2010 and the last chemo

This is a most wonderful holiday. Long days of leisure, no appointments to keep, reading novels, time at beautiful Stanford Valley, friends and family... It is a deep rest time with sunshine getting into the bones and even making my head a gentle brown. Tomorrow we return to Stanford Valley for another 3 days with friends and family to welcome the new year and let the old year go with  a sense of blessing and gratitude for what has been. It is good to make space for the new.
We return on Sunday and early the next day I will have a blood test to check out my blood count. If it is high enough I will have my last chemotherapy treatment. It is 18 weeks since I began. I was remembering the first session and the subsequent intense and deep fatigue - the nature of which has never returned. I remember Marian massaging my sore back and later gently attempting to get me to eat a slice of toast. How different everything is now. My body is strong and vigorous, my fitness is slowly building up and my appetite is enormous! All my hair is gone - yes all - and I have developed a little expertise in placing my false eyelashes on more or less correctly. My head is tanned - same colour as my face and I feel confident walking around without a head covering.

It feels strange coming to the end of the chemo sessions....

gorgeous summer

A whole full week has gone by since my last entry. It has been a very full time. Working 2 days after chemo was harder that I expected. My low energy was not helped by the fact that I was the only one staying in this vast and empty conference centre and our workshop was the only one happening. It was as if extra energy was required to make up for the sense of void in the rest of the place. Still it all worked out in the end and I knew that I just needed one further push for the facilitation that I had scheduled for the next day... p  u  s  h ... And even as I was doing that I could feel my natural energy returning. It is such an extraordinary sensation when the turn-around happens. It is as if many, many cells that have been dormant or maybe flattened by the chemicals, start to revive and begin to generate their own energy. I feel rivers of life begin to flow through me - and everything changes.

The holiday time has begun, with relaxation and much festive eating with different ranges of friends and family.

My biggest challenge at this time? Learning to put on my false eyelashes...

Into the last stretch

Yes I had my chemotherapy on Friday - all the good chants and songs for a higher blood count worked! I got the call that chemo was on and with great enthusiasm packed my bag for a day of 'relaxation'. One try on my left hand vein - no go - so the drip went into my arm but it is clear that the veins on that side are ruined. Next and last time will be on my right hand. Thanks for all of you who kept thinking of the golden honey flowing through ...

Some fatigue and yukki taste in my mouth and all is well.

I fly to Johannesburg this afternoon for a day's work tomorrow, one more  work day after that and then it is holiday time!! Yay! My last chemo session is supposed to be on January 4th and then a month following that I will have a scan to see the state of the liver.

My brain is very fuzzy, not much coherent thinking going on, but always the spirit of appreciation for your consistent and loving support, and for the mystery of life itself.

No Chemo Today

Thank you all for your wonderful messages of  'golden honey flowing in my veins' but it is not to be today.

I am feeling so frustrated - I thought I would write immediately so that ease can return. Yesterday my blood test results indicated that my blood count was too low to have chemo. Early this morning I returned for another blood test and had my time with the doctor who said all was well on examination although the blood results were still not in yet. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Just got the call that one important aspect of the white blood count is too low and I must wait until Friday.

What is hard, is that there is nothing I can actively do to generate my white blood cells - and that I have carefully organized meetings, work etc. around my chemo date! Ahhh, the best laid plans, and all that. There is also the girding up for the vein searching, all levels of preparation for the chemo event. The doctor said that it is quite usual as one gets further into the chemotherapy, for the body to take longer to generate white blood cells. Meanwhile I continue feeling strong and active - and that is a very very good thing.  And...

new thoughts

Tomorrow is chemo no. 5 - if my blood count is good. I hope it is. My body is strong and getting fit, my muscles slowly regaining their tone. Sometimes this thought flashes by: "If my body is so resilient and strong, maybe the cancer cells are too". As I said, it just flashes by.

My work in Johannesburg and Pretoria last week went very well. Once a 'container' is set, an ethos of respect is engendered  - and genuinely agreed to - people willingly show themselves, their stories, their best thinking and naturally appreciate one another. For me, as facilitator, this is real 'food' - of a certain kind. It lifts my heart and deepens my belief that human beings are indeed worthy and courageous. Excellent and meaningful conversations begin to happen.

At the end of the first day of that workshop, a Muslim woman came to speak to me, her head fully covered in her black headdress. She said that she wanted to show me something and took her head covering off. Her thick' curly shoulder length hair freely tumbled out, and she said: "Five years ago - I was just like you, I had lost all my hair, my eyebrows and my lashes. I wanted to show you how wonderfully it all grows back."  A gift.

toward chemo 5

It has been a blissful time with Deborah..
It is week 3 since my last chemo, I feel vigorous and strong and am preparing to go to Johannesburg today for some new work - a little unknown and challenging. I have discovered a new level of inner assurance with regard to my work. The last 3 months have provided me an entry way to a quality of confidence that has little to do with expertise or learning. The best way to describe it is to use the beautiful words of one my participants in a recent programme. When asked what she was assuming that enabled her to do something very challenging and high stakes, she said, after thinking quietly and deeply, "I am enough".  That brought tears to my eyes and I have not forgotten it. I think that is the source of this assuranceI feel - a key assumption that provides a sense of ease and freedom. So, although I am full of anticipation about how this new workshop will turn out, my anxiety level is not at all what it used to be. Maybe I have at last accepted that my own centering will always support me in finding creative ways of holding dialogue space in which people can easily connect one with another.
Blessings to each one of you.