Spa'z Attack

A couple of weekends ago, we visited a spa where we spent far too much money though it was great spending the time with my sister, mom, and my niece, all of us sitting 'round the spa library (a sinisterly dark room, Metropolitan Home ready-to-peruse, lavender lemon verbena scent wafting) while wearing spa robes and slippers. I went to the spa for a facial. My mom, sister and niece were all having massages.

Leading us into the dressing room, the spa hostess asked, "What size feet do you have?" I could not put that question together with the fact that I was there for a facial so I ignored her question. Finally she handed me a Calista Flockhart-sized robe replete with lilliputian rubber slippers, and left me to prepare. Life was so much simpler pre-facials. When I was young, my mom would holler, "Go wash your face!" There was never a call for a robe and slippers. If there had been a call, and entire family of seven would have gone robe and slipper shopping.

I was concerned. Why are they telling me to take my clothes off if I am getting a facial? My sister suggested, "Maybe they'll give you a foot rub." I have no idea what rubbing my feet has to do with a face? At 5'9" tall, my face and feet are a good distance away from one another. You'd think the spa would charge double if they're doing a foot rub in addition to a facial - in fact, I know I paid double. But I don't want a foot rub by a stranger. Naked, my toes look like Weebles (membah them?) and tend to curl up like the Wicked Witch's from the Wizard of Oz upon the threat of being touched. I could already feel my shoes tightening.

I once had a blind date with a guy whose company I enjoyed and he, mine, though he made a serious faux pas midway through the evening. He let slip that he had a thing for feet. My heart sank at any hope of continuing any relationship with this freaking foot fanatic. I shuddered through the end of that date as if I had to fart at any second. I was afraid he'd want to see my toes and I'd be out of there faster than Cinderella leaving the ball past midnight. That date was our first and last. Afterward he phoned me several times, asking, wondering why I wouldn't go out with him again? I finally told him I had a terrible illness. Even though it was years later, I was diagnosed with cancer. (See what happens when you lie?) All I'm saying is beware. Anyone with a creepy foot fetish should not bring up his penchant for a foot fantasy while on a date with someone who has lymphedema (lower body) unless the person likes chubby, wubby toes that look like they spent their life stuffed inside a Vienna sausage can.

That's why I'm saying -- just do the facial, okay?

Getting undressed for my facial -- I left my lymphedema compression garment on the bottom half of my body as guaranty that, should I become momentarily distracted during my facial, finding myself in a position where someone was actually making a quick move for my lower half, they'd come upon this additional barrier to my toes. Were I to pass out from all the tension and stress of this spa visit while laying on the facial table wearing my postage stamp-sized robe, they would not be able to get to my toes without actually cutting off my compression garment. By this time I'd wake up to find a secret society of black robe wearing white-makeup-faced goons, and Tom Cruise wearing a creepy mask (sort of reminds me of the spa library all over again). Putting my compression hose on in the morning take enough time out of my life already, I'm not taking them off for an unplanned foot-rub by a spa creep trying to earn bigger tip.

One pair of compression hose that I wear are so tight, they require the use of rubber gloves and a crowbar to assist with donning. Donning is the technical term the experts use instead of using the words "putting on." (You put on your cheapass socks. I don my compression garments. Notice the subtle the difference? Mid-summer when the temperature reaches 102 degrees, I promise you'll notice a huge difference.)

We use the word donning when we spend thousands of dollars (and insurance money if we are *really* lucky) on made-to-order compression garments, sewn in Germany by stitchers (sewers?) who obviously hate lymphedema patients (because the compression stockings, made to a patient's exact measurements NEVER, ever fit correctly the first time, and must be returned to the German seamstresses, (sewers?) 3-4 times to be re-modeled before the garments will fit properly in order for them to be donned. I have never become shorter between measuring and receiving my order from Germany -- (at least not 20 cm shorter).

On this particular spa trip I neglected to pack my assorted donning tools. Still I have developed and refined life long defenses to keep anyone who's hot after toes at bay. Yet, on that day at the spa as much as I fretted over possible foot attention, the esthetician never offered to rub my tootsies. Not one word passed between us about my feet. If I had followed instructions to take off all my clothes, I'd still be scratching my head, wondering wtf?

