No surprises??

July 12/11.

So the first radiation appointment at PMH late this afternoon was fine! Went to the hospital, not feeling nervous in the least, (I mean, this is NOTHING compared to surgery!), and didn't take a tranquilizer or anything else. I've been completely drug-free for months. - However, am about to start Tamoxifen, to ward off recurrence...maybe tomorrow. We'll see. Will tell you all about the side effects asap. (Don't need anymore hot flashes thanks)! Intensity Entity will confirm, - 'Hot enough Babe'.

I threatened to wear my kickass silver stilettos for the first treatment today, (so you KNOW I have to stand by my word)! Brought them with me, but couldn't take a pic in the treatment room. (Them's the RULES!) This is the best I could do to "kick cancer in the butt," as my friend, Cynthia Mulligan of CITYNEWS, (who is pretty damn kickass herself!), often says! I told her about it in a FB message today. I'm following in her footsteps all the way. She wrote back to wish me well and tell me, "You will soon be a fellow graduate"! Can only hope Cynthia. Thanks for everything.

After the treatment, wanted to take a shot in the gown and heels, but camera wouldn't work. Finally got it to go, but only blurry. Bathroom photog style...best I could do!

Two young women "worked on me". They were both very nice and told me everything I should expect to feel. I was lying there, arm way over my head (ouch), staring at the ceiling, which was covered in these weird, psychedelic green neon zapper lights preparing to hit me. There was music playing. Strange, while these two women did their thing, I was hearing two ladies singing The Flower Duet for sopranos used in the Canuck flick "I've Heard the Mermaids Singing." Before I knew it, the treatment was over.

The "big surprise" I referred to in the previous blog entry, turned out to be the fact that I went into major shakes afterwards! Didn't think I was nervous, but after being told not to move at ALL, (and then, suddenly, everything started to itch!), practically went into convulsions when it was over! Hopefully this won't happen after EVERY treatment! When I left the hospital, tried to take a shot out front in the silver heels, when a man suddenly offered to do it for me! (hmmmmmmmm, guess these shoes work!) I offered to put his name on the blog, but he said he prefers to remain anonymous! OK then.

Kicking you in the butt cancer!

Will be back again for treatment number 2 on Wednesday at 2:30 p.m.
To quote Jim Carrey, as The Grinch, "But what would I WEAR??"

Who knows? (maybe I should dress as The Grinch!?!)

Dazed & Drained

June 22/11

Well, THIS day didn't exactly go the way I thought it would! (although, to tell the truth, really had NO idea how it might actually unfold!)

For weeks, have had this appointment lined up with a therapist at Princess Margaret Hospital. Back in early May, was having tons 'o trouble dealing with circumstances WAY beyond my control. My new friend, Cynthia Mulligan, (of CITY TV, - who underwent breast cancer surgery and treatment just a few months before mine), told me she thought I might benefit from a few sessions with a therapist, and that if I got a referral, it would be covered by OHIP. Decided it was a wise suggestion, so, "The Nutty Professor" - (my medical oncologist) referred me and I got an appointment, - but not for a month.

Taken just outside the hospital this afternoon, immediately following my "session" and blood work, - (hence, the bandage) - As you see, rather dazed & drained, - as today's blog entry "title" says.
During the month away from hospital, things improved quite a bit, so wasn't sure WHAT to say at the appointment today. Do I "start at the very beginning" - (like, my Dad leaving the family home when I was 4?) - or do I just tell her about this crazy year, losing Mum, my Uncle Ev, my Mum-in-law having heart surgery, clearing and preparing to sell our Mother's house and then, the sudden cancer diagnosis and surgery?

Won't bore you with the details - (since, if you read this blog, you already know!) Told the Doc about "Intensity Entity", - the racing heart and thoughts, weight loss, etc. Afterwards, her ideas? - Stop - (or curtail), writing of the blog, and take anti-psychotic medication. (her words, -"NOT because you're psychotic, but to slow you down a bit and help you get some rest").

