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Route 53 - Life is A Highway

The Happiest Place on Earth

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“Success can be measured by how much time your children want to spend with you when they grow up ” – CEO of unknown company

Universal Studios
Universal Studios

I saw the quote above on a Starbucks cup while on vacation at Universal Studios the morning of the end of our vacation to Los Angeles.  I showed it to my wife and we smiled. What parent doesn’t want their children to stay close when they get older. 

While I really needed a break from the office for a week, my wife and I really wanted to reward our children with a vacation of their choice.  After the trip my wife and I took to Vegas for Valentine’s, it was time to give our children their reward.  Our children’s wonderful help during my wife’s surgeries was more than we could have asked for and they deserved this vacation more than their parents.  At the same time, watching them smile and to relieve any stress in their lives is enough to make any parent happy.  As a parent, my fear is that our children were seeing stress from the news of a bad economy and my wife’s illness and it was having an adverse affect on them emotionally and perhaps in a way that we couldn’t see.  Fortunately their academics were excelling and their teachers were supportive and told us they are both doing well.

 Living in the San Francisco Bay Area a 6 hour drive to Los Angeles is a very economical trip given the state of the US Economy.  It also reminded me of our family visits to Disneyland.  A 6 to 7 hour drive in a car can be quite a bonding time with a 9 and a 6 year old.  Our highlight that made us chuckle was when our 9 year old shouted “240 miles to Los Angeles”.  Our daughter asked how long it would take for us.  My son responded that, ” if mom drives at 60 miles an hour it will take 4 hours and if dad drives 80 we’ll be there in 3 hours”.  Our daughter then asked my mom when she was going to pull over to get some gas and let me drive.  I just smiled, our children know us too well.  At least our son knew his multiplication and we were going to go 6 hours without hearing the dreaded phrase “Are we there yet?” 

The drive to and from Los Angeles along 1-5 is littered with memories for me from family vacations driving in my grandfather’s Cadillac with stops at the famous Andersen’s Pea Soup, the smelliest place on Earth, Harris Ranch, where you see steer for acres and as far as the eye can see, and the small farms towns which grow oranges, artichokes, apples and other food that feed our country.  Our children stared out the window (when they weren’t figuring out how to solve Rubik’s Cube) and soaked in the geography.  Letting your children experience new things and watching their minds churn with questions is such a rewarding time for a parent. 

I always laugh at the Disneyland subtitle, “The Happiest Place on Earth”.  I honestly see more crying and pushing among children than anywhere else.  Fortunately we had a long talk in the car reminding our children as to why we were going on this trip and they responded like troopers even when the Los Angeles weather didn’t cooperate and stay above 70 degrees.  We added one day at Universal Studios to our trip to show the children between reality and make believe.  The Studio Tour was exactly what our children needed to see and they learned a lot.  Heck, as parents we learned a lot as well.  When we arrived home, all our children could think of doing was to write a play and stage it for us.  Okay, so they aren’t the next Leonardo diCaprio or Kate Winslet, but it showed us they got something out of the vacation other than a bunch of amusement rides.

My only concern during the week was whether my wife’s body could handle the stress of being jerked around by some of the roller coaster rides, but she assured me on several occasions that she was okay.  She was more scared than anything but our son wanted his mom to ride some of the faster rides and as parents we never want to show our children our fears that they might pick up unnecessarily.  I was even surprised that she had never been in the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland! 

Disney has also been hit by some recession as well as the discounted admissions (2 for 1’s) were all over the place.  In Downtown Disney we counted seven vacant storefronts.  At Universal Studios City Walk there were similar signs of the economic slowdown.  The theme park seemed empty and was only open for 7 hours.  We reminded our children how fortunate they are as we saw even fewer children at Universal Studios.  It definitely sunk in and on the way home I had the best message.  I heard from the back seat, “Dad?”

“Yes”,  I replied to my daughter.

 “”Thank you for this trip.  We had a really fun time.”  My wife and I just looked at each other once again.  We are so lucky. Lucky that we could provide our children with a family vacation and lucky that we have children who appreciate the opportunity that they have. 

Earlier when I was looking at a Disney shirt that said, “Grumpy”, my son told me I should buy the one that said, “Happy”.  I told my son that sometimes I actually felt grumpy and he looked at me and said that wasn’t true and that I was usually happy.  Well at least it was his perception and that was more important to me.  I was hoping that all of the grief in our household had somehow put a damper on the mood, but our children seemed to be sheltered from it all.

