The first entry

Dear friends,

I didn't think I would ever blog but circumstances have created a need for me to "talk" to you and tell you what is happening with me. Though I should love to talk to each of you in person and receive from you the comfort that you will extend to me, this is likely to be exhausting for both of us, hence the efficiency of this blog to update you, though I still hope to hear from you and receive your uplifting thoughts and wishes.

Some of you know that I ended last semester with a pain radiating down my right shoulder and arm that I assumed was due to a pinched nerve. My physical therapist friend, Jennifer, tried to help relieve the pain but was astute enough to insist that I go see a doctor. In fact, good friend that she is, she made the appointment for me and went with me to get MRIs done and we discovered that there is a "mass" on or close to my spine, at the bottom of the cervical spine. Masses are always suspect, especially in one who had cancer, so the doctor insisted that I get a CT scan done as well, which revealed yet another mass on the outside of the right lung, and perhaps some other spots, as yet undeterminable.

The awful thing about having had cancer is that it marks you permanently -- not just the scar that I carry on my face, but that anything amiss brings back the ghost of recurrence. It's like walking with a big C painted on you ... and for that reason, I have avoided doctors since my surgeries in 2006. Yet, it looks like I can't avoid them anymore. As much as I would like to believe and hope that this is some sort of infection, there is a good chance it is cancer, and very likely a recurrence of the sarcoma, which is a rare cancer, so not good news.

I found all this out on January 6 and since then, I have just been trying to accept emotionally that I may have to deal with this again. Many of you know that I've often referred to my cancer journey with gratitude because that journey taught me many valuable lessons and I grew a lot, but as of last week, all I felt was that I was done learning. I want to go to a different school where the lessons aren't delivered in quite so hard a format!

While I await that transfer though ..... I wanted to share with you what I am doing and ask for your support. The last time I went through this, Andre and I were so scared and felt so isolated -- not that we were, but we did not reach out to our friends for fear of burdening them. This time, I am wiser -- I trust my friends to know whether they can give and how much they can give. I've also learned what a privilege it is to reach out and help another person and that it is not given to me to deny someone that privilege. So, I am sending this message and going to maintain this blog to tell you what I am doing and feeling. Being able to share my feelings with you lightens my heart ..... and I deeply appreciate you for that.

Here's what is happening now -- since I never had an oncologist, my first order of business is to find one who can help and support me through this. The problem is if it is a sarcoma, they are very rare and there aren't many experts and we've been told that there are none in San Diego and we should not expect to stay here for treatment. Fortunately, my last journey has equipped me with friends who have great advice to give this time. I met another woman who had a similar diagnosis to mine (a wonderful, kind person) and she has recommended a sarcoma oncologist, Charles Forscher, at Cedars Sinai in L.A. Andre and I go to see him tomorrow at 9 a.m. Another friend is arranging for us to go to the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, though we're not sure when that would happen.

Today I also met a pair of wonderful, decent doctors at the San Diego Cancer Center in Encinitas. Dr. Vicario is an integrative oncologist and has said that he will support me through this journey while I go to whichever expert is right for me. Dr. Brenner is a physician and counseling psychologist. Their compassion and caring today made Andre and I feel so hopeful. So, I have doctors close to home whom I feel I can trust and with them in my backyard, I travel to L.A. tomorrow hopeful that we will find out soon what exactly this is.

There will be more appointments next week and more news. I am so grateful to Janet Powell, Annette Daoud, Sonia Perez, Marcia Woolf, and Teresa Shallow who have told me to focus on myself for this next week and do what I have to to get a diagnosis. I will miss being in the Faculty Center for the start of the semester but I hope that I will be back soon.

Please keep me in your thoughts and send me your positive energy -- I have been uplifted by it before and I know that I need it now. Thank you for being my friends and for sharing the weight of this news with me. I'll post again soon.