So, I've had 8 LONG years of looking after my Mum, not being able to write anything of a creative nature, (the way I did for my entire radio/TV career of 25 years). FINALLY got excited about writing something unique - putting feelings into words, making some people laugh, sharing it all with folks who actually respond/write to me/comment, and now, I'm supposed to just STOP? - And take drugs? WTF??

Will have to think about all of this. I considered not saying ANYTHING here tonight, - but because my ENTIRE goal since starting the blog, has been to "Tell it like it is," - (no holds barred), - I'm DOING it. Maybe SOMEBODY out there might relate to, or understand, what I have to say.

The Doc then sent me for further bloodwork - thyroid stuff and other tests outside of the usual CBC, (complete blood count). She'll get results tomorrow and will let me know if there's anything unusual. Who knows?

Left the meeting not knowing if this is helpful or if I should continue seeing a therapist. Wandered into the Princess Margaret gift shop and spotted a book I thought I'd like to buy for my daughter, Kate. On sale for 4 bucks.

Kate is interested in astrology and signs, so thought she might like this book. Had to laugh when I got it to the counter and the cashier asked me, (EXACTLY like that character Kristin Wiig plays in those hysterical Target store sketches on SNL), "Do we have any MORE of these??" - I almost lost it altogether! - Told her, yes, there are more, and she said, "Could you GET me one please?" Turned around, (laughing), grabbed another copy and passed it to her.

(This is the only decent bit I could find on YouTube that shows Kristin in action as the Target lady. It's somebody else's attempt to imitate it, but is kinda funny! Man, do I ever MISS SNL during the summer!)
After the long appointment, - (yakking it up & revealing info galore), I was glad to finally head off to my son, Max's recital with his girlfriend, Robyn. - Guess I'm feeling lucky! After posting the Jason Mraz song, "Lucky" TWICE over the past week or so, (featuring the amazing Wes Taylor & Matt Doyle version of the song), HAD to go watch Max and Robyn perform that same number in a local church basement tonight! - They did GREAT!!


Max and Robyn performing "Lucky"

Just before their show, parked my car and waited for them at the corner of Broadview & Browning. Looked up, and there they were. Sigh. So in love.

Max & his sweetheart, Robyn

What a weird day. I'm actually tired. (you don't think "Intensity Entity" has been killed off, do you?)

Cynthia

I got a fantastic gift yesterday in the form of a swift, uplifting kick-in-the-butt from Cynthia Mulligan of CityNews. A few weeks ago, this beautiful TV reporter became my inspiration to launch a blog, after reading all the posts on her blog (Kicking Cancer), which she started writing after being diagnosed with breast cancer a year ago.

Not only did she go public with her battle, but also took a videographer along to capture many of the stops on the journey for everyone to see. My favourite is the day she went wig shopping with her two young daughters. After undergoing chemo treatments, she decided to get a wig sometime between starting to lose her hair and taking the plunge to shave it off altogether. She even showed the audience how quickly her hair was falling out, by yanking a hunk of it right out of her head on camera!

I had to laugh, watching her girls trying on a variety of wigs and the moment Cynthia donned a wild, long-locked look, tossed her head and quipped to the kids, “I look like Cher!”



Though I’d never met Cynthia Mulligan, I knew her work and wanted her to see the blog she’d inspired. I sent her a message on Facebook, asking if she might have time to speak to me about her experience. Just hours later, I was surprised to receive a response saying she watched me on Global for years, was very sorry to hear of my diagnosis and offered to talk to me or even go out for coffee!

Working around crazy schedules, we set up some phone time and ended up chatting for a full hour! When I looked at the clock, it amazed me that 60 minutes had flown by. I’m pretty sure she gave up her whole lunch hour, just to try and help me. In the course of the conversation, both of us laughed and cried and by the end, I actually felt like we were old friends.

She began by asking my personal situation, how the cancer
was discovered, what kind of support system I have and how I’ve handled the whole thing. She admitted this diagnosis, “Knocks the stuffing out of you. It’s a roller coaster, but it’s not a death sentence.”

