about reinventing yourself, growing and thriving. After everything my sons and I have gone through, I've learned the most important lesson I want for them. Along with empathy, compassion, love and strength I have taught them to be adaptable. If we are rigid in our ways we will crack when life throws us the big twists.

So I feel this is the perfect time for me to grow and change, I can blossom. I believe in beautiful scars.

Please circulate the information on how to be a bone marrow donor. If there's anything I can do here it would be to get people registering and perhaps even saving lives.

OneMatch.ca

National Marrow Donor Program

Katelyn Bedard Bone Marrow site -this seems to be a good list of links for other countries.

I hope these links get you to where you need to join a registry, asap.

Username

2011-03-23T11:07:00.000-07:00

I got some bad news yesterday. I've received a letter asking to close down my shop that I've had on Etsy since 2007, which in internet years is ancient. The problem is with the username I have.

How it started was when I was in hospital. That was the absolutely worst time of my life and I was grasping at straws to keep my mind going. I was being blasted with the worst chemotherapy and was on a cocktail of drugs to keep me alive while the transition happend in my body from my bone marrow transplant.

Then in an art article online I read someone describing some artwork as "____ _____". I started looking all over the web to see if anyone else was using the name or had the dot com. There was a bespoke photography company in England that had the wallcandy.com so I registered its_________.com

I thought it was a perfect way to describe the colourful paintings I had been selling through a gallery. The paintings were of fruit with bright backgrounds and they sold like hotcakes. When I was home and well enough, 2007 I did another search online and didn't find anything new that was using the _____ _____ name. So then I opened my Etsy account.

Etsy saved my sanity on all the dark days that came later. I met amazing people on my very first forum which were the Etsy forums. They were funny creative people and it fed my need for creative stimulation when I was unable to create. I never really got around to seriously using the account for selling because I was too unwell to paint or to ship anything out, so I made sure to only sell things every once in a while.

Well, the friends I made there made me feel so less alone. When I got well enough to get out of bed and get off the laptop, I would then check in at night. Some of those friendships have blossomed and grown but all of them are immensely important to me. You'd be surprised at what small things have huge impact on someone.

So now I have been informed that I am in trademark infringement. Someone who makes something in the USA that is a completely different product wants to shut my shop down. I am a Canadian working out of Canada and our products do not conflict.

If I lose my Etsy username I will lose contact with a lot of people who only know me through that name. Some are on forums some are not. Four years of building goodwill will be gone.

I'm positive that I'm not infringing on their trademark so I will be looking into that today.

*I've finally figured out how to close commenting on this post. I've never had to do that before. I respectfully ask that you do not continue this Trademark debate here on my blog.*

My Artist Statement 2011

2011-03-16T21:38:00.000-07:00

My body betrayed me.

One day I found myself clinging to life in a sterile hospital room on a closed floor in the Vancouver General Hospital. There I silently slipped into a sterile system of tubes, fluids, chemicals, warning labels and the humming of machines. My body was toxic including anything that came out of it. There was a biohazard sign lying across my private room’s toilet and anything that came out of me was put into a bucket with the bright green biohazard sticker on top. The bucket would be sealed and then taken away and destroyed. One day I threw up on the floor and everyone was shuffled out of my room. They placed a security guard outside of my room’s door until the special cleaners in HAZMAT suits were finished and had left.

I suffered many violations and indignities to my body through those times and the four and a half years since. After the bone marrow transplant the very DNA that determines who I am was obliterated. My immune system and blood that flows through my body now is not my own. It is my donor’s blood, my brother’s.

Somewhere within that, art took on a new role in my life. I had never paid much attention to my self, just concentrated on my sons and my schoolwork. Now as a brutal turn, all eyes were on me. That was the day I turned the camera lens around.

As my body struggled through it’s necessary life threatening journey I felt like a documentary journalist. This kept me sane. Instead of grief, I felt curiosity.

As I sat alone in my hospital room, an ocean away from my children and anything that was familiar, I was afraid I would be forgotten. Life went on without me. I felt like I needed to live so I could at least create enough artwork so I wouldn’t fade away into nothingness. I didn’t know who I was anymore, without my children, without my artwork, without the feel of the green grass beneath my feet. I was nothing.

Art became an act of self-preservation. I needed to know who I had been, who I was and who I was becoming. People without cancer think it’s something you beat and then leave behind. Most often cancer becomes who you are, something that cannot be separated from you, chemically, emotionally and physically. For me with my stem cell transplant I have been altered at a cellular level. I am a walking science experiment, a freak of nature, minus the nature. Even medical science calls what I went through, a rebirth.

So I decided to embrace it. I decided to ride it like an ocean wave, not sure where it will take me. As I lived with the constant flowering and blooming of bruises on my damaged body I imagine the colours in my own way. I dreamt of having long black hair again when I tired of my bald head. I created a vision of my brother’s cells taking over like small bright stars that would save my life. I drew whatever I was feeling but more often than not, I painted my power. I painted the strength inside of me that pulled me through. I took photos of and drew my pain, my vulnerability and my grief.

I created a new narrative, one where I am the heroine. I took this broken body, my betrayer, this lemon and showed it for what it truly is, beautiful.

Rose Currie 2011

Alone

2011-03-11T21:12:00.000-08:00

Living post cancer is such a lonely thing. No one can share your fear with you when it pops up and no one can share your bone crushing exhaustion nor all the weird physical problems that arise. I feel a crossover of having such a successful show that I built from the ground up and the aftermath of it all. Being too tired to function really gets me down. I think it's the only time I start to waver and feel like my life is one huge black hole sucking the light out of me.

What good is the sunshine when you can't enjoy it? I hate those days when the sky is blue and I know I should be outside but just can't get up. I know I need to take care of myself for a few days or more until I feel better but this exhaustion always feels like defeat. It feels like I have let myself and my sons down.

I don't really know anyone that can understand this, or that's how I feel anyway. I tend to curl up into a ball and retreat from everyone until it's passed. I don't want anyone to see the deep gullies under my eyes or how much I've aged overnight. I would hate anyone to think of me as being haggard or worse yet feel sorry for me. I occasionally see myself in the mirror when I'm like this and it makes me sad for myself. Fuck cancer and everything it's done to my body. I just want the youthful strong body back again.

I know the feeling will pass and I'll get back to being myself again for a while. It's odd how this freakish exhaustion makes me feel like I've just bought a pass to loserville. My mind wants to think that it's my fault somehow, like I must have done something stupid or wrong. When you have chronic illness like this it seems like it could be easy to just give up on yourself and mentally check out . I believe in myself too much for that. I'm also as stubborn as they come. I will beat this, I will get up again and I will prevail. Fuck cancer.

Art Show Aftermath

2011-03-10T20:31:00.000-08:00

Under eye cover up is my friend right now.

I've been meeting some very cool people at the gallery. The first day I gallery sat, there was a movie being filmed all over the block and I walked into the gallery to see EVERYTHING happening out the front window. There was the actress Poppy Montgomery with a pram, double decker bus, red phone booth and tons of lighting equipment, people, you name it, it was there.

