Hello Beloveds, 

I am doing well.  Processing, processing.  This experience has been and continues to be a lot.  It continues to challenge my body and mind in new and old ways.  I say again, I am doing well and even went skiing recently!  It felt amazing to be in my body, on skis in the sunshine.  I am tired still, also body and mind.  There is a darkness that comes a knocking more often than I'd like to admit. Don't know why I don't want to admit it...but it's there lurking.  I have Lymphodema and wear a compression sleeve on my left arm and it reminds people of loved ones in their lives that have since passed...from recurrence.  The fear that wasn't, when in survival/treatment mode has since shifted.  Though I have 2 children who take up most of my mental energy, when I do get a moment, sometimes the thought of reoccurrence starts to enter in and though I don't sit in it and roll around in that fear, it's there in the background quietly waiting for me to latch on.  Every once and awhile I take a bite out of that fear sandwich but mostly I just acknowledge it and go on about my day.  Of course it's there, right?!  And yet, I don't believe it to be my story and I don't want to give over my power to that lingering baddy. And so....next steps...

On Wednesday, March 6th 2019, I have chosen to get a bilateral salpingo oophorectomy ie. I'm getting my ovaries and tubes removed, oof.  Here's why.  My breast cancer was Estrogen/Progesterone receptor positive.  That means estrogen was feeding my cancer.  Now that it's gone, I am on Estrogen blockers for the next 5 years.  One of the drugs is a shot in my Gluteus Maximus, my ass, every month for the next 5 years - this one shuts down my ovaries, putting me into menopause.  SO there are a few reasons actually that lead me to choose surgery.  1) Save my poor Glutes from getting poked and scarred. 2) Less chemicals in my body, thank you. 3) I'm 45, chances are at 50 I could potentially come out of menopause only to dive back in again. Who needs THAT rollercoaster. No thank you. And lastly, I haven't looked it up because I don't search my ailments on the web only to get faced with worst case scenarios or totally incorrect or invalid, to me, information, BUT...this is a long sentence...BUT, recurrence from what I've heard can often come back in the ovaries.  There, I said it.  I've had my babies. I am grateful for the job they did and how they have served my life and now, take them I'm done.  

Also, I go one step deeper. You know, a womans eggs, stored in the ovaries, come from her grandmother?  I think this is a beautiful and amazing fact.  That means Adelaide is carrying eggs from my mother!  For better or worse, it's a fact.  So, I've done a great deal of work around and thinking about where this cancer came from.  You know, us control freaks like to have answers damn it! Though I jest, there is a wondering and an exploration of the where and why that is inevitable.  There is a piece here that I mentioned when I first wrote, a piece that this cancer never felt like it was "mine". Like it was some sort of ancestral baggage.  I believe this to be a part of this, my story.  Without disrespecting those who have come before me, I believe there to be some deep melancholy and resentment that has been passed down from generation to generation of women in my lineage.  Not that I'm all powerful and can stop the ball rolling but I do hope to do my part to shift it as much as possible.  I feel something was spiritually cut out of my lineage when they cut the cancer out of my body.  Strange and far out?  Maybe. Even as I write this my heart beat has picked up and chest squeezing for fear of being judged. But I write and I share because it is my truth, take it or leave it.  Now...I am having another surgery, my 4th in under a year, to cut out parts of me that were passed down from my grandmother.  There is this part of me that feels the loss of having such a connection to her literally removed and yet, a part of me that feels uplifted in saying good-bye.  I believe so strongly in the interconnectedness of everything.  I also had a soul level sigh of relief when I decided to do this.  It's not as if my grandmother and mother and all those before them aren't within me but there is a lessening of the grip of their pain.  SO as these beautiful parts of me are taken I bless and release them.  I set my self free in the process.  I feel a contentment and peace in this moment.  Gratitude. The more we clear out, the more room we have to welcome in.

Love,
Antonia