Hello again!!

I am understandably quite upset that I still have no internet and therefore have very few opportunities to document my life for the masses. And, as is to be expected, I have volumes to document. Not really, but enough for at least a couple paragraphs.

Not much has happened medically since I last updated. In fact, nothing at all has happened medically since I last updated. I am still going strong with the blood I received last week, and I will find out tomorrow if my other counts have gone up. I am hoping they have. A whole lot has happened, however, in terms of my readjusting to society. I had been absent from a college environment for almost nine months. In those almost nine months, I went to two parties with people my own age (one was a disappointing Super Bowl party), I went to two concerts, and the only young adults I saw on a consistent basis were also cancer survivors. My experiences have been drastically different from most other people my age, although they were not necessarily any better or worse. Breaking up with your boyfriend is no less important than whatever I went through; it is just completely different.

The thing is, since my past nine months have been so abnormal, I have grown in a different direction than most people around me. I knew I would be changed when I got back to school, but it is difficult for me to objectively analyze the magnitude and the mental effects of having had cancer, since it happened to me and is still happening, really. Someone said to me the other day, "You're really weird." I was like, "What, I'm weird?" I don't think that person meant weird in the sense of being nutty and kind of out there (which I have always been), but more in the sense that I am somehow different now and that person couldn't really define why. I think basically what it comes down to is that I no longer have a tolerance for all the facades many people assume. Also, I have become much more blunt with what I say, which is both good and bad. I am doing a terrible job of explaining this, but again, it's because I can't verbalize what happened to me.

I got cancer; I left school; I survived (am surviving) chemotherapy; I have experienced really obscure types of pain; I have been more exhausted than I thought possible; I was in a hospital room for probably at least one-third to one-half of that time. Somehow, I found the strength to get through it all when I thought I had used up most of my reserves of strength when I survived high school (no, really. High school was so difficult for me). Now here I am, back in Boston, so happy to once again be living normally and with people. Clearly, I am changed, but I can't say exactly how. All I know is that I feel out of place at parties where cheap beer flows like water, drunk freshman girls are looking for attention, and drunk older guys are looking for the shortest skirt and the lowest shirt. That may be harsh, but that's the sort of thing I can not and will not deal with anymore. I have only been back in Boston just over two weeks, so it is going to be interesting to see how the rest of the semester progresses. Will I re-adapt to the college social norm? I sincerely hope not. But something's gotta give somewhere.

Oh, the other thing is that someone tells me at least once a day that they like my haircut and I look really good with short hair. To which I laugh and say thank you. But it's a pretty sweet boost. Anyway, take care, and feel free to e-mail me (cbridges86@gmail.com) or comment if you have any insight into the ridiculous life of Caroline. Enjoy Wednesday. Peace.