My feet spent the day neglected which is exactly the way I like them. If my toes ever get any special treatment, it's gonna be from me. After all, I know what they look like. I've already been warned.

Femme Fatale

Brownie woman turned out to be middle-aged, petite and attractive. From the start (if you read the previous blogpost), my gut told me that something was awry. I have a gut that cannot be ignored ever since I gave birth to twins 30 years ago.

Brownie owns a great car and she knew how to drive -- with this car group, those traits are prerequisites for a perfect relationship. This woman has some of the qualities of an enchantress merely by knowing *how* to drive fast. If she had stuck with the car and the driving, along with Chris's perception of her intelligence, she would do fine. Though it seemed as though she thinks that in order for her to get a man interested, she must behave giggly and helpless, traits that make me sick to my stomach. Her giggle was excruciating, after the nine thousandth time.

During the trip I witnessed several feigned femme fatale acts where it was obvious she was in want of rescue. That's why she wanted Chris to buy her brownies. Isn't that cute? It was just freakin weird. Brownie had also asked Chris to meet her near her condo so she'd have someone with which to drive up to the city. After seeing her car and watching her drive, she could go toe to toe with anyone of these guys. Chris told her to meet us at another designated spot. After that, Chris heard nothing from her. (Not so helpless after all I guess) Chris isn't clueless. He's just not on the market. 

The seductive move of Brownie's (that I'm putting in my how-to-get-a-date book) was when she accidentally locked her keys inside her convertible which was open. She squealed, near hysterics, "Oh, my door is locked. My keys are locked in my [opened, convertible] car! Oh, who can help me?"She could have leaned over and unlocked her car door. Or she could have jumped inside like a B movie-star over the side door, into the seat and got her keys out of the ignition but several men were standing nearby, ready to save the day. In the meantime, I had to go back to our hotel where I had left my camera inside the room. Our key had been locked inside the room - we had checked out already, leaving the key inside. From the door, I could see the key. I took the window screen off, climbed halfway inside the room, pulled the table over to me, grabbed the key and unlocked the door. No man was going to save me by doing anything different than I had done in the exact same situation.

There are lots of single men that go on these car tours so Brownie was smart to get involved (if she wants to spend every weekend doing car-related things if she wants to see her man). She could have gone to church, joined a bowling league or started a canasta club. These guys like cars and they like to drive their cars. Thankfully, one of them likes me. Well actually, I think maybe more than one of them likes me though he's in his 70s and I'm not so keen on driving around with an older (than Chris) guy. The old guy might seize up during the trip. Or expect sex. Ugh.

Brownie seemed desperate for a man -- enough so that during the first tour group trip she went on, she volunteered to be one of the guy's (I'll call him Hannibal) roommate at a hotel. Poor Hannibal, did not know what to make of Brownie though they became friends on Facebook. When I talked to Hannibal during this particular trip, post some tequila, Hannibal said he didn't know 'if [he] was interested." Brownie is about 14  years older and Hannibal didn't know if he could get past that age difference. Hannibal is conflicted.

In discussion with Chris about this, Chris thought Hannibal should just "go for it" and advised Hannibal as such. I warned Hannibal that sometimes "going for it" will find you inside a baggie on the top shelf of Jeffrey Dahmer's freezer. I do not recommend people "go for it." Then again, I don't have a penis, the "go for it" geiger counter du jour.

Heck of a Job, Brownie!

This weekend we're driving on another tour in one of Chris's cars -- 1000 miles in three days starting early Friday morning. We have to be at the Golden Gate bridge at 8 am. I've known about this trip for some time now. 

After many years of traveling with Chris, I sort of have a trip ritual that I get into. Thus when I first hear about another one of his trips, I freak out. Then after the freak out, I relent, and then, right before the trip, I start to freak out again. My sister has noticed the pattern and commented that it seems to be happening again. So right now, I'm officially in freak-out mode.

One of the things that has really got me disturbed about this particular trip is this one woman who is not even a  club member! (neither am I). She wants to go on the trip by herself, driving her own car. That, by itself is not the disturbing thing.