It didn't leave a lot of option to walk in the front door and check out the art. The woman who did find her way in commented that it was a great show to be up on International Women's Day. Very cool.

But I'm exhausted.

Utterly.

Time Lapse Video

2011-03-07T10:01:00.000-08:00

A brilliant friend set up his camera and created this time lapse video of the art show.

Very cool.

LEMON Video

2011-03-06T10:08:00.000-08:00

Exhibit-V is a site that creates short films of the art show openings around Victoria. Efren came by and created this video of me chatting about the show.

Fairly Hilarious

2011-03-05T22:03:00.001-08:00

On the way to the first art show in Chemainus I was driven up by my closest friend. Her 17 year old son was in the back and is a cheeky monkey. He stated loudly that my friend and I (Pinky) come off in public as a lesbian couple. I thought that was pretty funny because we are very close but... you know, we don't like each other that way.

So with some quick Photoshoppery I made this and sent it to them. Maybe her son could use it as his new screen saver?

What a day!

2011-03-05T19:30:00.000-08:00

This is definitely one of the best days of my life. I don't have pictures because other people were taking photos for me but the gallery was packed. Packed for 4 hours.

I am tired and deserve a big rest but I'm not sure I can rest when I can barely contain the satisfaction and joy I feel.

A big part of it all was having some amazing people pitching in. They made the day beautiful and I'm not sure how I could ever thank them enough.

Pinky & Brain Rocked the House

2011-03-04T22:21:00.000-08:00

Now one more art show to go to tomorrow.

OMG Today is the Day

2011-03-04T10:31:00.000-08:00

Day 2, first art show up island in Chemainus. The roller coaster continues.

I still have a lot to do for the Victoria Show tomorrow and I just don't know if that stuff will get done. It would sure help if I had a printer.

Day 1

2011-03-03T22:31:00.000-08:00

Day 1 down which consisted of me travelling to Vancouver for several medical appointments. I had 4 men peering into various orifices of my body today, carefully explaining to the medical student at each appointment, what they were looking at.

Apparently even throughout the trauma my body has received these 4 years, I still have 20/20 vision. In the next appointment with my legs pried apart and a microscope up my wahoo the doctor told his student to take a good look. He used words like stricture, constricted and atrophy and then explained in detail to the eager looking young man, that that often happens with chemotherapy, radiation, menopause or stem cell transplants. He also commented on the scarring I have inside my vagina, finished up and left the room.

Personally I think it's only fair that I get to show my friend this doctors penis while his feet are in the stirrups, and to tell her to look carefully for the constricted blood vessels, stricturing and utter ATROPHY of his old penis.

His bedside manner could improve a little I'd say. Call a young woman's vagina old and atrophied like she wasn't in the room with her legs splayed apart and you will likely have her yearning take you out, balls first.

It's only fair.

But at least I have 20/20 vision. Could come in handy if I ever made a career change to a sniper.

Postering the City

2011-03-02T21:23:00.001-08:00

I kept postering the city today. I was like a postering machine! What was great was how well the posters have been received. Every coffee shop and business I went to today was really happy to have them.

I took this shot at the beginning of my poster journey. These photos are in a small alley in the oldest Chinatown in Canada. Movies have been filmed here, although you have to step aside to pass people in some spots because it's so narrow yet it's still a vibrant part of the city.

I can't believe how many posters I put out today, almost 50. I put them up at my university and even put one in the art building I used to attend. I saw several of my old professors and they said they's come by the show. As I was putting the poster up there, there were some spry yet tired looking university students.

When I told them I graduated there in 2006 they said, "Yes! You mean there's life out there after this?!!"

Apparently they're glad to know that some people keep creating after leaving art school. It's kind of funny because they acted like I had "made it" just because I had a printed poster. If they only knew.

Stay in school kids, that's the best part.

Hanging the Art Show #2

2011-03-02T09:32:00.000-08:00

The art hanging part of the day went well, thanks to a friend who came and helped. We were a serious frame hanging team as we calculated the height, placement and width between each picture. She has a great eye and I was so glad I could trust her opinion about all the details. She's hold a painting up so I could go and look if the placement was right, then we'd switch places. The end result was a fantastic looking space!

This was the box filled with the glass framed drawings.

And below is what behind the scenes looks like. My pantings ready to vacate the house amidst piles of my sons shoes, longboards and bikes.

Below is a photo I snapped when my son happened to walk by the gallery and pop in. I caught the moment of horror as he saw what mom's been up to with the photography. It's the same photo that won 1st prize at the Monday Magazine photography competition. Methinks he may be difficult to get to the opening now.

There was only one casualty when I accidentally knocked this piece over. It had only been framed for about an hour but at least I was the one that broke it. No worries new glass is waiting for it as I type this. When I snapped this shot it caught the reflection of the light in my kitchen which made it look like there is a sun in the picture.

We barely managed to get everything up with a few seconds to spare. The building was being locked up and so we took a couple of really fast shots before we left. We never even had any time to do in progress shots.

Later in the evening when I was postering I saw a woman inside the gallery quietly standing and contemplating the paintings. She looked ever so thoughtful and mesmerized at the same time. That's the best compliment I could ever have asked for.

Postering the Town

2011-03-01T22:32:00.000-08:00

My youngest son and his girlfriend were my partners in crime today. After I hung the show, we went around in the dark putting posters up.

Can you find my posters in the photos? They're hiding there.

Do or Die Time

2011-02-28T21:01:00.000-08:00

I'm making the button for my art show. The art show site is coming together although I've been struggling with getting a gallery up. Anyway things have to come together because I'm hanging it tomorrow. Now's the time to feel the fear and do it anyway.

PS Wooohoo! It works! Check out the side bar and click on the button!

Snow

2011-02-27T01:12:00.000-08:00

Snow is a rare commodity here. Word has it that the rest of Canada doesn't make snowmen. I guess that's because it's colder than hell frozen over there. Here it's beautiful. When we get snow, we get excited and the snowmen and impromptu igloos start to be built. Canadians here laugh when people think we have igloos but I guess in the rarest of places they do exist, even for a couple of days. I just happened to see one partially built on a high school field as I walked past.

When I was a kid, one year it snowed enough for me to make a pile large enough for me to carve out and crawl into. It never snowed that much again long as I lived there but I will always remember that cool, crisp feeling of being surrounded in white.

For me, I prefer the rain and the misty beaches. That's what I grew up with and what I'm used to.

So here are some rare snapshots of my neighborhood in snow. There is even a snowman that was built at city hall wearing a city T-shirt.

And I rarely ever get to wear my kitty ear knit hat.

Prepping the Gallery

2011-02-24T16:47:00.001-08:00

Today was the day I painted the gallery.

It's a small community run gallery and we wanted it to be fresh and white for my artwork to move in on Tuesday.

So we found some paint cans and cracked out the roller. I painted the entire bottom section of all the walls as far as I could reach. After that I burnt out and there was no way I was going up the ladder. I still find it frustrating how limited my abilities are now. The gallery coordinator finished the top portions.

There was a bit of a reminder across the street. There is a theatre there and I spent 4 years painting huge sets for another larger theatre before I got the 'C'. I used to sit atop a 20ft ladder that was on wheels, on the stage. It would move and squeak with every brush stroke I made. You'd think a little gallery would be no problem.

