Dear Life,

Dear Life,
Please simmer down. I'm not talking insanely fun wedding planning. I'm talking surprise surgeries and other unexpected and unwelcome medical things.
Two weeks and one day out from my right implant removal surgery, and I feel pretty good. I am mostly (mostly) past the whole I-only-have-one-breast-for-my-wedding-thing, and have moved on to adapting to it and my prosthesis and new prosthesis bras and clothes. Which are amazing. There is a reason prosthetic breasts are about $300 a pop each. Because they look and feel real, and every day that I feel like I'm "faking it" with two boobs, I feel better about my appearance and therefore better about myself.
No matter how crazy it sounds (and unexpected it sounds), I think one of the main reasons I am dealing so well with only having one breast and not the other, for the first time ever, is because, for the first time ever (since my mastectomy in May), my pain is minimal. I still have the pain from the surgery. The pulling and tight feeling of the scar tissue healing. But already, I'm in a lot less pain NOW than when I had my implant. Even three months post surgery. And, frankly, at this point, I just want to be comfortable.
I say it time and time again: I haven't been comfortable since before my mastectomy in May. Chest pain, back pain, pain driving, pain sleeping, pain moving, pain opening doors, pain sneezing, pain carrying purses. With the expander it was like I had a rock in my chest. Constant pulling, tugging, stretching and spasms. The right implant, though made of silicone and not "rock," didn't prove to be much better. (Hence it ripping my skin from tightness).
At this point in the game, I'm less concerned with how many breasts I have, and more concerned with moving and living comfortably. And maybe, just maybe, I can do that now, for the next six months, until I begin reconstruction again.
Today marks the two-month countdown til the wedding and I am entering a new "zone." This is the Marjie-pampering zone. This means I am going to be, besides the wedding planning and puppy craziness, taking care of ME. Scheduling manis and pedis, massages and facials, teeth whitening, hitting the gym more often, and other things that help me take care of me. I want to feel good about me, even if that means putting a little more mascara on my eyelashes to cover what I don't have on my chest. I still feel beautiful, and for the most part I still feel whole, even without a breast. The little part of me that doesn't feel whole yet is the part of me that has to convince myself that I AM whole. That I am still me, 100 percent, despite what body parts I do or do not have. The prosthesis is wonderful, and they make wonderful clothes for women like me. But at the end of the day I take them off, and what isn't there isn't there, no matter how much I try to pull it and twist it like taffy. Does that upset me? Yes. But moreso, it challenges me. It challenges me to see ME in a different way. It's a challenge I never imagined, in a million years, I'd have to embark on, especially just months before my wedding. So that's the part that needs filling. The part of my brain that's not quite sold yet on how I look.
And also the part of me that has to convince myself that all this is OK - that I'm a different type of bride but that's OK. I always, no matter how hard I try not to, compare myself to other brides. I know it isn't fair that I've had to deal with breast cancer on top of four surgeries on top of a Li Fraumeni Syndrome diagnosis on top of planning my wedding, working full time and living full time. A bride should be planning her wedding and that's it. But I know life doesn't stop just because you think it should. Things happen no matter what's going on in life. It just sucks that I've had ALL this to deal with, one thing after another, WHILE I'm supposed to be enjoying this very valuable moment in my life. But I HAVE been enjoying it. I didn't ask for this challenge, and I didn't ask to be a special bride. But as Popeye says, "I yam what I yam."
And my two engagement parties, three bridal showers, bachelorette weekend, and upcoming two aufrufs are going to be proof enough that none of this interferes - or even TOUCHES - the magic that is this pre-wedding phase. And I have to believe it won't come near the wedding itself either.
So life, please simmer down. Just a little. Let me focus on these next few weeks and weekends, which are booked up to the wedding. And let me focus on me and my puppy and Sean. And let me be in the zone I want to be in.
As I write this, I ask myself: "Why am I asking Life's permission? Why am I addressing Life?" After all, it's me who's in charge. Two-month countdown and all the excitement and joy that comes with: GO!
{100th post on Pink and Pearls!}