DDs and Discount Balayage - My Appearance and Cancer

There was a strange sense of anticipation the weekend before I met the specialists who would become the sun and moon that I would rotate around, Professor Friedlander, the grouchy but caring oncologist and Professor Hacker, the gentle, caring surgeon. My all star team there to save my life. Professor Hacker was so sweet that when I meet Friedlander or 'The Prof' as he is known at the womens I cried afterwards saying 'he was ice cold he doesn't care about my case'. This was completely untrue and was just my nerves and anxiety coming to a head. I was to begin chemo straight away. I had that morning bought a deal from my hair salon on cut and colour that would have saved me a lot of money and had to ask 'wait does this mean I lose my hair?' the answer was yes of course and the refund was prompt. I had to cancel my beloved gym membership as I was unsure of whether I could still handle the pace as well as my laser appointments and so began prepping the strange new life post cancer.

I was so scared of the chemo room and had a big cry my first few times in there. It is a room with recliner chairs all around the edges, where the nurses buzz around a big table in the middle, flitting from patient to patient. I met the eccentric nun full of advice on chemo and dog rearing, whose time was coming to an end, Rose, an elderly lad who would die a few months later and a cast of other female characters may of whom I still encounter today. I was comforted by the fact that there was another young girl getting treatment, albeit for a different cancer. I had discovered that I had low grade serous epithelial ovarian cancer. What this meant wasn't a lot at that stage but it was different from her more aggressive high grade cancer that responded better to chemo than mine. Mine was the slow lumbering beast of cancers where hers was the fast spreading bushfire.

Skinny little bald me

After Christmas I started to lose weight, buying all new clothes for my tiny new frame. It was like dressing a barbie doll, all the clothes that used to suit my busty frame didn't work any more and I looked to intagram models to see what skinny people wore, having never been skinny myself.  I'd spent my teens being a curvy, fiery little babe (you're allowed to say that about yourself when you lose your body, sorry bout it). I had a rig. Firm, large breasts, a curved butt and just my tummy that bloated a little in the way that I managed with gym to never let get out of control. But did I appreciate it at the time? Hell no. I was obsessed with weight loss my whole youth. Not once did I stop to be thankful for my lush bounty. Now I'd give my left hand for my old body back. Maybe not..maybe..I don't know if the limits of my vanity stretch that far but I'd hate to test it. All my weight loss dreams I'd spent my teens and twenties obsessing over were coming true and all I wanted was old curvy me back.

The rig at its peak, such curves many tone such tan.

My boobs disappeared as did my generous curves as chemo had its way with my appetite and nausea ensued. My hair went after about 3 weeks just as predicted. The night before it went my mum was brushing it in bed and I revelled in what would probably be the last time experiencing someone brushing my hair for a good while. The next morning it came out in handfuls and what remained on my head stung like sheets of metal in my scalp. I called a neighbour who is a hairdresser and together with my loving Dalmatian rested in my lap, knowing I needed her we shaved the lot. I felt great.

Me post shave feeling relieved.

I looked in the mirror and a badass stared back. I looked fierce and strong and I was so proud I hadn't let it fall out and had taken charge. Hair had no power over me! I then learnt to embrace the headscarf more so than the itchy hot wig (it was summer) and every day would layer my face with Ella bache tinted zinc to protect my skin and give me come color then would chuck on a turban from louvelle shower and turban wear, a great Australian company making pre tied turbans. I also learnt to tie a scarf prettily and thanked myself for buying some faux Hermes scarves in China the year before on a holiday, not knowing I'd need them. I then signed up for the cancer rite of passage - Look Good Feel Better, a cancer makeup masterclass for free. Little did I know how closely I would come to work with the organisation.

The day I went into the Pitt at David jones for the LGFB class I was in a state of dread. It would be all old ladies and I didn't belong there. I despaired. I wanted to come to the city to work not learn to draw on eyebrows. What followed was an absolute delight and I found myself reluctantly enjoying myself. I signed up to provide answers to Andy questions they had about the experience for their marketing materials which lead to 2 magazine articles online, a press speech, a tv spot and a speech at a fashion event in front of hundreds about LGFB and my experience. It was so invaluable to my confidence and made me feel like the old me doing something I was good at and for a cause I cared passionately about. I wanted to do right by such an inspiring charity. Who knows what the future holds but should they need me, LGFB always has an advocate here.

Home for the weekend to process the unimaginable

My grandmother was so very very sad. No grandparent should see their grandchild struck down in their prime. The thought of having to passively watch me go through this kills her as she is too elderly to be of active help apart from as my supporter and cheerleader. Little does she know how invaluable that role is. She showed her love by making me a christmas dinner a month before christmas. I could taste the love. She is my spirit person - I have never felt a deeper connection to anyone than I do my grandmother and I am absolutely cut from her cloth. We share the same views and since I've gotten sick I've become even more like her, ready to espouse the perils of buying a dog without thinking it through at the drop of a hat, monologue always ready and cantankerously pushing my weight around the hospital, just like my dear old Nanna, an ex glamorous HR exec for the original Harvey Norman who used to gad about in furs and pearls in her glorious post divorce years and now was just as noble in her robe and slippers. 