No worries though. I'm tired and a little broken but the slate is clean and white, waiting for the colour to move in.

I snapped this photo of the gallery from the outside looking in with the peak of the theatre reflecting in the windows.

Art Show Invite

2011-02-24T12:35:00.000-08:00

This is the art show invite that a friend just printed out for me. It's very exciting to see a tangible evidence that it's all going to happen!

I'm still working on getting a gallery up for the site at roselemonade.com.

Winter In Victoria

2011-02-23T20:52:00.000-08:00

Snow, meet Cherry Blossoms.

The weather can't quite decide if it's Spring or Winter here. We don't get a lot of snow here, and the last few days people have been having spring fever. It's been sunny and warm and I was eyeing up summer dresses. There have been snow drops and crocuses popping up everywhere, decorating the neighborhood with their spring optimism.

The BAM! We wake up to snow today. It's the first snow I've seen this year. I even saw snow on a palm tree as I walked down town to meet up with a friend.

So, Winter meets Spring is absolutely glorious as long as you have snow gear.

Pinky & the Brain

2011-02-22T11:40:00.000-08:00

At some point when I came home from the hospital, and old friend started visiting me. Since I was pretty much bed riden, she would come and sit in my bed with me and we would dream of all the possibilities in our future. This was a really vital thing for me since I didn't have any clue what kind future I was going to have, if any.

We would laugh and plot and come up with outrageous schemes to take over the world. One day we even jotted it down in my sketch book. Somehow I was dubbed Brain and she was dubbed, Pinky. I think it could be because I'm a bit analytical and she is more about friendship and human connection. I'm still working on that part of life.

Pinky on the left and Brain is on the right

So we jotted down our top secret agenda which was basically to make bags and bags of money. I even called my spare room, "The Money Room" because it had a lot of shelves to keep the money.

So as time has progressed our plotting time has subsided as we sculpt our real world agendas. Her world has changed in many ways and as she has gotten her career on track she dreams of finding love again. My time has been spent working on my art shows, hoping that it will come of something even if I can't imagine what that something is. Sometimes I even wonder if it's really worth it.

We went out for a family dinner in Chinatown for a birthday and Chinese New Year. The meal was fantastic and at the end we got a fortune cookie each. When we opened them we were surprised to find what our fortunes read. Then there was an extra cookie. Since no one else wanted it we decided to split it, each holding one side as we cracked it open. That particular fortune had us laughing our asses off. I decided they were good enough to place on our Pinky and the Brain page.

In case you can't read the text, the one on the left reads, "You will be deeply loved". The one under Brain on the right reads, "Assert yourself, your ideas are worthwhile". The one that we jointly opened says, "Your secret venture will work out brilliantly"

It looks like all that plotting will come to some good after all...

Another Day

2011-02-21T16:13:00.000-08:00

I'm starting to get a bit burnt out. I miss seeing people or actually having time to visit but I must plod on until these art shows are up. I can't believe how much work this all is but it will be very worth it in the end as long as I don't end up in the fetal postion in the corner of the gallery.

Doing all this has been much more than just work, it's been a great opportunity to stretch out my art and organizational skills.

It's not the first time I've done any of this but it has been a long time. I've had one show post cancer but it's been a couple or so years since then. All my energy has been absorbed in keeping my little family together and getting better. My health is an ongoing puzzle but I feel like I'm at point of being refreshed.

First my mind and then my body.

this photo is me being a little snap happy with one of my paintings

Cabin Fever

2011-02-19T16:28:00.000-08:00

I haven't been feeling well this last week. Not like a cold but not like myself either. I've had a few day long, skull cracking headaches, and nausea and just a weird all over unwell feel. Maybe it's signs of an upcoming stroke? Or an aneurism?

A few weeks ago the health unit called me and told me I may not be immune to the chicken pox, and I've been itchy. I Googled adult chicken pox symptoms.

Or maybe it's something else? Like Lupus? I've been watching House lately.

Maybe it's a skin infection? Or my kidneys are failing?

My eyes have been awfully dry. I hope it's not the graft/vs/host flaring. Although it doesn't feel like graft/vs/host... or cancer.

Maybe I've suddenly become allergic to my bras? Or that top I just bought at the thrift store? Maybe it's an adverse reaction to hair dye? I did just get my hair done for my art show.

Or maybe there's a build up of all these stupid medications in my system? Maybe there's a lifetime cap on what your body will ingest medication wise?

My hip is still bothering me. I've gained a lot of weight this last year. I hope it hasn't impaired my immune system. Or caused more estrogen in my body in addition to the hormone patch that I have to wear.

After talking to a friend the other day it seems as if I've had at least one migrane. What would happen if I had a stroke while driving? Would I be able to stop the car?

Geesh, I hope I stay in one piece until the art openings.

This Should be Naked Day

2011-02-18T12:44:00.000-08:00

This should be naked day.

I showered and put on a cute bra and bottoms and I feel done. I'd like to wander downstairs and make myself a cup of tea... even get out the paint brushes and paint the large 3' x 4' painting that is lingering, waiting to be finished. The house is silent and I've been working, driving and running around for weeks getting all the art show stuff done.

Yesterday I framed the pieces that had to travel, packaged them up, drove to get my roaming parents from the airport at 9:30pm, drove them back to their car and sent the box with them. That will save me an extra day traveling the island. Then I came home and chatted with the middle son about his future. At 1:15am I received the call to go pick up my 15 year old who was at a special midnight birthday skate. I did all this with a mind bending headache. It felt like someone and put a nail through my skull.

I got to bed by 3:00am. Usually that amount of activity would cripple me the next day. And I suppose I am.... I just don't want to get dressed.

I deserve a naked day.

Unfortunately my sons could pop home at any moment and they really hate mom's naked days.

Wakeful Slumber

2011-02-16T12:09:00.000-08:00

Newest Painting

2011-02-15T13:35:00.000-08:00

I'm still working away like a busy bee. It's hard to believe the amount of work that goes into putting on an art show. Since yesterday was Valentines Day I went to get my hair done to do something nice for myself. That and I didn't want to show up at my art openings looking like someone who's been wearing sweatpants for the last 2 months.

I had also committed myself to making a painting for a local gallery's fund raiser. This economic crisis has lead to our arts funds being chopped. Galleries that previously had funding are really struggling now. It was a little crazy to offer to do it considering the amount of work I have to do with these looming deadlines. It didn't help either that I had a blinding headache all day.

I woke up to find all the tea gone and started drawing and painting on the LP cover I had prepped the night before. There's nothing like leaving something to the last minute. I decided to draw my super power socks and I didn't title it but it did get handed in.

It will be sold (hopefully) at an event on Friday.

Website

2011-02-12T17:04:00.000-08:00

I'm wanting to make a separate website to house my art show photos. I'm looking for a way to make the site myself, have a nice gallery, have the photos difficult to steal etc. Does anyone have some suggestions for what to use to make this? I was checking out Wordpress but I don't think it has what I want without me knowing complete HTML.

