Laughter Is Medicine

Going through chemo has been the most amazing and weirdest experience of my life. 

It has given me the ultimate excuse to unleash my weird but also has given me an appreciation for the importance of attitude and the need to laugh. 

Not just an LOL that we all use, that really means smiling softly to myself, but true "guffaw" style laughter that makes your stomach hurt and your eyes water. 

If you've known me for oh, like five minutes, you know that I have a really odd sense of humor and work really hard to not take myself seriously. But this experience has shown me that my attitude can, and does, have a direct impact on others. 

Whether other patients or the medical staff, I love to make people laugh. 

Two weeks ago I arrived at chemo dressed in a chicken headband and beak  - Chemo Chicken- and handed out slingshot chickens. I gave them to all the patients and the staff and watched as people shot them at each other. 

It was great fun. 

Patients told me last week that their kids and grandkids were still playing with the chickens! 

The staff has told me that they love when I come in and that, after a whole week of working with cancer patients, they look forward to my being there. 

Those words are the wind beneath my wings. (See what I did there?)

I love to help people and I love to know that I've had an impact. 

Don't we all. 

When all is said and done in this life, is the cleanliness of our house or the model of our car what people will remember or will it be how they felt when they were with us?

We all know that "Debbie Downer" (sorry if your name is Debbie) person who sucks the happy out of a room. I want to be the sunshine in the room. The person who makes people happy when they walk in. 

And why not? When they laugh, I laugh. Let's be honest here, sometimes I laugh the hardest. Did you know that laughter really is good medicine? 

No, really, it is! 

According to HelpGuide.com Laughter can: 

• Boost your immune system
• Relax you
• Release endorphins
• Improve heart health
• Reduce stress
• Burn calories 

Evidently I need to laugh more 'cause I got some pounds to lose. 

Seriously though, with all those benefits who wouldn't want to laugh more? 

But honestly, it can be really difficult. Not all circumstances are funny and, despite my propensity to do so, not everything is a laughing matter. 

The question that matters is: How can I improve this situation or the situation of the lives of the people around me? 

Recently, my best friend's mother passed away. Although it was sad to lose her, she lived a great, long life, was well loved by her enormous family and had a wonderful impact on everyone she ever met. 

At the funeral my friend had a tough time collecting herself. When I arrived she was surrounded by a bunch of people who were telling her to breath and trying to calm her. 

Yeah...worst thing ever! 

What she needed was "Vanessa's Crazy" to get her out of her own head, not advice on how to calm herself. She already knew she was our of sorts and didn't need to hear it. Telling someone they need to calm down, even when they do, is the worst. 

Truly, has anyone ever actually calmed down at the mention of their need to do so?  

I jumped in, inserted my wacky sense of humor (that we share) and in short order I had her laughing and joking and was able to help her get through the viewing and funeral. 

She has been there for me for most of my life and I was more than glad to help her through that day and others. We've been BFFs for almost 40 years. We know each other inside and out and all I have to do is call her, tell her I'm having a crappy day and before I know it we are laughing hysterically. 

Recently my "little" sister was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a double mastectomy today. It was a really long surgery, nearly 8 hours long, but is over and she is being moved ICU for the next night or two. 

While I have not been worried about the surgery I was VERY worried about the pathology. Working on becoming a cancer survivor myself, all I really cared about was what her margins are and whether or not her nodes were clear. 

I do not know about the margins or the rest of the surgical pathology yet, that may be weeks, but the nodes were clear! 

Whew! 

Now I can breath and she can get on with healing. 

Her surgery was much more extensive than mine so her healing time will be much longer and more complicated but, at least she's off to a good start. 

Because of the stupid virus, only her husband will be allowed to visit. In fact, she wasn't even allowed to have him there for the pre-op stuff. 

The stress of bein alone was horrible for her.

So, of course, I called her this morning and got her to laugh. We stayed on the phone talking about how much I tortured her when she was a kid, laughing of course, until her doctor came in. After that things moved quickly and before she knew it she was off to surgery. 

