WTF Does this blog even mean?

I have been up since 4:30 this morning, partially because I have not felt very well since chemo two weeks ago and partially because I wanted to get my kids lesson plans out of the way. I helped my husband cleaned house and then started immediately on getting their weekly assignments finished...I just finished it all. Provided I did make a stop to the ER to make sure I did not have Pneumonia. Thank God it was just bronchitis.

The cancer has spread to my brain and now they are tossing around the leukemia word. That's okay, because if I am one thing, it is a survivor. I will find a way to beat this for my family. They all need me. I am not sure what they will do without me or me without them.

I have been having trouble breathing all month, well basically since I started chemotherapy. I didn't want to find the cancer had taken over my lungs, but I still couldn't breathe. So, they gave me a chest x-ray and found I had a ton of fluid on my pleural sac which is why I kept coughing up mucus.

If it gets any worse, I may need a chest tube. 

I can't explain how I feel right now, which is funny because I am going to blog about it, or at least I guess I can. This is going to be one of those "doesn't make sense"blogs, where I'm just going to write what's been in my messed up mind and leave everyone who reads this to scratch their pretty little heads. 

It's been strange talking about myself and how I'm doing lately. Not because it makes me uncomfortable, cause it doesn't (have you read the blog? I'll tell ya every time I poop if you'd like, I have very few boundaries). But there's an assumed optimism that some people have when they talk to me that I don't quite share.

Not with my immediate family, they know the deal. It's unspoken, but we all know the odds. No point in talking about them or bringing them up, it's just depressing and I still don't really feel "sick" per say, so why bother. And my friends get it, probably anyone who has read this blog gets it.

But when I talk to some people, I can almost sense they are waiting for the tumors to go away. I mean you expect that from someone you've just met or someone who is simply an acquaintance. But there are some people who just don't seem to "get it" And I know they are thinking this way because that's kinda how I felt when I would talk to people I knew who were diagnosed before my own journey. I never realized how irritating that must have been.

And they don't mean anything by it, they just want the person they care about to get better. And I'm not talking about when people tell you they are praying for you or telling you to keep up the positivity, that's cool. It's that sense that one day this will all be over. And as much as I hope that will be the case, I'm not stupid, I know my chances of that happening are in the single digits. And I think my problem is I can't tell if these people don't want to acknowledge that fact for fear of being negative or do they really not know?

I guess I can understand, but for some reason lately it's sorta stuck in my brain. And I actually wonder if it's because I feel so "not sick". Like it's almost as though I have to keep putting it into perspective for myself. And the reason I keep saying "not sick" versus feeling "good" is because I still have bad side effect days, but that's all treatment related. I haven't had any cancer symptoms since the cough stopped.

I wonder however if this need for people to understand the gravity of this is a genuine need of mine or am I just feeling sorry for myself? I find I've had a shorter fuse about things lately. Like when someone has something they need to deal with and just won't go to the doc out of laziness, all I think about are the cat scans where I have to drink the red goo and I'll get all pissy. Like I want to shake them and be like, "really? I wish I just had to go for just a checkup, but no I have to monitor my tumors, but I can see how going to the doc to get a simple blood test would be so stressful for you!" Which is ironic considering ignoring an issue I needed to go to the doctor for is what got me in this predicament in the first place.

I'm hoping this is just a phase cause I'm finding it a bit intolerable, as in I want to smack myself aka Cher in Moonstruck and yell "snap out of it!" I don't like feeling sorry for myself (that's not entirely true, I used to be ace at it, but since then I have been "given" a real reason to and I suddenly don't want to anymore). I enjoy joking about it all, and I love it when people laugh instead of looking at me with that awkward "Did she just make a cancer/fat bald chick joke?" look, where they are too terrified to laugh.

And I hate when people who have beaten their cancer don't have a sense of humor. I mean come on! You beat the beast!!!! Fuck, I'll declare myself Empress of Gainesville if I beat this shit! I mean laugh baby, laugh a big fat belly "I conquered the fuck out of you" laugh. Like Zeus going all lightening bolt throwing and shit.

Does that make any sense? I want people to acknowledge that I'll likely be dead in less than a decade and to laugh about it? WTF is wrong with me?

I say let's just blame the steroid withdrawal and revisit my state of mind in 2014. Sound good?

Love you all and truly mean it, and God loves you too,

Shanna xoxoxo