A Few Updates

Ay carumba.  So many things to tell you, my one reader, about!

One week later, and my legs are still banged up from my Mountain Falling Biking incident.  The poofy left leg?  Well, the poof is gone, but now I have just one huge bruise covering my entire shin.

Adults aren't meant for falling.

I mean, my kids fall all the time, right?  But they're kind of...boingey.  And smaller.  They don't take up so much area/volume as I do.  They're able to kind of rebound from falling.  Oh, and football players.  I don't know how they can stand to fall all the time.  Seriously.

Or maybe it's because my body is now an Old Lady Body that falling was such a big deal for me?  I'm lucky that I didn't break a hip!  Haha!  My blood pressure still sucks, and my bladder acts up every now and then.  Stupid chemo.  When I go jogging, it reminds me of what it would be like if I was, like, 80, and trying to jog.  It's just ridiculous.

Let's talk about something nice.  Let's talk about Kar teaching dance!!  Woot!!  It took a really long time for everything to get settled and figured out, so I didn't talk about it on here until I knew for sure.  And now I know for sure.

The first thing that happened was that I got hired at a studio here in Bend to teach on Fridays and Saturdays.  I'm going to have a chance to do lots of choreography and have some lyrical/modern teaching opportunities.  I'm really excited about that.  I mean, ballet is my Number One Dance Love.  But modern/lyrical?  Number Two Dance Love.  It will be fantastic.

I've had a chance to take some adult ballet and modern classes at this studio, and it's been SUCH A BLAST.  When I'm not huffing and puffing.  From my dang blood pressure.  The teachers understand.  Hopefully it will get better and better with each passing month.  I'll take more classes this summer; right now, both classes are preparing their numbers for the spring show, and I don't want to get in the way.

Can I tell you how great it feels to put on a leotard and tights again??  To move my body in those old, familiar ways?  Pure healing. That's what it is for me.

And then I got hired on at a studio about 20 minutes away to teach during the week.  It feels like a really good fit; the bosslady up there is a definite kindred spirit.  I'll also be teaching ballet and lyrical up there, as well as a little bit of pointe!  Yeee!  I love pointework!

I might be teaching some summer classes up there, as well.  We'll see.

Also, I'm going to be teaching ballet to a cute girl in my ward here, in her house.  Ben made me a portable ballet barre!  He had a ton of fun making it; he's immensely proud of it.  As he should be.  My darling kiddos are enamored of it.  Sadie almost thought of taking dance classes again.  For about three minutes.  And then she remembered how much she disliked it!  Haha!  I'm good with that. Ballet isn't for everyone.  I get it.

Oi vey.  Her form isn't the best, but that's because she only took, like, four months of ballet.  Haha!  Roll those feet out, girl!!

The last bit of news is boob-related.  Kay.  So.  According to my plastic surgeon here in Bend, plus a doctor my nurse-anesthetist sister works with (he actually talked to me on the phone!  He does only breast reconstruction and really knows his stuff), plus several reputable websites like the Susan B. Komen website, etc., I might not ever be able to successfully do tissue-expansion on my left side again.  They all say that once rejected, my left side will always reject them.  I mean, there is a small chance that it wouldn't reject, but I don't like the percentages I'm seeing on that.

The only other option is to do this DIEP Flap thing, the tummy tuck-type thing.  I really don't wanna do it, but do I want to go through life with a concave chest?  (Maybe.  It's kind of tempting to just take my other expander out and be DONE FOREVVVVER WITH THIS CRAAAAP.)  The more research I do, the more I'm finding that this surgery has a very, very high success rate.  And that it's not as scary as I first imagined.  It's something I'm considering.

Soooo, I'm going to Portland on Friday to see a specialist there about it.  We'll see what she has to say.  (Nobody here does this surgery.)  She'll probably look at me and see if I'm a good candidate, etc.  We'll ask lots of questions and just get more of a feel for what this surgery might entail and if it's the right choice for me.  I'm not saying I'm ready to commit to anything.  But I think that at least exploring this option is an okay thing to do for now.

So yeah.  I'll let ya know what she says!  And what I decide!  My only decision right now might be just to wait a year.  I did ask my surgeon here about that - I asked him if I could just...take out the right boob tissue expander while I think about things for a year, and he said it probably wouldn't be a good idea.  If we try fakies again, it would be dumb to cut out all the skin I've expanded for the past year.  If I do a DIEP Flap, there's no guarantee that I'll have enough tissue for both boobs.  So we have to keep the right one in just in case we need to do one fakie and one...creatie.  That's what I'm calling the boobs that a DIEP Flap can make.  Creaties.

I'll let you  know what happens.  Right now, I have to stop typing and help Gage find his damn train toys.  Sigh.