Cynthia’s tumour started out at 4.4 cm., but after chemo, it shrunk to about 1 cm. Then she faced surgery (last October), for a
lumpectomy and removal of 14 lymph nodes, followed up by six weeks of intense radiation.

If you’ve seen my blog, you know all about my huge fear of pain. I asked her to tell me the truth. Cynthia stated, “I won’t lie to you. It hurt! But it wasn’t unbearable. I had a drain (under the arm) for a week. They sent me home with Percocet and Tylenol 3. I only took the Percocet for the first night. The day I went home, I took a two hour walk!”

She still finds it difficult to stretch out her arm, but admits her mobility is good. I told her it’s tough to remain positive when facing the unknown. While agreeing this is true, Cynthia told me, “Anything can happen. You could walk out the door and get hit by a bus. This was a wake-up call for me, a second chance at life. I appreciate it more, love it more and embrace this exquisite existence.”

People who’ve beaten breast cancer tell me they learned a lot during the course of their treatment and recovery. Upon hearing this, Cynthia quickly responded, “What have I learned? Two things.
1.) I want to have less in my life and live more.
2.) I’m not afraid of dying anymore.”

I asked how it was possible for her to continue to work throughout her treatment. She snapped back, “Work was my salvation!”

Once we got to talking about the 30 radiation treatments, I mentioned to Cynthia that her blog posts stopped at radiation zap #14, before much burning began. What happened when she got to zap #30? “I got very red and pretty uncomfortable,” she concedes, “but the hardest part was my life.”

Cynthia’s treatments were intertwined with much personal upheaval. Apart from the state of distress over her own health, her Dad suffers from severe Alzheimer’s; her colleague, (whom she refers to as, “a beloved cameraman”), Bill Atanasoff, was seriously hurt after being hit by a car this past November; and then, her longtime friend, Mark Dailey (“The Voice” at CITY), passed away of cancer in December while she was still undergoing radiation. They had been emailing back and forth between Sunnybrook and Princess Margaret and she was devasatated by his loss.

Perhaps these cataclysmic events led to her love and appreciation of the inspiring quotes posted daily on an easel just inside Princess Margaret Hospital. She urged me to be sure to watch for them. Her favourite says, “You can’t give birth to a rising star without chaos in your soul.”

When I revealed to Cynthia my apprehension about the moment of being wheeled away on the gurney on April 27th, knowing I won’t be the same on the other side of surgery, she recalled that feeling only too well. Her comments are the most reassuring words I’ve heard.

“I hated losing control and knowing I have to go under a general anaesthetic. But you’ve got to go with the flow. You are NOT in control of this. You have to give up that sense and just absorb, absorb, absorb. Stand up stronger and get through it one hurdle at a time until you’re ready for the next one.”

Following the death of Mark Dailey, another cancer patient she had come to know, gave her a note. In a voice filled with emotion, Cynthia recited a part of that message from this caring woman. It said, “Fall 7 times, stand up 8.” She was in tears when she read it.

Her blog entries are oh-so-positive and upbeat. I wondered, - didn’t
she EVER get angry? “You bet!,” she laughs, “and it’s OK to get mad and say, ‘Fuck you cancer!’ It attacks our femininity, but last summer, I bought some kick-ass clothes, some sexy dresses. Cancer can’t take away our confidence!”

This past weekend, Cynthia was presented the “Voice of the Foundation” award from the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation in a ceremony at the Royal York Hotel. At the event, she proclaimed, “The best way we can beat breast cancer is to raise awareness about it, take away some of the fear, keep it out of the dark closet, put it in the sunlight and kick it!”

Link: Cynthia Mulligan honoured for breast cancer advocacy work

She sure did that for ME yesterday. She really made me cry when she said, “My oncologist told me the women who do the best are the ones with the strongest and best attitudes. Mind over matter. Keep on living through this. Keep walking. Keep moving. Keep laughing. I believe in paying it forward, and that’s what I’m doing with you. And Elaine, someday, a year from now, you’ll be doing this for someone else.”