I'm pretty worn out from trying to get all this done. Hopefully I'll find the way to get them online in time.

Suggestions very welcome.

Cook without a Kitchen

2011-02-11T13:51:00.000-08:00

An artist without a studio is like a cook without a kitchen.

I was just outside photographing my work and racing against the thunder and rain. I think I got most of them thankfully because the coming weather is all rain rain rain!

Break

2011-02-09T17:37:00.000-08:00

Need to put down the art show prepping and walk away. I've been building the poster for my art show and then decided to make it bigger yadda yadda, and photoshop quit leaving me without my poster saved. I know. Classic mistake.

I've also been researching printing, contacting people to let them know the dates, finalizing details, and even arranging to paint the space.

Now that I've been staring at the poster graphics for 2 days straight it looks completely wrong and I'm obsessing over little changes... that's the time to take a walk, put it away and leave it until tomorrow.

So much to do, so little time.

Searching for Strength

2011-02-07T13:31:00.000-08:00

I'm searching for strength today. Strength to put aside the fear and lunge into making these art shows real. Painting and creating is one thing, tying them together and writing about it to put out into the world is a whole other thing. Once people are invited and my visual thoughts are placed on a white wall there will be no hiding. It's a lot like being in a space with a lot of critical people and slowly stripping your clothes off to be bare, all your flaws and vulnerability showing.

What will they say?

Being an artist is one of the most difficult things I've done in my life. The facade we build to protect ourselves from the world is dropped and our hearts are hung on the wall.

Would you say that you think someones child is an ugly baby right in front of their mother? Well the general public loves stripping an artists most vulnerable offerings and tearing it to shreds.

I have stood by my paintings in the past to have the very fibre of their birth chastised and called out as, "not art", "I could do that with my eyes closed", "Is this what artists are doing now a days?" etc etc. Those are the bad parts that we fear when we place our souls on the wall for all eyes to see. What we cherish is the moment someone comes up and falls deeply irrevocably in love with the same painting that moments before was under fire. Seeing that painting go home with the right person is like watching your child go home with their soul mate.

The one show I am preparing is about my journey through cancer. I have been doing self portraits throughout these years of struggling to save my life. They are no small part of me. They contain the emotions, joys, fears, sorrows and rawness of just being.

There is one thing I'm very proud of and content with. They way I can put what is inside of me onto paper, canvas or words fills me with solitude. I am utterly thankful that there is no struggle there. I worked really hard for many years studying art with an open mind because I was determined to work through those layers of creating to get to the innermost part of me. My goal in art was always to be able to express the dark parts of me that no one sees. Having the ability to feel and express the innermost self has always been my objective.

I can only imagine what might be thought or said when my work is up and people gather. I need to cross through that fear and do it anyway.

Another Sketch Book Page

2011-02-06T11:49:00.000-08:00

I scribble quotes that mean something to me, all through my sketch books.

Sometimes I even put them on my blog! This sketch book page ended up drawn on, painted, collaged, painted again and then a quote scratched on top in sharpie. When I put things in my sketch book, they are never for show. My sketchbook is private and strictly for myself to capture ideas for a later date.

I feel it's also written in a personal language that's all my own, no one else would ever be able to decipher it anyway. Every mark I make is connected to larger, well developed ideas and concepts that reside in my mind. I guess the sketchbook is more like an index page. The real content is within me.

Ha!

2011-02-04T20:24:00.000-08:00

I just found this post from the last time that I had an art show. That sounds like me today!

Click here to see the post.

Painting in Progress

2011-02-02T17:27:00.000-08:00

I paint very slowly and carefully. It's still not quite done but his is how the bear has transformed since I last posted an in progress photo. It's gone from a bear wandering the arctic to a bear quietly lumbering through a frozen forest.

I don't sleep since I had my stem cell transplant so I know how this bear feels, being awake when perhaps you shouldn't be.

The Heat is On

2011-02-02T13:13:00.000-08:00

I'm down to the wire now. I have 26 days to do everything needed for 2 art shows including setting the opening receptions, hanging, travelling to Vancouver for a days worth of appointments. I need to write a list of all the paintings I'm submitting, along with jpegs and prices. I need to build or create some type of web presence for my art. I need to create posters and announcements as well as getting them printed and distributed. I need to send out announcements to the relevant newspapers etc etc etc!

I'm also still painting!!!!!!

OMG! Am I going to survive this?

Joy in Things

2011-01-26T14:42:00.000-08:00

I'm so excited about my new little pet. I just acquired this tiny little vintage Starflex camera and am pretty excited about it.

I welcomed it into my life by snapping some photos of it with my digital camera. Digital meets analog.

Flipping Tired

2011-01-24T18:13:00.000-08:00

but I keep on painting.

I feel like I'm in a game of Frogger where I keep jumping, dodging and narrowly missing catastrophe at every turn but I'm not letting it stop me from painting. If I believed in fate I'd think something was trying to test me and keep me from getting the work done for my arts shows. Anything and everything has been happening and I keep thinking I'm getting to the end just for something else to start.

Having 3 sons is a lot to do with that right now. Teenagers are a handfull and not in any of the ways you'd expect.

It's just life. Life is happening and I need to keep up lest be run over.

Old Haunts

2011-01-22T11:30:00.000-08:00

My life is still separated into two sections, before cancer and after. I used to work 24/7 in university, at my job and parenting my sons. I didn't know many people in Victoria at the time and on Fridays I would take myself out for noodles.

I loved my Fridays because I felt I had put it a good amount of work all week and this was my way of rewarding myself since it's the little things that count. My daily routine was amazing and I loved it.

So since my life is nothing like it was, I occasionally try to fit a moment in that feels like the old days. Last week I was on my own so I went on a little jaunt to Chinatown to pick up some noodles. It felt like a little magical moment.

There was a parking space waiting for me, the lanterns were glowing and the noodles (chili plum not too spicy) were extraordinarily delicious.

And for some reason this old school RV sitting there seemed like a symbol for all the things I have yet to do in my life. Places to go, things to see....

Yesterday's Sketch

2011-01-21T12:07:00.000-08:00

I went to a community studio yesterday to get out of my house and away from my paintings for a bit. I was reminded how terrible I am at being able to create anything when people are around.

All I could concentrate on was how people were sniffling and sounding sick. That and the guy sitting next to me who seemed to keep having all of my stuff gravitate to being in his hands.

I quickly blasted out this sketch of the piles of colourful seat cushions that were stacked against a black wall. Then I came home and sterilized my eraser.

Art & Fear

2011-01-20T21:36:00.000-08:00

I feel the heat from the impending double art shows. I can't believe the first time I try and show my work for several years, I end up with two shows in the same month.

Some would call that crazy.

I call it extra crazy because I'm such a slow and methodic painter.

Two art shows at the same time means two entire bodies of work that need to be completed ASAP. Working over Christmas was out because so many other things need to get done and of course being a mom zaps tons of time. Now I'm trying to catch up which means painting 24/7.

Here's a page from my sketchbook which contains my scribbling thought processes in creating my final paintings.

When I'm not wringing my hands and pacing for fear of not meeting my deadlines, I'll be posting more pages.

