Can we have a forum for "older" people with bc?
Comments
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SV...
If you break out on the tip of your nose get yourself to an ophthalmologist. That is an indication the herpes can spread to the cornea... bad news if it does. Sorry for the pain. It is the worst.
pam
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I LOVE mashed potatoes too! .......You know what's good? After I boil the potatoes, I add a little butter... & buttermilk if I have it, instead of milk.... & about 1T.Mayo Sometimes I add yogurt instead of the mayo.. Or even a little cream cheese! Now I know this is not for the diet conscious, but just SOMEtimes, ya gotta do it!
I'm ALWAYS losing posts! Glad to know I'm not the only one, Ha! So glad you had a fun Day Melissa! Can you post that poem about the sea-glass? It was beautiful! If you can't, let me know, & I will, it that's alright! Just "copy" it, & paste! Okay, love you all! xoxoxoxo
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Oh, spar, I am so sorry you get such bad news. My healing prayers are with you. Where is the break? (I missed that post, sorry.) Chee-chee is such a cutie, big enough to hold in your 2 hands, what a lover! Pull chee-chee close and let him soothe your pain and disappointment...love to you.
Rita, if you try the potato soup recipe I posted, let me know how you like it. The other contributors recipes sound too complex for me, as cooking has always been a crap shoot for me.
Chevy, does Lacee have any offspring?? She is so photogenic! . As far as losing your posts if you are entering a long one over a period of time, just do the "copy" thing of it every now and again, then when you go to post it and it is gone, just hit paste. And always before you hit the "submit" button, do the "copy" thing in case you lose it.
Melissa SV, if you touch the shingles always wash your hands before touching another part of your body, I think they can be spread (like cold sores) to other parts of your body. If I am wrong, I will correct my information. Ditto on the advice of the shingles being on your face.
Wow, you really found some great deals at Eddies! Retail therapy has an amazing effect on the psyche!! I've got the itch (no pun intended) to shop after reading your post.
gentle hugs
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Isabella, where are you? I'm worried about you.
Anyone have her email addy?
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She walks alone in the slow of time by silver waves falling on beaches of dark red,
sand
Looking for a treasured blink
burned from cold fire, now lit brite and found
in the yawn of this morning's dawn;
It reveals the treasure, in new form and
alive again in the glint of its shine
This jewel of the ocean waiting patiently
for her eye to see a new found mystery.
Now broken and smoothed by water and wave:
just one small piece,
of ancient bottle or cup or plate or tea.
Carried centuries ago, in ships of old'
held in lockers and on tables, bright'd by burning oil,
This glass, carried in full
'neath the groans of timber plied and
bent and nailed
to weild air in the
great white sails
which caught the wind, and carried safely all
'til Neptune rose with one raw slap, its journey end
broke the hull and stores of the ancient ship
and sent it's crumbling bits to fall
in a long, long journey to the ocean floor,
Where current and tide
took broken glass and
shaped it all anew
to shining slivers of jewels
in reds, and greens and whites and blues.
Waiting for her alone hand exposed
she scours the seabed floor where slackened tides
loose their grip,
on the glass of the sea.
To find in the looking, the question of "she";
she counts her character in each
piece of glittering light in her hand,
in wonder of what it will be,
when it sings again, changed forever from cup to jewels,
this ancient glass of the sea.
SV
OK, really corny and very rough but J made me copy it down for you all to read! I am so embarrassed to show my writing-this is for the pleasure of those who get it. I am deeply existential-sorry for the angst over something so simple as sea glass. Tee hee
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SV great retail therapy. Love the poem as well.
Spar I do hope you can sort something out about your leg - what a bother.
Have been wondering about Isabella as well, where are you?
Should do some work but the ice dance is on, might take my laptop into the other room.
Alyson
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Hi all....still here, but having only time to read.
Big problems with my Aunt, who has ended up in a psychiatric unit.... more like a 'looney bin' to me, but its all thats available at the moment. I am driving out to see her 4/5 times a week, which is absolutely stupid, because I am just not keeping up with everything at home. After almost constant visiting for three weeks, and the crying and wailing that I am getting every time I see her I am cutting it down to twice a week. It is draining me. The staff tell me the minute I am gone she turns it off like a tap.....I haven't told them I won't be visiting as often...but I won't.