It’s very hard for me to imagine this could one day be true, but if it is, I can only hope to be as open and honest as she’s been with me.

Be sure to catch CITY News at 6 on Tuesday April 26th (date changed from the original air date I blogged previously!) Cynthia will go wig-free for the first time since shaving her head and has decided to donate her expensive real-hair wig to someone else in need. She’s nervous about unveiling the new look, which she describes as, “Mia Farrow short.” I can’t wait to see it!



In May, Cynthia will reward herself with a weekend trip to New York City with two old girlfriends who stood by her through the entire cancer experience. She looks forward to running in Central Park. After all she’s survived, she says, “We’re celebrating life!”

Thank you, Cynthia, for everything!

Stop this Train

April 15/11

I’ve always hated roller coasters. After taking the plunge and riding a massive one many years ago at Canada’s Wonderland, (and being nauseous for two days afterwards), the very thought of getting back on has always made me feel ill. Wouldn’t you know, I was forced to board this one, the day I discovered a lump on February 4th, and it’s been nothing but ups and downs ever since – with plenty more scary swoops and nosedives ahead.

One of my favourite songs is John Mayer’s Stop This Train. The lyrics are so brilliant, as they seem to fit any situation you can conjure up. To quote him:

Stop this train, I want to get off and go home again
I can’t take the speed it’s moving in
I know I can’t, but honestly, won’t someone stop this train?

In a later verse, he adds:

See once in a while when it’s good
It’ll feel like it should
And they’re all still around
And you’re still safe and sound
And you don’t miss a thing
‘till you cry when you’re driving away in the dark

Then John wraps it up:

Singing stop this train, I want to get off and go home again
I can’t take this speed it’s moving in
I know I can’t
‘cause now I see, I’ll NEVER stop this train.

That’s the way I feel right now. I’ll never be able to stop this train and I’m in for the ride of my life – and as Regis Philbin would say, “It’s outta CONTROL!!”

All I can hope is, it’ll be a train ride, not a train wreck.

Was hoping for MRI results today, but nope. Another weekend without knowing.

One good whistle stop along the way today was hearing from Cynthia Mulligan of CITY TV. This beautiful reporter was my inspiration to launch a blog, after she went through her own nine month breast cancer journey and chronicled it all online. Though I’ve never met Cynthia, I wrote her about Lain’s Log and asked if I could speak to her about her experience. She responded, saying she knew my work from the Global TV days (which surprised me) and offered to speak with me or even have coffee together so I can ask a few questions to help face my fears.

Having read her positive, upbeat posts, I can’t imagine Cynthia ever even thinking to say, “Stop this train.”


Kate covers Stop This Train


John Mayer covers himself! (Just fantastic!)

Starstruck

March 29/11

From the time I was seven years old, I was in love with TV stars.

As a kid, I always wanted to look exactly like Connie Stevens,

     or Sandra Dee,

or, (if you can believe it), like "Marina" (the puppet), from the supermarionation show, Stingray!


 Stingray - Marina's theme - (I couldn't get enough of this pretty, but sappy song). I never even realized till years later that the face of puppet "Captain Troy Tempest" was modeled on James Garner, even though he looked exactly like him! Guess I was too busy studying Marina's exotic makeup so I could copy it!
I was just crazy about Johnny Crawford, ("Mark McCain") of Rifleman,

Bill Bixby, on left, ("Tim O'Hara") /My Favorite Martian, 

Don Grady, ("Robbie Douglas") /My Three Sons 

and Roger Moore ("Simon Templar") /The Saint.


Hey, hey, they're the Monkees!

Later, as a teen, The Monkees stole my heart, (especially Mickey), and I couldn't get enough of Bobby Sherman, ("Jeremy Bolt")/Here Come the Brides (sigh). I watched more TV than any kid I knew. It should have come as no surprise that I wanted to enter the field of entertainment reporting and meet the stars. Over 30 years, I've interviewed thousands of celebs. Anyone and everyone from the world of television, film, theatre and music. What a blast. I was always professional, but never tried to hide my enthusiasm when meeting my faves. Afterwards, stars often told me it was a pleasure to be interviewed by someone who knew so much about them and was actually a fan. That love of celebrities has never left me to this day.

