The Invitation

The Invitation by Oriah Mountain Dreamer

It doesn’t interest me
what you do for a living.
I want to know
what you ache for
and if you dare to dream
of meeting your heart’s longing.

It doesn’t interest me
how old you are.
I want to know
if you will risk
looking like a fool
for love
for your dream
for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn’t interest me
what planets are
squaring your moon...
I want to know
if you have touched
the centre of your own sorrow
if you have been opened
by life’s betrayals
or have become shrivelled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know
if you can sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.

I want to know
if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you
to the tips of your fingers and toes
without cautioning us
to be careful
to be realistic
to remember the limitations
of being human.

It doesn’t interest me
if the story you are telling me
is true.
I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to yourself.
If you can bear
the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know
if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand at the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
“Yes.”

It doesn’t interest me
to know where you live
or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after the night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.

It doesn’t interest me
who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the centre of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.

It doesn’t interest me
where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know
what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.

I want to know
if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like
the company you keep
in the empty moments.

By Oriah © Mountain Dreaming,
from the book The Invitation
published by HarperONE, San Francisco,
1999 All rights reserved

I used to have this posted on the door to my bedroom.  Now I want to wear it around my neck. post it on my front door, and ask these very questions of everyone I meet.  These are in fact the things that matter.  And the things that I have been facing through the last several years.  I have learned that I can get up and care for the children after having spent a night suffering in grief.  I do like the company I keep in the empty moments.  I am fully willing to look like a fool for love.  Although I continue to face these challenges, and relearn what I already know and work on the ones I don't, I trust that eventually the lessons will take me to enlightenment and self-contentment.  I may not be religious but I am feeling the phrase "let go and let god" bone deep today.  I hope this brings you some warmth as it does for me.

Reclaiming myself

Hi there!

I know its been awhile. 2014 has been a challenging year to say the least. As I've mentioned I am working extremely hard to reclaim myself. This is an insanely large undertaking including everything from my mental and emotional state of being, my physical health, my home and my activities.

This week brought about a new aspect of this process. I've been considering returning to work part time for awhile now, but haven't pulled the trigger to make it happen. Although I am still not going back to work yet, I came a little closer this week.

In my research for kindergartens for Bella (for next year) I came across a position at a wonderful local private school that has preschool and k-8. One of their listed benefits was tuition and childcare. The position was 30 hours a week, and my kids could have attended the school! Well as it turned out it was only a 20% coverage of tuition, so I would have been working to pay for tuition and childcare.

But I was asked for an interview immediately and it went really well. The recruiter was highly complimentary and it felt good to clear some of the cobwebs out of my professional self. It inspired me to work a little harder to find an ideal situation for me so that I can be mommy, and professional.

Working on me

I stated earlier this year that I was working on myself this year.  I started the year working on my body in preparation for surgery and then having my reconstruction.  I've been starting to write a little, something I've wanted to do for myself for years now.  I'm looking at projects around my house that I want to accomplish.  I'm continuing to pursue my health both by working on my diet and adding exercise into my life with regularity.  I am building my social life again as I remember who I am beyond mommy.  I am looking into returning to work part time after Gio turns two this fall.  It is all a major undertaking.  But today I thought I would share some of the smaller ways I am working on growing into myself more fully.


I never got into the practice of making my bed every day.  Now, I am trying to make sure that I do.  It is such a small task.  It takes less than five minutes.  I'm not sure why it wasn't something I ever learned to do, but it wasn't.  I didn't particularly care.  But, what I have realized is that it keeps my bedding nicer, the sheets tight to the mattress and clean from whatever the dogs or kids track it.  It also makes the whole room feel nicer.  When I walk in throughout the day, even if there are other things making the room messy, by having my (giant king sized) bed made, it makes the whole room feel more orderly.  I even bought a new comforter with matching throw pillows.  It feels so- grown up.


I am working to stay on top of the house cleaning.  By doing the laundry at least every other day, there is never a giant pile to get through.  By putting dishes in the dishwasher every time I pass through the kitchen, and running it daily, the kitchen never feels out of control.  By encouraging the kids to help clean up their toys between every activity, the level of chaos in the house stays minimal.


