Diet blues

Having read Harry Potter in a day-and-a-half, I feel energised and ready to tackle the world. OK, so I am 63 years old, but I love these fairy stories. And I am not alone. I remember when I was around 11 years old I got the biggest book of Russian Folk tales called "The Flying Ship". Unfortunately, I had no chance to even glance at it, because my Dad, who had a habit of coming home for lunch and have a siesta thereafter, asked if he could borrow it and I never saw it for three days! So, Harry Potter was great fun. Of course it's not as good as Philip Pullman's Northern Lights trilogy, but enjoyable just the same. By the way, the first movie made from the Pullman trilogy is supposed to be coming out in December!

OK, so back to reality. Well, the sun is shining, I have just cleaned the yard in the back and rearranged things that I have not had the energy to do since this cancer thing started (meaning since I moved last June!). Hurrah! The landlord is supposed to fix the upstairs bathroom and balcony while I am gone, so I cleared everything underneath.

My latest meshugenas is the food I eat. The raised blood glucose got me going and I am determined more than ever to shed the kilos and stave off diabetes. Wish me luck!

In any case, I found a software that tracks everything one eats and am trying it out for seven days. It's fascinating to see just how much sodium, sugar, etc there is in what I eat. This morning for breakfast I had matzah coffee - the Hungarian-Jewish breakfast, the only thing I ever put sugar in, and there went my daily allowance of sugar. Oy veh! Who would have thought.

In addition to this focus on food, I have also started walking and got a pedometer. Also, the rib is healing, so I can do my Qigong as well. So, things are looking up. I do have to rest sometimes, but overall my energy level is much better, and I can see flashes of normal energy levels, and I am now more confident that it will return. I have to admit that I've had my doubts.

One of the hardest things is coming to terms with the fact that you may never be the same as you were before – be it looks, energy, outlook, work. You have to reinvent yourself in many ways and there's no map to follow, because you don't want to talk to other people with the same problem, as you want to return to 'normal'. Yet, it's really nice to talk with people who went through it and have some insight. It's a very strange conundrum. I've talked about the twilight zone feeling before, and this is another one of those. Mind you, it's a good excuse for pondering again the existential question of youth: 'what will I do when I grow up'? What will I do and how will I change when I have recovered completely? It's a chance to change in a positive direction, but it's really hard not to look backward and grieve over what was lost.

Preparations

I've been quiet for a while, because I've been really busy getting ready for my overseas trip, which was planned as a round-the-world - Florida - Washington DC - London - Budapest trip, but has been pared down to a manageable US trip only. I am really sorry to have had to do that, but sanity prevailed when I realised that I am even having difficulties climbing low elevation hills, let alone traipse around the world!

Recovery from all these past treatments is a hit and miss affair! First of all, you never know how long each phase will last, so you ruminate 'what if...' meaning 'what if it will be forever': what if I'll have to have siestas forever, because I get so tired around 3pm; what if my ribs will be brittle for the rest of my life; what if............you get the point.

Well, I am happy to report that nothing lasts forever, not even the fatigue. For the past two days I have been able to keep going all day without getting too tired. Today is a different matter, so I've just cancelled an appearance tomorrow as a guide for the traveling exhibition "Courage to Care", because today it seems that I do need to recoup the energy expanded during those days. But never mind, it's the first sign that perhaps things will change for the better on the fatigue front.

Another good news is that I finally made a decision about dying my hair. I know it's a bit boring all this talk about hair, but hey, it's a serious business. The way my hair grew back made me look very distinguished, but it is actually the fashion now among a certain segment of the 'beautiful people' here in Sydney and I just don't see myself that way. So, I found a herbal dye and plunged and got it coloured yesterday. The colour is not quite right, but I certainly feel much less exposed – more natural. I never thought I'd agonize so much about any part of my body, let alone my hair. (Wait until the time comes to make the decision about that breast reduction surgery!)

The rib fracture is healing and is not as uncomfortable as before, so i've started to walk a bit more. My next challenge is to change to a low GI diet to prevent getting diabetes. For the first time in my life I had a raised blood glucose reading a few days ago (5.6). Isn't it nice that there's always something to worry about?

On the plus side, the sun has finally emerged after the coldest winter in 21 years, and today it's sunny and warm outside. I went out and trimmed the plants in my mini garden and now, I am going to rest and read Harry Potter. The Australia Post owls just dropped it in my mailbox!

Decisions, decisions

To gray or not to gray, that is the question. Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the indignity of a lackluster salt 'n pepper mop, or to take up arms against the relentless march of age and decrepitude, and by opposing end them?

Well, the first step was to send this picture to Tunde. Sure enough, he said he loved the style, but "what's with the gray?" What indeed. I remember the shock when my mother stopped dying her hair, so I sympathise.

Strangely enough, it's become a really a big question whether to dye my hair or not, and it's not a question of vanity. It has much to do with my self image before the Big C and my ultimate desire to get back to my 'before'self. Of course, as I said before, and as I discussed today with Tony, a fellow cancer survivor and writer, the reality is that one can never get back to the before self, but must create a new self that incorporates the old. So, whether to keep the hair colour natural or not is far more complex than one would imagine.