Bobby Sherman was my ultimate teen idol!

Years later, as a very young radio reporter, I got to meet and interview Bobby. (and yes, I'll admit at age 22, I wasn't as professional as I might have been!) I also interviewed him again several times during the years at Global Television.  While at Global, I had the opportunity to interview Davy Jones & Mickey Dolenz of The Monkees! (if someone had told me as a teen I'd be sitting down and talking with my idols, I never would have believed it).

Even now, as I think about what lies ahead on this journey into the world of cancer, I find I'm inspired by many stars.

Robin Williams, (here showing off his surgical scar following heart surgery in 2009).


In 2007, Regis Philbin underwent heart bypass surgery.


David Letterman came through emergency quintuple bypass surgery in 2000.  I admire David Letterman, Robin Williams and Regis Philbin, all fabulous entertainers, who were brave enough to go very public with news of their heart surgeries. They inspire me with their courage and also because they found ways to use humour to plow through their challenges and help others face the same issues. Letterman has become part of my coping mechanism after the cancer diagnosis. He's hysterically funny and honest with his feelings and comments and there's just something so calming about him for me. He's always there, ready to talk and make you laugh.

Robin Williams - Never a dull moment!

 As for Robin Williams, he’s the all-time best interview ever! I don’t think he could give a bad one if he tried. Again, funny and honest. One time on a junket in Los Angeles, I was talking to him about Patch Adams, in which he played a doctor who uses comedy to try and make people feel better. I asked if he truly believes laughter is the best medicine. His answer surprised me.

He started off by saying, “Yes, I basically do believe that theory, but there are limitations.” He went on to talk about his dear friend, the late Christopher Reeve, and how he would visit him after the riding accident which left him paralyzed, and do everything he could to lift his spirits. Robin became quite emotional as he explained that even he had trouble believing laughter could help when Chris was in so much pain. I’ve never forgotten that, and recall departing the hotel room interview set, walking down the hall into a stairwell exit and crying. Robin usually leaves you doubled over in guffaws, but not on that day.

I often find just thinking about a star like Christina Applegate, (who had a double mastectomy), makes me feel, if she can do THAT, then I can do THIS.

Jaclyn Smith, Olivia Newton-John, Sheryl Crow, Melissa Etheridge, Suzanne Somers all faced their fears and came out winners. 

Here in my own hometown of Toronto, Dr. Marla Shapiro, Beverly Thomson, (CTV) Wendy Mesley (CBC) and Cynthia Mulligan (CityNews) are just a few of the incredible women who have made this journey. I only hope I can conjure up the kind of courage that they were able to find within themselves.

Desperately seeking the best!

March 11/11

Have spent long hours Googling, reading, researching, brainstorming, watching interviews with Dr. Marla Shapiro, checking the blogs of media people who have been through this, (like Cynthia Mulligan of CITY TV) and others, contacted my old pal, Beverly Thomson of CTV - (we worked together for years at Global), and she said she'd be happy to speak to me, and talking to people who are cancer survivors.

I've decided the surgeon I want to see, if it's possible, is Dr. David McCready, head of Oncology at Princess Margaret Hospital. He was Dr. Marla's surgeon and has a stunning reputation. I checked with another surgeon acquaintance of ours at Sunnybrook (who saved my Mum's life and gave us five more years with her). He kindly gave me some very helpful advise and also confirmed for me that Dr. McCready is a superb surgeon.

My GP has sent off a referral, but I fear, this man's reputation has him in high demand and wonder if I will be able to get an appointment or consult with him at all! If not, I have one or two others on my list, but in my opinion, "He's the man!" We'll see what happens.

Meanwhile, I continue to live in a high state of anxiety and try to break it up with reading, writing, watching funny TV shows and talking to funny people (and I know a LOT of them!)