Living with big maybes and bigger blessings

Funny thing … all of this. Just when you think you’ve got it all settled, something else shows up. For give my indulgence here. I’m feeling mighty damned lucky these days. This post will just be up for a couple of days … Kitchen Counter Cultures has always been intended for stories—about food, and about other things that go along with it, most importantly, life.

I’ve been months’ away. First it was one thing, then another, and another. We’ve been eating well—since last report, we've added Takashi, Boka, Publican, Topolobampo, the Bristol to our "been there, ate that" list. But still, the most delicious of all is Phillip’s own cooking. We’ve eaten tender lamb racks and brined roasts, and shaved Brussels sprouts with thick bacon, stews, and pulled pork. Phillip’s making guinciale in one of the fridge’s produce bins. We seem to be on a pig thing.

Family and friends visited. We celebrated holidays and birthdays and survived--no, thrived--through a tough Christmas. (It’s life in a retail household. Each night’s conversation was/is punctuated by numbers and stats, by comps and forecasts. They’re way head of the curve, way ahead.) And there are more changes coming for him soon, professionally. I expected changes too, but, in that way you never really know, I’m surprised their manifestations.

Because cooking is Phillip’s personal meditation, passion and release, it’s become his domain. I rarely cook anymore (which I miss), but I do love eating it all. He works hard at healthy and simple cooking. And it’s nearly always extraordinary. We’ve been doing it right, leafy greens, lean meats, low fats, exercise, moderation (in all things but work), etc., etc. We are so healthy—normal weight, perfect cholesterol (mine at least—the man refuses to go to the doctor), low BP.

And now that I’m more "mature," when I felt the lump in my belly, I assumed that it was a fibroid—no big deal. There was no pain, no nothing, just a palpable lump. Mom has a history of fibroids, and there’s never been cancer anywhere in the family line—even the smokers died of something else—so, no big deal. (We were betting it would be filled with dog hair).

By the time I was able to get into the doc in late October, it was 10 cm (think softball), still no pain, but now visible. My internist freaked out and ultrasounds were inconclusive. Around Thanksgiving, I went to one gyne-oncologist who told me only that “we’re taking everything out,” and patted me on the head (which totally pissed me off). I got a second opinion. The second surgeon ran blood tests--the CA 125 was well within normal range—and we spoke about possibilities and options, but in the end, he still said “we need to know what this is,” so we scheduled surgery, and agreed only to take what was necessary, with a promise that there’d be a pathologist in the OR with us checking everything. Over the holidays my left side started hurting. Silly fur ball, I thought, no big deal.

On Jan 4, I went in for surgery; on Jan 8, the path reports came back and I got to come home. All went as expected, but they found some anomalies, too. The fur ball was a fibroid, and they found just a few isolated cancer cells in my left ovary (the CA 125 test). It's "clear cell, stage 1A," the very earliest stage. I don’t know if the fibroid and ovary are related issues or if I’m just damned lucky. (I have so much to learn about all of this.) “Furbie” and the cells are gone now, and as I understand it, by eliminating all possibilities for further growth, they eliminated a huge part of the future risk.

But there’s still this big “maybe”—there may be cells left. So we’re organizing the next few weeks around the possibility. Just to be sure, and just in case they missed a cell somewhere, I'll go through three rounds of chemo (it should just take a couple of months), and then we go on to next steps, which will hopefully just include regular check-ups.

It’s such an odd thing, this “maybe.” If not for the fur ball, God knows when we'd have found the rest. And is it like pregnancy, you either are or you’re not? I did have cells so did I have cancer? (Do I still?) Even with this minimal impact, almost just an inconvenience, I don’t know if I should be scared, or frustrated, or pinching the shit out of a lucky rabbit’s foot. Most of the time, I’m choosing the latter. Every so often, one of the others creeps in and just gives me a good poke.

If you’ve made it this far, please say a prayer to whom or what ever you pray to for Jill Costello and the millions of others with more identifiable cancers. It's so much more "common" than I ever imagined. Drop into Jill’s page at Caring Bridge (http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/jillcostello). Donate if you can. I’m amazed and inspired by the faith and courage that surrounds this. The kid, a friend of a friend, has such spirit and fight.

As we gear up for the next few weeks, we’re beginning with things we can control: food and exercise—more fruits and vegetables, more fish, yoga as soon as the zipper down my belly is removed on Friday (or, more honestly, as soon as the doc says it’s ok). Tonight, Phillip’s cooking tuna, seared simply on both sides, served with sauteed greens and red quinoa. I've set up camp on the couch, and it's snowing, there's a fire in the fireplace and the dog is curled in front of it all. Life goes on, doesn't it?

Take good care of yourselves, my dears. Here's to it all!