My next plan for that is to create an actual schedule.  I've come across schedules like these periodically, and was actually inspired when I read "The Help".  It never occurred to me to have a cleaning schedule.  I always took things as they came, which usually meant a major cleaning before every event hosted at my house, or when things got really out of control.  Not a great way to support sanity.  So I am looking into what schedule will work for me.  Things that are daily, weekly, monthly, and how to do them in small doses so as to never feel overwhelmed.


I'm aiming to begin meal planning properly.  Maybe even to the point that every Monday is chicken day, Tuesday ground beef, Wednesday fish, etc etc etc... I'm not sure I could stand the limits of "Monday is burrito day, Tuesday is Hamburger day, Wednesday is chicken breast day" but setting the proteins and planning from there seems doable.  It should limit my grocery shopping (saving food, time and money) and hopefully the effort expended "figuring out" what we should eat three meals a day every day.  And I should also eat out less, saving calories and money.  An all around win.


It is a lot that I am taking on right now, but what I realized is that with the chaos that has been my life from baby to cancer to baby, I let go of the adult management of my life and never got it back.  It is time.  I want joy and simplicity.  This is how I am hoping to gain that.


How do you keep your life simplified or controlled?

Pool Party!

This weekend we celebrated Bella's fourth birthday with a big bash pool party.  It was a really sweet event full of love and fun.  My goal this year was to go much simpler than I have in years past.  We served good old fashioned pool party food- hamburgers, hot dogs, coleslaw, pasta salad, chips and dip, and fruit.  Although I did do some creative things, it was nothing like last years princess party madness. As usual we had a good sixty people in attendance.  I know that sounds crazy, but since our family alone is close to forty, it really isn't many more than "normal" holidays and such. The most important thing is that Bella had fun.  It was the first year that we invited friends of hers from school so that was pretty special. The kids all loved swimming, and went to town with the piñata.  My heart is full for my sweet girl.  Her actual birthday is this week so I will write more about her then.

Pulling back a little...

I just decided to take a facebook hiatus.  I actually shut off my account.  I'm finding the world a tad overwhelming, and staying in contact with people is adding to my stress instead of helping ease it.  I'm planning on a month long hiatus.  I will decide if I want to go back after that time.  I will still post here as often as I am inspired and able but don't be surprised if there is a lot of radio silence again.


Until we meet again...

Radio Silence

I'm so sorry for my complete lack of posting.  We've been quite busy, though I can't tell you exactly with what.  Just life I suppose.  Bella's fourth birthday is coming up soon so surely I'll have some fun things to share then.  In the meantime we are running with our various summer activities.  I will hopefully have some more time and mental capacity to post again soon with some real updates on the family. 

Reclaiming myself

Though I am very much still healing, I am feeling so good about my body.  This surgery was crazy.  What it takes and the amount of recovery time is extreme.  Going in, I also felt I had absolutely no guarantees.  That is a really scary place to be.  But I also knew I was miserable in the state of my body and had to do something.  Of course there are still plenty of things I plan to do to get my body healthy, but the fact is that I felt broken.  My body hadn't been mine in years.  From pregnancy to cancer to pregnancy to breastfeeding, I had given my body over to "other" in many ways and for many purposes.  I am so blessed and grateful for all that my body has done.  I have carried two beautiful, healthy babies to full term and birthed them with little complication. I fought the battle of a lifetime, poisoning, cutting and deforming and burning/poisoning myself to eradicate the rogue cells that were trying to kill me. Finally, I fed and nourished my beautiful boy on demand for 15 full months.  My body did all of that.  Truly amazing.


My body unfortunately also carried a great deal of extra weight.  And allowed those killer rogue cells to take hold leaving me deformed.  I hold no stock in "being skinny" but as I've written about previously, my weight does affect me in my ability to do the things I desire in the world. Also, when combined with emotional damage of youth, I carry a negative self image, feeling undesirable and unattractive.  This was a hard enough battle on its own.  Adding a deformity from the loss of a breast was a weight I couldn't quite bear.  When I had my mastectomy I never went through a grieving process regarding my breast.  For many women it is a very emotional thing, even feeling that they've lost their womanhood.  I truly never felt that.  But my expander was uncomfortable and never looked even sort of like a breast, even when in a bra.  I had hoped that the implant would be better, both in looks and comfort.  It was better, but barely, and as you know, didn't last.  I felt most comfortable with nothing in (ironically) but still never felt good about myself when I looked in the mirror.  Going into this surgery, I had hoped only to feel ok in clothing and a bra.  I had very low expectations even for that.  I just didn't trust that I wouldn't be permanently externally marked from cancer for all to see.


