Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

This is the day in my chemo regime when I start losing my hair. It’s always a difficult time. I’ve gone bald at least three? Four? times. Hair follicles start to ache and then the hair starts flying when I run my hand through my hair. Sigh. Never imagined this would be a part of my growing old. Bald patches will appear and then it will all fall out. I was just looking at my smooth legs too. Bye bye body hair. Eyelashes start falling into my eyes. Thank goodness I had my eyebrows tattooed nearly two years ago.

It’s also Mother’s Day which makes me a little sad. My mom lived until 89 but the last few years were hard. She was in pain, and we didn’t know why. Her cancer wasn’t diagnosed until the very end. I wish I had known and I could have commiserated with her but even her gerontologist didn’t run the proper tests.

But at the same time, my children and their spouses make this time of year less painful. I’m so proud to be their mom and Mimi to my grandkids.

Joni Mitchell was right, though. You don’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone so I’m trying to appreciate my time with my family. Life is nasty, brutish and short (in a war and this is a war) as Hobbes famously said.

I have week off from chemo this week. Looks like the line of lesions along my neck lymph nodes are shrinking so I’m hoping this oral chemo/infused chemo is working. I don’t return to Sarah Cannon til next Monday May 18. So I don’t want to end on too negative a thought. Here’s a poem my friend Marilyn Kallet reminded me of. Raymond carver was a great writer of short stories and poems and died young from cancer. But he was appreciative of the time and love he had over 10’years after his diagnosis. I am too, it’s been 3 years of love.