Things come in threes, right?!? I wasn’t planning to share about this just yet, but it seems like the right time. 💝

I feel like maybe Life & the Universe has been preparing me my whole life to be strong for this moment. I found out on Thursday, July 26, that I have breast cancer (invasive lobular carcinoma), very small, hopefully easy to treat. I don’t know anything more than that at the moment, but I’m feeling optimistic and scared, nervous and confident. It’s a strange time in my head.

Last year when my sister was terminally ill, she and my stepmother tricked out their backyard patio into a lovely place to lounge and read and visit. I decided that I also wanted my backyard to be an oasis of charm and comfort, and so we spent some time and money this year, getting that done. Now I feel thrilled that I have that in place already for the upcoming months! (Before it gets cold again.) I have a feeling you’ll be able to find me out there many evenings and weekends in the near future.

As I am with most things, I’m planning to be pretty transparent about my experience. I don’t think anything or anyone benefits from keeping things in the shadows. I think community works best when we’re sharing our lives and our struggles. It’s easy to want to just share our best selves, curated for perfection on social media, but that’s not real life. I try to live authentically, trusting that this will help me give and get the best support to and from other people.

Until I get more information about what’s happening and what my treatment plan will be, I can’t actually answer questions with anything other than “I don’t know.” I will see my breast surgeon on Monday, the 6th of August, and will hopefully get some answers, but for now, I really don’t know.

My own personal treatment plan is to be as compassionate as possible toward my body and my mental health. I haven’t been great in my life about showing compassion to myself, but I’ll be working on that now. I’m not a huge fan of the term “fighting cancer,” as I don’t want to fight my body, but I will be working as hard as I can on healing myself. I will keep you updated.

I’m moving forward with strength!

💖 💕 💝

Updated to add: I firmly believe I will be okay, and this will be over sometime soon-ish, with me still here, living a beautiful life. And I really do have a beautiful life! I wasn’t very clear about that. Just nervous about what lies in between now and then!

I just got news last night that Kevin Kerr, my first real long-term relationship, first real love, passed away from pancreatic cancer on July 13th. We were in touch off and on over the years, though sparsely, but I’m so glad to have those emails and texts to look back on. I was happy to see he was still drumming his whole life. Rock on Kevin! You’ll be missed in this life.