Mammograms are scary

Well yes mammograms can be scary for anyone, but especially if you have already had one breast removed from cancer, it can be extremely nerve wracking which Was the case for me. But the good news is my right breast is clear, had the mammogram last week and got results yesterday when I went to my surgeon just to get a check in of mastectomy site, but the crazy thing there was a stitch still left in there, which could explain the slow wound healing I had. Now I’m hoping to be healed enough to swim this summer. Just an update on me. ❤️

Divine Feminine Studies

For a number of years now I am not sure how I fell down this rabbit hole, it really started in my twenties with my friend and roommate Tonya in the old house in Grant Park in Atlanta, GA, when we started reading things like “Women Who Run With the Wolves”, by Clarissa Pinkola Estes, and listening to Ani DiFranco. I started studying divine feminine aesthetic around that time. Not as a practice of religion so much, but more of an earth study. This might offend some people, but as a previous atheist, it was just hard for me to believe that the creator of all things could be male. Female made more sense to me, and then I started studying how before Christianity, there were many pagan worships that were based on female deities. Which later they called them all witches, and when Christianity came to sweep the world, those ancient cultures and religions were wiped out and people were killed and burned.

Since my personal journey of discovery, that started before I got cancer, yes I have been battling cancer for about a year and a half, read previous blogs to find out more about that, but my point is when I became critically ill, or found out pretty suddenly, I needed something to hold on to again, because it’s damn near impossible to go through cancer, or life in general, on one’s own is what I found without some sense of a creator, and so my studies grew stronger. Actually now that I think about it, what really pushed me to reconnect with the divine feminine is when my best friend, Tami and her daughter died in a house fire in 2014, and that brought me to my knees, and on my knees is where I found the divine feminine energy. I have had many meditations where I see myself in a golden temple, so beautiful, it would bring you to your knees, there is grace in grief.

My friend Kay and I started an FB group online in 2016, called Divine Feminine (Sacred Energy) long before I got sick to focus on the sacred energy of the divine feminine and I began my meditation journey probably about that time.

I did holotropic breath work too, and reiki with a trusted practitioner, which I continued to do and still do. My point is just it made more sense to me this sense of the divine feminine, although there is a masculine energy too, that’s where things got out of balance somewhere along the line, and I feel like with this focus on energy, I am helping the collective consciousness wake up and find the rebalance.

In my opinion, I think what happened is the divine feminine was buried, at some point, and then she started re-emerging, on a collective level. Now it’s time for her to come into her full power, and Momma Earth rumbles too, does she not? Don’t you hear her, in the earthquakes, and floods, and with the turning of the moon tides, she is there waiting for you. And the wisdom of the grandmothers and the wisdom of the crone, she also waits for you, patiently, gently touching your shoulder, saying wake up.

Thoughts on love

After living for half a century, I still haven’t figured out how love works. I can’t seem to hang on to it for long. Maybe that’s just how it works. People come together for a time, then go their separate ways. I do know some people have longevity in their relationships but it seems I have not mastered this ability.

I have to remember to appreciate the good times, the times of love with another person, and then times to myself where I get to practice self-love. It gets difficult, especially with all that I have been through.

Critical illness will change your entire mindset and I often seem to set my sites on loves that need saving, but sometimes I can only save myself. But they save me too for a time.

Maybe that’s the problem, we get so busy trying to save each other, we forget why we are together, or I don’t know the weight gets to heavy maybe with a critical illness in tow especially. I am well now, but there’s always that fear in the back of my mind, not even fear, just a thought, that the cancer could come back, and I don’t want to put loved ones through that again, I don’t even want to put myself through that again. But it’s hard to have that expectation to keep another person alive, when you are trying to keep yourself alive.

It’s been said before, we are all dying, it’s just a matter of what rate of speed. A woman in the breast cancer group I am in died today, I didn’t even know her, but I shed tears anyway because so many people die from this horrible disease and I felt that loss, but at least she is at peace and doesn’t have to do more treatments. It’s a constant battle, and then my love and I were battling and I just couldn’t fight anymore, not when I feel like I am fighting so much, plus raising two teenagers.

So sometimes we let go because we do love the person that much that we have to send them away to find their own way in the world, and it’s hard, because if you still love that person, its like ripping your own heart out. Unfortunately, or fortunately, it has to be done sometimes. The cracks are where the light gets in, I’ve heard, though the cracking will feel like it’s killing you too.

