Hopefully it's Nothing....

Iron Dome takes out missile mid-air

In the past couple of weeks, I've been hoping for nothing. To some, that might ring pessimistic.  As missiles rain down on my country, air raids sounding off in every city of Israel, each of us prays and hopes that our home won't be hit. And if my house is hit, God forbid, hopefully it's nothing.... Hopefully we'll be in the bomb shelter and only the house will be destroyed. When the Iron Dome takes down a Gazan missile over Tel Aviv, hopefully it's nothing.... hopefully no one will be hit with shrapnel and injured, or worse.

On Thursday, July 3rd, I had my last chemotherapy treatment. Five days later, I began to feel very unwell and I spiked a fever. I called my doctor... hopefully it's nothing, but I had to go to the emergency room. My head began to pound with an excruciating headache and blood work showed my platelet counts were falling at a drastic rate. I needed a head CT scan, to check for a brain bleed, my second one since June 19th, when I had similar symptoms. Of course, once again, hopefully it's nothing.... and it was, no bleed! Thankfully!

I spent 5 nights in an isolation room, on the oncology ward, at Shaare Zedek Medical Center... hoping for nothing. Really, I was hoping my platelet count would go up along with my white blood cells, and hemoglobin, and electrolytes. I was praying to NOT need a blood transfusion.  I received a platelet transfusion, some Neupogen shots, IV antibiotics, and lots of electrolyte infusions. I became well enough and I went home. Something really bothered me about my release letter because in the summary, at the bottom on the page, it said something about a little lesion, in my brain. Apparently the little lesion, in my brain, was confirmed on the June 19 CT as well. Hopefully it's nothing. It wasn't there in May or March so obviously I'm worried.

How does one stop worrying at every single bump and twist along their journey? The first time the air raid sirens blasted in my city and we ran for the bomb shelter, I freaked out. It was unexpected. My heart pounded in my chest as I escorted my beloved young children, one by one, down to the bomb shelter. My breath was heavy, and I was scared. The second time, I was in the hospital, and all I could think of were my children, at home... were they okay? Would their babysitter get them to the bomb shelter safely? By the third air raid siren, I took my time to find my beret and put on my shoes before walking calmly to the protected space. My heart didn't race and I merely hoped it was nothing, I prayed no one would get hurt, that people would make it into the bomb shelters safely. Shortly after arriving home, from the hospital, the air raid sirens rang, and my whole family calmly walk downstairs, into our bomb shelter, I tried to make up a silly song about marching into the shelter. The kids bounced down the stairs. We took some smiley photos. We waited to feel the vibrations of the explosions, we listened for the "booms". I am not scared as long as I have my entire family around me, safely in the shelter. How does living through a war become so routine? It does, because we adapt. We have faith.

As the Iron Dome continues to take down hundreds of missiles coming our way, from Gaza, I look to the sky and imagine God's Great Hands shielding us from the blasts and the shrapnel. Every time, it's a miracle that so few people are physically injured. We are living through an unimaginable situation of rockets and missiles repeatedly falling from the sky, and we've managed to continue living around it. Okay, so we won't go to the beach because that would be crazy.... no bomb shelters at the beach! So we'll stay home and create an art project or bake or read a book. Thankfully, the army, the airforce, and of course, God, is taking care of us.

So, later I will have an MRI of my brain. I can only imagine what could cause the appearance of a lesion, in my brain, on the CT, twice. Hopefully it's nothing... but if it's something... surely I'll find a way to deal with that bomb too.

When Is Enough... Enough?

How do we know when we have truly done enough? Tried enough? Studied enough? Spent enough time.... enough attention? Prayed enough? Given enough? Thanked enough? Cared enough?

Coming to the end of a very difficult week, in Israel, it's very hard to separate the emotions in my personal life from the feelings we're experiencing as a Nation. The soil is beginning to settle atop three freshly covered graves of 3 teenaged boys. As I type away, from the safety of my air-conditioned quiet home, my phone blasts Color Red alarms as missiles, from Gaza, rain down on the South of Israel. While three families and an entire country are in mourning, for the murders of three teens, there are so many questions and not enough answers. I admit, my own personal struggles with cancer and chemotherapy, as trying as they are, feel less important and urgent.

When is enough enough? There's a very thin line between not doing enough and doing too much... doing harm. The lines are covered. We can't see them. Is it possible to hope enough or hope too much? So many people are waking up to that reality right now, in front of my eyes. For some, the pain is too much. The anger is too much. For others, the pain is not enough. The love is not enough. It's hard sometimes to not judge. It's very difficult to be silent. With the internet, Facebook, Twitter, and instant media... it feels like enough is enough. It's all too much!

Last week, I reached my breaking point. I had had enough! My physical level of suffering, from the effects of chemotherapy, had reached the point of enough and I knew it was the end. I only told one person, my beloved husband, David. That same day, I received a call from my oncologist. He informed me that enough was enough. My body has reached its limit. The balance between killing cancer and killing me is blurry. In order to avoid causing permanent damage to my bone marrow and possibly killing me, the time has come to take a break from chemotherapy.  The tumors shrunk. Some of them are no longer visible. The chemo did a lot of good and now, maybe it's enough.

When the cancer came back, it reappeared in unusual places, deep inside my liver, next to my heart and vital arteries, and peppered throughout my abdomen. Stage 4. The cancer was fast and aggressive and progressed quickly. Thankfully, it also responded to chemotherapy quickly. We have no way of knowing if this was enough chemo. It's very unlikely that all of the cancer cells are dead. It's very unlikely that this is end of my cancer journey and therefore it's time to find another treatment that will hopefully keep me in clinical remission for as long as possible. It's time to try promising yet experimental treatment. Clinical drug trials offer treatments that haven't yet been approved and are therefore unavailable on the open market. The only way to receive treatment is to become part of a scientific study which also comes with the risk of NOT receiving any treatment at all - placebo which are made of sugar or some other harmless, inactive component.

Today, I received chemotherapy treatment; hopefully my last. Hopefully it was enough. It's time to rebuild my inner physical strength and recover from the physical effects of the chemicals that helped to save my life. As I try to internalize and heal the pain and horror all around us, here, in the Holyland, I draw a line directly to the heart of my own personal struggles. When is enough enough? If there's ONE thing I've learned on my journey... it's to love and have faith and there's never too much of those. Love and faith. Love and faith. Enough pain. Enough violence. Enough war. Enough anger, hatred, and mistakes....! We always have enough of those.