I will sleep a little better tonight knowing that my sister is through the surgery and resting well. There will be crappy days of tears and doubt ahead and I will hold her hand when possible or just be an ear on the other end of the phone. I also know the pain she is headed for and will be ready with funny memes and anecdotes to take her mind off things. 

Most importantly, I will make her laugh. 

A Language Unto Itself

Four and a half years ago, mom, siblings, niece and nephews, cousins and an aunt and uncle accompanied my dad to the hospital to have his cancerous bladder removed. The doctor never got the chance. The cancer had grown so fast that it had breeched the bladder wall and invaded his abdomen.

He was opened and closed.

When the doctor arrived in the waiting area 45 minutes into what was supposed to be a 4-6 hour surgery I look at him and said, "Oh shit! This can't be good."

After my dad regained consciousness in the recovery room my mom and siblings stood at his side as the surgeon delivered the death sentence.

It was one of the worst moments of my life.

Prior to that surgery date, my mom and I has taken dad to meet with an Oncologist in Baltimore and I remember sitting in that little exam room listening to the doctor tell my dad what types of chemicals they were going to pump into him.

I took copious notes and studied up on all of the lingo associated with chemo.

We could never get him strong enough to endure the chemo. He opted to just have the surgery but even that was not an option.

He died less than two months after that Oncology appointment.

Cancer: 1 My family: 0

Two weeks ago, my siblings and I accompanied my mother to the hospital outpatient wing to have a lumpectomy that would remove the breast cancer that had invaded her body.

After my mom was taken into the prep area and well, prepped, my siblings and I were escorted back to stay with her until the took her into surgery.

As I entered the pre-op area I had a flashback of the recovery area we walked into four years ago. I just kept putting one foot in front of the other and telling myself, "Not the same, not the same."

She came through surgery with flying colors and, despite arguing with me about almost everything, had recuperated very well.

Tie score!

Today we sat in an exam room in the same complex where we had taken my dad in Baltimore and listened to another doctor describe the toxins they were going to pump into my mother.

Oncology is a language unto itself.

One I had hoped to never have to learn...again!

There are two standard types of chemo that would work for my mom based on her hormone receptors and her HER2...still not entirely clear on that but it has something to do with proteins...and how they attack the ducts and breast tissue.

There is no such thing as good chemo but one protocol is a little tougher to tolerate than the other. We were referring to the second as chemo "light." Not that it's really any 'lighter' but it's four treatments over 12 weeks as opposed to eight treatments over 16 weeks.

There are other things that we've learned, one of which is that nearly 80% of all cancer patients are cured by surgery but there is no way to determine the difference between the 80 and the 20 and chemo is recommended to keep any rogue cancer cells from migrating and taking root in another part of the body. In other words, clear margins don't necessarily mean that there is no more cancer.

Another is that there are no two cancer patients that are the same. Cancer is a mutation and those mutations differ from one patient to another.

Chemo is really an insurance policy against one of those mutations implanting itself into another of my mom's organs. But...there are no guarantees.

The difference between my mom's cancer and the cancer that took my dad couldn't be greater but I constantly have to check myself to keep from going to the "worst case scenario" and "what if" crap that my brain likes to toy with.

Staying positive can be extremely difficult but I have to repeat the, "Not the same, not the same" mantra that I said over and over again in the hospital two weeks ago.

I have never been a terribly religious person. I consider myself to be a Christian as I believe in Jesus but I tend to venture more toward the spiritual side of worship and prayer. I talk to God every day and also find that prayer has a way of calming me down and focusing on the things that are important.

What is important is to concentrate on the here and now and give thanks for what we have.

We are blessed that she caught this so early that it's curable.

This too shall pass and before we know it we'll be sitting poolside soaking up the Vitamin D.

In the meantime, we'll take our supplements and pray for the chemo to be as gentle as possible on her system with the exception of making her cigarettes taste so gross that she comes out of this a non-smoker.