My Sunday Night

Many people comment on how well I am handling this crazy situation and how positive I have stayed through all the ups and downs of this battle. Most days I do well and try to live my life like cancer doesn't have a hold of me. As I have said before, I made a conscious decision early on to not let cancer get the best of me and to approach it with positivity instead of anger. Some days are easier than others and believe me I have enough down moments, I just try not to marinate in them and focus on the things that are going good in my life.

All that said, you can't control the subconscious, as I learned the hard way last Sunday night. I was dogsitting one of my regular dogs and went to bed around 11:30. I woke up around 3am to go to the bathroom and once there I realized I needed to throw up. Not so fun, but just part of having cancer and being in treatment. So, I assumed the position and then proceeded to just wretch/dry heave violently without anything coming up. My body wasn't allowing it to come out, almost like holding it back. I know these are details that you probably don't want to know, but I was violently wretching over and over again, 10 times total. I sat next to the toilet and my mind began to wander and started to question if my body needed to get whatever was in me out and it wasn't allowing it. And then I started to violently shake, my whole body basically convulsing. And then started hyperventilating. I was semi coherent as to what was going on and then snapped out of it and realized that in this moment what is happening is crazy! I rushed to my phone and called 911. Yep, 911. I knew that I couldn't get anyone to me fast enough and I was terrified at what was happening. It seemed like an eternity before the paramedics got to the house and I tried to calm my breath and ease my shaking but had no luck. I was still insanely nauseous too. They finally got there and I was taken to the hospital (U of U, not the usual place but I requested to go there because if it was cancer related then I wanted to be as close to Huntsman as possible) I finally threw up on the way to the hospital which helped ease my mind, but I was still hyperventilating and shaking. Once at the hospital they started an IV and got anti-nausea meds in me as well as started fluids. I was able to reach my mom and sister who came to the hospital in the wee hours or the morning. Once my mom got there I literally started listing off things that needed to be done and random things, cause I really didn't know what was happening; just in case things went downhill from there. I started researching severe side effects to my treatment, came up with hyper-toxicity. I made her repeat it to me just so I knew someone would know. Doctors weren't too concerned with that and weren't thinking it was anything cancer related. I finished my fluids, my shaking and breathing settled and they sent me home around 10am.

I wasn't having hyper-toxicity, I was in the middle of a full blown, knock down panic attack. I didn't of course realize this until later that day when I was back home resting. I slept pretty much the entire day Monday and when I was awake I sat and thought through it all. I had feelings of shame and embarrassment and didn't even know if I wanted to share this with anyone. As a society we look down on weakness and vulnerability; and succumbing to anxiety is in the center of both of those things. It took me until later in the week to realize that this is just where I am right now. Yes, it is scary to think that I have bottled up so much anxiety about what is going on with me that it grew into such an intense and scary situation, but again, that is where I am at in this very moment. I have had a lot on my plate for the past few years (obviously more in the past year) and the past two months have been extra trying and new stresses have come up and then the stresses of what the future holds. It just gets to be a lot, more than I was aware of obviously. There were some other things that night that triggered some of this, but that is for another post.

I decided to share this because, well, why the hell not. The people who want to know my journey don't want to just know the big and good parts of it, they want the whole thing; the good, bad and difficult times. Also, not sharing it gives it more power and shame. If the people in my life can't handle that I have bad days, then they shouldn't be around me right now. They can jump back on when things get back to "normal" I suppose. I am embracing this hurdle and working on sorting though my anxiety - even if I don't feel it every day. I am working with my doctors to manage my stress and anxiety going forward. You can't help the situation if people don't know what the situation is. I am still figuring it out, but trying to own my story and all the stressors in it. I am serious when I say one day at a time, and sometimes 10 seconds at a time.