Chemo Brain!

Thursday, February 2nd.

What is Chemo Brain?
According to the American Cancer Society, Chemo Brain is:
- Forgetting things that they usually have no trouble recalling (memory lapses)
- Trouble concentrating (they can’t focus on what they’re doing, have a short attention span, may “space out”)
- Trouble remembering details like names, dates, and sometimes larger events
- Taking longer to finish things (disorganized, slower thinking and processing)
- Trouble remembering common words (unable to find the right words to finish a sentence)

So here are a few things that happened today:
- I went to the Mail Room to buy some movie tickets, and I couldn't for the life of me remember my Employee ID - the same one I've had for 8 years at the company.
- While leaving work, I went down to my motorcycle in the garage as usual, but this time I put my shoes (with special orthodics), new coat, and company iPad in a different saddlebag compartment than normal, and left for home. When I got home and opened the usual compartment, guess what - all these items were missing! My immediate response was to panic. I called Russell at work and confessed that I had left the iPad, shoes, and coat on the back of my motorcycle and could he go down to the garage and check if it fell off. Well he not only checked there, but walked about 1/2 mile down to Jamboree to check if it had fallen off! He called me with the sad news that alas, they were not there, nor were they in the company Lost and Found.

As I'm really dependent upon my orthodics, I immediately went to Runner's High and purchased another pair, all the way lamenting on the loss of my precious iPad, my ECCO shoes, and my new coat that Jenae bought me. Well, about 1 block from home, I had a flash of what I had really done, and was overjoyed to find all my stuff in the "other" saddlebag.

So after apologizing profusely to Russell, I realized that I was ready to take some time off work. This just confirms what MANY of my friends and co-workers have been advising me to do. Rather than trying to cope with the stress of undergoing therapy and continually trying to keep up at work, I think it's fair for both me and my job to take Leave of Absence.

I honestly don't know how I'm going to cope with all of the free time I will have, but I'm definitely going to start with creating a "Bucket List" and checking off all I can. I am anxious to see what God has in store for me over the next few months.

As always, I'll keep y'all posted.