This lunch was as delightful as a degustation to our weary souls. We were all joyous as if this wasn't all happening and it felt like bonus christmas. I was stoked. I pigged out on curried eggs around my bloaty stomach and delicious potato salad and was numb to all that I'd just heard.

A feed for the last of days

Me and my nanna 

 My friends were in shock. Flowers poured in from friends family friends and the community and people displayed a kindness I had never known them to be capable of. The first time I had to tell someone was when I ran into an acquaintance my age in my home town where I grew up and she asked how I was. I shakily burst into tears as I admitted things weren't well and I had cancer. The poor girl must have been horrified at the outburst but I was on shaky new ground and I hadn't yet learnt to navigate it as I now can, putting others at ease with the perfect tone of lighthearted humour and calm.

My loyal dog knew something wasn't right. I'm numb here and reeling.

My close group of girlfriends was hit so personally. This wasn't happening to one of us it was happening to all of us. Their mothers grieved for me, having watched me grow up. A close friend I'd grown apart from sent stilted, well mannered condolences as is proper to do. Some people shied away. I can't blame them. When I was in high school a close friends brother died and my first brush with death scared me so much I fell back on ' I don't know what to say' and avoided her. I now know it doesn't matter what you say you just need to be there, but I have been in the shoes of someone who dealt badly with these situations and I am not the one to hold a grudge or condemn them for it. It does mean that they aren't now still in that golden place reserved for the 'ones that were there' of lifetime soul deep friends, but I also would never judge them.  Most people went above and beyond, and for that I am forever grateful. For the most part I spent the weekend with family in quiet contemplation of the mountain I was to climb.

A Damsel in Distress with DDs Limped into a Doctors Office...

It began in my twenties with a persistent bloat. I got all the tests I could done to identify why it looked like i'd eaten a bowling bowl and the verdict was IBS after exhaustive tests ending in a colonoscopy. A doctor proudly stated 'your intestines are just filled with shit'. Wrong, wrong, wrong, mate, but how was I to know? I went on a low FODMAP diet and dressed around my constantly distended, sometimes painful stomach punctuated by crippling episodes of reflux that kept me up all night.

Then, at the age of 25 after starting my eagerly awaited new job at tech company Atlassian, where I felt I finally had the work life balance I'd craved working at my high stress consulting job for two years since uni I felt a persistent pain in my left hip. Obsessive Googling in the wee dark hours of pain revealed it must be Sciatica and I made my first mistake - going to an inexperienced doctor near my home as I was too tired to venture to my female health specialist. Then, a Bowen therapist, Chyro and Physio all had a crack at fixing the pain over the course of a few months with no results, just frustration lack of sleep and tears.

One day my stomach suddenly bloated to become a massive rock hard mass in front of me. More than bowling bowl stomach- double bowling bowl. Something was very very wrong and I was lucky I had gone to work so the nearest doctor was my extremely experienced female health specialist, Mira. She knew instantly something wasn't right and sent me for an immediate X-ray, which I hobbled towards a few blocks away.

“They saw shadow on the scan and for the first time, but not the last, I was pulled in to the side rooms reserved for bad news scans”

I vividly remember leaning on a traffic light, needing to vomit and despairing. I then proceeded to vomit profusely in the bathroom of the scan room. I was terrified. They saw shadow on the X-ray  and for the first time, but not the last, I was pulled in to the side rooms reserved for bad news scans. I was too scared to get an intravenous CT scan so I downed the disgusting oral liquid and it was sufficient to show that all was not well - more shadows. I was to go to the hospital emergency immediately and get a full CT scan to see what was afoot.

Very scared of the needle and not knowing that bigger dragons lurked under the surface

Hailing a cab on the street I felt like I was outside of my body. I called my partner at the time (hows the foreshadowing there), Ethan and said he had to meet me at St Vincent's Hospital. His presence calmed me and he helped me to overcome my lifetime held needle phobia by holding my hand, which contributed to why I was being diagnosed late as I'd avoided blood tests like the plague for years. Once I even ran out of a waiting room like a ghost in the night when they wanted to run a blood test. By the time I'd had an ultrasound and a CT scan we were told we were dealing with an ovarian mass. I assumed it would be polycystic ovaries and I was in the good company of several girlfriends I know with the condition. We all had no idea what was to come next. I cried because of the impact to my fertility but didn't even think the C word. A girl in a bed near me told me to 'calm down, it's not a big deal'. I've fantasised about what I would now say to her if I ever saw her again, but it would probably get me arrested. That was when the specialist told me that it looked like cancer and the whole situation turned on its head. The girl had left, so I couldn't revel in my histrionics being justified and then some. My parents needed to get there and things had gotten serious. It was a Friday so I couldn't see the specialist until the following Monday so I was sent home to reel and tell my loved ones the unthinkable.