Watercolor Iris. From a Let'sMakeArt tutorial.

Surgery is no joke, friends. I was feeling better this morning, and I've stopped taking the pain pills. (The pain is the same with or without them.) Because everyone was driving me crazy, which happens when I don't get a sufficient amount of alone time, I decided to go for a drive and deliver some art I promised to people. I made five art deliveries around the city and took photos of four homes for house-portrait-commissions. I had two more to go, but they were a bit farther afield than my energy could manage. 

Driving around for an hour was depleting, apparently, and I'm now in bed, clutching my mastectomy pillow and with the electric mattress pad cranked on high. Being a sloth comes with guilt: guilt that I'm not playing with my kids, mostly, but also guilt that David is, yet again, doing 100% of the household chores. I've done a good job of collecting dishes by my bed, but I'm not strong enough to carry them downstairs. Last week I dropped a bunch of oats all over the floor. Dishes aren't as easy clean-up.

I forget that surgery, to your body, is basically the equivalent of being attacked by a saber-toothed tiger, biologically-speaking. My cells have no idea that the surgery was planned. They instead are totally stressing out and having to rebuild tissue and also recuperate from the strange medicines. I'm meant to be lying in my cave, having my hunter-gatherer family bring me water and nuts and perhaps some mammoth-flesh if it's a good week. 

Instead I'm sipping decaf Earl Grey and eating Dutch Caramel Apple Pie that a wonderful friend delivered yesterday. It's better than a cave, I think.

My body is exhausted, but my brain is on overload. I have so many projects I want to do. I want to get a real re-start on my memoir (which I'm having to re-write in light of my own cancer diagnosis. It was originally a memoir about being The Sandwich Generation, taking care of two parents with cancer while trying to find fun and joy in the little things. Still working on a tagline, friends, but are you a literary agent? I have one interested, but then again that was a year ago...). I want to finish this instrumental album. I want to finish a music video for "18 Months Later" -- my new single that isn't out yet, but you can hear it here if you are a Patron even at the lowest tier - $10/year! I want to make new paintings. I want to write a romance novel. I want to be the best homeschool mom on the planet. I want to draw with my new markers that you all bought me because you are SIMPLY THE BEST. I want to record new music.

More than anything I want to perform for people. I miss a crowd so much. I miss the back and forth, the heckling, the laughs, the response, just everything. 

Back to art though. I'm running a special for Patrons who are at the $20/month level, where I will draw a house portrait for you to thank you for your support. I do have a listing just up on my website where people are ready to straight-up buy a portrait rather than joining Patreon... but really I'd prefer you join Patreon where my music community is:) On Patreon you can also just pay for a year at one time with a discount of 15% and that turns out is $204/annually, which is the cost of a home portrait anyway, so support an artist and get a cool perk!

Okay, enough about Patreon. I've gotta shut up about that already. Anyone reading this is likely already a member there, and I love you eternally. 

Thank you all for the love, for the art supplies, for the books for my boys, and for the pies. My family is so very grateful.

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HOWDY! It's nearing midnight, day of surgery. I was floored by the number of people who've been reading my blog lately -- and the number of people who care about me. You'd think I'd grasp that, but clearly I need many years of therapy to understand that I have a really great community.

This is probably the most important thing in cancer treatment: finding your village.

Tomorrow begins the first of my three surgeries to repair the post-mastectomy issues. I can't quite see the end of the tunnel yet, but I'm relieved to be making some progress. 

At some point in the last two weeks I started drawing again. It started because I wanted to do my own art therapy to try to control a new essential tremor I've developed since surgery. Weirdly, I can't control it very well when I'm playing piano, but when I'm drawing or painting, I'm able to slow it down a bit. 

My plan was to have date nights based around a watercolor project subscription box I ordered myself for Christmas. You know - like one of those paint & drink wine places, except at home because who is going out during a deadly pandemic? David and I did one of the watercolor tutorials together sometime after New Year's, and I was hooked. David, less so. 

Yes, we are still homeschooling. And not Zoom meetings at home with a teacher, but 100% homeschooling, where I am the teacher and we study what we want. I'm loosely following a curriculum I bought, but I am loving the freedom to stray when needed. 

I'm fortunate my boys can read, as it makes things a lot easier. I don't have to teach reading (though I supposed I already did that by accident?), and we can get piles of books from the library and study all the precambrian creatures we want. Then we can use modeling clay or pipe cleaners to make our own prehistoric animals, and then I can assign Graham to use those animals to make a stop-motion animation. Then he likes to write up something and post it to his instagram, so I feel like we're covering a lot of life skills in one subject. 

Here's a list of the resources we are using for homeschool. (It's an Amazon Affiliate link.)

We are reading 'official school books' (Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass/Phantom Tollbooth/Midsummer Night's Dream so far), but he always has some dragon fantasy book going on his own. Wee Angus just finished My Father's Dragon and we are doing some Winnie the Pooh and more Frog and Toad stuff next. 

As for math, they love doing it independently -- with apps that adjust to their current level, mainly Prodigy. 

Art is an easy find in my house. We've done some watercolor penguins this week, after I started making my own penguins from a Let's Make Art tutorial subscription box thingie I got myself for Christmas. Music lessons are on Wednesdays.

I'm kind of tortured about what to do about next school year. I don't see live music returning by the fall and then it's flu season again. I'm pretty sure I'm out of a job for another year at least. I'm hoping that the increase in vaccines means that museums and other fun field trip destinations will be open and maybe I could try a year of homeschooling where we aren't locked in our house. (My big dream has always been to just be a traveling homeschool family!) 

Quick cancer/surgery updates:

I have three more surgeries. The first one is February 4, and this will be to swap out the tissue expander for an implant. I'll have to heal from that one, let the flat side continue to heal, and then we can talk about putting in a tissue expander on the flat side. 

