Welcome!

My last short fiction instructor told us not to write about cancer. "It's been done," she said. Well, the hell with that. I learned in the last three weeks that I have stage III breast cancer. Writing, painting, and assorted other arts are how I process stuff, in addition, of course, to long conversations with friends. These conversations have begun in earnest these recent days, but I realized my Facebook page in particular was in danger of becoming a medical-update site. I do not want that. My life is still going to be about more than cancer, as much as that may not seem possible right now. Also, I don't want to alienate friends who are not ready to walk this particular valley with me at this time. For example, one elderly friend who called to cheer me up this week can't even handle the "c-word," and there is no way she will be up for any truly frank discussion of what's about to happen here. So she is advised to keep in touch with me via Facebook. People who are comfortable with the c-word, honest discussion and occasional cursing are welcome to join me here.

Monday, December 10, 2012

Cut-and-paste takes on a whole new meaning


                We have reached the point where I become a human arts-and-crafts project. Squeamish persons, read no further.

I went to see my plastic surgeon this morning to plan the next round of surgery, in which they install a nipple in my right boob. Right now that naughty boob is roughly the same size and shape and texture as the other one, only it is blank:  no nipple or areola or anything on the front. So the plan is as follows:  they do a big old skin graft.  They take a section of skin from my left armpit, where my smart surgeon cunningly left some extra the last time she was cutting and pasting in there. And they take that bit and fold it into an origami nipple. And then they applique it onto the blank boob. And my boobs and I live happily ever after.

The doctor says in all probability, the new nipple will be slightly smaller than the old one. It’s hard to get it exact.

I can live with that.

It’s outpatient surgery, down at Sibley Hospital down in DC again. It will take about an hour, and they know enough by now to bring me coffee the minute I get to the recovery room.

It both amazes me and creeps me out that we can do this sort of thing, with my own living skin, as if it were nice paper from the scrapbooking aisle at Michael’s.

There aren't all that many decisions to make. My surgeon did ask me if I would like to be awake while they do the skin graft. I just looked at her.

Hell, no!  Good Lord, what sort of a question is that? Why would I want to be awake for this business? So I can watch? Unless they want me to be really, excessively drunk or something instead?  No, thank you! Really, that struck me as a silly question. Ugh. Do I look like a masochist?

This is all going to happen in January. And then another three months before they tattoo the areola on there and this spate of fixer-upper work is done. Apparently I have to be awake for that tattoo part. It doesn’t warrant general anesthesia, or any anesthesia, really. Their thinking is, most of the nerves in there are mostly disconnected anyway.

(What’s several dozen needlesticks in the nipple, anyway? Aren’t you a badass Montana girl?)

The assistant sort of laughed and said I could have a margarita first. Yeah, right, a margarita…  Silly assistant!

My surgeon recommends the Rockville tattoo artist, Tina Marie. But I have friends who speak highly of Vinnie from Baltimore. I wonder which of them is more likely to turn a blind eye to a hip flask of Scotch?

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