Sign in Problems

2011-01-13T10:55:00.000-08:00

It seems whenever I have time and inclination to do a blog post, I'm locked out of blogger. I'm not sure why it's doing that. My computer seems to think someone is trying to break into my blog. Now what would a hacker want my blog for?

Anyway, I'm sure it's just a hiccup and that I'll be able to write a real blog post soon.

Merry 2011

2011-01-05T13:37:00.000-08:00

May you see inspiration and love wherever you turn.

This shot is compliments of my neighborhood where apparently anything is possible.

Merry Christmas from the Canadian West Coast

2010-12-26T20:36:00.000-08:00

Have a Weird & Wonderful Christmas!

2010-12-23T23:04:00.000-08:00

Busy, Busy

2010-12-11T15:10:00.000-08:00

I'm busy getting ready for the holidays.... there is so much to be done.

I do what I can to enjoy the process so I popped into China Town on the hunt for beautiful little gifts.

Project Kill

2010-12-08T13:29:00.000-08:00

Killing my project list, that is.

Being sick again (through October to the end of Novemebr) has knocked me off my feet and I inevitably get set right back and have piles of work and life stuff to get done. I find it very stressful to have all these things that need doing when I am unable to get them done. Because I am an artist and I am not able to get back to work yet because of my health, I find that I end up picking up projects for people. My brain still thinks it's five years ago when I could get multiple things accomplished every day but reality hits when I feel completely inept and overwhelmed.

Most of my days has this omnipresent feeling of being behind and even guilt, yet I wander around in circles too stressed and chemo brained to get anything done. Hiding from it all is no way to live. I find these little projects which are often photography projects clog up my psyche.

I start to feel better and then I am slammed with everything that needs to get done. Well no more! I made a kill list and all my projects are on it. I'm trying my best to not get distracted while I'm at my computer and I'm trying my best to remember to eat because I end up cycling into exhaustion if I forget to.

So far I have killed 2 big projects and am onto a third today. I'm not working on my paintings yet because I need to clear the slate. I expect a sense of freedom to arrive when I'm done and I won't be taking on anything else. My sons and my needs will come first.... like it should be.

The first project haunting me was some snapshots of whales for some friends of mine. I was visiting my family when from their patio, I saw some orcas approaching. I grabbed my camera in just enough time to get a few shots of the Killer Whale family coming in close to the shore and swimming in between boats. Then I realized my friends were on the one boat quietly watching.

As peaceful as this looks, the pod was hunting seals and I watched as the older ones stood by as the young whales killed a seal. I also saw a few seals sitting quietly very close to shore terrified out of their wits, I'm sure.

Just a few more, larger projects to go!

Evening Breaks

2010-12-04T11:37:00.000-08:00

Often the smallest moments are the most powerful ones.

Mom's a ....

2010-12-01T19:40:00.001-08:00

I feel utterly hostile right now. Some days are just so hard to cope with. My stupid body is so slow and I have things to get done. The more I try, the more frustrated I get, then BLAMMO! Mom turns into a bear and tries to eat the little children. Although the children are taller than me and hold their own in the grief giving department.

And now I realize the handy illustration I just made is off kilter. Thank goodness I have this rice crispy square to take my frustrations out on, grrrrrrrrr.

My Morning Inspiration

2010-12-01T11:40:00.000-08:00

My morning routine helps me get over the slow start my body commands. I wake up and lay there until I'm able to get out of bed feeling groggy because of the medications I have to take at night. My first thought of the morning is, tea & newspaper! I head on down to the kitchen and put on the steel kettle to boil, then I head to the door and grab the paper. My sons leave it on the inside as they rush off to school in the morning. I have my tea and then read the paper, often trying to get my eyes to focus. The graft/vs/host I have in my eyes make them very very dry (very dry).

Then I head to my computer to read the art & design blogs that I love. (And yes it does take me ages to shake off the morning sluggishness).

I read PoppyTalk who is a blogger from my neck of the woods in Vancouver. I also browse through DesignSponge which was my first blog I ever read regularly. This morning Poppytalk posted about an online magazine and it really help stoke the 'ol inspiration fire. It's called CovetGarden.

I haven't read a lot of online magazines before but they are pretty amazing. I love how in depth this one goes into their crafty subjects.

I also check into Bloesm and Decor8 at some point in the day or every few days.

Here's the links:
Poppytalk
DesignSponge
Decor8
Bloesm
Covet Garden online magazine

Happy reading!

Teenagers

2010-11-30T19:37:00.000-08:00

It's 3:30 in the afternoon and I leave the house walking.

A few blocks over from my house I hear some loud voices from the end of the street. One of the voices sounds familiar. I see a pack of teenagers happily chatting and walking down the sidewalk. I see a woman walk down the street obviously nervous about passing the loud group. She crosses the street. I cross the street too...

...heading straight toward the boisterous pack. They see me and suddenly disperse with one of them hiding behind a parked car. I lock eyes with the nervous looking ones that haven't hidden fast enough from me. I keep heading towards them, not breaking my gate. As I get closer, the hiding teenager pops back out at just the wrong moment.

I have him! I spread my arms wide as he tries to dart around me but there is no escape! I grab him in a big bear hug that last just long enough to be totally embarrassing. I then proceed to hug his girlfriend and one unsuspecting 'deer in the headlights' looking guy. The rest manage to escape unscathed.

It's all in a days work parenting teenagers. If I wasn't embarrassing them then I wouldn't be doing my job.

Ready, Set, WORK!

2010-11-25T10:28:00.001-08:00

I've been very busy getting things ready for my art shows, starting from the ground up. I have no space in my house to work so I have completely rearranged my bedroom to be my place to sleep, my office and my painting studio. Only one thing can be done at a time because there is no space so I've started with scanning a lot of photos of my childhood and my parents childhood. I use these in various ways in my paintings. The work I've been doing the past few years has had a lot to do with photographs.

I have also been watching, thinking and mulling but not necessarily in that order. It almost feels like I'm not doing much except putting out family fires and making sure everyone is alive. It's not easy to be single parenting these days. Not that it ever was I guess.

Mulling over the concepts for my art shows though is critical. I have had a lot of thoughts, ideas and AHA! moments (not necessarily in that order) in the last few years and it seems to be a big job to graft them together into something comprehensive. All the artwork in one show needs to be a body of work that can hang together.

My areas of study in art have been pretty varied and the art I create is just as varied. I can flip flop from one complete style to the next without blinking an eye. I suppose that's a good thing except when I need to put together a body of work that all looks like it comes from me.

The planning and milling around my room portion is a good part to be doing right now considering I'm not well. I work around the ebb and flow of what my body needs. I have the odd mini dance party here and there to keep my energy from falling into a deep hole.

As this process goes on, if I keep plugging away and getting as little or as much done as I can in a day, I think I should be able to make the deadlines. This is the part where it goes from exciting to work.

I plan to continue posting here about my post cancer adventures, my health, my inspiration and snippets of work for the impending arts shows. I'll also be offering the odd art piece here for sale. It's a lot to do so wish me luck.

