i knew i would get sent home from chemo and what are you drinking?

i have always gotten screechy draws on what is in my mason jar.
sometimes it looks like a stool specimen when a cotton tea bag is floating in there.
sometimes it looks like bile.
sometimes like the urine of a very dehydrated individual.

'what are you drinking?' the woman seated next to me asked
while we were waiting for morning blood draws.

lemon.
maple syrup.
grated ginger.
tincture of turmeric and turkey tail and maitake mushroom.
black pepper.
cayenne.
i lean over to her ear and whisper, 'i makes me poo.'
some time passes and she leans over to her husband of perhaps 60 years and whispers even quieter,
'she says it helps her go poop!'
i wrote the recipe on the back of a TIDY NEST card and handed it to her.

i got sent home from chemo.
i expected it so it did not crush my spirit.
on the contrary i met jenna at monahans fresh seafood bar for salmon, calamari and french fries.
super yum.

my beautiful hindi oncologist and i had a heart to heart:
so the nodes in my thigh are causing reconsidering to happen.
he thinks perhaps they have become resistant to the carboplatin/taxol combo.
they perhaps have learned to outsmart the poison.
fascinating.
he would like to switch my cocktail to carboplatin (standard for BRAC1 peeps)/daxol.
AND he would like to add one more round of infusion.
so that would put me at 7 total vs. 6.
i would have 3 left.
and
like i care
my hair might start to grow back because that is taxol related.
(i think he kindly offered that as an up).
you guys he is separated and has 2 young children.
what am i to do?
i have a thing for indian men.

i asked if peewee could be severed.
my counts are looking really good.
pleeeeeeeeezzze?
he compassionately scheduled me to get whats called a pressure check to see if its still needed
and then scribbled it out in his notes because he really thinks it will be safer to wait incase my counts get messy again.
he would not want me to have to get it put back in.
oh peewee.
stop stalking me.

i left the hospital totally unfazed by all this news.
its just another thing happening.
i felt full of mojo-sie.
thank you dr. miller for that one.
im not acting in fear anymore.
no I'm not.