Chris sent out an email asking people what foods they wanted him to buy for the trip. (Chris is the go-to guy for this particular trip. In other words, he's the mom.) After he got a vetted list together, he sent some other club members over to the local Costco to purchase the items. Then Chris sent an email out to the club members who are attending the event (and also a copy of the email to this random, non-club type car owning woman) and told them that some of the items they'd requested weren't purchased. 

You guys would have died if you saw this list. Lime-flavored Bud, Vitamin Water, Snapple, Lemon-flavored Ice Tea, non-fat Green Tea with apple-flavored dip sticks, apple juice with green tea extract, purple-green water with floating balls of jello-like substance suspended and floating in liquid -- a huge assortment of different kinds of crap drinks. You would have thought the list was compiled by 5 year olds. The list of soda alone would have cost a fortune, (rootbeer, diet rootbeer, caffeine-free, diet rootbeer, caffeinated rootbeer with 1/3 sugar, 1/3 Splenda,& 1/3 HFCS, Splenda-free rootbeer without carbonation. You get the idea.) The members of the Fiat club that went to Costco used their brains, (what's left of them) and purchased only two cases of soda total. We don't need 10 cases of warm soda for 28 adults on a 3 day trip. Plus these folks are all OLD which to me means they don't need any soda. Your soda days are long gone, geezers!

Chris sends out another email explaining to the adults that the club members who went shopping did not purchase everything on the list but that we'd have plenty of things to choose from to quench our thirst besides water (such as warm cola, warm vanilla-flavored rootbeer etc.) But this one car driving woman emails Chris and pleads with him to please "get some mini chocolate brownies." And because Chris and I had been having a laugh about the ludicrous assortment of crap (on a stick) proposed shopping list of food items, he forwarded her email to me so I could laugh at this insane request for mini chocolate (as if they come in some other flavor??) brownies, (from an adult woman, who if that desperate for brownie bites, better just stay the eff home.) The gist of Brownie woman's email below:

"...And if you don't mind too much, please get some mini chocolate brownies."

And up until now, I have not been able to let this go. I can't figure out if I've got a huge control problem (I do!) or I'm suffering from some sort of bizarre jealousy or if I'm worried about my food intake being sabotaged by brownie bites? I think it's absolutely nutty that this woman would email Chris and ask him to make sure he buys mini brownies. (And it's absolutely nutty for me to obsess about the nuttiness of it.) But she doesn't even know him. She's an adult. She could buy her own GD brownies or make a whole pan of brownies (something I would do) and make them tiny and put them on a plate for herself. For crying out loud, she'll be in her own car, she could put an enormous box of brownies, the likes of which no one has seen, next to her on the seat, stuff them all in her mouth (I have done this!) and die of an overdose on the way up the coast. I mean, out of all the foods on the planet, she has to have brownies and Chris has to bring them for her? I don't get it. And of course, I've had this conversation with Chris a shitload of times now because I am so flummoxed about this woman's request for brownies, and Chris is ready to kill me. I mean, I had chemotherapy last year -- I thought I'd be dead soon, and this woman emails Chris for brownies? Pretty please with sugar...

Needless to say, I told Chris if he buys mini brownies for this woman, that will be the end of our relationship. And if, after my promising to end our relationship, he still feels inclined to buy the brownies, I need him to buy me a five pound box of See's Candies for the trip. I will keep the candy in the seat next to me and overdose on the way up the coast. 

Saturday Revelations

I attended a class on Saturday -- all 'students' in attendance were post-cancer treatment. The class was a call for volunteers willing to help those who find out they have a cancer diagnosis. We were each given 5-10 minutes to tell our cancer stories. We represented all sorts of cancers. A room full of humans with assorted body parts removed, bladders, uterus, breasts, colons. All stages of cancer were represented.

Everyone in attendance seemed full of life for that moment in time; all willing participants. We had to give the reason we wanted to be there? Mostly we're ready to help others, the newbies and maybe that will help us understand ourselves even more. There was not a complaint among us. We shared some fun and some sad times. 

