Still here...

I haven't gone anywhere.  

In fact, I wrote this post a few days ago and I've been considering whether I want to actually publish it.  I've finally decided to do it, and hope some good can come from it.  

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post titled "Ruminations and Risk Taking".  At the time my use of the word "ruminations" was simply to mean contemplations - of any sort.  At the time I wrote that, I was enjoying being outdoors, soaking in the sun, and listening to birdsong, just contemplating life, and being thankful that I was rebuilding my strength, and getting on with life.  There was some heavy stuff on my mind, but my feeling then was that all was mostly well.  And it was.  And still is, for that matter.  But recently, I've come to realize that there has been a fair amount of negative ruminating going on, too. 

In recent weeks, my brain has been revisiting stuff I'd rather not think about (explanation as to why, in a minute), but it wasn't until the third or fourth time over the last few weeks that I heard myself monologuing to my husband for 10-15 minutes at a time, reviewing (ruminating out loud about) stuff from last year - some things he already knew, some things I had never told him - I realized that I am dealing with a load of unresolved stuff that happened during the diagnostic stage of my cancer experience.  Yes, I know that was an insane run-on sentence, but I'm leaving it as is.  Welcome to my brain right now.

Last week, when I once again heard myself telling my husband something awful from last year, I stopped myself mid-sentence wondering, "Why am I doing this again?!?"  And as soon as I asked the question, I knew the answer!

Since mid-May, I've begun a series of follow-up appointments with doctors.  I had my second appointment with the endocrinologist (who works out of a different cancer center than I visited last year) to discuss results of tests she had me do.   A few days later I had my first six-month follow-up with my oncologist to discuss the ongoing endocrine therapy he has me on.  Earlier this week, I had a follow-up MRI (unrelated to breast cancer, and that came back clean - yay!)  Next week I have my annual follow-up visit with the surgeon who removed my cancer.  And, I guess, just because I was on a roll making medical appointments, I had scheduled my "Welcome to Medicare" appointment with my GP for last week.  Whew!  

All these appointments have been as good as they can be (and I anticipate next week's follow-up with my surgeon will go fine enough), but being pulled back into the world of cancer treatment, and walking back into two different cancer centers several times now in two months has caused me to revisit the trauma that happened during all the diagnostic tests a year ago.  

Sitting in the waiting room of the cancer center recently, music started playing.  Where I was sitting, I couldn't see the man sitting at a grand piano playing and my first thought was, "Wow, I don't remember hearing any piped in music in all the visits I made here last year".  Something clued me in that it was a live performance, and I moved, finding a seat where I could enjoy watching as well as listening. 

With a few unpleasant exceptions, most of the staff I encountered last year were the nicest and kindest medical people I've ever been treated by.  At the same time, the tests they ran me through were among the worst things I've ever experienced to date.  Truly - the stuff of nightmares. In recent weeks, I was only able to sleep for four or five hours a night.  Sometimes, not able to fall asleep until the sun came back up.  Weirdly, I was functioning fine (in spite of little sleep and a brain on overload), but there was (and maybe still is to some extent) a cloud following me around for weeks now.  And I finally called it out.  I think it's just plain old unresolved trauma. 

I'm not sure where I go with these thoughts from here - I'm pretty sure I'll figure it out, or time will resolve it, or I will find help if I need to.  But for now, somehow, calling out what's been going on with me helps me feel better.  I'm happy to say I've been sleeping somewhat better.  

And while I'm sparing you the details of the things that try to trouble me, I hope my sharing this much is helpful to someone possible going through their own "ruminating" over hard things that don't seem to have any resolution.  

As for myself, I'm sure there's value in just getting this off my chest. To give air and light to unwelcome thoughts and make them less powerful.  And to document this experience for myself.

Maybe you know someone who has experienced some sort of trauma or difficulty in the recent past, and while they look just fine on the outside - in fact, they may be very fine, life might be great - they also may have dark, troubling thoughts from time to time.  While no one wants that kind of thing to go on forever, I'm pretty sure it's normal to experience this kind of thing after any sort of trauma.

If you, personally, know someone in such shoes, don't be afraid to ask them how they're doing.  They probably won't be expecting it, and they may not know what to say.  But they will appreciate that you asked.  

And if they talk...

Just listen.  

Validate them - listening without giving advice is priceless

Appreciate their vulnerability. 

It may just mean the world to them.

And if they don't want to open up, that's okay too.  Or maybe they're feeling on top of the world at that moment - they'll tell you if they are.  Celebrate with them.

