Sixteenth and Final Chemotherapy Session

Last Friday's final session was a happy ending to a celebratory week, one that welcomed my youngest brother, Brian, to town for a short visit before returning Mom back to Kansas just after the ringing of the bell at Texas Oncology, which was the best two-minute party I've ever had.  

Complete with many radiant faces, confetti-throwing and congratulations all around, it was the perfect culmination of Mom's time here in Austin, caring for her eldest daughter, and also the commencement of a new chapter for her, and for our family: returning to our hometown and into her own, new nest, in a retirement community just a few miles from the house we've called home since 1983, when we moved as a family of eight, from Kearney, Nebraska to Clay Center, Kansas.  My siblings are faced with the lion's share of work required to clear the house and prepare it for sale, and I'm sorry I won't be able to be there to help, also a little sad I won't be able to see it one last time before saying goodbye.  

Mostly I'm relieved, however, that treatments are over, that Mom has a comfy and fun new place to live, (complete with several friends living there, and walking distance to the city pool and the high school football track & field) and that I can now focus on getting back to normal life without the interruption of infusions and the hellish week of side-effects to follow.   As I type this entry, I am so grateful to be seated upright, able to look at a screen, and have the wherewithal to construct sentences of my experience.  The last three days were the most severe of this entire journey, fraught with feelings of the worst kind of flu, a fainting spell that has my nose a little swollen and a small scrape on my shoulder and head, and intense fatigue that had me sleeping fitfully round the clock.  So, while I feel a little off at the moment, I am 100% better from where I was over the weekend and thank God this was the last time going through it. 

Today I go in for one last MRI that will give my oncologist and surgeon the information to make the surgery game plan, which will happen sometime near the end of April.  Until then, I'm making the most of the minutes I feel well, to live presently and purposefully, envisioning and praying for positive outcomes and being ever grateful to engage in the tasks of daily living.  I hope this note finds you well, joyful and enjoying springtime...thank you so much for sharing this journey with me.