Maybe we have left our hearts in the Happiest place on Earth until the next time we visit, but it is nice to know that our children find that our home isn’t that bad.  Maybe it is the Second Happiest Place on Earth for our children.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Mind Over Matter

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Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.  ~Winston Churchill

As most runners know, there are times when you hit the proverbial “wall”.  I’ve found that it doesn’t matter whether you are running one fast mile or 5 long ones, the wall is always there. Your body aches and screams for you to stop but it is your mind that powers you on.

In a way I have hit that wall in caring for my wife.  That tough edge has been hard to keep up lately.  I’m not giving up on her though.  In fact her strength is coming back and I’ve been able to let my guard down a bit and that has allowed me to move on a little bit.  i think she is showing me that strength again to let me know that I can go on too.  She has now started going on and doing her own research online.  It has relieved me from having to read some of the more tragic or difficult stories online.  I used to go on Breastcancer.org to find answers but lately she has found a few good friends with the same physicians and they have encouraged her, helped her to mentally get stronger to face her fears, and she is spending more time talking to other women online.

She still is fragile though.  I just got back from being away four days in Las Vegas at a convention.  It was very difficult to be away from her and to leave her with no back-up.  Our nightly calls were more about wondering if she was okay.  It was also about telling my 9-year old son to watch out and take care of his mom.  I’m hoping that I don’t scare him, but I see great maturity in him.  I always have see it since he was little baby.  He just had this “old sage soul” look about him.  At the same time he still has the other issues that little boys have, not cleaning up, not lifting the toilet seat, and not slowing down around the house.  All in all he’s a good kid though and I trust him immensely.  My favorite moment (you’ll see the relevance below) is when he was 7 and as an advanced reader had picked up an encyclopedia to look up the word embryo, a word he had heard on Animal Planet.  The next thing you know he is telling me that apes and humans are very simliar and that men have sperm and women have eggs, but they don’t lay them like chickens.  My daughter (5 at the time) stood behind her brother with her arms crossed and looking at me as if to say, “Hey, what’s the big idea?”  well let’s just say I don’t think I’ll ever have to have the bird and the bees talk with my chilldren ever.  Hopefully that is a fatherly chore that I won’t miss.

It has been 5 weeks now since my wife’s latest surgery and I have had a hard time honestly looking at her scars and even at her chest.  Tonight she wanted to start documenting and had me take a few photos of her reconstruction.  I was a little nervous.  It was the first chance for me to take a look.  It is hard for me to look at my beautiful wife with her scars and say that they look great only because I know she is able to sense any hesitation or trepidation in my voice.  It is still early and even she knows they aren’t quite ready to be looked at.  She is going to need to get some revisions as the original scars haven’t healed straight.  She will have a follow up appointment on March 23.  It should be an hour procedure. 

The hard part was that today the doctor called to make the appointment and our 9 year old son listened in on the other line when my wife was talking.  He later told my wife that he had listened.  He is really worried that his mother is going to have a third surgery and asked if she was going to be okay.  Our daughter caught on and told us that she thought we got rid of “mommy’s lump”.  We told them that just like we need to go to the doctor every year that mommy needs to go every month and that she was lucky that her doctors could spend so much time with her.  Listening to her talk to the children I realized she is getting stronger.  She doesn’t want them to worry.  She is even telling me she will just need local anaesthesia for the final surgery.  I would prefer general if it were me but she is game.  She told me she knows she can “handle it” .  I told her that I didn’t think it would be a good idea but she’s the strong one when it comes to blood and guts and told me I was getting soft and where was the guy who stripped her drains 4 months ago?  We had a good chuckle.

All this means to me is that my wife is almost fully back and I couldn’t be happier.  She’s taught me a lot about myself and our relationship over the past several months.  It has been painful and although there are times we wanted to give up, but somehow we’ve built the strength from each other and kept moving and pushed through that wall.  The aches and pains are still there but the goal line or finish line is still out there on the horizon. 

Life goes on and we’re traveling down the road together.  We’re helping each other out and making sure the other doesn’t give up and that we don’t give up on each other.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

Looking Within for Happiness – Life is a Highway

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When you are down, look to your children and your children’s children for hope and happiness – Fortune Cookie

I looked at my fortune tonight as my son and daughter read it over my shoulder.  My daughter asked me what it meant and my son gave me a wry smile as if I had been rooked by the fortune cookie gods.  It is so true to have not just children but to have faimly around you who give you that unconditional love and respect.  That ear that will listen or that smile that brightens a gloomy day.  You don’t have to have that kind of felling with all your children or relatives because it just takes one.