Dance Party in The Lonely House

2010-11-24T11:32:00.000-08:00

I've been needing some extra pick me up the last few days. My body goes through waves of various ailments that knock me down for extended periods of time and I'm sick of it!

I'm getting better at the half the pace of the slowest moving animal on Earth and then have had some serious spontaneous stomach troubles thrown in. It's probably graft/vs/host but it's hard to tell when there's multiple things going on inside of me.

I need some serious help so when I found this video I was elated.

I've locked on to this song below and it's helped me get up in the mornings. I have a lot to do in preparation for my two art shows in March and I have no time to be lollygagging.

I got this song from my son and he was hesitant to tell me the name of it because he was afraid that I would listen to it 24/7 until I got bored with it and ruin it for him. Well, he was correct! I play it constantly until he gets home from school. What he doesn't know won't hurt him ;)

Doctor Doctor

2010-11-17T13:41:00.000-08:00

My GP gave me some steroid nasal spray and the grip this sickness has on me seems to finally be slipping. I am SO damn glad.

Save Me Doctor

2010-11-16T09:53:00.000-08:00

I'm going back to the doctor again today. I am just not getting better so I hope there is something she can do. I'd really like to get painting but every little thing is wiping me out and it looks like someone has punched me in both eyes.

Restart!

2010-11-13T21:02:00.000-08:00

I'm excited to get painting for my two upcoming art shows in March. First thing's first, though. I don't have a studio anymore so I need to carve some space out of my home for somewhere to work. I'm still sick so arranging things when I'm up to it has been a good place to start.

It's expecting too much to work in the house with the very large monkeys (teenage boys) that galavant about. There is always some rogue soccer ball or impromptu wrestling match breaking out in the middle of the floor so I've focused on my bedroom to find space.

I've moved some furniture, collected my brushes and made a space in the light of my window. I also sequestered this little plastic horse from my son's room. It looks much better on my window sill anyway.

I've gone for some short walks in the sunshine and taking note of my surroundings. You never know what will spring a great painting idea from your mind.

My neighborhood has a lot of bits and bobs everywhere you look. I try and look at things with with a curious mind. Rather than graffiti and junk, I see street art.

Some of it intentional, some of it unintentional.

The people in this area take great pride and care of the spaces here and there are little curiosities everywhere you look.

The streets are also like a gallery if you are looking for it. If you don't take care to notice, it will pass you by. There are often portraits, monster characters and other paintings tacked onto the telephone poles. They eventually disappear as they get taken home to live with people.

I always plan to sneak out at night and grab one because I feel weird about snagging it in plain view. Call me silly but this one was the last one I saw so as night folded I slinked past and grabbed it and now it lives with me. There will likely be more soon anyway.

And now with things getting prepared I'm off to be the one creating.

Hoping for a Fresh Start

2010-11-12T11:38:00.000-08:00

I'm still sick. If there's anything like a brutal reality check that I'm not who I was, it's being sick for over three weeks. I can't help but feeling I'm a failure which is a feeling that doesn't make a lot of cognitive sense. How is being ill a failure?

My plans fall apart in mid flight, left, right and centre. I try my best to not let it get me down but it's struggle.

I try to get my thoughts to gel to a point where I can take action to get them done, or at least point myself in that direction. It's such a far cry from where I used to be. I used to get lists of things done effectively every day and get top marks in University etc. I know that is still a huge piece of me even though I am significantly slower now. I need to have my plate less full but my eyes are bigger than my stomach. I still want to tackle things with wild abandon and sometimes I get it done but then I pay the price physically.

I often lament how it feels as if my life before cancer has been severed from me and all I have left is this post cancer life. All the momentum I have built was thrown to the wind.

Or has it?

I received a call a few days ago from a gallery I used to supply with paintings. I have the distinction there as having sold the most amount of paintings of any artist they've ever had. Not bad.

They want me back which feels fantastic. I've agreed and will be working for the next few months getting work ready for them. I also have secured another location completely separate of that to feature my work in March. The work I've been creating for that show is very personal and about my intimate reality of having cancer at 32. I have 2 completely different types of work to get done for two different locations and I need to start ASAP.

I know this is way too much and my body may self combust like it's doing right now but I need this. I can't be cancer girl forever. I need to be able to morph into some other incarnation that is more inclusive of all that I am. I need a dash of hope in this suffering. Actually, I need to leave this suffering behind me.

And what I mean by suffering is collecting up the pieces of me and put them back together. I could make a list of all that is wrong in my life directly because of this horrific infliction but it would be a looooooong list and I'd much rather concentrate on what is right.

Feel Good Inspiration

2010-11-10T10:49:00.001-08:00

The Flu that Never Ends and the Magic Elixir

2010-11-09T13:01:00.000-08:00

So, I'm still under the influence of this flu. I'm seeing a minor improvement as the days go by and hope to be rid of this damn bug by Christmas. Or sooner.

After about a week of this misery I decided a mini cherry cheesecake might do me a world of good. When I actually tried it though, the miraculous effects I had hoped for didn't emerge... and then I just felt guilty. After several more days passed I bought myself a coffee which is fairly unusual for me.

A few days after that I was out doing my usual mom chores (because those never end, sick or not) and I stumbled upon a Starbucks.

Despite hating to give corporate Starbucks my money when I have local shops I could go to, I was seduced by it's warm atmosphere. The inside was a generically cozy, and there was the large board of delights to choose from. After standing in a small line I purchased a small peppermint mocha.

Somehow that warm, consistant across continents, pepperminty coffee made the whole world feel okay for the time it took to drink it. Several days later when I had to go out again, I tried another one not expecting the same magical effects. Well, again I was soothed into feeling a little better when I had it's warm paper cup in my hands. When I slurped the whipping cream with the little shaker bits of minty chocolate I felt transformed. The hot mocha made my throat feel a lot less scratchy and irritated.

It may not have been the most PC or ethical purchases that I've ever made but, it was a little piece of heaven.

Sigh. Now if I could just figure out how to get this headache to go away.

Broken and Whole

2010-11-08T09:00:00.000-08:00

I am so broken right now. This flu will not go away and I spent the entire last night in violent coughing fits. It was so bad that my sons came in demanding to know if I was okay.

This last year I've been slipping off of some of the physical progress I've made. Last year I was hooping and having so much fun with it. I was taking an arthritic water fit class with disabled elderly people and they were kicking my ass but I progressed quite a bit. I was also happily hiking up the local mountain.

When I was taken off the last of my viral and immune suppression drugs last November (that kept the viruses and graft vs host at bay) I immediately caught the H1N1. I became extremely ill and my immune system was sent into overdrive making the graft vs host flare. So much for all the people who cried foul and said the H1N1 was a mass scare tactic. My son with asthma got dangerously sick and I spent the rest of the year trying to recover. It was well into the summer before I started regaining some energy.

I've gained 23 pounds, gaining back the 15 I had lost to still be 27 over my normal weight. My muscle mass has disappeared, I have huge bags under my eyes and I just feel lousy.

One thing that has improved immensely since last year is my memory! I am sooooooo glad. I was really afraid that I would never be the same egg headed university geek again. I loved my mind before all this happened. I had such huge capabilities in that area before and now that it's coming back I feel a lot more like me. Not physically but mentally.

