“Keep resting, take your chances to rest.”

Well we are now 3 weeks post-surgery and we are slowly moving back to normal.  We both have finally gotten rid of our coughs which both hit us around the time that she was diagnosed.  I’m thinking it was a bit psychosematic (sp?) but either way, it’s all done. 

I’m still dropping off the kids and preparing everyone’s breakfast and lunch as she is still weak in the mornings and has not regained her stamina.  Picking up the kids in the afternoons and helping them go to their activities is exhausting and I see the weakness in her.  We had a long discussion to remind her to her rest when she can.  She has resumed light work which again is a good distraction for her, but she can barely stay awake at the end of the day.  She has also been going on walks with friends so I think that is helping to both get her out, but also take a lot of her energy away.

We did watch Christina Applegate on Oprah today.  Yes, I watched Oprah.  It was good for her to see Christina Applegate and her diagnosis.  They are very similar in age and diagnosis as well as surgery and timing.  I don’t think we learned anything new but I could see my wife breath just a sigh of relief.  It is the sigh of knowing that she has more people like her.  She is not alone and not left wondering why her as opposed to someone else.

It is still hard to leave her alone.  As someone recently said to me, men just want to fix things.  I do.  I want to make her feel better.  Traveling again for work is difficult to do.  Leaving her and not being close to help is so hard.  It is good though to get immersed in work again for one week (before next week’s oncologist appointment). 

At dinner though our son did ask us about the other mother of a classmate in his school who died of breast cancer.  We had to remind him that her case was different and that there are all kinds of situations.  He was also under the impression she passed after visiting the hospital again.  This explains a little why he is worried each time we go to the hospital.  Hopefully he understands a little better now.   It is best to remind our children to ask us every time they have a new question.

As a funny aside, today I met Kathy Ireland!  Wow, pretty amazing.  I was speaking at a Social Media Marketing Sunmmit and walked in to the Speakers Area before the conference and there she was.  it was like the episode od Friends where Chandler gets caught in a banking vestibule with Jill Goodacre.  Kathy even knew my name which left me feeling like I was 15 again.  My wife had a good laugh when I Tweeted her and told her I was sitting next to Kathy Ireland.  She knew at least it was relieving the tension of giving my speech.  It went well by the way.