Little Changes. Kristi Marsh

      

      Little Changes. Copyright © 2012 by Lil’ Red Cardinal

      All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission of the author. The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the author is illegal and punishable by law. All inquiries should be addressed to: Lil’ Red Cardinal, P.O. Box 569, North Easton, MA 02356.

      This book is available for purchase at www.choosewiser.com, www.Amazon.com, and at selected bookstores. Audio book, eBook, and book club volume discounts are available at www.choosewiser.com or at [phone].

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      Original illustrations and cover art by Kathryn Tempestoso.

      Published in eBook format by Lil Red Cardinal

      Converted by http://www.eBookIt.com

      ISBN-13: 978-0-9840-0960-2

      This publication contains the opinions and ideas of its author. It is intended to provide helpful and informative material on the subjects addressed in the publication. It is sold with the understanding that the author and publisher are not engaged in rendering medical, health, psychological, or any other kind of personal or professional services in the book.

      The author and publisher specifically disclaim all responsibility for any liability, loss, or risk, personal or otherwise, that is incurred as a consequence, directly or indirectly from the use and application of any of the contents of this book.

      To my Buggy, Wylie Woo, and Princess Pie.

      For giving me a job to do.

      To my infant nephew, Philip.

      May you grow up to find my story laughable and the journey obsolete.

      Next

      Saliva seeped into the hollows under my tongue, preparing my body for the first wave of nausea. I closed my eyes and clutched the car door handle. My upper lip quivering, I exhaled a barely audible moan. I murmured to my husband, “Hon, I think…I think I’m feeling ill. It feels…like I’m seasick.” He said nothing, but I felt his presence stiffen with the protective mission to transport me home. The commute from the inner corridors of Boston to the suburbs was notorious for sluggish traffic. To quicken our drive, I disappeared inside my head.

      With closed eyes, I lifted my feet onto the dashboard and slumped down into my seat searching my memory. Was this queasiness similar to my morning sickness? What had that been like? My first pregnancy was just eight years ago, but I was having a hard time concentrating. I scanned my memory files again. Ah, yes. I had mild, not remarkable, morning sickness with my pregnancies. Our towhead boys, Tanner and Kyle, were eight and six, and my baby girl Kaytee had just left her fierce threes. My life was full, loud, active, and deeply gratifying. My soul smiled, longing for my three anxious children. Perhaps this nausea, this poison, wasn’t so bad.

      After my tumor removal surgery a month before, the doctors informed me that chances were good the cancer was gone. But a chance is a chance, not a guarantee. The stakes were too high to leave even one cell floating in my body. One rogue microscopic cell swirling in my system could lead to the unimaginable. I understood. I would undergo chemotherapy.

      Earlier that day, my husband escorted me to the world renowned Dana Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. Shoulders back. Chin up. I walked down the soothingly decorated hospital hallway. As I advanced past curtain-drawn cubicles, I caught glimpses of dispirited, elderly patients hooked up to plastic piping. Alone, I had to sit my body down in the oversized vinyl chair in the midst of sterile alcohol fumes. There was no space in my mind for self-pity. Or for being scared. A fierceness rose from a depth I didn’t know existed. With a warrior’s vengeance, I internally snarled, How dare cancer enter my life! The oncology nurse, wisely knowing what my afternoon held, slid on protective gloves and hooked tubing to my recently implanted chest plug.

      Arriving home, my husband ushered me upstairs to the bedroom. I curled into a fetal position in the darkness, preparing for combat. It had been four hours since merciless, bounty-hunter poisons—Adriamycin and its accomplice Cytoxan—were dripped into my body to annihilate cancer cells, but time seemed irrelevant. I visualized the poisons snaking through miles of veins. Down my arm, up and down each finger, cascading through arteries in my leg, and returning to my core. Venom-blood rivers rushing to decimate the cancer and with it, innocent bystander tissues. My stomach lining. The roof of my mouth. The cells that produce hair. Circulating. Eradicating.

      My physical body revolted against the foreign liquids in its veins. Protectively, it initiated a system-wide shut down of my senses. Soft rumbling from the clothes dryer one floor below caused me to whimper. The image of tumbling, rolling clothes exacerbated the nausea. Blue, flickering television light from the family room outside my door made me cringe. I brought my fist up to my forehead and sheltered my eyes in the blackness. As my soul witnessed the fighting inside, I thankfully sensed warm tears slide across my cheekbones. They assured me I was still part of this world.

      I escaped by disappearing deep into memories—to a rocky cove and a sandy beach. The sun was melting into a pink celebration at dusk. Low tide revealed dark rocks filled with creeping crustaceans. My children, with wind-whipped hair and marshmallow-golden sun-kissed shoulders, collected ocean specimens in colored plastic pail aquariums. This was my happy place. Not even an arsenal of poison could eradicate this peace.

      For me, this marked the beginning of my fight against the all too-common breast cancer. I had read one in eight women in the United States would be diagnosed. I prayed I was taking one for the team so that my friends and daughter would ride safely in my statistic and never become initiated into this sorority. I could hardly bear to think of loved ones enduring the slash and burn of operations and chemotherapy. Still, as brutal as modern methods may be, these chemicals have a place in our society. I am deeply appreciative for the science, drugs, and toxins that came to my defense. They gave me life.

      They gave me today.

      In the aftermath of chemotherapy, I was thrust into an enthralling predicament. A do-over. I could resume with the comfortably familiar, or I could redefine my interpretations of living a healthy life. I could do what I had always done, or I could challenge my standards in search of a new and different outlook. Neither choice revealed a timeline; neither was wrong. Tentative, yet trusting, I chose the latter and embarked on a life foreign to my family’s experiences. I gutted our routines and started to rebuild, not only my body, but also our rituals and expectations. Most decisions were exhilarating, infused with a delightful buzz. Yet some days, gut-wrenching revelations dropped me to my knees, and I pleaded to return to virgin days of ignorance. But knowledge prevents retreat, and I could not go back. I gripped my children’s paws and pulled them close. Five years later, with incredible purpose, I can say nothing has ever felt more right. This was and is living.

      My movements rippled and resonated in the curious. Friends followed their own passions, entertained by my modifications to mainstream motherhood. Eventually, national media celebrated my actions, my way of living. Yet, I am not alone. It was just my turn. My story is not about trudging through cancer’s dreary and devastating wake.

      It’s about what happened next.