Today, I put on "normal" clothes for the first time since surgery.  I wore a regular bra (which I had basically given up on since my first pregnancy), a simple cotton shirt, and jeans.  I couldn't have been more thrilled.  Although I am still "big" as far as sizes go, I now have a flat stomach.  And my bra was appropriately filled on both sides.  You would never have been able to tell that I had undergone anything. Although after an hour in said clothing I could feel it in my still healing body, I had a new lightness in my heart.


For lack of a better description, I feel like myself again.  The inside and the outside finally match.  I look forward to continuing on my path of healing and strengthening my body, losing a little more weight and building my muscles so that I can show my children how to live a healthy life.  Fruits and vegetables and reasonable portions to eat, hikes and biking and enjoying the amazing things our home has to offer.  Hopefully this will also open up a few additional options for me to achieve some goals I have in mind- parts I can play in shows, new skills I'd like to learn, things like that.


I am just so amazingly grateful to have undergone this surgery.  I never intended to do it so soon, and was quite terrified of what it was going to take.  What was worse, I never felt confident that it was going to give me enough back to be "worth it".  Today I can say that this was one of the better choices I have made in this process.  I may have felt I was making it under duress somewhat, but it was unquestionably the best thing I could have done.  My surgeon is amazing and I look forward to thanking him properly. He gave me back pieces of myself I hadn't even realized I had lost.

Post Surgery Update

I had started writing this post earlier this week but never made it back to it, so I'm starting from scratch!

Surgery was about a week and a half ago now.  The process didn't exactly start out as expected.  We had been expecting surgery to go for about 4-6 hours (and in fact my surgeon had indicated he thought it would be in the 5 hour range for me).  Well it ended up taking 7 hours.  Then as I was slowly waking up in the recovery room, I hear my doctor talking about my blood flow numbers.  Apparently there was an area in the tissue transplant that wasn't receiving adequate blood flow. So he turned me straight around and took me back in for another 2 hours.  Yep, that would be 9 total hours of surgery.  I was rough by the time I made it back to my room to be sure.  Sore throat, sore body, and drugged.  My mom, dad, sister, brother in law, niece and husband were waiting for me when I arrived at my room.  I think I scared them a little. =)  Nick knew I was in rough shape and could see I was worried about the night, so promised to return early the next morning.  Gratefully I had a wonderful night nurse who really did make all the difference to me in that difficult first night. She was kind, funny, and on top of caring for me.  She even made sure to get me a massage through the complimentary service for cancer patients for that next morning.

Aside from the fact that it is quite literally impossible to get a good nights sleep (or even a nice nap for that matter) in a hospital, my recovery went decently well.  The first couple of days were rough since they wanted me to work towards getting up and moving and my body was just not there yet.  But by day three I was working well towards their goals, and could have even been released half a day early if I'd wanted.  But I knew I wasn't quite ready to manage myself at home and my family definitely wasn't ready to have me home unable to easily make it to the restroom on my own. One more night was perfect.

I arrived home on Saturday and was doing surprisingly well.  After feeling like the bionic woman with an IV, central line (that's an IV in your neck), catheter, leg pumps, blood pressure cuff, oxygen/pulse monitor, blood flow monitor, Doppler monitor, and five drains, I miraculously went home with only two drains in my body. I could walk quite well and wasn't feeling too much pain.

So now, here I am one week post release and feeling good.  I'm weaning myself off pain meds and trying to walk more.  Unfortunately both of those things have left me a little more sore. But my energy and strength seem to be really good.  Also, I'm really happy with my physical results from surgery so far.  Of course I won't know the full results for awhile as the swelling goes down and my body adjusts and heals, but I feel good and like what I see so far.  My doctor also seems happy with the results and several of the nurses told me how great he is (I heard perfectionist used several times). In my opinion, no one knows better than the nurses who work with (and after) the surgeons.

