Hard to believe this was two weeks ago.
Hi.
How have you been?
It’s sticky out there, huh?
And those four lines sort of sum up my life of late.
Disbelief, confusion, general shock at the state of my world
A polite-enough, energy-conserving greeting
Asking about you, so you know that even though all I do is think and talk about myself and cancer and surgery, I really, deeply care about everyone else in my life and would so much rather hear their news than share mine
Awkwardly talking about the weather, because it’s really humid, and also really buggy
It’s been two weeks since my last run: 3.1 slow, sweaty miles through the Dartmouth College campus, in the dark, in the rain, wearing a cotton sweatshirt because it was 4 AM the day of my surgery and I apparently forgot how to dress for a sticky summer run.
Two weeks since I arrived at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center for a 6 AM check in.
Two weeks since I stood in a long line of patients and their caregivers at the surgical center entrance, waiting to confirm my name, date of birth, and other pertinent information.
Two weeks since I felt like the ultimate rebel by wearing my own fuzzy socks as I was wheeled into the operating room, instead of the sad, beige hospital-issued grippy-bottomed ones.
Two weeks since I woke up in my recovery room barefoot, with my socks in a plastic bag next to my bed. I keep wondering whose job it was to take them off once I was knocked out.
Two weeks since I woke up after surgery, delirious, just wanting to know how the surgery went and if we did “the full surgery” or just the first part.
(Just the first part. I’ll need more surgery, eventually.)
Two weeks since everything changed, yet again.
Two weeks ago, I had a double mastectomy as the first part of my treatment for bilateral invasive ductal carcinoma.
I’ve spent the past 14 days (plus two months) in a blur. The first week was heavy on the physical recovery. I was in less pain than I expected, but still quite a bit of physical pain. I was very swollen. I was very bloated! (And then I wasn’t, yay!) I was adjusting.
Last week was better, and it was worse.
Physically, I was able to start going for little walks, and then longer walks. I learned to give myself sponge baths and successfully washed my hair in the bathroom sink. My range of motion continues to improve, and I can get in and out of bed without pain. The wins were usually small and relatively infrequent, but they were there, and I celebrated them.
There were also some non-wins. “Losses” doesn’t feel like the appropriate word, but it was a tough week.
In part because I hoped to get the surgical drains removed, and I didn’t. That was a major blow, even if it wasn’t totally unexpected, and I’m making a bigger deal of it than I probably should. (Sometimes being an optimist is brutal.) I think I need somewhere to direct some of my cancer-related rage, and it helps to hone in on one specific thing, and my thing is these uncomfortable drains.
I was — and am — still recovering and resting and spending a lot of time in bed, watching TV, not doing anything productive. (Which I know is fine! It’s just not what I’m used to.) But the world keeps moving. Everyone else’s lives keep moving.
And they should.
They need to.
Mine feels frozen in time, though. It has, for the better part of the past 2.5 months.
As a huge fan of the classic storm-chaser film Twister, I’d liken life lately to living in the eye of a hurricane. (Yes, Twister is about tornadoes and I made a hurricane reference. So?) I’m in the eye, and I’m relatively calm, but mostly because I’m numb, and everyone and everything else is swirling around me.
And then occasionally I get tossed out into the storm, and that’s when I break down and cry and think about screaming. (I never actually scream, because what if my neighbors hear and worry?!)
It’s been a really, really hard few months.
I know there’s more hard to come.
I wish I could see it.
I wish I could predict it.
I wish I knew how hard. What that hard will look like. How I’ll handle it. How Annie will handle it. How I can prepare for it. How I’ll recover from it.
Meanwhile, breast cancer is everywhere I turn. I try to ignore my own reality, or find small distractions. And then it’s the Today Steals & Deals host announcing her diagnosis, or the friend-of-a-friend sharing hers via The Atlantic.
I’m writing this from bed, where I spend most of my time lately.
I’ve wanted to write. I’ve wanted to record a solo episode about surgery and recovery so far. I’ve wanted to share. But whenever I try, I can’t. And I’m giving myself grace in that I’m not forcing it.
But today, I wanted to write.
I wanted to say hi!
I wanted to feel productive. And somehow this feels productive.
And I wanted you to know that I’m OK, and I’m totally not OK.
I’m recovering well. Physically, I am healing exactly as I should, and at my plastic surgery follow-up last week, the team was very encouraging about my progress. My non-boob-boobs are weird. I have expanders in, and now that the swelling is down, you can really see the expanders. They are round and hard and visible and lumpy and weird. I hate them. They are uncomfortable. They will set off metal detectors, I’ve been told. They are foreign objects, under my skin (in every sense of the phrase).
