“I Can Hear the Bells” - April 21, 2026
Hi breasties! The sun has been out longer than 45 seconds this week! Why does that feel vaguely illegal somehow…? TL;DR at the bottom.
Here’s a sentence I have waited to say when this started: I’m done with chemo! 20 doses across 16 infusions…we’re here, folks. We did it. There’s a part of me that keeps going back to October—I knew even then that future me would have a lot of reassurances for the me I was 6 months ago, I just had to live to see it. Chief among these reassurances are: Yes, you will survive in one piece (sans the murderous tits); yes, you will have the courage to leave the relationship you knew wasn’t working for you, and yes, you can deal with very very difficult things and not lose the parts of you that love, feel, think & care very deeply to the abject shitshow the last few months have been.
After making myself nuts trying to decide for weeks, I did ring the bell. My thinking was that there were a lot of people at the cancer center who know they will never ring the bell and the last thing I wanted to do was to remind someone of that on my way out. The nurses and my loved ones assured me that by and large, those patients are actually very happy to see it, and I should see it as a celebration of the team effort that went into getting here. So, I did and I threw in a few words of gratitude for good measure. I will miss the absolute hell out of hanging out with the nurses every week, but let’s not pretend I’m not going to have to be there every 4 weeks for the next (very long time) like a poltergeist running a tight schedule. I’m literally going to be the Phantom of the Davenport Center. The only difference is I show up and leave a trail of baked goods in my wake instead of murdering people. Sing to me, my angel of [chemo]…
I had an MRI on April 13 to see just how much cancer is left now that we’re done with chemo. When I initially spoke to the radiologist, they said it was gone by, like, 85%. That would have been massive news on its own. But when I got to my surgeon’s office on April 15, she opened the files and kept scrolling. And scrolling. Finally, she said “uh, I can’t find any cancer on this scan.” What the radiologist saw was a shadow or impression of where the main tumor was in my right beast. The cancer is GONE. 4 tumors and two satellite lesions… evaporated. That is genuinely miraculous. I had a very low shot at a “complete clinical response,” as this is called. People with the same type of cancer as me doing the same treatment sometimes don’t see any progress at all and here I am sporting a complete clinical response to chemo!!! My onco and surgeon are so happy. It’s absolutely wild.
Anyway, I asked my surgeon this question: “If I was your sister or best friend, what would you recommend I do?” Her answer was pretty simple: take everything off and don’t reconstruct. Not only does it take multiple surgeries over the span of years to get it right, but people nearly always have complications and healing issues, AND you can get a recurrence even in reconstructed breasts. With my poor wound healing and high recurrence risk…it’s a big steaming platter of “no thanks.” So, the type of double mastectomy I’m getting is with an “aesthetic flat closure.” Basically, the area your breasts used to be are sewn a certain way that even in a tight tank top, everything lays clean and flat. I’ve seen the end results on other people and…it’s beautiful, actually. My flat friends have told me that no one ever notices unless you mention and they don’t even think about it anymore past a certain point. Again, future me will look back at me right now and say, “they were right. You’ll be fine.” Just gotta get there and see.
The Great Teat Yeet of 2026 will take place on May 15. I had the option of doing it on the 22nd (my 31st birthday) but getting it done sooner rather than later is what’s mentally best for me. One week less to ruminate and make myself nuts about it. But the good news is that I should be going home the same day and recovery doesn’t seem as grueling as I thought (thanks largely to choosing not to reconstruct). It’s no walk in the park but it should not be hell either. That’s all I care about, lol. Of course I’m a stomach sleeper, though. Time to learn how to sleep on my (STUPID, PROBLEMATIC) back, I guess.
It is bewildering to think that we’re coming down the home stretch. Just a couple short months left until this is behind me. I once again will mention the gratitude I feel for the support and love in all its forms I’ve been so willingly given by so many. I truly have no idea what would have happened to me if I didn’t have some incredible people basically dragging me by the collar towards the finish line at times. Maybe some aspects of my life are fated to remain lightly cursed—and I’ve made my peace with that—but I’ve been disproportionately blessed with undeniable proof that angels don’t always have wings.
And all of that love is now returning to you and yours.
Caroline
TL;DR - I am now the least cancery cancer patient ever; we are DONE with chemo!!!; cntl + alt + deTeat May 15 and I’m going flatter than earth (lol); love you people so much!!