Onward and upward from here! I've been pleasantly surprised at how good I've felt so far.  The trick will be to avoid overdoing it.  I think I may be dealing with that a little bit right now. I am grateful I did what work I could in advance of surgery to strengthen my muscles as I am feeling the benefit of it now.  I just have to keep my focus on eating well (and the sugar/carb cravings I've been having this week are definitely not helping!) and slowly advancing towards getting my body back into motion. I think it may also be time to look into the writing challenge I've been wanting to do.  Something a little more productive than watching trashy tv and movies! lol

The best part of all is that I am starting to experience a little sensation of emotional closure on cancer.  I didn't expect that to be the case for me, but as I "get my body back" I do feel that I am walking away from that process. And so begins 2014- the year of Karey. ;)

Surgery is here

Tomorrow morning, in approximately 9 hours, I will be drifting off to sleep for the biggest surgery I have ever had.  The final major piece in my cancer journey.  I'm feeling nervous about being away from my babies.  And nervous about the results.  I've felt so uncomfortable in my body for so long now, and have only just started to feel comfortable again since both the expander and implant were out.  I hate the idea that I might not continue feeling comfortable in my own body.  And yet, the results could set me further along the path to feeling not just comfortable, but proud.  Here's hoping that is the result!  Although I've spent the week feeling excited, I've been aware of a constant anxiety also plaguing me.  They are very similar emotions of course. I only realized the anxiety was there once I noticed I was stress eating. =)  Well with a few things left to do before tomorrow I'd better get to it, but I am asking for thoughts and prayers and good vibes and juju for a smooth surgery with outstanding results and rapid healing.  Not too much to ask right? ;)

Blessings

I am feeling very blessed today and wanted to share.  This past weekend I met a new cousin. No, it isn't a new baby... My mom was not raised by her biological father, and never knew him. We always knew that. In 2012 my mom found an older half brother she knew existed from her biological father. He told her she had two more younger half sisters from their father. She met them later that year. It was instant family for them. They both have kids, and so my "new" cousins. I haven't had any opportunity to meet any of this family until this weekend. My cousin Amie is engaged to a Harlem globetrotter and joined him for a weekend here on the west coast. We got to see Nate do his thing on the court (quite a show- you should really check them out, it was so much fun), and most importantly spent two days visiting with Amie. Just as it was for my mom with her sisters, it was instant  family. A reminder of how sweet life can be.

My poor kiddos got run down in the process of no naps and lots of activities so now we are dealing with the aftermath of a cold/flu. But we are all happy despite that. Trying to get well quickly since this weekend is another big one! My niece Mia turns 5 this weekend and is being surprised with a weekend celebration at Disneyland! (If you happen to see her, remember- its a surprise! Don't mention it!)

Just reminders of how blessed I truly am. Life may be challenging, and certainly not what I expected, but even in the dark you can see the stars if you're willing to look.

Happy New Year! 2014

Onward and upward is my motto for this year.  Many changes on the horizon and a lot of work to get through them.  I am hopeful that this time next year my life will look significantly different, and hopefully all for the better.  First on the agenda, a month of health.  I am working on a pre-operative diet and exercise regime to prepare my body for my reconstructive surgery.  We are tentatively looking at a date in mid-February so I have a lot to do in a short amount of time.  I need to strengthen my core muscles, and limit any inflammation present in my body.  I also need to wean Gio.  Immediately.  The expectation is that we will be lifting my left side to better match my right at the same time.  In order for that to happen, I cannot have any milk left in it.  Tonight was the first attempt at giving him regular milk without me present for bedtime.  I'm sure it will be fine.  He goes down for others just fine though usually does get some pumped milk.  The real challenge will be weaning him around me.  He doesn't need milk around anyone else, but melts down if he's tired or otherwise needing comfort and isn't given milk with me.

And all that just gets us into February!  Then it will be a long recover process.  Five days in the hospital and a minimum of six weeks recovery at home.  Sounds like full recovery will likely take more like three months.  There apparently may be additional "clean up" outpatient surgeries down the road too.  Fingers crossed that won't be the case.

After that?  Who knows!  I have a lot of hopes for this next year.  I do know it involves dance class for Bella, more preschool, finding some activities for Gio, lots more outdoors and nature play for both kids.  Trips to the zoo and the discovery museum, days at the parks and walks around the neighborhood.

I am setting the intention to find myself this year.  I need more music and performance in my life.  I need to find something regular and structured and productive to do with myself even just a day or two a week outside of raising my children.  I need these things to present themselves to me in a way that I can easily see them and take advantage of the opportunities.  I intend to heal some old hurts, even just a little, and find some more happiness in the small every day moments.

Most importantly I intend to see the world through my children's joyful eyes.  They are magnificent and see the world as such.  I am so lucky to have them and hope to remember that every day.