Challah!

It's like I tell my parents, "when you don't hear from me it means things are cool and I'm just really busy and occupied trying to be normal." Not that blogging isn't normal or that I don't love the blogosphere or that I didn't write stupid things here incessantly before I got sick. Bah.

Things are mostly good. I'm a little sick to my stomach/dehydrated from the 6MP, but other than that... I've been trying to be "active." This means I've been riding my bike on the trainer, walking to work/radiation/home again, and yesterday Christina and I took an erie (but pleasant) walk around Seward Park. The thing is, I have these really powerful memories of running around Seward Park right before diagnosis and saying to Christina, "I just need some answers about what to do for the next few years..." And other memories of walking around SP with my parents right before I went into the hospital for the first time. And another memory of not being able to walk further than the first little dock with my mom when I got really sick. Somehow I'm not capturing all the millions of runs I went on there with M-Rachel or all the millions of runs I went on by myself or the triumphant memories of getting up to two laps without stopping, etc etc. Blah blah. I love Seward Park, OK?

Here is something fun. The radiologist (in defense of radiation no doubt) told me that if hair never grew back where LB was, it was because the tumor (not the radiation) had damaged the hair follicles. So the other day, I'm checkin out my cute bald head and notice LB is darker than the rest of my scalp. Upon closer examination, it's because the most dense hair regrowth is where LB is! I have this habit of rubbing LB that started long ago. For a while it was painful, and then it was kind of gross feelings, but now when I stroke the remains of my tumor, there are all these soft little baby hairs. TMI? I don't care! You're reading it!

In the last few weeks I've had a 180 on my baldness. Of course I still miss my hair and the identity that went along with it, but most days I look in the mirror and think, "you're pretty cute!" Some other awesome things about not having hair are: not washing hair, not struggling in vain to make hair look cute, not buying hair products to straighten/defrizz/curl/condition/wash hair. And of course there's my on-going fascination with androgyny...

Which leads me to the general topic of how I feel about myself in relation to sex and all that. When y0u have a giant tube coming out of your chest it's really hard to imagine having sex with anyone. I also realize that my lack of hair sort of kills the fantasy as well. Isn't that strange? I never realized how much my hair played into my thoughts of my own sexuality until it was gone. Thankfully (I guess) the initial anxiety of having cancer coupled with these crazy powerful drugs sort of shut all of that off for a while. What I find is that as my anxiety goes away (goodbye, Ambian! For now...) and my hormones say, "fuck you, chemo drugs!" I need to reconcile how to hold on to my sexuality and still be bald, tube-ridden, etc.

Well, I'd say that's enough for now. It's Sunday! It's sunny! Have a great day!