We talked about how, when you are diagnosed with cancer, well-meaning people offer advice, make declarations and try to separate themselves from us. They ask how we feel about "the gift of cancer"? What foods we ate? And did we know that "negativity causes cancer?" 

We talked about when all the excitement of cancer treatment is over, our husbands, lovers, friends expected us to take cancer off like removing an old dusty coat, and get back to our lives as they were before cancer. Quit feeling sorry for yourselves. "Can't things be the way they were?" We talked about how life is never, ever the same as it was before cancer and never will be again. Knowing our time is limited, it was time well spent.

Teef Bigot

I had my teeth cleaned. 

My disheartened hygienist complains, "You never have any plaque." *waaaah* 

Oh, lookie me, I'm a disappointment in the plaque department -- which may also mean my arteries might be a disappointment in the plaque department (The Plaque Department?? 17th floor!) which might also mean that worrying about dying of heart disease, (instead of sixty three other possible deadly diseases I could die of) based on ovary removal during a radical hysterectomy for stage 3C uterine cancer that I probably got from eating a hotdog when I was three years old, oh, THAT, and being such an angry, negative person -- could be put off that much longer. 

I asked the hygienist what I could do to make my teeth more of a challenge for her? She had no response. I hate to have boring, un-plaqued teeth when I'm paying the same price that a disgusting, toothbrushless, plaque-covered, booze-breathed, multi-toof-missin hobo with no dental insurance has to pay. Why am I the one gypped out of the full dental cleaning torment, blood, gum pain, floss flyin, -- not to mention the mandatory lecture on flossing -- well, ARE YOU FLOSSING EVERY DAY? -- because at my age, I take extra good care of the three teeth that remain in my mouth? Taking care of my teefs hardly take much time at all. 

Is it too much to be asked to be treated like everyone else in this world?

Paradise Lost

The other day I read a snippet that mentioned that women who lose their ovaries ("Oh, Where oh where have my ovaries gone? Oh where oh where can they be?") die at a younger age than women who (are allowed to) keep their ovaries. At first I thought -- one reason we lose our ovaries is because we were diagnosed with illnesses that might have killed us earlier anyway - diagnoses such as ovarian and uterine cancers. At first I thought this whole idea was kind of funny. I mean, I thought I'd die of cancer. Who cares if I keep my ovaries? 

One article stated that removing the ovaries eliminates the risk of ovarian cancer. So that's good, huh? And while these same women were also found to have fewer breast cancers which is great news, data show that ovary-less women are more likely to die of heart disease at an earlier age. 

Seems there's a rule of thumb that if a woman is age 45 or older, it's okay to remove everything during a hysterectomy. As useless as doctors may have thought ovaries might be once all that glop and sludge is surgically removed, the truth of the matter is that ovaries (those that remain attached, inside the woman) produce two hormones, ovarian testosterone and androstenedione. Both hormones help develop estrogen which in turn go on to protect women against heart disease, osteoporosis, dementia (of which I already show symptoms! Oh, wait, that's insanity) and Parkinson's just to name a few health disasters.

I "lost" my ovaries during radical hysterectomy surgery where the surgeon left an empty spelunking cavern replete with dripstone, stalagmites. But really, isn't losing ones ovaries a misplacement issue, possibly involving assistance from neighbors or local authorities or in an extreme case of loss, the FBI could put out an APB ASAP FYI). 

Surgically removing the ovaries is known as an oophorectomy. (surgical removal is technically not a loss). (Notice that oophorectomy starts with "oop?" See item #3.) I like how all the studies and articles say "losing" as if no one is responsible for the loss when I know that somewhere there's a huge red hospital bucket, skull and cross-bone design on the outside filled to the brim with centuries of lost ovaries. How about a Caesarian section? My sons were born by Caesarian section surgery. Does that mean I lost them? If so, someone must have substituted my lost sons for two founds ones.