I am ending up trying to catch up with things on an evening, when I really need to be off my feet.The house is sooo untidy, I just plonk things down and run... and the fridges are bare. DH is still like a bear with a sore head with his siatica....and trying to guilt trip me because I am not helping him out, he has just not stopped moaning all evening about the pain he is in, and bearing in mind he saw a physical therapist 10 days ago, was given exercises, and on his own admission he has only done them once, 'and it did no good' so he 'wasn't carrying on' . Bearing in mind also that he has virtually stopped taking his pain killers, and amytriptiline ( for the last 36 hours he hasn't taken 1 painkiller)...so, bearing this all in mind there could very shortly be a murder here, I might not be posting much longer. ( are you allowed laptops in jail? shouldn't think so !!!) I feel quite guilty that I don't have the energy to constantly keep asking him how he is, and does he want anything ? I don't really need to anyway, as I am getting it in glorious technicolor from him every hour, on the hour !! when all I want to do is sit quietly and read. I think me just sitting quietly reading is giving DH the impression I don't care, when I am trying to unwind myself, and let my painkillers work for me.( not much chance of the unwinding bit when I am getting siatica, siatica, siatica all the time.)
My own pain level is pretty high, all my Arimidex pains seem 10 times worse when I am burning the candle at both ends....and I need to get off my feet in the evenings because of my slipped discs. I'm beginning to wish I was a dog this week, all my dogs do all day is curl up infront of the fire and sleep, with the occasional comfort run outside...what a life ! I come in at teatime, frazzled at driving thru very heavy traffic, and there they all are, snoring. Although as soon as they hear me they are up, and about knocking me over, at least they're pleased to see me !! Or could it be that my appearance heralds their 'meaties' time.
Right off for a nice hot shower. I have made myself a cheese and tomato sandwich, I missed my tea tonight, so off to bed to watch some tv and munch my sandwich!
Isabella.
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Just PMed Isabella and when I came back she had posted. Do hope your you can get some rest so you aren't so stressed out.
SV why did you take off your poem, it made me cry? Please send it to me.
Must do some work.
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Oh ISABELLA, I was really worried, but I had a feeling you were trying to deal with being a 'caregiver' in a situation that is about impossible to do!! Sweetie, take a mental health break for real. There is just too much on your plate having to deal with DH (I'd lock him up with the dogs) and the doggies, the FARM, the house, the drive and all of the emotions that go with having to have a 'loved one' in a psych unit. I am so sorry. Chances are, she has no idea about your comings and goings and it may be evil to say, but take a week for yourself. I think someone described it perfectly, my house looks like a trash bin with windows right now!! i am afraid i will end up on the show "The Hoarders" not because I hoard but because 'it lays where I drop it' right now." Best I can do. Everything is written on bits of paper scattered hither and yon and no idea what i am supposed to be doing. Normally my life is run very efficiently by a calendar-not a chance right now. If this is the best i can do, I cannot imagine the pressure of having all that you have to deal with on your shoulders!! Please care for yourself first!!!! We worry about you and love you!!! (((((GENTLE HUGS)))) SV
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Oh, Isabella, it is so good to hear from you again. Please don't murder your old man, we need you too much here. Is there any place you can get away to and dodge the stressors for a bit?
please take care of yourself first!!!!
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Spar - Sorry to hear about your news. If crying is what you need to do - DO IT! Crying just seems to help. I truly hope that something can be worked out. Chee-Chee is so adorable. I love the little legs. I can relate to little legs.
SV - Hang in there girl. Even with all the crap that you have to cope with I feel confident that you willl get thru this (and as you said, this too shall pass). Shingles- damn! You know, in the last six mos. I have heard about so many cases of it. Take care of yourself.
Hope everyone is doing as well as can be. Just know that spring is just around the corner. Yippeeee! Warm weather - yessssss. Sunshine, vitamin D and all the rest.
Hugs to everyone. Chris
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Caring so much and thinking about you Spar. Prayers for you.
Also for Isabella
I never got to see the poem either. Was working all day today.
I'm done in. See you all later.
Hugs, Jackie
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THIS FEELS LIKE MY LIFE! XXOO SV
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I am having trouble getting these on the page, the ginger one is Gus. He was trying to use the chair as camaflage, I sure didn't trust him as he was ready for trouble.Barnabas is the grey/blue, he is regal and very beautiful.
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This is the beach I spent many hours of my childhood.
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OMG ... where to begin?
Spar ... I am so sorry. ((((((((((HUGS)))))))))) Post and let us know what's going on. How did you break it ... I can't remember. However you did it, don't do it again. Chee Chee is sooooooooooo cute.
Chevy ..Lacee is beautiful. I love the snow on his nose!
SV ... hang in there. Life can be so darn frustrating.
Isabella ... let me add my concern to the pile already posted - please, please take care of yourself. I can feel your frustration with all that stuff you carry around on your shoulders. You have got to put all the baggage down and rest. I know, easier said than done.