I don't struggle to remember small things anymore. I still write everything on sticky notes but I can hold an address in my head and even the directions of how to get there. That is lightyears from where I was last year.

My mind is still quiet. My brain used to be in constant overdrive and I could never realax or have a mental break from anything. The first huge difference I noticed in myself during chemotherapy was the quiet void in my brain. I usually had 8 note/sketch books on the go to scribble down all my ideas. Writing them down released some of the pent up anxiety of constantly having the ideas and then perfecting them, detail by detail. It scared me when in the hospital I sat there, empty, no ideas rolling off me into my notes books. The pages were quiet.

I accept this sense of peace and serenity of the quiet mind now that I can focus my thoughts.

So for the body..... The problem with all of my attempts at regaining health is the simple inevitability that I will crash. Whatever I do, it seems to go well for a while and then my body starts shutting down in exhaustion, a graft vs host relapse, in pain or all of the above. So I rest and recover and then try try again until the next crash. The funny thing is, things usually feel fine with the activity and I think, "I can do this! Woohoo!" and then CRASH. I'm off my feet for days, weeks or months. It's so frustrating.

Whenever I discuss this with my doctors, they tell me to do less, tone it down, scale it back....

I've finally decided that after trying wholeheartedly for 4 years, I don't have a clue. So I signed up for a course called Cancer Transitions. I'm really hoping I can get a lot out of it and apply it to my recovery.

So far one thing has stood out to me in it. There is another person who has had a stem cell transplant and that person has the exact same problems as I do. We get going on something, are feeling fine and then the crash comes and we are laid out until our bodies allow us to get back up again. I was so grateful to hear someone else describe what it's like to hit a dead stop and not even be able to will your body to keep going.

So these are my rambling thoughts for the morning.

I am so grateful that I'm so resilient. I'm so glad that I know that the way forward often has relapses where it looks as if we are falling backwards. It's all a part of moving forward. Moving is not so bad, it's the stagnancy that gets to me.

So if this damn flu would just go away....

MRI Birthday

2010-11-03T10:10:00.000-07:00

So I had my birthday, (yay!) but had an MRI first thing on my birthday morning (sucky) and generally my birthday rolled by not feeling at all like a birthday. I don't know the last time I had a medical appointment free birthday. Because of the overwhelming pain in my hip I stopped doing any activity and the pain went down. I managed to walk 10 minutes after my MRI and ended up in a bit of pain from it but not as bad as usual.

I kept off my hip and then after a few weeks the pain went away. Within that time I had gone into a thrift store and contemplated buying a set of crutches but decided to wait until I had the MRI. By the next week the pain was almost completely gone.

They stuffed me into the giant machine and played ABBA for me while the imaging was taking place.

Here is my fancy 'before' picture with me in the hospital robe.

She put me on the narrow little bed and it moved into place and then I was raised so that my nose was inches from the top of the inside. She put the headphones on me and told me it wouldn't be a long one, just 20 minutes. For the first time in my life I panicked. I pulled off my headphones to call out that I was feeling claustrophobic but it turned out she had been walking into the booth and didn't hear me. I calmed down and popped the headphones back on and stayed as still as possible. I missed her instructions that she had relayed to me over the headphones but I was glad that she missed my little panic episode.

I'm not really sure what came over me, I think I've just filled my personal lifetime quota for being in large machines, getting my insides looked at. This has just been enough already. When I headed home, trying to not let the stress overtake me, I wandered through the neighborhood coffee house. I'm not a coffee drinker but I felt like I needed a distraction.

This particular coffee shop has a really nice, bubbly girl in there who seems to remember me for some reason. I went in, made my order and she asked me about my day. I told her it was my birthday AND my MRI day. She happily made my iced mocha (with a shot of hazelnut) and told me it was a gift.

I can't tell you how much that meant to me on that lonely morning. I had the weight of wondering what the hell was wrong with me. I had to wait 4 days for the results. As I was in that machine, feeling the humming and sound vibrations going through my hip, I kept saying, "Please find out what's wrong, please see what's wrong, please see what's wrong", to myself or maybe to the machine.

On the Friday at my oncology appointment I was told they saw nothing but a healthy hip. The relief washed over me at the same time as, 'what the hell?'. Add a little dash of, am I crazy? and that was my initial feelings of finding out my hip was in tact.

This doctor was not the one who I saw last time and she ran through all the same questions that the last one did. After some thinking, she suggested it may be a pinched nerve in my back. I thought that was ludicrous that that much pain could come from a pinched nerve but then I got to thinking. My uber healthy/active/young grandmother has been laid out with a nerve problem in her back. And truthfully, I can't really tell what the pain is. It feels deep within my hip but it also radiates down my leg and sometimes into the knee.

I was given a requisition to have my back x-rayed but I tossed it. I have been poked and prodded to no end. My back has been x-rayed more times than I can count when the doctors were unable to give me lumbar punctures. Each subsequent lumbar puncture was done with a series of x-rays. I've had enough. I have done everything my doctors have asked and I will get that next x-ray if they insist.

At the moment the pain is gone (whoohoo!) but I also haven't been walking or exercising at all which is terribly, terribly bad. I had a good week and a half until another wave of fatigue hit me and now I have the flu. I'm starting to feel very down about my prospects at building a normal life.

Halloween is my favourite day of the year and I wasn't able to go out. After 4 years I wonder if this cycle will ever end.

Well, after writing this depressing post I'm going to take this sad sick body out for a walk in the sunshine.

Down Time

2010-11-01T15:46:00.000-07:00

Ugh. There is so much down time in my life. I begin doing something extra and it goes well for a few weeks and then BAM, I'm down for the count. I can't convey how frustrating this is for me and I'm sure for others reading this.

When I am physically unable to function I get very upset, frustrated, and down. Not down in a sense that I'm depressed, just down with the circumstances I'm in. I need to give in to my body's needs and let it run it's course. I've learned through never ending trial and error that there is no other way to deal with it.

After 4 years you start to know your limitations. I have learned and accepted a level of patience I never thought would even enter my life.

It actually feels a lot like being whipped. My body is letting me know who is in charge.

This time it has started out with the usual week of fatigue and is being topped off with the flu. I need to roll over and let the fatigue and illness overtake me until it's done, and then I will get up and keep moving.

If there was a patience medal, I think I would have it by now.

Frustrating, frustrating, frustrating.

The Cheeky Kiss

2010-10-18T16:07:00.000-07:00

I had a tough day today. There are dark circles under my eyes, clouds are over and it feels like the life has been drained from world now that Shannon is gone. When my youngest son came home he put on his girlfriends lipstick and gave me a kiss on the cheek.

What a silly boy. It did make me feel a lot better.

Friends and Saying Goodbye

2010-10-16T18:02:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning forever to post this photo. It's of an art fundraiser my friends put on for me when I was in treatment. I was allowed home to the island for a few days in between treatments before my transplant and so I surprised them by showing up. I hadn't seen my kids or any of my friends until then, so it was a hugely joyous occasion. None of us had the magnitude of what I was going through hit us yet.