These past five months have had me running, literally, to keep my sanity and energy.  Our children while never less important in our lives have not always been given the attention we’d like to have given them.  As a parent you shield them from life’s problems so that they can approach life without barriers and without bias while tryig to provide them with the tools that will help them to survive barriers and bias.  one of my more favorite movies in the past 10 years is The Pursuit of Happyness.  It is a true story about a single father who did all he could to raise his child in a world that was unkind to him.  Ironically it is a story that took place right here in San Francisco and at the time of the real stroy I was a struggling young college intern right across the street.

I’m not homeless, but the emotional adversity has been rougher on me than I thought it would be.  Finally after 5 months, my wife’s parents are here to help.  The relief in my body is a bit of a shock.  I don’t have to worry about my wife every second of the day and the ability to focus more on my children and reconnect with them on more than just a “bedtime story” level is something I really want and need. 

This weekend we found an hour between the raindrops to toss a baseball around.  It felt good to feel that ball pop in my glove and sting my hand.  After an hour, my hand was burning from my 9 year old’s pitches.  It felt so good for it to hurt like that.  I also took my daughter to go to see the Nutcracker with my mother.  For her to get all dressed up and have a day out on the town with her grandmother made her feel special and the smile on her face was all I needed.

So back to that crazy fortune cookie at San Tung Restaurant.  It was the most honest and truthful fortune cookie for me.  To those who wonder about such things.  I am superstitious.  I take the cookie that is pointing to me and I never read the fortune until I have full swallowed the cookie.  At least that is the rule my cousins always told me to obey.

I explained to my daughter about what it meant and I told them how the game of catch and the Nutcracker were perfect examples of all that I needed to make my life better this holiday season.  I know they don’t get it and they’ll still want the latest electronic games and gadgets for the holidays under the Christmas tree, but should they get my good fortune someday when they are my age, I’m sure they’ll at least understand what I was feeling tonight.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight, Route 53 - Life is A Highway

We’re a Family Again – The Highway of Life

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“Let’s keep our batteries charged as things usually get worse before they get better”

Almost a month since surgery and we seem and more importantly, feel, like we can do some normal things again.  As we had no appointments this past week, there was nothing to break up our schedule and we had what we might term to be a “normal family weekend”.  As we sat around the table at our favorite sushi restaurant on Sunday night, we had our team meeting about what we had going on this week (playdates, practices, appointments, etc.) we reviewed the past week with our children to ask them how they were doing and what they enjoyed.  Our son said he enjoyed playing in his first golf tournament.  Our daughter said that she enjoyed “being a family again”.  When we asked what that meant she said she enjoyed going out to dinner, going to her soccer game, and even playing a family board game  with all of us present.

She was right.  It was the first time we had energy to do things together rather than split up or outsource parenting to our friends and family.  We were smiling and laughing again.  The sushi dinner was never mentioned as such, but it was our first real time we had gone out together in a month for a meal and thus served as a bit of a celebration.  We needed the break, the laughs, the down time and I think we really needed to lavish our children with much needed attention.

They have seen and heard so much and partly because of their naivety and partly because they are mature for their age, they were able to process their feelings. Unfortunately, I think it wore on them to see their parents not having the fun they used to have and seeing their mom’s sunny disposition remain sunny, but at a cost of her strength.  Our daughter’s comment raised some flags for us to make sure we focused on them during the coming weeks especially if chemo becomes part of the equation.

Today marked the third of 5 appointments with the plastic surgeon post-surgery.  He says she is progressing okay but we’ll have to see how things are going with chemo to know our full schedule.  We have our 1st appointment with the oncologist on Thursday morning so we are a bit nervous.  I just wish we’d know a little more before we go in the first time to meet with her.  She’ll definitely tell us about the Tamoxifin (sp?) but all we are worried nabout now is the Oncotype score reading.  We are bracing for her to tell us she will need chemo and agreed that we just need to get our batteries charged and braced for the coming months ahead.   It is just natural to assume things will get worse before they get beetter.  In a peverse way we both agreed that everything so far has actually not been as bad as we thought it would be, but we have run across some things we never thought we’d encounter.

On this highway of life, cancer has been more than a bump in the road, but  a very windy detour that we hope leads back to the main road and let’s us get back to destinations unknown with many life adventures to discover.

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight

The Psychologist Visit (6 days to go) – A Loving Fight

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“Stay focused and keep the course.  Keep doing and stop thinking. Especially stop overthinking.”

Today was the meeting with the psychologist.  Actually this is the meeting I dreaded because I don’t know how you can meet with people for one day and drop advice and hope that people take it right.  It was also a meeting we didn’t have to take , but my wife said , “Let’s just go and listen”.  It has actually thrown my wife off kilter.  She hasn’t been able to stay on task at work all day and it has created more worry in her life.  My wife was fine for the most part and now I had to undo what the psychologist did…..and of course, listening to my advice is not what my wife likes to do.

