Notes from the chemo room

Billy and Steph have been with me at every chemo infusion. (Steph reminded me she missed two. Once when Serin, another of my dear friends and her husband flew out from Boulder to be with us for a few days and came with me, and another when she couldn’t get out of work). The three of us spend the hours chatting, processing, quiet on our phones, making plans, and laughing. Sometimes we cry.

Yesterday was my last infusion until surgery on July 21. As Steph and I talked, I didn’t know that Billy captured highlights of the conversation on his phone. This morning he shared his notes with me.

Below is what he sent me unedited:

Support groups for “cancer survivors”
Support groups for “stage 4”
Need a “might be getting better” support group

Sitting on the clean half of the bed
I don’t want to clean the house.

How are you?
Fine. Not fine.
Really not fine.

Merry go round in the park. Thrown into the
wood chips
I just want to sit on the bench and have a
juice box
Supposed to get back on. But
getting better also means having to deal with
all the shit of life.

Ring the bell
Yay…! Fuck all this