Monday Night

So, it seems like I might want to start at the beginning, and that Monday night is as good a start point as any... I could go back to deep decisions made in the fall of 2010, or experiences of the past three years.  Yes, Monday evening feels like a good place to start.

To set the scene, it is June 20th, I have renovated and sold my house, moved everything to storage and we have just moved to a wonderful, temporary, new home.  I am renting a waterfront, fully furnished house in Annapolis, Laura had just returned Friday night from a few weeks in Colorado, my sister Polly is arriving from California for 3 weeks the next day.

It was a warm evening, I came up to bed, got undressed.  As I pulled off my bra I rubbed the side of my breasts and felt something very different in my left breast.  A lump, at about 2 o'clock. I knew immediately that it did not belong there and that it was grace and spirit showing it to me that evening.  I was also really scared and felt a deep trust underneath.  This was an experience that apparently I was going to need to walk.

Back to denial, I started doing lymph work on myself, wondered if it could be a cyst or fluid or such and texted Laura, who was downstairs and asked her to center and steady herself before she came up.

She came up and palpated it too, it was different from all the other lumps and bumps that are generally in my breasts.  This was new.

I don't know if we ever said the word cancer.  I know we were both thinking it.