I am dying for people to feel them. They are so strange.
I’ve felt them. Quite a bit, by this point.
Weirdly, that’s a win.
After 10 full days of refusing to touch beneath the surgical bra or look down, afraid of what I’d see — or not see — I finally looked. And it wasn’t awful. In fact, it wasn’t bad at all.
My surgeons did a beautiful job. They saved my life, and they did it with all of the care, kindness, hand-holding, and tear-wiping in the world. (Now I’m crying, because I love them so much and feel so lucky that I got — and fought for — the team I got. I owe Dr. Kari Rosenkranz my whole life. I am also very, very interested in being her best friend, and have a hard time playing it cool around her. I’m such a fangirl.)
So, I looked. I looked down. I looked in the mirror. I looked from all angles. I felt around. And I’m OK.
And then I’m not OK.
Because this sucks. It sucks that I’m in bed, recovering from surgery, still waiting for the pathology results from surgery so we can determine next steps.
It sucks that I have “email Akron team” and “email Chicago team” and “email NYCM team” on my sad little to-do list, but I keep putting them all off, because I don’t have any actual updates for any of them. I don’t know if I’ll be at their races. I have no idea what life will look like on September 30, October 8, or November 5. Until we have the pathology results and I meet with my medical oncologist (for the first time, next week), I don’t know what happens next.
I don’t know when I’ll go from expander to implant. I don’t know when that surgery will be. I don’t know if it will be before or after chemotherapy. I don’t know when chemotherapy will start, how long it will go, and when it may end. I don’t know if I’ll need radiation.
My life is a tsunami (another storm reference) of confusion, forced patience, and overwhelm. It’s a tidal wave (I’m getting good at this) of emotions at every turn.
I’m OK, and I’m not really OK.
And, right now, I’m OK with being both.*
Thank you for being here. Thank you for showing up for me in all of the different ways you know how.
Thank you.
*Yes, I have a therapist, and an amazing IRL support network. Don’t you worry.
The latest on the Ali on the Run Show:
Motherhood Mondays with Laura Green & Julia Berteletti: They’re back, four years later!
Kate Grace, Olympian & New Mom: More mom talk!
Erica Stanley-Dottin, 2:52 Marathoner & Tracksmith Community Manager: If you’re looking for a mix of inspiration and no-BS advice on how to get faster, Erica is the ultimate inspiration. She’s so cool.
Kara Goucher, Author of The Longest Race: A classic Kara catch-up episode! We laugh, we cry, we over-share.
Steph Catudal, Author of Everything All At Once: This book. These words. So powerful. This conversation came at a time when I needed it the most.
What I’m watching: Schitt’s Creek, exclusively. This has, unsurprisingly, been my recovery show. I think this is my fifth or sixth time watching the series the entire way through. It’s my favorite, and it’s comforting.
Sharing: The GoFundMe page my friend Julia set up for me. The amount that has been donated already is so unbelievably generous and overwhelming, and has alleviated so much stress from my life. I will live in gratitude for the way people have shown up for me throughout all of this. And I’m sharing this here simply because people have continued to ask. So, here it is.
And so…
Take good care of yourselves. Take good care of each other. Tell someone you love them today. Thank you so much for being here. And whatever you’re going through, keep going. (Note to you. Note to self.)
Love,
Ali
Love to you! Give yourself grace. I'm glad you feel like writing. Ok, I am going to try to share a brief (and hopefully funny-ish) story about expanders. I have experience with them, and yes, they are super weird. But I didn't have them on my chest. I had them under my scalp. I was hit by a car while running, and a large piece of my scalp was torn off. I had 4 total surgeries to reconstruct my scalp & restore my hair. Part of this required 2 expanders under my scalp for a couple of months so they could ultimately move hair-bearing scalp to the big bald spots I had after skin grafts. So, basically I HAD BOOBS ON MY HEAD. My plastic surgeon (who was amazing) did a lot of post-cancer breast reconstruction, so the nurses were always like, don't you need a gown? (Nope!) And would be kind of shocked when I pulled off my hat to display my scalp boobs for further saline inflation. At least yours are in the right place? :-)
I am a couple of months ahead of you on a similar journey. So similar that I was diagnosed a few weeks before I was supposed to run the Eugene marathon. I deferred to next year and had my double mastectomy a few days before the race. I also hate my expanders! Good to know they will set off metal detectors. I fly for the first time next week. I’ve been following your progress and appreciate your honesty and vulnerability. I have felt so many of the same things that you have described. Take care and hang in there! We will get through this!