The day after chemo.
The day after chemo, I’m swollen. The fluids from the past four days lodged in my pores, having nowhere to go but limbs, belly, and face. I look and feel filled out, maybe like I once did before losing 40 pounds to lack of hunger. Clothes don’t fit, and I’m peeing, peeing, all day and night peeing out the drugs. It feels thicker than normal pee and requires closing the lid and flushing twice so as not to splash the poison where it could harm others. No “if it’s yellow, let it mellow” rules apply.
The day after chemo, I’m numb. My feet and hands are off-line, the subtlest touch feeling like I’m covered in wax paper. The sensation disturbs my movement. I have to move slowly and shouldn’t play with anything sharp, an essential note for living in a body with few platelets.
The day after chemo, my mouth tastes foul. Like licking a dirty stop sign, metal, and grease, a dirtiness that toothpaste cannot touch. The inside of my mouth is chewed on from pent-up anxiety that plays out while I sleep. I know, I know - wear that mouthguard I paid so much for but, ugh, that somehow makes it worse. I chain-suck Jolly Ranchers. Slack-jawed, I air out my mouth like an old blanket on a line, hoping a bit of sunshine will do it some good.
The day after chemo, my eyes turn black. This is how I know I’ve become part of the poison I’m given. A small piece of the light that bursts from my eyes fades away. I wish I knew where it went. Only time returns me to the hazel-eyed woman I am. It scares me, so the day after chemo, I keep the lights off in any room with mirrors. This isn’t me anyway, only the me that is metabolizing chemicals. The first time this happened I shared with a friend that I felt a little of my soul had left my body. “Maybe that part needs to go off and find something it needs to bring back to you.” If I catch a frightening glimpse of that darkness, I think of this for comfort.
The day after chemo, my ears never stop ringing. Tinnitus has become part of living within me, a part I hope will fade as the disease does. The quiet is the loudest part of my day, a sharp, high-pitched squeal set on repeat bouncing around my brain, out my ears. It never quiets - the best I can do is forget it’s there or have sound around me to drown it out. I sleep with a fan, and I hum out loud to myself. I listen to podcasts as I walk around the house or ride in the car (on the days after chemo, I don’t drive). Never is the sharp ringing worse than on day one, an omnipresent, tin-like pitch bringing me back to hearing test day in elementary.
The day after chemo, closing my eyes, I’m shown visions. Abstract greens and blues, outlines of the scenery I’m living in. If I look across at Evan sitting on the couch, I can close my eyes and see the shapes silhouetted in my mind, painted in bright colors. It’s psychedelic and strange, distracting and consuming. Even a blink puts me into a Mary Poppins sidewalk chalk wonderland. It may be the best and worst of the day after as I can dance in the colors but struggle to read and move around the world.
The day after chemo, I force myself to eat. The lack of hunger is still the most strange sensation of the cancer experience. The feeling goes so far beyond not being hungry, and it’s a physical repulsion to the idea of food combined with a total transformation of what food tastes like. After 18 months, I’ve learned that only the boldest tastes break through my dull buds - kombucha, kimchi, lemon desserts, and blue cheese. Knowing I need strength, I eat whatever I can and, even better, if it’s happy-for-my-inner-kid foods like mac ‘n cheese and strawberry ice cream cones.
The day after chemo, I have no bones. Do you know that bit in Harry Potter where Gilderoy tries to repair Harry’s arm and instead removes all his bones? That floppy-ass arm is what my whole body feels like. I have to hype myself up to walk to the bathroom to thick-pee as all my muscles are telling me nope. Nu-uh. Better if you stay put. Cool cool cool, I’ll just hang out here with my psychedelic visions out of my black eyes, all swollen with a gross-tasting mouth listening to the shrieking noise coming from inside my head. *sigh*
I often stay still and try to remind myself on loop that THIS CHEMO IS SAVING MY LIFE. There is no good math and no precedent I’m aware of for my flavor of lymphoma where someone goes into full remission three times as I have - and I have this chemo to thank. Plus, this is just the day after. I’ll get stronger. My eyes will lighten up, and the swelling will go down.
The day after chemo is a practice in impermanence.
The day after chemo, I get to practice this. And I’m better for it.