No one woke me during hysterectomy surgery to ask about keeping my ovaries, not that I had enough knowledge at the time to even make a choice. I wasn't aware of these studies. Hell, I wasn't really even aware of ovaries. (Is that why Joni Mitchell wrote "Big Yellow Taxi"?) I was diagnosed with uterine, not ovarian cancer. My cancer was thought to be contained inside my uterus (so much for thoughts... the cancer already escaped). Though knowing the diagnosis was uterine, I suppose the doctor *could* have left my ovaries. Now this all seems like water under the surgical bridge. (I'll bet you didn't even know there was a surgical bridge.)

Pishaw.

Though I read this article only recently, it seems that studies have been going on for years, some as far back as 1988. I found articles from 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2007 all mentioning the benefits of keeping one's ovaries intact. I imagine my doctor must have known about ovary benefits. He certainly is a knowitall about everything else! Yet he chose to remove the entire kit and caboodle. That surgery was the last official 'wham bam thank you Mam' I'll ever have.

Laying in the hospital after surgery wondering where that mysterious part of me went, I asked the doctor, "What happens with that whole gaping hole area?" "Where does the stuff go?" I felt flummoxed. How was I to know if I'd need to carry a towel (or bucket) to sop stuff up? The doctor reassured me "it" just sort of drips and gets absorbed by the body. I envisioned diapers, plastic bags, ants and yellow jackets. Though rest assured, since surgery, there has been little, if any dripping. I guess some doctors must really know what they're doing. *shrug*

A women's reproductive system includes her uterus, fallopian tubes, ovaries, among other miscellaneous doodads, and then, sometimes for whatever reason, this area might have to be evacuated. My reproductive system had to be evacuated due to a uterine cancer diagnosis. So what's left in it's place? A rental hall? A cereal bowl? A Park N Ride lot? Seriously though I didn't *lose* a thing. All my missing parts were removed in a package deal during surgery including my (lost) ovaries. If my ovaries are really just lost, and someone has them, please return them in a jar for Show-N-Tell next Tuesday.

I found from reading assorted articles and study snippets that, I now have a chance of dying earlier of all sorts of miscellaneous, hideous diseases; the list having grown exponentially with the advent of knowing of the lost ovaries. And silly me, I had only contemplated a horrific death from cancer. 

Worrying is such a waste of time. I snapped out of my cancer-worrying quickly, and though I slip in and out of self-pity mode occasionally, (not since chemotherapy) I snap out of it PDQ because I don't want to spend the time I have left, wallowing. Each moment that passes is lost, like vapor you can't put in a jar to share with friends and family. And now that I've learned the list of things I *could* die from is that much larger -- I figure I don't have enough time left on the planet to worry about that many things.

Fat Like Me

I went to the doctor this morning. I walked down the hallway towards the exam room (aka second waiting room) (where you usually have to wait another 45 minutes for the doctor), with an assistant who takes notes, the patient's blood pressure, oxygen and pulse.

I don't know the assistant's background, what kind of training she's had. She could be me, only much thinner and younger, not as pretty and certainly not as great a personality as I have. We can't have everything.

As we walk toward the scale, she says to me, "Do you want to check your weight?" I said, casually, "Not particularly." (She was giving me the option so I chose not to.) So she turns to me and says in a loud, demanding voice "Well, WHAT DO YOU DO? DO YOU CHECK IT AT HOME!?" as if I'm some mental deficient and don't realize that I am pleasingly plump already? I mean, duh.

I guess she thinks I don't own a mirror; that I don't have the slightest clue that I have a big beautiful butt and more than sufficient thighs. Maybe she thinks I've been on a bender for the last 50 years, cramming whipped cream topping, bonbons and bacon fat, all the food I've been stuffing, bringing me to this very moment in time where I don't particularly feel like checking my weight. What can I say? I mean -- other than "no" when offered the option?

I own a scale. Weight Watchers meetings are Sunday mornings. My pants actually fit along with the majority of my clothes. My fat clothes have long since been given away. Imagine that -- clothes that fit? I buy my clothes off the rack in a regular store. But I didn't feel like peeling the label out of my collar for her to validate my claim. I'm smaller, dare I say, tinier today than I was a year ago during chemotherapy even though I longed for positive (negative) results on the much bandied about chemotherapy diet. This morning I just didn't feel like 'checking [my] weight.'