Merry Day After Christmas

For as long as I can remember, I've always felt a sense of sadness on December 26. The season that was built up from November 1-December 25 is GONE. Now it's back to normal. Only a little while longer left on break and before I know it, it'll be back to school...on SATURDAYS (yikes...it makes me cringe to think about it).

I hope everyone reading this had a wonderful and blessed holiday. Aside from the trauma of my grandmother going to the hospital, it was a great Christmas. For anyone who doesn't know, my grandmother was taken by ambulance to Baptist Desoto on Christmas Eve morning. She is in ICU on a ventilator because of lower lobe pneumonia. The doctors seem pretty optimistic about her recovery and last I heard hopefully the ventilator will come out tomorrow. I saw her for a little bit last night and I think she knew I was there. She was in and out of consciousness and was aware of people in the room. Even if she didn't know it was me, I'm glad she got the sense of someone being there with her.

An unexpected gift that Santa brought was snow on Christmas day! Granted it didn't stick, but it was the first time it snowed on Christmas Day in Memphis in 100+ years. So that was fun :)

Now, in just one short week comes 2011. Everyone is trying to decide on resolutions, whether it's too lose weight, quit a bad habit, save money, etc etc. The list goes on and on. I've been doing some thinking and I think my resolution will be to get through everything thats coming in 2011 with as much grace and courage as possible. Knowing that the distraction of the holidays is gone, I have nothing keeping my mind from thinking about my upcoming mastectomy. I called the doctor and told her that I wanted to go ahead and schedule it.  I need a date to concentrate on, something to mark on the calendar and count the days until it comes. I know it'll be in late April because my last final is April 16.  I just think it'll make my anxiety a lot easier to handle if I have something concrete that I can think about instead of it being some unknown, looming dark cloud hanging over my head..

Another reason for wanting a date is because I want to know if it's at all possible for me to go to MDA Summer Camp this year. I want to go SO badly, but it'll be ultimately up to Dr. Cooper whether or not I can. If I schedule my initial surgery in April, I'll still be going through the expansion prcoess when camp is going on. And I don't know what my doctor will think about me going out of town then. But we will see.

This may be a good time to briefly explain the whole mastectomy process I'll be undergoing. I think a lot of people don't know how it's done. When I have the initial surgery, the surgeon (Dr. King) will remove all breast tissue. The the plastic surgeon (Dr. Cooper) will insert tissue expanders in it's place. Then for a period of about 4-6 weeks (I think that's the time frame she said) I'll go to Dr. Cooper's office to have them filled. (She'll basically run a magnet over the port and then insert a needle into it and fill them up. Once they reach a size that I'm happy with, I will have the exchange surgery. It's an outpatient procedure where they swap the tissue expanders for implants. Later, if I so choose I can have nipple/areola reconstruction. And that is the whole procedure. Pretty straightforward right?

For the time being, I'll try to keep occupied as much as possible. Hopefully my posts won't become too crazy in that time period as I try to stay sane =)

Happy New Year!

Michelle