Alyson ... really beautiful pictures.
I was supposed to go to a new podiatrist today but they called and changed it to tomorrow. The one I had been seeing (who my sister says is the "go-to" guy for diabetic foot ulcers) wants me coming in every week where he scraps at the skin growing up around it, gives me new medicine and bandages it at $40 (co-pay) a pop! What has occurred to me - finally - is even if it does heal what is there to prevent it from doing it again. What are we going to do to prevent that?
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Morning Isabella, so glad to year from you again!!!! I'm so sorry about ALL your problems with your Aunt....My Mother in Law used to do the same thing with me & my Sister in Law...but that didn't just start when she went into a Nursing Home! She always put us on a guilt trip....So WE naturally kept bringing her home-cooked food, visiting her more than even her Sons....Until one time we heard her comment to the nurses that 'Her DIL were all full of s***, & that she hated all the food we brought!" Well the food stopped, & so did our good nature!
At least my SIL & I could discuss it together & try & laugh about it....But it seemed our "obligation" to her kept wanting to take precedence! Well THAT notion got ground out of our brains, the meaner she got! Hopefully your Aunt will just do fine, even when you are not there! And that Husband of yours! I think it is their mission in life, to make sure we know all about every ache & pain they have....And they won't take care of themselves either! They can have a suit-case full of pills, that they have been prescribed, but they won't take them! We are supposed to feel sorry for them, & like my Grandma used to say, "toity to them"..... I feel bad that YOU are feeling so bad! Just take some time for yourself girl.....and pretend you are one of your pooches, & hang with them!
And SVMELISSA.....Are you alright? Did you think I would MISS that you deleted your posts? At least I "lost" mine...Just waiting to hear about your rip-roarin' days lately! I downloaded a short video about Shawn White! That kid is simply amazing! And he was on Regis & Kelly yesterday! If you google him, you can find him boarding when he was just 11! And his life is so fascinating for him & his family!!!!!! See, now, you can also call me a "board head"....not just a "red-neck gear-head....Hah! By the way, Jimmie Johnson won yet AGAIN!!!!!! But not actually by racing...Cautions & a rain delay, pit-stops & timing played a BIG part in that race! It would just be nice for someone ELSE to win sometimes! I even scare the dog when I yell!
Okay kids....gotta get this day going! It gets light earlier & dark later, & it really helps my moods! I'm just waiting for SPRING!!!! xoxoxoxo Jeannette
Okay, I tried just writing this all down, like in a letter...then I could minimize this & read the posts, to answer, then when I was finished, I just hit did "highlight" then copy... & I put it all here to post by just hitting "paste", Yipee!!!!!!!! I KNEW I could whip this into shape!
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Hey Tuesday,
I've been reading a lot too. We PODS have a LOT to say. And it's just life, everyday in the lives of really not too many of us that stick around in here. There are a LOT of readers. We discuss our lives and we really don't know who is reading about it. I talk about the boards with my family, and I've shared where I post stuff with some family... but I wonder who is reading besides the ones of us that. Thinking too much!
Haven't been for a swim in a week and I miss it. We were so busy last week, and DD is busy this week which means I'll be the babysitter. YaY.
oops... I'm on her laptop and she just got home.... later,
Connie
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I love to read and right now I am reading two books, each fascinating and tangentially related.
The first is called Change your Mind: a Practical Guide to Buddhist Meditation. The author, Paramananda, says the following about meditation:
"Samatha [breath meditation] encourages the gradual integration of the psyche. It brings together one's disparate sub-personalities into a unified whole so the mind is no longer divided against itself and is able to act with energy and focus."
I volunteer at Hospice of the Ozarks and am in a training session for a new program called a "Structured Life Review". It is based in part on Professor Erik Erikson's model of the Eight Stages of Man. Here is a quote," Man must accept his life as it was lived in order to gain integrity, wisdom and happiness."
As a therapeutic listener, I and other volunteers will help the dying go through their memories and (we hope) develop peace. The book is called the Handbook of Structured Life Review. To find out more about this book...http://www.amazon.com/Handbook-Structured-Life-Review/dp/1932529276
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I am working my way through the collected works of Jane Austin. Just finished Persuasion. I am more into fiction than non-fiction. You guys are too smart for me :-)
pam
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Jane Austin was so able to describe the human condition and the conditions for women in particular, her works boarder on non-fiction.
