My neck and shoulders have been cold for weeks now. I started chemo for breast cancer on Dec. 1, and had 8 weeks of a pretty powerful 2x chemo cocktail. Then I had two weeks off and I stared a lesser mix, an herbal beverage known as Taxol, made from the yew tree. That sh*t will kill you if you just plain drink it, but this is infused (like a fine botanical tea) right into my port (easy access for blood draws and chemo infusions on my chest), so mostly I just sit in a comfy chair and drink my smoothie and let the magic flow into my veins.
Is chemo fun? No. Is it terrible? It’s not great, but the alternative is a high risk of metastatic cancer after the fact, so I chose to go with a proactive chemo to kill any leftover bits that survived the surgery and the radiation. So far, I don’t love it and I don’t hate it. I was chatting with a friend on Threads the other day about sexual assault vs cancer, and frankly, cancer is easier. In case you’re keeping score.
Regardless, my shoulders and neck are cold because all my dang hair fell out. This means I am smooth enough to skid down a mountain with no drag. I could pass for a young person, if you don’t look at my tired face. I still have eyebrows, but my eyelashes are crisp and sparse. My tears fall out of my eyes because there are no eyelashes to stop them. And my nose hairs are gone so I have a steady runny nose. Such fun.
Why do I mention it at all? Who wants to hear about this? No one, I’m sure, but here we are. Well. along the lines of writing what you know, I was writing my last draft of Silence, the novel forthcoming this fall about my Puritan foremother named Silence. In the novel, she is punished for questioning God in the Separatist meetinghouse, and punished for blasphemy. And so they cut off her hair as part of her punishment. And when I first wrote about this, it was all just sort of de rigueur. Yeah, they cut her hair off. The draft was done and it was in editing, then copyediting, but BEFORE it went off to the ARC print and proofing, I added a bit more atmosphere.
Because if my neck and shoulders are cold, so were hers. I learned something new about myself and about my MC (main character). My long hair, what I have been used to since I last cut off my hair in, uh, 2012 (flapper-style, for my Doris Diaries series)? All gone. I couldn’t bear the idea of long strands falling in the shower drain. So I got it cut short, then shaved, so I could donate the long hair to Locks of Love before it fell out, and I sat around with a short Mohawk/skullett for a few weeks until the rest of it fell out. Cold neck. Cold ears. Cold shoulders, too.
I wear a hat all the time now. It’s winter at 2500 feet. It will be snowing this week. My neck feels frigid. I sleep in a cap as well, but sometimes it falls off in my sleep. I awoke to my Muse, Ophelia, licking my scalp one night. It felt like the gentlest rough loving from my companion cat. If you ever have the chance to feel that kind of love, you’ll know what I mean.
Anyhoo. The head is bald. I look like Dopey without his hat. Lauren says I’m rocking the hot lesbian Sinead (RIP) look from the 90s. Not sure that’s true. It’s hard to feel hot when you’re — cold. (Heh.) I have the Gollum look going on. But I am slowly, slowly, starting to not hate it? And thinking I might keep it super short for a while? Despite loving my long hair (see banner above the posts), I might try out being a badass for a while. What is life but a grand experiment anyway? WTF not?
This is me. <squirm>
Good to see you here! Cold head and shoulders/no hair. Way to edit "lived experience" into Silence!
I think no (/short) hair looks good on you! And it went to a good cause, too. Hope you're doing (relatively) well.