Feeling better

This is the building where I work... It will give my former coworkers
plenty of Deja vu.

Monday I went to my local Gilda's House for a program called Look
Good, Feel Better.

It's taught by a salon owner, and participants get a bag full of
makeup, skincare products, and EYEBROWS. Can you tell why I went?

I quickly noticed it was something of Old Ladyville. But I think
people my age were AT WORK -where I probably should have been, if you
ask my checkbook.

But I consulted my rapidly vanishing eyebrows, and off I went.

I was ok except when we went around the table to introduce ourselves.
We had the option to share whatever we wanted about our diagnosis,
chemo, etc. I found my hands clenched tightly together under the
table and a huge knot in my stomach. Just to say that I had been
diagnosed right before Christmas, and was in the middle of chemo. It's
not something I usually have to SAY, given email/ texting/ etc.

I was feeling a smidge lucky by the time it was my turn, since
everyone else seemed to be having quite a bit more chemo than I'm
going to. :::knock on wood:::

I basically learned that my skin will be wildly unpredictable for the
next year or two, and if I do the wrong thing my face could just come
right off. Really. This woman sitting off to my left washed her face
and a whole layer of skin came off. Say it with me: gaaaaaag.

So we practiced all sorts of makeup tricks to help us feel better
about the face looking back at us from a mirror, which is something
that has been bugging me... I don't look like ME anymore; the wig is
pretty and fools people until I wiggle it because it's too tight. But
it's not MY hair and I don't look like "me", especially bald.

(I have been coping with that by taking frequent self portraits with
my phone and posting them to Facebook and/or sending them to a friend
and saying in not so many words "I still look ok right ?". So thank
you to anyone who's seen some or all of them and kindly restrained
from saying "enough with the pictures already!" You know who you are.

I did like some of the tricks our group leader showed us with
eyeshadow, and especially how to dot on eyebrows (!) and blend them
with a clean mascara brush so they're not so obviously fake. (!!!!)

This week at work I am proofing some material about gardens and
greenhouses and it's SO NICE not to be reading medical/ EMT/ nursing
stuff. It seems karma has a little fun with me; we have a number of
those texts roll through our department.

Next week, of course, I get another hand grenade lobbed into my
system, so I'm going to suck it up and watch the first season of Mad
Men, all of the seasons of the Office, and whatever the heck else I
can watch with only one eye open. Then it will be three done, one to
go. Bitches. ;-)