There were some good parts of the visit.  The doctor first encouraged my wife that distraction is good and that what we are doing is right with her continuing her work.  She also told my wife to start some breathing exercises so my wife doesn’t become dependent on Adavan (sp?), a drug my wife has been taking to deal with some anxiety.  They don’t want you to become too dependent upon it.  Then things got worse when she started reminding my wife of things that she didn’t need to remind her of and telling us how to handle other matters that we’ve already taken care of.  What the heck?!!!

I have taken the responsibility of worrying about things for my wife and making sure that she doesn’t dwell on things and throw herself into a depression and suddenly this “Quack” does that. We were definitely in good spirits all the way until this psychologist starts telling my wife of people of longer recoveries than expected, kids who have been traumatized, and other roadblocks that we have discussed in the past, but have agreed to be prepared for, look out for, and deal with them when the time comes.  This psychologist might have been trying to talk to us as if we were unprepared when everyone has told us so far that we were more than prepared. Argghhh!

It took a few hours, but I’ve gotten my wife’s mind focused back on other things.  She’s in a good way.  We spilled our anger over the psychologist’s thoughts and said, here’s what we will listen to…and the rest is “Quackiness”.  We’ve refocused on the good points and are at piece.  We laughed because my wife’s month long cough is finally gone.  Definitely an anxiety cough and something the psychologist did say was likely a product of stress and even possibly the medication.

Today was the first day of school and there was some sadness for us.  Two young families in the school with us lost parents this summer.  One lost a father to an aggressive pancreatic cancer and another lost a mother to breast cancer which had metastasized into her liver.  We had seen her all summer at the pool with her young sons and were saddened to hear of their loss. 

At the same time, we are so grateful to have a wonderful core group of parents that we have told who have already approached us with help, food , etc.   Such amazing people and we are so happy with our school community.  They will watch out for our children to make sure that they seem okay with what is going on at home.

Hey wait…was this more of a distraction? I guess we somehow got distracted by more events and other drama, my wife got a lot of work done, our kids seem pretty psyched about school and soccer practice and our first games this weekend!  5 more days of this!?  Aiyyee!  Somebody needs to distract me!

Breast Cancer - A Loving Fight

“Dad, is mom going to be OK?” – A Loving Fight

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“Stay Focused.  We’re almost through the hard part of waiting.”

The waiting is almost over, thank goodness.

I have this little puzzle that sits on my desk which has 8 pieces that lend to success in the business place: Teamwork, Imagination, Knowledge, Determination, Optimism, Leadership, etc.  Fighting cancer has been a little bit like that.  I’ve called this section of the blog “A Loving Fight”, but like a heavyweight boxer, we haven’t even begun.  We are one week out from her surgery and are still in the training phases.  We can stop waiting and start recovering.  Waiting is also a misnomer as we’ve spent the last month preparing.  The “knowledge” piece of the puzzle is what we’ve been working on to prepare us.  We’ve been stocking up on meds, food and pillows as well as getting those nagging little errands done like fixing the car, fixing small household projects and other things which would be pushed aside over the next several months.  It’s crazy, but our home has never been more efficient.  My wife is finishing off a monster project that has been a godsend as it has preoccupied her mind.

Me?  What have I been doing?  I’ve been gatehring all the information I can.  Breastcancer.org has been a great resource for information.  The forums have also allowed me to communicate with other peopl in our similar situation.I really do need to thank everyone there.

This week we have our final consultation with the surgeons as well as a psychological visit.  I do think she needs the psych visit as she has had a nagging cough since her biopsy.  It does however go away when she sleeps and when she is running around doing something exciting.  She only gets it at night when she relaxes.  So I do think the cough has to do with her anxiety.

We’ve managed to keep an even level of emotion in the household so it was a bit of a shock while on a walk to the store with my 8 year old son he asked me, “Dad, is mom going to be okay?”  I stopped and told him everything would be all right and gave him a big hug.  He’s always been wise beyond his years.  He then asked, “Are you going to be okay?”.  I hugged him and said, “We’re all going to be okay”.  When we got home, he vacuumed our whole house which made us smile.  I have to admit that if any of you remember the show, “The Courtship of Eddie’s Father” starring Bill Bixby, I felt like I was living in an opening episode of one of those shows.

School starts tomorrow so the kids will now be bable to preoccupy their minds with friends, teachers, soccer and schoolwork.  Anyone who says having kids take years off of your life needs to laugh and spend time with ours as they are going to be a big part of our healing process both physically and mentally.  They have a lot of things going around in their tiny little heads, but they aren’t immune to the situation.