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LOOOVE Jane Austen. I wish there were 50 books! She was so insightful and so many of her themes carry over to modern times. Thank goodness women have more options today but human nature has changed very little.
pam
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Thanks for the suggestion, Jo. I'll look for it when I finish this tome! Sad thing though, I don't think her life had the happy ending I am always looking for.
pam
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notself...interesting. I have been reading Brian Weiss, M.D., Sylvia Browne, Eckart Tolle, Susan Ford and a few assorted others. Much of this would be considered New Age and I find it highly spiritual in that it addresses my soul. I will be 65 on my birthday so have in the last 12 years or so done a lot of spiritual study work and I am very, very comfortable with much of what I read.
"Samatha [breath meditation] encourages the gradual integration of the psyche. It brings together one's disparate sub-personalities into a unified whole so the mind is no longer divided against itself and is able to act with energy and focus."
I copied and pasted relating to the meditation because I think it is something we should be doing daily. Other authors I have read basically recommend it as well. They say not only integrating, but meditation blocks all the wrong living we tend to do....and that would best be described as any time you are not living completely in the present. If you deal with life not in the present you will tend to use answers from that past that won't really fit the situation now as we are always in a new unit of time. Same can be said for trying too hard to live in the future based on what the past has been like -- it generally is not a sufficient answer and causes much stress and worry....especially when they same things we are TRYING so hard to plan for don't materialize.
Being in your present completely makes available to you much better solutions to things as they are based on the exact present -- nothing else and they are much simpler and easier and life is not the effort that it often becomes to us.
I know this is not for everyone -- and sometimes I am surprised that it is for me, but I do welcome being in tune with myself and the universe. One of the greatest things about getting thru the hardest parts of my cancer ( spells stress ) txs is that soon I will be back to having more time to devote to a study that I wish to continue till the day my soul leaves this lifetime behind. That would as well include meditation which I learned to do many years ago in California -- 38 years ago to be exact. Sadly, life got in the way.....raising children, working at different jobs etc. Little time to practice meditation nor do the Yoga I learned, or keep up with spiritual studies. I will be able to do all these things once more.
Pam, I don't think anyone here is too smart for you.....I certainly think most everyone has it over me and I bet a lot of these ladies feel just that way as well. Just like you in fact seem to feel.
In my studies --- I think we are all pretty much where we are meant to be for the life lessons we set out to learn and experience in order to grow our soul. Not to make anyone question, but usually if you are not where you are meant to be you will "feel and sense it" with quite a wobble. Now everyone that wobbles a bit will say or think they must be off track or something....that is not so. We all will experience dessert periods and generally come out on top --- so don't get to questioning every little thing with yourself.
I think I have taken up a lot of time here, and to many this may be all so much gobbledegook. But that is because we are not and never would be all on the same level -- it is not a bad thing, it is just the way it is -- others may relate to some of this information -- and some may call me to task. All I can say is that these are the things which I have learned and my soul recognized the learning with the deep serene calmness that comes when you have not only seen the truth, but felt it. When your whole entire body vibrates to the message -- you can know and believe and feel at one with your soul and with your loving Creator.
Hope you all have a stunning day the rest of today. I am so loving the animal pictures. All are quite special and adorable.
Warm spiritual hugs, Jackie
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Jackie,
How well you put this when you said, "If you deal with life not in the present you will tend to use answers from that past that won't really fit the situation now as we are always in a new unit of time. Same can be said for trying too hard to live in the future based on what the past has been like -- it generally is not a sufficient answer and causes much stress and worry....especially when they same things we are TRYING so hard to plan for don't materialize. "
I thought you might like this 2500 year old poem.
Let one not trace back the past
Or yearn for the future-yet-to-come
That which is past is left behind
The "yet-to-come" is unattained
And that which is present he discerns
With insight as and when it comes. --- M III 187
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Pam, I love Jane Austin and read Pride and Prejudice as a comfort book - I just about know it by heart, Persuasion is also up there as well.
I do read a lot of nonfiction as history is my subject and I have become very interested in theology of Celtic Christianity. But as I am trying to write a Social Studies text book at present I haven't had much time for my own reading.
Darling grandaughter arrived round here yesterday - we were baby sitting - wearing a Canadian olympic tee-shirt. Her Daddy is really indocrinating her, it was so funny as she showed us the word on her shirt and said Canda - not bad for sixteen months. Then she showed us how she could dance- they had been watching the Ice dancing. I must add that SiL was not pleased about the hockey.