Thoughts of the day

Well I know I said I wasn’t going to talk about cancer that much but it’s the kind of thing that takes over your life. It’s a terrible illness but so far I have beat the doctor’s odds for me from where I came from and I plan to keep fighting. I am currently going through the radiation portion of the preventative program, coming from stage 4 breast cancer to over a year since diagnosis. Radiation is something I wasn’t really ready for to be honest. It’s every day, and you have to lie on this machine sort of like a petscan or CT, and this machine comes down with lasers and zaps your skin. It doesn’t hurt at the moment but after, wow I wasn’t prepared for the burn. Some people might ask why do I put myself through all this? Poison to combat the poison of cancer. Sometimes it doesn’t make sense to me either, but i want to live as long as possible for my kids if nothing else, but also for myself. I feel like I am not done yet.

It’s rigorous to be sure but it’s supposed to help keep the cancer from coming back. 33 days, so far have done 31. I’ve got two more boosts they call them, those are blasts of radiation to specific areas, not so wide spread for me that means right on the mastectomy line, so my skin is pretty mad right now. I try to meditate while I am there, or focus on the lasers that shine on the wall with this weird floral wallpaper border, but I swear there are codes in the lasers. Maybe codes for my life, secrets I try to decode while I lie there with my arms up. I’ll be glad when this part is over. The kind of cancer i have has a high risk of recurrence but so far I am winning the battle and just trying to source joy in every day. Life is a blessing, that is definitely something I learned. And also I am stronger then I knew I was.

Rockwater Glass and Healing Gems

So in my copious leisure time, on top of work and raising kids, oh and battling cancer, I make jewelry. Lately it’s been beading, but I also make glass, do wire wrapping of stones, and make all sorts of things. Here’s some picks of some of my latest pieces. All available for sale. I make lots of other things, wrapped stones, repurposed jewelry. I recently got a new load of vintage jewelry, so more work coming soon! Check out my Facebook page, Rockwater Glass and Healing Gems for pics of other pieces. Thanks!

Mala beads, 108 beads plus one prayer bead. $60 Paypal or Venmo. Email me for details. rockwaterglass@gmail.com

Triple goddess necklace. $40, with charm. On stretchy cord. Lapis, jade, and volcanic ash beads.

Bracelet on stretchy cord $30 rose, jade, lapis, purple glass, and watermelon tourmaline beads.

Thoughts of the Day

I am a person who has beaten cancer for almost a year so far. Although I didn’t start this blog to talk about cancer. I started this blog to talk about a lot of things, really anything I wanted because I felt this urge, this sort of pressure,  to write down my thoughts, because I have a lot of thoughts about many things. But last October of 2018, I did get diagnosed with cancer, so it may come up. But mostly I think what the blog is about is not cancer so much, but how surviving cancer, much longer than they expected me to, and being in the clear, has given me a voice, and a sense of needing to express myself more. So that’s what this blog is about really. That sort of sense of pressure one feels like before it rains, the smell and sense of rain, which is called Petrichor, like when the air is heavy, and dense and it feels like rain would relieve the pressure, so now you know why the name.

Something happened to me with going through cancer, and I’m still going through the residual effects of cancer, by the way, and chemo for a bit longer as preventative, but I am doing a lot better than I was a year ago. But again, that’s not my point. My point is something happened to me from having cancer, something quite profound.

Before I got sick, I was sort of floundering around not sure what I was doing as a divorced Mother of two, working my butt off with 3-5 jobs at times, trying to make sense of my life and not really feeling like I was able to and probably taking it for granted as well. And then I got sick, and everything changed. Suddenly small things seemed more meaningful, little moments I caught and still catch more, I was forced to slow down and take a good, hard look at my responsibility in it all, though I don’t blame myself for getting sick.

I had to take responsibility for getting well. This is a slippery slope, I am not saying if I hadn’t made it through, that it was because I didn’t take responsibility for myself, I am just saying for me, the illness gave me a different perspective on myself and my life. I had to be stronger than I even thought possible, and this gave me a renewed lease on life. I have lost many friends to cancer, among other things, and I am certainly not saying that those who didn’t make it were weak, so please don’t misunderstand. I am just talking about my journey, and my awakening that was pushed along by suddenly finding myself with a critical illness, I guess I am a stubborn MF, because it seems things have to get pretty intense for me to make a change but so be it, I am here, that’s what matters, and my life I now feel has some purpose beyond just being a Mom, which I am so grateful to be, and my love for my children did get me through a lot of times, just wanting to be with them as much as possible. I am not saying I know exactly what my life purpose is, but I think it is to help others and help the planet. Even if I could make a difference in one person’s life, I would feel that was worth the effort, so here we go. Thanks for tuning in.