It's a bit like my affair with the piano over the years. I studied piano formally from the age of 7 until 18, when I told my teacher that, rather than do the two years of training to be a piano teacher, that she suggested, I wanted to go to university to be a doctor. As a result, I stopped formal piano lessons and lost my piano when I went to university. Well, I never became a doctor and life took me in a different direction, but I always missed my piano, which was my soulmate as a child refugee in London.

After I got stuck in the US as a stateless person and moved about a lot, with no room, or money, for a piano, a musician friend actually bought me a guitar to fill the gap, but it didn't do the trick. Five years later, having made great effort to love it without success, I finally sold the guitar and it was only many years later, in 1985, that I finally bought a piano. The significance of this was not lost on my mother, who sighed a big sigh of relief. It meant that I was now settled. My peripatetic refugee existence was over. I was home. I had my own house, a healthy young son and a piano. Life was sweet.

Similarly with the hair colour. When I make my final decision, I believe that I will have come to terms with whoever I turn out to be after - I was going to say 'this adventure is over', but then realised this is nonsense, because it will only be over when I croak – so, after I come to terms with the 'new me', whatever that will be.

In the meantime, I have up days and down days. I've been really weepy for the past two days and it's driving me nuts, but you know I've been there before, and it has nothing to do with the hair, so I guess I'll get out of it again.

Another hurdle

Well, that gym membership didn't last long. Just sent off a request for a refund. No, I am not a wimp, it turned out that the pain in the ribs is caused by a hairline fracture, (a radiation present), and they gym can't postpone this particular membership, hence the refund.

Honestly, this is so frustrating! I remember being warned that brittle ribs could result from radiation, but you know, that happens to someone else, not me! I've had a hairline fracture on the same side about 20 years ago, but that was after falling on the ice on a terrible winter day in Washington DC. This time I think I was just doing exercise on the X-trainer that I bought many years ago and occasionally actually use.

Well, good bye X-trainer and hello ThinWalking. Have any of you heard of that one? A friend just gave me a small booklet about how you can walk yourself thin. Maybe that's the solution. So, I am off for a walk on Bondi Beach - cracked rib or no. The sun is shining, and Bondi beckons.

Besides everything, one of the best places in Sydney for yummy Hungarian walnut and poppy seed strudle is on Bondi Beach! Just the thought makes me feel better already!

Renewal

Any notions that I could one day return to my old, pre-cancer life and self, have now been permanently dashed. I really must face facts and admit, accept, fathom and, most importantly, accept that my life will never be the same again and I can't just sail through the day chasing rainbows and 'ideas' without paying serious attention to my body.

Of course, people have been telling me this for decades. 'You need to do more exercise... do some yoga... walk' - my friends advised, and admonished me. I have to say that I did take some of it on board: I went jogging with a friend and her dog in the 1970s (I hate jogging), learned yoga and did a lot of swimming in the 1980s and even got a personal trainer five years ago.

Unfortunately, I have always had a love-hate relationship with the gym. I find it almost as boring as jogging. I am a water baby and besides water sports my only passion used to be table tennis, but that's been a memory since I injured my ankle in 1996!

So, what to do? I bit the bullet and last week joined a gym with a pool.

Birthday Blues

Had a wonderful birthday yesterday. In the morning I went to Bicentennial Park in Wattle Bay with Jacki and Mark and their four kids (Chris' son and daughter and granddaughters) and played soccer with the girls and took some video too. It was great fun, except the weather turned cold and I was freezing.

In the afternoon I went with some friends to a lovely old pub in the middle of Sydney, called the Cricketers Arms Hotel, which had a roaring wood fire in the olde fireplace. There was a jazz band too and lots of door prizes. No, it was not for my birthday, but I did enjoy it. It was actually a fundraiser for an organisation called Friends of Claude Ho iin the Thyolo Area (FOCHTA). This is a grassroots organisation that helps AIDS orphans and victims and their carers in Malawi. I put up their website in case anyone wants to put a few dollars in as a birthday present (:-)

Today was another big day. In the morning I went swimming with my new Gold card to the local Acquatic centre, which gives me access to the gym, pool and all the classes, as well as a fitness professional for advice. Afterwards, I went with Jacki and her two daughters (Tegan and Leah) to get a kitten from the other side of town. They ended up with two gorgeous ginger tubbies and lots of feline paraphernalia. We picked them up from a half-way house for unwanted kitties, and I was shocked by the huge amount of paperwork that was involved in handing them over. These animals have already been desexed, microchipped and vaccinated. I am not complaining, just felt sorry for both Jacki and the foster mother who had to do the paperwork. Where are the good old days when you just take the kittens and promise to be good parents?

Well, that took almost the whole afternoon, and when I got home I was really hungry and tired. Now, it's evening and I am again bothered by pain in my ribs and nausea. I had it for a while and complained about it to the radiation oncologist, who told me to see the surgeon. I got an appointment two weeks from now, but I tried to get an earlier one with no luck. Hopefullly it will settle down. Most uncomfortable. Of course I went on the internet to research what it could be and it said something about liver damage. No, I didn't read any further. One thing I've learned is that a little knowledge can really mess you up. So, I guess I'll just wait and see what happens. I guess it's just frustrating that the recovery doesn't seem as smooth as one would like.