Life is Short, Eat Blueberries

Image from antioxidant-fruits.com

What's going on in our family is that my sister had a double mastectomy last week and starts an especially toxic form of chemotherapy next week.

She lives far away, and I can't be by her side. I feel remote and haunted, but she is handling it with this incredible grace that I don't know quite how to describe.

I can't seem to stop thinking about cancer, its insidiousness, sneaky and horrible like random violence. Yet I have not even dared to go to a website and study it the way I study literally every single other thing that affects or interests me.

It is on my mother's side of the family, this cancer potential. My mother's sister, Ruthie, died of breast cancer 20 years ago. Ruthie's son, my cousin, Lane, died of stomach cancer 10 years ago. My mother survived breast cancer with a lumpectomy and radiation 6 years ago.

And now my sister. She had a clean mammogram in July, found a suspicious lump in March, and here we are now.

My sister is a warrior, a petite, shy woman with a gun and knife collection that would shock you. From the start of all this, she has seen cancer as an enemy, something to be attacked calmly and methodically, something that can't be allowed to glimpse any weakness.

She's a Girl Scout whose motto is preparedness and survival, so she spent the weeks leading up to her surgery arranging every practical thing so that she could survive afterward.

And she has this huge faith in the strong arms of God holding her up and the bigger picture of which this life is only a tiny part.

My mother called me last night, and I felt myself turn back into a frightened child. I asked her, my voice small, "Mama, how do I keep from getting cancer too?"

I have my instructions now: vegetables and exercise, regular mammograms, eating breakfast, adding blueberries into my cereal, the usual list. Follow my dreams and be happy because life is short.

Life is short and we are all precious! I hope you are all taking good care of yourselves, dear readers, adding blueberries to your breakfast cereal and following your dreams.

*Good article about anti-cancer healthy eating.
It says:

• Turmeric (one of the main spices in curry)
• Green tea (more than 3 cups a day)
• Veggies & fruits (5 or more a day)
• Less meat (12 ounces a week)
• Fewer sweets (try fruits and berries instead)
• Agave syrup (instead of sugar)
• Omega-3 oils (olive, canola or flax seed)

• Watch out for cancer-causing growth hormones in meats and dairy
• Try to eat organic if possible.
• Get more exercise

New Things

I went to the Student Health Center yesterday to get something for stress and to finally get the paperwork to register with the disability services on campus.

I have been struggling for ages with the necessity of getting disability services for my MS, reluctant to admit I'm not as strong and capable as any 18-year-old on that campus. Climbing the campus to Founders Hall every day finally got the best of me.

I haven't actually signed up yet, but when/if I do, I can get a ride to Founders in a little bus.

Founders Hall. These are about a sixth of the stairs necessary to climb.

New School Schedule
I should mention, as an aside, that I dropped two of my classes in order to have time to search for work in a serious and focused way. Now I only have one class, Teaching ESL Composition, two days a week.

I miss my teaching internship in Language Analysis a lot, but I am frankly relieved not to have to attend the American Lit class anymore because of a tiresome couple of preachy, politically-correct undergrads. But that's another story...

I will still finish at the end of the Fall semester, as planned, but I will have to take an American Lit class while I am writing my thesis.

New Health Concerns
At the health center, they measured my blood pressure as usual and found, for the very first time in my life, hypertension. 116/90. That's worrisome.

In spite of my sedentary habits, indulgent eating and voluptuous figure, I am used to receiving unearned praise when I go in for check-ups: compliments on my nice, low blood pressure.

Now, life has to change. Most importantly, I need some exercise, something more than trooping miserably around the campus.

Can worry and heartache can cause hypertension? I do have a lot on my mind. Soon, I will tell you about it.

A New Goal
On a more hopeful note, I found a job announcement for a great job I intend to apply for. There is a huge application process, beginning with a curriculum vitae, recommendation letters, transcripts, and a letter of intent.

My hopes are up; I can't help it. So wish me luck.

Once I dropped classes and grad school dropped in priority, I had a realization. I know it sounds ridiculously obvious, but a good job is the answer to all my problems. Of course, it means I won't be able to teach next semester at HSU. *sigh*

New Appreciation for You
I should mention that as of March 1, we joined the ranks of America's uninsured. My son's eye problems are still ongoing.

I just came from reading the most inane discussion over at the Eureka Standard where one of his readers is saying that people who object to the American insurance industry and the state of health care in the US are "slackers."

Blood pressure and all, middle-aged mom and all, peace-loving intellectual and all, I would gladly punch this guy in the face.

How I would love to be a slacker just for a day!

And thank you, to all my readers, for being sensitive, intelligent, kind-hearted people.