The two paintings in the background are mine. My friends collected, donated and sold tons of artwork to financially help out my sons and I, and they did a fantastic job. This photo also shows a thousand cranes that many hands folded for me. I guess it worked because I'm still here.

Shannon, on the far left passed away suddenly a few days ago. She had a stomach ache, went to the hospital and then came home and went to bed. And now she is gone, I can scarcely believe it.

It's so difficult to believe. She was such a creative and bright force. She was always smiling and bringing creative projects to life. She loved vintage things, friends, helping others, her husband and children. She made our small community a better place. When she moved in next door to me, she brought big ideas and made them a reality in our little stagnant town.

She taught me a lot, the main thing being that I could let myself be a creative person and let it show. She introduced me to Fluevogs, she borrowed and wore my vintage dresses with a flourish and she spread colour wherever she went. She would dye her hair wild colours constantly and she always made it look gorgeous. The last thing she did on Facebook was say if 50 people hit the 'like' button, she would dye her hair pink in support of fighting breast cancer. I'm pretty sure she would have done it either way.

After I met her I found the gumption to cut off all my hair and dye it purple for my 30th birthday. I found the courage to pack up my children and move in search of new adventures and opportunity. She was a doer. Once she told me that she didn't understand the creative people in her life. She said that we are gifted with so many ideas but we often don't do them. She would take an idea and not sit on it for a second. She would run with that idea and make it a smashing reality. I found a lot of good in knowing her.

I guess I never really said it before, but she changed my life. I had been discouraged from being myself as a vibrant artist and human being my entire life but she lead by example. I followed her blazing path and then onto my own.

Without knowing it, she helped me become me.

Shock

2010-10-13T08:47:00.000-07:00

I had my MRI and I will get a chance to tell how it went but right now I am reeling in shock. I moved to Victoria from a small town and in that small town I knew a lot of people. One of them was a neighbor and a friend, our sons are all friends and best friends.

My middle son called me downstairs where he was sitting motionless in front of his computer. It turned out she had died during the previous night. I just can't believe it. My son said, "She helped me get through you having cancer" and she did. She helped gather people to have a community fundraiser to help us out financially. She watched over him and he lived with them for several weeks while I was hospitalized. Unbelievably, my son had the time of his life that summer. He was surrounded by a loving family and friends.

I just can't believe it yet. I thought I would be in the ground long before her. She was only 43 or so and has 3 children, two quite young. She was bright, creative and full of life at all times.

She and her family would come to visit when I was unwell and her little daughter would try on my wigs. I cared for their toddler when she went in to have her third child. It was quite funny how they dropped him over the fence into my arms and ran because the baby was coming asap. When they bought their house I helped her pick out wild paint colours to her husband's, chagrin. She made it work, though.

In the last few years of me being in the midst of illness and recovery, we lost touch. My son still went and stayed with them regularly but I never saw her and I never knew why. I guess I'll never know.

I can't understand what could have happened to her. I've been battling some deep trauma recently around mortality and felt like I was finally coming out the other end... now this.

It feels surreal. My first thought upon hearing the news was, I thought it would be me.

Mentioned on a Fellow Canadian Blog

2010-10-05T22:02:00.000-07:00

Here is a post on another blog that mentions me at the New York conference. I really got a lot out of that trip.

Click ->here<- to read it.

Stress Vent

2010-10-02T16:24:00.000-07:00

My mind is getting away from me and Google is at my fingertips. I promised myself, I wouldn't mention avascular necrosis until I know for sure but waiting is so hard. When they booked the MRI it wasn't a long wait but still a waiting game.

My brain keeping pinging around to my life after being diagnosed with degenerative condition but I need to put on the brakes. It's just so damn hard to not flip out at the unknown. I like to know what's going on in me. I read my own bloodwork results and follow along with all the tests I get.

I manage to stay away for a few days and then there I go, Googling it again. Every site has different takes on it. The one I just found said that in the early stages before there is much damage, it can be recommended to keep the weight off the joint in hopes that it will heal. It showed illustrations of a normal hip and then another with the crumbling hip ball. I went back to my X-rays and stared hard at them.

I imagine having to get another handicapped place card for my car and then I cry a bit. Then I begin designing what my crutches will look like. I think I would paint them white with pink flames... and maybe a hot red-cross symbol. They'd be super hot. Then I could start wearing matching nurse outfits with the white nurse hat.

Again, super hot. It almost gets to the point where I'll be disappointed if I don't get the freaking awesome flaming crutches.

But I'd really rather have healthy bones and hip joints. I swear I could just scream.

(now I'm mentally designing my Halloween costume)

Hopeless

2010-10-02T10:43:00.000-07:00

I went out taking some photos yesterday. My goal was to get the most amazing blues but in the end my favourite photo was Hopeless.

Waxing Poetic in The Bathroom Stall

2010-09-30T21:06:00.001-07:00

Occasionally when I am forced to relieve myself in a public toilet, between trying to play the 'don't touch anything game' and dodging any roaming pathogens, I wonder... does God write in Sharpie?

Does God send Earthly secrets to the few, in the know, and sprinkle universal wisdom to anyone caught in the sweet moment of relief?

Or perhaps does God answer unknown authors grieving questions in the low key location of the bathroom stall walls like a booth of enlightenment?

Silent conversations go on within those steel walls. Replies follow. Some kind and supportive, some explicit.

Have I discovered some underpinnings of the human psyche that flow from the ink of a pen? I find all writings within the proximity of the loo to be unexpectedly introspective as if these words are released from the depths of the writer's soul.

Sharpie 1-"Somedays I almost feel alive
but most days I forget to live"

Reply sharpie -"don't give up"

Self questioning sharpie -"i'm frightened by what I think"

Bitchy black pen -"post secret much?"

liquid paper says -"smoke doobies!"

Dayglo Blue paint pen -"hooray for doobies!"

Yearning for answers Sharpie says-"I have enough $ to pay for school but my parents won't let me quit my job that I hate. Should I quit anyway or should I stick with it? <---Never be a server ever! YES NO"

Reply in blue pen -"But you must be miserable to make art! Surely this is true."

Bleeding Kitty says -"Love Bites"

Silver paint pen -"ART SCHOOL IS HIGH SCHOOL ALL OVER AGAIN"

And apparently Tom Loves Laural but why in the heck was he in the girls bathroom?

Paint

2010-09-28T20:11:00.000-07:00

So I traded the war paint in for oil paint today. I picked up my pallet and scraped the old paint away. I made sure I got all the residue off so I could start fresh. Despite the case of nerves, I squeezed out and mixed new colours and dabbed my brush in. I slid the paint covered bristles onto the rough gesso'd canvas that had a drawing of a thought on it.

It's an interesting thing making a thought into a visual image. You never quite know if it will come across or not. Whether is does or doesn't makes no difference. It occupied me and made me refocus for at least a small amount of time.

These thoughts I've been entertaining about my life without a hip and degenerating joints are twisting me into knots. I need to not lose myself.

Thank god for friends who put up with me and thank goodness for understanding people online who can relate to what it is I'm going through.