And then there was one...

My, oh my, how quickly time flies when you’re having fun. Believe it or not, friends and neighbors, but we just finished my seventh chemo treatment this afternoon – just one more treatment two weeks from today. Needless to say, Eric and I are pretty darn excited. Just one more session of sitting around with an IV in my arm for four hours (while poor Eric sits in the world’s most uncomfortable chair watching me sleep for an hour) and then it’s on to radiation. It’s so hard to believe that I’ve been going through this for over three months. What’s even more difficult to believe is that I’ve been unemployed for five months.

FIVE WHOLE MONTHS! That’s even more insane than me being in treatment for breast cancer. Ever since I was 11 years old, I’ve always had some type of job. I started babysitting when I was in sixth grade, that expanded to the ice cream stand in high school, the ever-enthralling Government Documents department and Admissions during college (and my cousin’s chiropractic office during the summer and winter breaks), my first post-college job at Saatchi, followed by Digitas and finally, Microsoft. Even when I volunteered at the Olympics, I had a part time job as a hostess in a restaurant. The last time I came close to not working for this long was when I studied in London for a semester.

Fortunately, for both my sanity and my checking account, I’m working on getting a new job and will hopefully be gainfully employed once again within the next month. I certainly could have worked earlier but it was actually quite refreshing to not have to worry about going to work, especially during the first five treatments when I never knew what my side effects would be (on-going nausea? emotional breakdowns? complete exhaustion? debilitating bone aches? other fun bodily issues that are inappropriate to list on this blog? It was like that old game show Press Your Luck. Every day was like, “No nausea, no nausea, no bone aches…”). For the most part, the past three months have been alternating weeks of one good and one bad – fingers crossed that the next few weeks work out well as I head into the final stretch.

While I have been bored for much of the time (during my bad weeks when I’m not feeling so hot and need to stay in the apartment…there’s only so much Food Network, Scooby Doo and Gilmore Girls that you can watch…unfortunately, I have this weird anti-DVD bias that I really need to get over, especially because I have a TON of movies I haven’t seen yet…and yes, I am 31 years old and I still watch Scooby Doo…so what? wanna fight about it?), I’ve also managed to keep myself fairly busy during my good weeks – various doctors’ appointments, physical therapy, meeting up with friends, dealing with my insurance company (which could be a full time job itself), and cooking and catering. However, my biggest accomplishments during all of this nonsense is learning how to knit and starting a 10-week pottery class.

My pottery class just started last week and I just learned how to “wedge” my clay and attempted to center the clay on the wheel. Now, I realize that this is completely pathetic to say, but when I got out of class, I felt like I got into a fight with a bear…and lost. I was absolutely exhausted! My arms hurt, my back hurt, my hands were a mess. But I look forward my next class on Saturday morning where I will find that I forgot everything that was taught to me a week before.

As for the knitting, I first learned back in December when my friend Allyson taught me how to cast on and the basic knit stitch. Since I’m the least coordinated person on the planet, it took me quite a while to get those basic steps straight (poor Allyson! I think she tried to leave twice, but I kept her hostage until I could finally get a few rows finished). But once I did, I haven’t looked back. I’ve completed two full scarves to date – one for Eric and one for Ross (as a thank you for all of his Zippie-sitting) – which doesn’t sound like much, but they’re pretty long scarves. Eric’s scarf was my first completed knitting project and is just the basic knit stitch. After I finished that, I taught myself how to purl stitch out of a book my friend Kristy gave me back when I got out of surgery back in September (like I said, I’m a procrastinator). Ross’ scarf is the very exciting 2 knit/2 purl ribbing (okay, maybe it's just exciting to me). Of course, now Eric is jealous of Ross’ scarf and wants me to make him another one.


But seriously, the knitting is probably the best hobby for me – especially during my “bad” weeks when I can’t get off the couch. I now feel slightly less guilty about sitting on my butt and watching TV – because now I’m “being productive” (if making bad scarves can be considered “productive”). And me being me (aka: results-oriented), I like to crank through and in the words of Tim Gunn, “Get it done” (oh yeah, I’ve also been watching a ton of Project Runways…kind of a placeholder until the start of Top Chef and LOST).

However, while I’ve enjoyed learning these new skills and spending time with friends or in the kitchen…it’s definitely a good thing that I’ll be working again…especially when I’m finished with my last round of chemo in two weeks!