I woke up in the bedroom at 3:30 in the morning dreaming of a green pizza covered in pumpkin seeds. I do not often dream in color but this was very green. Now my name is Carolyn and I have breast cancer. The bedroom that I share with my little dog Amy is much closer to the bathroom and if you hear anything one hears it all the time. "Drink as much fluid as possible. Keep those kidneys flushed." Kidneys are those things that look in the drawings like lima beans. I need to share how lucky I am and I need to share with you how it began. Or how I learned of its beginning. Last summer I had a standard mammagram at Specialty Hospital in Johnson City, Tenn. The radiologist thought there might be a change but he was not sure. He suggested I wait six months and see if there was change. I agreed. I did mutter that my insurance only paid for one a year and he said that they knew how to write around that. Bea Ellis -- who had breast cancer, just this week returned from deep sea diving, teaches water aerobics at Freedom Hall pool in Johnson City -- said I was lucky. If it had been fast growing I might have had a real problem. I did make a mistake. Patricia Danzer, my acupunturist of New Paradigms, fussed when she heard. She could have been using Chinese herbs. Today her Culing or Chinese Culin keep my stomach calm. I take a whole bottle of the little red pills before I eat. Step back with me please. On January 17th my sister Maude’s ashes were buried closed to our father’s heart at Salem Black River Cemetery in S.C. Known as Old Brick Church the stones are the family pages of history. When my sister died, I stepped up a generation and became the older sibling. My sister Maude had been so musical but through falls and stress the music had gone out of her life. I would like to hope that perhaps some of my words can make musical sounds. When I was six, my stepmother asked if I wanted to take music. If I did I had to promise to practice. I must not have made the promise because I never had music lessons. I never really learned to dance either which is another story but what I am trying I think to write is that the music had gone out of my life and my heart was hurting. On the 9th of January, my little dog Amy was so sick and I was over at the vets sobbing away. "I just buried my sister, please do not let me bury my best friend." Amy is, as I write, lying on the couch watching what I am up to. Patricia of New Paradigms had been after me to go to a chiropractor. I had never in all my life been to one. However my luck was holding because I left the vets and went to 807 E Jackson Blvd where the sign read "Petersen Family Chiropractic Walk ins welcome." Howard Petersen, just out of school and a twin who used to be a musician, is top of the line. Every bit of advice I have gotten has been excellent. He and his wife will circle you in their hands and pray for you and I wish to state right here that every healing prayer I can get I am taking. As a matter of fact, at nine this morning I was in the chiropractic office. The X-rays taken on February 9 showed that my COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disorder) diagnosis was partly because the top of my rib cage was so rigid that it could not move. Later on, when I told my primary care doctor that I had been to a chiropractic doctor who had helped me and who might be able to help him, I discovered that my doctor would rather hurt than change. He suggested that the x-rays were not mine. I was there when they were posted. I do still go to this doctor just to keep him updated. After all, he is of the old school who used to make house calls and I owe him something for the calls he made on Christmas day when the children were sick. I also owe him for the fact that when my husband came in with Pancreatic cancer he got him the best care available. Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease is a big way for saying you can’t breathe freely. The Pulmonary Rehabilitation program located in Johnson City gave me all sorts of tests and seemed awed that I only had 20% breathing ability. My exercise tests revealed a heart problem. I wore all the monitors. Four of them blew their head gaskets. The hospital blamed the batteries. They reattached me to all those little suction cups but within a very few days I was referred to Dr Shaba who is a leading cardiologisist. At her office I was filled with stuff that I am sure glowed in my veins and once again told to run the treadmill. Suddenly they began to yell: Use your inhalent! It was in my bag, on the floor. It was a new one and no one knew how to get it open. I survived and she put me on a calcium blocker. Diltiazem CD 120 MG one a day. Please do not call her up and tell her that I do not use it. It is like having a door on top of you. I cannot move. On March 1, I went to Speciality Hospital at ten for my mammogram. Dr. Glynd Ramsey was the radiologist. She thought she saw change but assured me that she would talk to the other doctors and call me by Friday, please have the name of a surgeon when she called. I suggested to her that I knew professionally she could not criticize my choice but, if she had problems, to suggest to me: Have you thought of Doctor ... and I would pick up on this. Friday came. Dr. Ramsey did not call. Monday I went back to the hospital to discover that she had been ill on Friday but that she was trying to get in touch with me. The doctors all agreed that there had been change. I suggested Dr. Paul Thur de Koos and she came close to a giggle. She had trained under him. An appointment was made for March 16th. Get there 15 minutes early and bring the film and the meds. On the 21st I was to report to outpatient medical center for pre-admission testing. On March 22 I left with my college roommate and her husband for Coker College in Hartsville, S. C. It was our 50th class