Never Look Back

I titled this blog entry, never look back, and then proceeded to look back. I second guessed every decision I've made regarding my health, from the time I was diagnosed with node positive melanoma. I decided to delete the futile look back but keep the photos I picked from amongst my numerous recent ones of my garden.

I should mention that part of what's ridiculous about my looking back is that I am lucky as all get out to be N.E.D., as in no evidence of disease. It would be more understandable for me to second guess myself or my doctor if I was actively fighting a recurrence but all I'm fighting is a string of mess which may or may not relate to my groin lymph node dissection. Also, since my sentinel node was positive for metastatic melanoma, it's particularly silly that I fixate on the fact that some articles suggest the SNB and LND are not as clear with patients who have a very deep primary because their melanoma is as likely to have spread to distant sites as it is to spread to the lymph node basin. The point is, my melanoma did spread to a lymph node and hasn't spread anywhere else as evidenced by my latest scan.

I ended up coming back and adding the gist of what I deleted because without this addition, it ends up sounding like I'm second guessing and looking back because of something big, bad and ugly, and that's not it. I guess like a lot of people, I want it all. I want everything to be the way it was before . . . I feel guilty for being like that. I am all too aware of how lucky I am. It's not that anything particularly different is going on today which makes me keep coming back to my blog if only to write some more and delete some more. I'm a little discouraged that my energy has been decreasing lately but that's probably temporary. Could be something as simple as the heat.

It's humorous how many pictures I'm taking of my garden because I am afraid everything with wilt, shrivel up, and become compost. Although it's hot as all get out and we aren't getting much rain, it's not like I'm going to suddenly end up with a barren desert.As a matter of fact, a major storm just landed in my garden. Well, maybe not in my garden alone, but the boomers are booming and the water is pouring down. I can almost hear my flowers saying, thank you, thank you, thank you.
The good thing about letting nature take its course, for the most part, is most of my plants are pretty adapted to drought at this point. I still find myself holding my breath when I go outside for fear the lantana or other plants I love will be casualties. So far so good. I may have a jumbled mess but the color and variety is holding strong.