I had a dream

To quote from the Broadway show "Gypsy" --

I dreamed I was watching pieces of my life being boxed up and thrown out. First I was in the hallway, saying that I needed those boxes, don't move them. Then I was outside watching belted trunks begin tossed around.

I think this is both emblematic of the stress I feel and a reaction to the way cancer appears to be taking over my life. I almost said taking over my life again, because of course this has happened many times over the past nine years. In stead of sitting quietly on a merry-go-round bench, I'd suddenly be thrust upon a pony, hanging on for dear life while it went madly up and down.

I'm not much on dream interpretation. Are the boxes parts of my life I've had to give up? If so, hat are they? I'm still singing an I even danced last weekend. I thought I gave up on the parenting dream years ago. My health is what it is; sometimes I feel okay, sometimes great, sometimes like crap.

Maybe the boxes represent giving up hope that I could continue to ride the metastatic breast cancer merry-go-round even longer than I already have. I confess that I feel my mortality even more so this past week than in recent months. Learning that I have new mets everywhere was daunting. There just aren't too many treatment options left to me.

Dr G says that one just has to live long enough for the next new thing to come along. That next new thing may likely be Afinitor, presuming the FDA approves its use in metastatic breast cancer.


(Pertuzumab is a different drug. You may have heard about Darlene Grant, the woman with mets who believes that pertuzumab could extend her life and appealed via YouTube for compassionate use. Pertuzumab is designed to treat HER2neu+ cancer. We'll see what the results of yesterday's biopsy show, but my cancer has been HER2neu- until now.)

** Today's update on Afinitor: Dr G's nurse says that he had the peer to peer review with my health insurance company and then asked her to contact Novartis, maker of Afinitor, for more information. Rik also faxed my application to Novartis for financial assistance in receiving Afinitor.