Erica (to Seth): "It hurts when I do this..." Seth: "So don't do that!"

Ah, technology. I have this insane love/hate relationship with it. First I'll speak of the love. Over the past 50 years, some really, really smart people came up with a way to detect my cancer, which is the size of pea, in my breast without cutting me open. Then, they found out how to detect the speed of growth, the medication it responds to, and how to remove it. I even had some sort of radioactive kryptonite injected into my tender, tender breast so that it would "light up" my sentinel lymph nodes. Kind of cool, but very painful. Today, when I saw the surgeon he gave me enough percentages to make my head spin, but dammit, I felt better afterwards. The good news is that I have a 9% chance that the tumor has spread beyond the 1st lymph node and because of that, I won't have to have another surgery. I was a little disappointed that I won't get to experience that wonderful anesthesia again, but very relieved that one more step was eliminated. Now, don't be surprised if that news changes, because these doctors can be real tricksters from time to time. So, as of right now, I am planning on radiation and chemotherapy. I say let's get the party started.

Now onto the "hate" part of the scenario. Technology, more specifically the world wide web, can be amazing, but it can also be very dangerous. Some of you may have heard of of the Internet, but if not, you can basically type anything into a little box and get tons of information. This is great if you are comparing prices of office shredders or looking for the cheapest flight to Vegas, but not so great when you have a health issue. Without fail, every single time I start researching on the Internet, I walk away scared shitless. It might not hit me right away, but one tidbit of information will re-surface in my brain when I least expect it. Like at 3am when I can't sleep or when I'm having a perfectly lovely evening with Seth. Now, don't get me wrong, there are some amazing breast cancer survivor stories, but for some reason, I only remember the bad ones. Even if I read 30 survivor stories, all good, and read one story about a breast cancer tumor metastasizing to the brain... yep, you guessed it. Am a masochist? Why do I keep reading this stuff?

That said, I vow to each and every one of you that I will not type "breast cancer" into the little box ever again. I will only type things like "Vegas, Thunder Down Under, Cheap tix" from this point forward.

We leave for Mexico tomorrow morning. I promise to bring back some sunshine and warm breezes!

xo
Erica