It will mean a great deal that you asked.

Spirea in bloom in May.

Soon it will be very hot here...

Billie Jo at Afternoon Coffee and Evening Tea made me smile today with her honest post about preferring the indoors as the weather heats up.  I relate completely.

And it stirred up this post in me. 

Writing recently about putting a garden in, and showing some of the pictures, while I think I've been honest about it being a bit more of a challenge for me this spring, it's easy to make gardening look and sound somewhat idyllic.  

The truth is, it's a lot of hard, sweaty and dirty work - for anyone - to put in a garden.  If the sun is shining, and the temperature is anything above, say...  68 degrees, and depending on how hard I'm working, I turn into a sweaty mess out there in fairly short order.  Because of that, if possible, I save showering for after working outside in the morning.  But that isn't possible every day. 

If I can't garden until the afternoon or early evening, presumably I've gotten myself in presentable condition for whatever I needed to do in the first part of the day.  As I change my clothes and put on "gardening shoes", I begin an internal discussion about how hot it is, how sweaty I'm going to get, and how I'm going to need to take a second shower afterwards.  The worst is actually when it's a coolish temperature outside, and I can probably work "sweat free", but if it's been rainy, it's turned buggy, and I know the smart thing to do is use a bug repellant.  Whether I'm hot and sweaty or covered with bug spray (or both), I'm going to feel compelled to take another shower when I come back in from working outside, and while I enjoy the clean feeling afterward, I hate the idea of getting wet all over again.  

In fact, I dislike it so much, on a comfortable day when I don't anticipate getting sweaty or dirty as I work outside, I sometimes forego the bug spray - just so I don't have to take a second shower.  I take my chances with the mosquitos, and almost always regret it.  Mosquito bites that turn into painful welts aren't pretty, and they are maddeningly distracting for three or four days.  The whole situation - painful welts, valiantly resisting scratching - it's pure misery.  And ridiculous.  And probably not even smart.  But I repeat this scenario over and over again.  All because I don't want to take a second shower.

I probably have a whole blog post inside me about how much I can drag my feet like an eight year-old over taking a shower - let alone two showers in one day.

But that's a post for another day - or probably not. Today, inspired by Billie Jo, I just wanted to write something I don't know that I say very often.   

One of the things I appreciate about gardening is that it gets this seriously heat-averse gal outside in the most miserably hot temperatures, when my natural bent is to stay inside where it is cool and mosquito free.  It's been a lot warmer here than normal since March, but our truly miserable heat is expected come July, August and September.  The early part of October can even be hot here, though the humidity seems to lessen by then, making the heat more tolerable.  And the promise of the first frost and falling leaves makes October's hot days kind of nostalgic feeling.

When our boys were young, I'd take them to the public pool at least a couple of times a week during the hot summer; in one town we lived, we'd visit a nearby lake.  On days we didn't go to the pool or lake, we might pull out the sprinkler, or fill up water balloons.  Oh, and water guns - those were a favorite, I'm now remembering.  It seems to me that we all enjoyed summer.

When the boys got older, and going to a crowded public pool ceased to be as much fun, I think that's when a dislike of summer started to settle into me.  Summer became something to endure.  That's been my attitude for years now.  And I've always felt kind of bad about it.  To dislike a season that is responsible for providing much of the world's sustenance seems pretty ungrateful.

I don't know how long we'll live in this place that has a nice garden spot, asparagus and strawberry patches, and a couple of fruit trees.  We may live here longer than either of us has the strength or desire to garden.  I don't know the future.  I only have today.  And today, as much as I dislike getting all sweaty, or using bug spray, and taking more than one shower in a day, I'm realizing one of the great benefits gardening is to me, is that it gets me outside - pretty much every day.  And the biggest surprise is it also has made me not dislike summer quite so much.

When the temps here get to be 90 for a stretch of time, and it hasn't rained in over a month, I may still complain. Ask me to travel south between the middle of June and the middle of October, and I'll probably groan.  And, if I absolutely have to attend an outdoor event on a hot, humid day (or evening), I'll consider it something to endure.  Yeah...  I don't think I've fully embraced summer and all its sweaty heat, but I don't seem to hate it (so much) anymore. For that, I am grateful.

And sometimes...  like today...  we get treated to a pop up rain storm that totally refreshes everything, cools things off.   In the spring, these showers are expected from time to time. In the summer, a shower like this feels like a gift.