reunion and some things just have to wait. But it was a joy that Charles did the driving even if it was in his huge sort of 3-person truck. I had lived on the campus at Coker until I was six and my roommate Cassandra had lived in the town. I would still recommend Coker to anyone and if you apply for admission, mention my name because this should save you $100. Coker’s new Fine Arts building is built on top of what was "Patchwood," the cottage. The rose arbor is still on the outside. Roses have somehow been a part of my life. I do not grow them and I feel that the thorns go out of their way to grab me. However, my father proposed to mother while she was playing "A Wild Irish Rose." My wedding silver was International Wild Rose and my crystal was Heisey Rose. Daddy used to sing a song: If thy grief overcome thee 'ere the winter's gloom, God will thrust it from thee when the roses bloom. Coker wined and dined us all. It is funny because the campus and the drawing room are so much smaller now that I am bigger. Charles drove back to Jonesborough Tennessee, Saturday night. We got lost in Asheville when we took the wrong turn off. By the time they got into my driveway, they decided to drive home to Sevierville. We were all tired and bent out of shape. On the 26th, I reported to the outpatient surgery by 8:30 for x-rays and the preop placement of the needle. Dr. Ramsey did this. Picture after picture is taken. You stand there, twisted and distorted while they are developed and more are taken. The pain on a scale of 0-10 was once about a 4, for just a few seconds. When I was finally decompressed and put into a wheel chair, being careful not to touch the metal probes that are sticking out of my right breast, I asked my daughter Cassandra who was outside of the door: Cassandra, if this was you, what would you have done? She answered: I'd have talked it over with my friends, the same thing you are doing. Until that time she had been giving me the patient's rights of: You have the right to refuse any treatment you do not want. The lumpectomony was done. The cancer was about the size of half of my little fingernail. It was 100% estrogen positive and was a tumor grade one, in stage 2. It was located almost in the center of my chest. Many women have cancers closer to their armpit. On April I am back in Dr. Thur de Koos office. He suggested that I try the worst case scenario: That I visualize myself as totally well. I laughed. If my bad knees (they are not bad, they just hurt), my breathing problems, my rhumatoid arthritis were gone, I would not know who I was. There would be a new creation. Let me tell you, I am working toward it.

I had gone back to Doctor Petersen because, after the surgery on the 26th, I was so sore I could hardly move. Every part of me hurt. I had also twisted myself by trying to get away from my right breast. When Dr. Ramsey was putting in probes they were saying: Don’t look, don’t look. (If I had looked, I would have changed position of the probe but I took them at their word and still had not looked.) Dr. Petersen made the pain go away. He also suggested that he thought I might have an allergy to the mixture of the anesthesia and to tell the doctor this before the next surgery set up for April 4. I would also like to say that it was he who suggested that I go on an alkaline diet. He gave me a copy of the alkaline foods. This explains why I wake up dreaming of eating green pizza. On Wednesday April 4, I was filling out forms again at short stay surgery. (We have learned to zero the forms, leaving off the date and just hand in a prefilled-in form.) At 2:30, I am talking to Dr. Joseph R Brown and James Laursen. Dr. Brown was confronted with me and my daughter Cassandra, and my daughter Diana who is an attorney, and he looked at us and asked: Where is the cop? We answered: Susan is in N.C. She tracks medicare fraud for the Department of Insurance. Now Nurse Cassandra had said: Mama everyone has pain after anesthesia. But Dr. Brown and James Lausen listened and changed the mixture. I stayed under longer but there was no general body pain. I went in to have a sentine l node biosopy and removal. I had been told that if the sentinel node showed signs of cancer that the lymph nodes under my right arm would be stripped. This would also mean that the left arm should never again have a blood pressure cuff put on it or any shot of any kind given. I have seen many women with huge arms filled with fluid and I confess to you that I was frightened. I was also told that, if it is just the sentinel node, you will be out for about 40 minutes. If the chicken fat nodes are stripped, it will be about three hours. I came to and looked at the clock. It had been three hours. I figured that I had had it. The nurse came by and said: The sentinel node is clear.” It was not, but that is what they thought at the time. Some pathologist working overtime found one spot of cancer right in the middle of the node. It was like a ballpoint pen prick. I learned this from Dr. Thur de Koos on April 9. He had already called and set up an appointment for April 18th with Dr. Tabor in Ornocology. Dr Taber had given our family the very best of care possible when my husband Richter had pancreatic cancer in 1996, and I knew that he would never use a treatment just to use a treatment. He is a moralist, he sings and he is Jewish. I write all of this because when I went to McLeod Blood Clinic on the 18th, they put me in Dr. Lamb's room. Now I know Dr. Lamb and he knows me. I suggested to him that I was not going to have chemo from an ornocologist who did not sing. He did not sing. He looked a little sad and said: Well I wear ties like he wears. I said: It is a lovely tie. I got moved. The clinic's attitude was: Oh well it is only nine, first mistake of the day. Dr. Taber immediately takes five vials of blood from the right arm. The arm that it would have been impossible to take blood from if I had had all the nodes stripped and then throws me a curve ball by announcing that he, his wife and his three children were leaving this area for North Alabama on the first of June. Of course I could drive to Alabama but I want to be home. So he assigned me to Dr. Tom Johnson. I was bounced back to Dr. Thur de Koos on Friday 20. I would like to write here that from the first day, he has been encouraging one to do anything one wants to do. To swim, to stay active. The first time he said that, I came home and fired up the riding mower to find out if I had enough upper body strength to mow. I did. Today is May 31. My grandfather, Eugene Whitfield Dabbs, died on this day in 1933. Yesterday was the anniversary date of the death of my father, James McBride Dabbs. He died in 1970. Tuesday of this week the 29th was an awful day. I met Dr. Tom Johnson live and in person for the first time. He informed me that everything that had been done to date was incorrect. He plans to change the chemo, do it more often. He promises that I will lose my hair. He tells me to take no vitamin C and no antioxidant. To stop taking the Tamoxifen. He wants me to have additional surgery and have the lymph nodes of my right arm stripped. He also sets up treatment during the time that I thought I was in Scotland and Wales. Dr. Taber had said earlier: Certainly we can work the treatment around Scotland. I tell Dr. Johnson that I refuse to have my right armpit knifed. Would he do this to his mother? Yes he would. Well I am not your mother. I take 2 grams of Vitamin C a day. He says: So do I but I do not have breast cancer. They set me up for some sort of heart scan that I will get today to see if my heart is strong enough to stand what he has in mind. Somehow I feel that my heart will let me down on this one and I will be rewired this coming Wednesday. I left the office with Cassandra my daughter who had been there and went downstairs and got into the car. I shut the door. I wished I was dead. I figured that was a little negative and drove off to Don Garcia’s for coffee. He took one look at my face and poured in the coffee, the sugar, the chocolate, the cinnimon and the cream. I stopped by Sally’s to pick up a rent check. She is 86. She is a survivor of breast cancer. She had the check ready. I went to the hairdresser's to get my hair cut just as short as possible. Richard was in Missisippi. I will go back today. Three of the women in there are cancer survivors and are working away. A long time friend Bob Lilly bought me a root beer float from the ice cream parlor. I went to Cassandra’s for supper. We had hotdogs. She is trying to read and figure out what the new chemo will do. I go home. I have trouble sleeping. Yesterday I went to water aerobics and then to the funeral of a friend. Howard was buried at Mountain Home, the Veterans Administration cemetery in Johnson City. There is something nice about a small town. I know where my primary care doctor lives, out on Hunters Lake. I got to his house and helped him carry in the groceries. He put on the coffee, got orange juice and peanuts, and we went out on the porch and listened to the wind and the birds. He asked me to call Dr. Lamb, that Lamb would return my call after hours and I could ask him about procedures. I have not done that yet. Oh yes. I called Dr. Thur De Koos' nurse assistant to find out if the double port I had placed in my left shoulder had metal in it. She answered: Some do and some don't, did I have to have an MRI? I said not yet, but try to assess the records and find out, that I could understand that while Thur De Koos was in surgery he might not stop to read the warranty but I needed to know. She said that it would probably take a couple of days. I said: Thank you, do it. Dr. Peterson had said that with deep heat therapy he could improve my breathing but I had to have no metal. I asked Dr. Johnson if he was familiar with this and did he have any problems with it. He answered that he had no problems but he felt that chiropractors should stick to bones and that all one had to do to breathe was to keep breathing. You know, at the moment I think how fortunate he is that I did not kick him in the balls and make an attempt to strangle him at the same time. Hostility, anger and fear are not good emotions but sometimes there is a great deal to be said for a burst of cortisol.

"My Wild Irish Rose,/ The sweetest flower that grows,/ You may search everywhere,/ But none can compare/ With my wild Irish Rose...." -- Chauncey Olcott

"The power of Mars sitting with Pluto for the next few weeks is tremendous and can manifest both tremendous evil and tremendous good. The challenge is in harnessing that power and directing it. There are many tricks and strategies, perspectives and ideas for doing this.... There is a dimension of human nature that remains dormant most of our lives and most of the time which, when activated, mobilizes resources and powers we didn't even know we had and hurls them at a specific intention or goal. Certainly this includes activating actions in service of desire, but is also much greater than that as it mobilizes energies and abilities from the deepest and most powerful layers of the self, something which can only be done when the unconscious and the deep psyche is fully engaged as well.... One of the key things in activating this level of Will is getting your ego, or little self, out of the way. Therefore, for most people, activating this level of WILL is not something you can do by merely wishing it into play, as it is usually the ego that is doing the wishing. But it is something that tends to be activated for some people far more often under planetary patterns such as Mars-Pluto." -- Intersections in Time by Chris Hedlund, Cosmic Telegram Newsletter