I May Have Found the Antidote to Chemo's Side Effects

When I showed up for chemo this morning, I still had a slight headache from this weekend. I drank too much wine on Saturday, yes (enough that our group landed at a Waffle House at one in the morning to nosh on cheese-smothered hash browns; alas, they did not prevent our hangovers as much as we had hoped), but I also cried a lot and was sleep-deprived from the outset of the weekend. I had taken the redeye to North Carolina to watch one of my best friends, Leslie, get married. As it turns out, I cannot recover from overnight flights or red wine like I used to.

There is nothing like a weekend of indulgence in fried chicken and pulled pork nachos and staying up too late (and maybe one shot of bourbon) to set you up for a successful round of chemo. Ahem.

I should note: this is a fairly rare thing for me, to drink excessively anymore. I know it's not recommended. I know moderation is what's best for staving off breast cancer (although I'm honestly not sure if they've studied it for cases of advanced disease like mine). I know my liver is doing lots of work as it is. I know, I know, I know. These reasons are why I am typically a one-glass-with-dinner-once-in-awhile type of girl. But it was a wedding.

I had a dear friend's marriage and a clean scan to celebrate. And then I had chemo this morning. Next week I might be on a juice cleanse, no joke.

I've mentioned before how wonderful my friends are. The wedding this weekend was between one of my friends who'd cut off her hair for me and a man she met while working in Jordan. Leslie and Bill are the type of people who make you want to be a better person, and I don't say that lightly. They have devoted their lives to helping others and to service in a way I can't say of too many people. Their collective resume (which I'm sure they don't have, but if they did) includes the AmeriCorps, U.S. Agency for International Development, the Army, nursing school, jumping out of airplanes, traveling the world, and just generally making it a better, safer, healthier place to live.

Leslie and her new husband are downright incredible people, so I shouldn't have been surprised at the gesture they made at their wedding, the gift they gave me and so many others. I had already been crying at the mother/son and father/daughter dances because let's face it. I am a sap.

And then Leslie announced that in lieu of gifts, they'd asked for guests to donate to a couple of charities close to their hearts, and that they would also be making contributions to The Special Operations Warrior Foundation and Play for Pink, which donates 100% of its funds to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. I knew they'd been planning this, and it still caught me off-guard, still had me bawling into my napkin and hoping the wedding photographer wasn't getting that particular moment on camera. I'm not exaggerating when I say my friends (and family, too) are helping to save my life.

My heart is so filled with love after this weekend that it will be the thing that gets me through the chemo side effects this week. It will be my antidote. And then I'll do that juice cleanse.