Sunny Weather, Follow Up Getting Closer!

It looks like the weather is making a turn for the better here finally. The sun has been shining for 2 days now and they are calling for pretty nice temps this weekend. I am supposed to go out for a friend's birthday and quite frankly I am pretty excited. I am so ready to go out without needing a 10 pound coat and freezing to death. My birthday/New Years Eve party was awful. It was maybe 10 degrees outside. We walked about 2 blocks to a club that ended up having a $40 cover charge PER person so we laughed at them, told them they were nuts and turned around going back to where we were before....all with no jacket, no coat....just a sleeveless tank top and a skirt. Yeah I'd rather not do that ever again in my whole life. I am surprised I didn't get frost bitten. I am so ready for summer. I say it a lot. I actually say it so much that I wonder why I do not move somewhere warmer.

As the weather warms up it reminds me that May is drawing ever closer. My follow up appointment is May 8th. I am pretty excited and nervous at the same time. I know very simply that my chest and neck are not the same as they were before. I am thinking maybe I am starting to accept it. I always felt after I got better that I'd just feel exactly as I used to but I don't. I still have trouble taking in deep breaths sometimes. I run out of breath often when I eat. OK. I don't so much run out of breath as feel like I have to take a whole lot of deep breaths when I do eat. I am not sure why it happens more when I eat and my oncologist thought I was nuts when I told him this last time but it's so true. I feel the lump in my throat about 50 to 75% more after I eat a large meal. I also have to stop and yawn or take deep full breaths. Is this not insane? It's totally true though. I hate it. I really do. My hubby always notices the deep inhales when I eat. It's just how I am now. Those things and the occasional pressure, not to mention the very rare wheeze gets me into full on panic mode. I realize everyone will make a wheezy sound now and again but for ME it's such a scary thing. I wish I didn't live with the fear every day that it could come back. I think more of my beautiful family and my poor hubby who would have such a difficult time adjusting without me. So I must stay well for that reason alone. I hope this CAT scan and ECHO give me the peace of mind that I need and I can just start accepting the changes in my body and begin to just adjust and live with those changes instead of always thinking something is wrong or hoping it will get better. I can't hold breaths singing as well as I used to. The veins in my neck bulge and I despise it. I can't help it. The tumor was wrapped around the major veins in my neck. I will always have scar tissue in there forever. I wish I knew if that scar tissue was still on those veins. It would explain a lot. Regardless I doubt it will ever go back to "normal." I am accepting that perhaps this IS my normal now.

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