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I don't know, Jackie. One way I have gotten through some of this breast cancer turmoil and just plain unpleasantness has been to remove myself from the moment and see it all as something someone else is going through... not me! I am the person I was before diagnosis or the person who I was going to be in the future but certainly NOT the person listening to the dr's bad news or the one lying on the scan table or under the radiation beam! My body is changed by what I have been through this past year but I am trying hard to keep my mind and soul from following suit. I want the innocence of pre-cancer. I don't want to be smarter or a better person for having "fought" BC. I want to remain the eternal Pollyanna. I do what I am supposed to for my body (meds, tx, diet, exercise) but my mind is my own and it does not accept the reality of the present. I am old enough, happily, that I don't have to plan my career or the path my children will take. All that hard stuff is done. I plan for a grandchild to come visit when we can try to catch lizards or when high tide is so my friend and I can walk on the beach. I scheme how to get DH to dress up and take us out someplace fancy for dinner or how to get someone else to be secretary of the civic club cause I have lost interest. Shallow? Absolutely! And I read Jane Austin because there is always a happy ending :-)
So I leave the metaphysical to you deep thinkers. I am just muddling through and trying hard to ignore the bad stuff.
pam
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notself -- thank you for the poem. Very thought provoking and I'll probably print it out. Some of this does sound hard -- it is difficult for most to live in what Eckert Tolle calls the now -- which is every second inclusive of the one just happening and any after that. I think that is because so many of us think that we are but the mind is always working silently and since there is a past and present that so many consider as it resides somewhat insidiously in our mind -- we just feel like we are in the now. Meditation so helps this because usually.....that part of your brain will relax and just be -- nothing generally from the past and generally nothing in the future. It takes a little effort and practice but is well worth it. Because ultimately, you will become who you really are -- yes, I know a few will say that they really, really are _insert name here__ and yes you are but you are just bigger and far more capable than you ever imagined. It is just the hustle and bustle of the world that intrudes and blocks a lot of your now.
Ok -- there is nothing wrong with you. I still operate that way so often and it is ok -- there is never a time you can't begin to make changes if you feel they are important to you. So don't obsess about where you are --- I did say --- you are basically where your life plan meant for you to be. Acceptance of what is ( total and true acceptance ) also and always allows you to change what you feel is not or no longer desirable. I think notself's meditation paragraph alluded to that point. We are not static nor in a vacuum.....and can change what feels like a poor fit any time we might feel we could be better than we are.
You are all -- not matter what your level some of the greatest people I know and I am very proud to know you.
Ok -- break time is over. Back to my cleaning --- which is about as much now as I can handle for this afternoon.
Hugs, Jackie
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Hey girlfriends,
I have a dilemma tonight. I am wracked with emotions that don't know where to go, so they are coming to you, my PODS, my backup, my advisors.
I'M MAD AS HELL. I had a consult with a Plastic surgeon today to look at my boobs. Now, I'm absolutely not a vain person, but the bc side is considerably smaller now, after surgery, radiation and the unbeforementioned radiation shrinkage. dh went with. Have been considering having a reduction on the right, large side.
Then I log in and look for others and find that large breasted women with a teeny little DCIS can and ARE having bi-lateral reduction and nixing the rads because they can take bigger margins. And My Breast Surgeon never even suggested. My Rad Onc, never even suggested, nobody that had anything to do with working on me EVER suggested that because I HAVE large ones they could have done that, I wouldn't have had to have Radiation Therapy AND I would be symmetrical all with one operation.
I wouldn't have lost my job. I likely wouldn't have all this SUPER PISSING OFF BACK PAIN, I KNOW I wouldn't have had a necrotic cyst removed and caused 2 rounds of antibiotics and a punch biopsy that hurt like hell and is STILL RED. OMG. We attended high school and graduated the same class together, me and this breast surgeon. WHY didn't she give me options.
Now, I find out, 2 1/2 years later that so much misery could have been avoided and nobody even cared to look at alternatives. My DH was wanting to, but they, the docs all pushed and pushed their way, we really felt we had no choice.
DAMN I"M MAD. and confused. and a whole lot of other emotions right now.
Conne
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Hello Friends,
Hope that this note finds you all well. I have a lot of catch up reading, have not been on this website for at least 3 or more months. Have been taking care of my terminally ill Mom. She was diagnosed with lung CA in June of last year and we have brought her home with hospice. I am so tired that I just go to bed when I can and get sleep. Hope the Lord sees to come get her soon, she is really in pain, and so is my Dad and my sisters.
Hope that you all continue to heal and feel better, next month I go for my one year check up. Time really flies.
Hugs and kisses to you all.
Cindy
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Connie,
I don't know about DCIS as I had a lumpectomy for IDC and radiation is a given. Your DCIS was large ... maybe that pushed you to radiation? Also lots changes in 2 1/2 years... perhaps the standard of care is different now? We can't go back, just forge ahead, And best wishes for a good symetrical outcome.
pam
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