I'm still really upset with my first plastic surgeon, who did a weird kind of surgery and used a weird kind of tissue expander (one that was prone to infections, apparently). Mostly I'm annoyed that he put the tissue expander over the muscle. The new surgeon suggested that under the muscle was preferable both for surgery success and for looking more natural. So he is going to go under the muscle on my February 4 surgery, which means I'll have a pretty painful recovery, as those muscles have not been stretched at all and they are about to get a big ol' implant underneath them. #ouch

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Other updates/tip jars are here.

I have been at a loss as what to write for ages now. It's not writers' block; I've been able to make some progress on my books and songs. I just feel like my blog is boring, that no one cares how I'm doing, or that even if they do care, I've got nothing new to report. 

That's probably the biggest issue here: I'm in limbo. I've nothing new to report. I know you care. You wouldn't be reading if you didn't. But I'm still half-healed, with three more surgeries before I'm whole again.

I've decided to go ahead with breast reconstruction, a deeply personal decision that I still wrestle with. I feel like I should be brave enough to "Go Flat!" It's a movement heard around the world, and it's one that I support.

Just updating for people following along, and for future breast-cancer patients who wonder how this whole process goes. 

I'm doing okay. I'm still lop-sided. For y'all just catching up, I had a bilateral mastectomy in October. At that time they placed tissue expanders on my chest -- basically spacers for future implants. The tissue expanders are filled with a saline solution bit by bit to stretch the skin over a few months before having the final phase of reconstruction. Unfortunately there is a shockingly high rate of infection (10-15%), and I was one of those unfortunates. 

This means that I currently have a left breast that is a rounded tissue expander, just awaiting to be swapped out for an implant. But my right "breast" has been removed completely, including the tissue expander, and I was sewed up flat -- concave even. 

A Mastectomy during a Pandemic

I am writing this because I didn’t find helpful resources out there about what to expect when getting a mastectomy during a pandemic. There are a lot of great blogs about how friends can help you, what your partner can do during surgery, etc, but none that explain cancer surgery during COVID-19.

I had my mastectomy during the beginning of the third surge of coronavirus -- in October 2020. Things were not as locked-down as I would have liked, particularly when it came to other patients. Please, people, if you are going to a doctor’s appointment, you have GOT to be considerate of other people. 

Someone in that waiting room is immuno-compromised. Someone in that waiting room has recently gotten a cancer diagnosis. Someone in that waiting room is terrified for their life. The least you can do is wear a mask properly, not bring your whole family to your appointment, and not sit down right next to a stranger.

Today's Guest Blog (Part 1 of 2) is by actor-writer-reader-musician-cinephile Gregory Maupin. If you have ever seen Kentucky's Shakespeare in the Park, then you have seen Greg and his equally talented partner, Abigail Bailey Maupin, perform. As a duo, they are known as RANNYGAZOO and are just an astounding package of wit and wonder. I love to see what they are into and upto. (I am also a supporter of their Patreon page: you could be too! Click here to see what magic they've offered.)

Quick update on me: Today is my first-ever colonoscopy prep! I'm oddly excited about it: alone time is precious. The kids are getting whatever screen time they want, and I am going to hang out in the bathtub with a book or laptop and hope I can write a book or a song or maybe just a few blogs... 

GIFT GUIDE: what to buy Breast Cancer patients. 

This year was bad enough, but now your friend (or you!) is battling cancer too?! It's just dumb at this point. When you are in the midst of cancer treatment, there's not a lot that can make you feel better. But there are things that can make your days more comfortable, and that's what I'm here to suggest.

I'm feeling okay. I want to get back to creating. Writing and producing books and music. My brain is still fogged from anesthesia -- I've had three surgeries since summer -- which makes it difficult to focus longer than thirty seconds at a time. I do that thing where I re-read the same paragraph five times in a row before giving up or slowly trucking through.

I was 50,000 words into writing a memoir about the Sandwich Generation when I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Now I haven't even looked at that memoir because I'm unclear whether I need to trash it all or simply add a third act. 

Grief is still a cloud that follows me around. We moved into my parents' home very slowly, so things like their refrigerator magnets and photographs are decorating our space. Most of the time it's fine, but yesterday I broke down while opening the fridge: a photo of my parents with Motorcycle Joe just did me in. 

It's a photo of them the way I will remember them. The mind chooses an age, and it's not always the age they die. This is my parents, grinning and glowing. Mom is between cancers, but her hair is the glorious crown of ringlets I always knew her with. Dad's bright blue eyes are laughing. Both of my parents are just oozing joy and pride. I saw it and smiled, and then I sobbed because my children didn't get a chance to know their grandparents. 

Grief. It's that ball in the box metaphor, and damn if it didn't just hit the grief button hard. 

Anyway. Basic stuff: how am I?

I'm trying to heal. I'm on my fourth round of antibiotics, and fighting this dumb infection. I've had complications from the past two surgeries, and I'm really frustrating with my plastic surgeon, who seems to not give a crap about me. I am looking to switch surgeons, but I can't even get a second opinion consult with anyone until December 23. It's hard to be rosy-eyed when even your cancer doctors don't care about you. 

The meal train was amazing, and thank you all so much for the gift cards. They've allowed us to order meals, since I'm still unable to cook or do the washing-up. David has been working 12-14 hour days and also doing all the dishes and trying to finish the kitchen renovation that was put on hold because we did demolition in March. I'm hoping to have a kitchen countertop by Valentine's Day, but don't want to put any pressure on poor David. 

I'm excited to have a pantry though. Here's David's handiwork. I'm not even able to paint, so David did it all himself. It used to have an oven and a pile of trash and boots and snacks. Here it is empty and then with a coat of paint and new vinyl floor: