Crash Day

So yesterday I crashed. For those who have been through Chemotherapy you know what a ‘crash day’ is for those who don’t let me explain. A ‘crash day’ is when you are so weak you have trouble walking, making coherent sentences, completing a thought, and you completely lose control of your emotions. It’s a day when you can’t sleep but you’re too tired to keep your eyes open. A day when you can either be starving and eat continuously or have no appetite at all. During these days your short term memory is null and void even if you write things down you forget them. People talk to you and you watch their lips move so you can try and follow their conversations but it doesn’t always help and there are long awkward moments where you are not responding just staring at them as you try and processing their words. Imagine you are an artist and you are about to paint a beautiful landscape. You are talking to someone, carrying on a conversation as you set up your easel, pick up a thin delicate brush and gently dip it in the paint. You start by painting the trunk of a tree with long smooth strokes but then your hand lays down the brush, dips your fingers in the paint and begins to finger paint on the canvas. You stare at your hand thinking to yourself, “Who’s doing that? Wait, that’s kind of interesting.” Then your emotions start screaming at your hand, “Stop it! What the heck are you doing?” and you begin to cry. The whole time you are trying to listen to whoever is talking to you so you stop and try to focus on their face hoping your brain will not think about the messy canvas. As the conversation is continuing you get distracted because your emotions are in the background saying, “The canvas is ruined, there’s paint on the floor, and look at you hand!” Then you forget what the other person is saying as you look down at your hand to see what your emotions are talking about. All of the above occurs in the span of seconds. This is what it’s like on ‘crash day’. But the good news is the ‘crash days’ are getting fewer and farther between. Yesterday was the first in 2 ½ weeks all the other days I was feeling and thinking normally. I LOVE NORMAL!