Day 477: Post-Cancer Exercise Modifications (And Other Life Lessons, Because I Can)

Now that I’m more than a year “cancer-free,” I often find myself questioning the purpose of this blog. Is it to leave my children a reminder of who their mother was if this shit comes back to haunt me and I don’t make it? Is it a platform for ranting? Is it just an excuse for me to write somewhat creatively every once in a while? Is it to tell something of my absurd little story so that some other young woman going through similar things doesn’t have to search the internet in vain for advice?

On the off-chance that the answer is anything approaching the latter, I’ve decided to do my own completely un-scientific, not based on any knowledge of sports medicine, list of modifications for working out during and after breast cancer treatment. You are supposed to stay active to save your life, lower the risk of recurrence, etc. etc. For those of us who were extremely active BEFORE finding out we had breast cancer, we might be somewhat skeptical of this. This doesn’t mean we won’t continue to exercise, even manically, under the assumption that we are doing what we can with what we’ve got to fight something no one really understands. It just means we wonder sometimes.

Before I got pregnant with Augie, and hell, during most of the pregnancy itself, I exercised for about three hours most days. That was partly because I was annoyed at how hard it was to lose weight after Lenny was born (out of whack hormones, related to breast cancer, perhaps?), and it was partly because I was frustrated at being unable to get pregnant for a while (again, with the hormone imbalance). I figured, if I’m not going to get pregnant, I’m going to get skinny, damnit. But mostly it was because I learned years ago that if I don’t get a lot of exercise, I can’t sleep. And when you are a chronic insomniac because your body is begging you to move move move! all the time, it gets tiring, literally and figuratively. Exercising compulsively is good for me; hell, it probably saved my marriage. When people remark on how Gabe must be really understanding because I get up super early all the time to work out and he is in charge of getting the kids up, I think on the one hand, well, they’re his kids too, and on the other I think, you have no idea. If I go early enough, the entire family hardly knows I'm gone. Besides, Gabe is all about me exercising. If I get four or five hours of sleep a night, I’m actually fun to be around. He’s my biggest workout supporter.

So I exercised like a nut for years and got breast cancer anyway. I don’t know that exercise will do anything to save me from cancer, but it doesn’t matter, because I like to do it anyway. Besides, I have a lot of very small clothes in my closets (yes, I use up a lot of the closet real estate in our house) and I don’t want to get new ones. Anyway, I continued to exercise to the extent that I could after two surgeries, and during and after chemo and radiation. I started new routines, took up new activities. My co-workers who saw me waddling into the gym 8 months pregnant saw me slowly walking into the gym when I was straight-up bald and going through chemo fatigue just a little over a year later.

Though I kept at it, I got frustrated by what I couldn’t do, and truth be told I am still frustrated. My left pec still hurts, making chest exercises difficult. My breast hurts as well, 14 months post-surgeries. I have an insane amount of scar tissue, and today I left the gym early because my boob was just killing me beneath the scar and I didn’t think it would be advisable to sit there holding myself in pain in the co-ed class. Mostly, I still have issues with the extension of my left arm. I can extend it all the way above my head when my hand is empty. However, I cannot easily bear weight on that arm when it’s extended, either with free weights or the weight of my own body. Doing this leads to chronic and sometimes scary pain in my pec, breast, and arm. I’m half-convinced that overdoing it with my arm and chest is part of what led to that awful mastitis I had over the winter, though the docs all said that's not true.

So I’ve learned a few things through trial and error, and though those things are specific to me, I’ve decided to share in case anyone finds them useful. I will insert a caveat though: If you have had breast cancer and you try these things and you injure yourself, don’t blame me. I’m a business economist, not a personal trainer, so listening to me is probably not that advisable. I’m just a really opinionated business economist, so here goes Katy’s list of “if you have breast cancer and would like to exercise, but you can’t do this, do this other thing instead:”

Can’t do:

1. Push-ups. Do planks instead. You might be weaker in the chest, but somewhere underneath it all you will get a core of steel. (I like to eat, so there won’t be any 6-pack on this body anytime soon, but I know those muscles under there are strong!) I have accepted that I might never be able to do push-ups. This is ok—it’s not a necessary condition for a happy life, after all. The main issue in a classroom setting is to not distract anyone else by standing or lying on your back, bringing attention to the fact that you are being a smart-ass and not doing push-ups. So plank it as long as you can hold it.

2. Overhead tricep extensions: Easiest modification of them all: just do kickbacks instead. Same benefit, much less pain.

3. Lat pull-downs: do these straight in front of your chest rather than with arms overhead. This works different muscles, but it still works. You are not sitting there with your sorry ass on the couch, so go ahead. Today the gym intern made a general comment, knowingly directed at me, while we were doing this: “Make sure your arms are ALL THE WAY OVER YOUR HEAD.” The gym manager glanced over at me quickly. I gave her a reassuring look. No need to bring breast cancer into this 22 year old girl’s state of consciousness; I can take the criticism in stride. Now in general, I have finally graduated to being able to do normal lat pull-downs overhead, but I have to use smaller weights or a tube with less resistance. Today my breast hurt, so I just modified and held my arms straight out. Follow your instincts.

4. Squats/lunges with weights for strength: When I first told my gym instructor that I had cancer, she said she would work with me on modifications. She said, some things you won’t be able to do, but other things you’ll always be able to do, like lunges. This is true. Breast cancer does not affect your legs (unless chemo makes you too weak or gives you extreme neuropathy or spreads to the bone, of course). My issue was that I always held two 10 pound weights for extra strength. Post-breast cancer, until very recently, I could not hold the weight straight down at my left side without hurting my arm. So I used ten pounds on the right, five on the left for a while, and totally destroyed my back due to the imbalance. Then, for months I used a lighter (12 pound) medicine ball instead, holding it right out by my belly so my arms were bent. That way I got the benefit of the weight-bearing exercise but I didn’t wreck my arm. I have recently graduated to using weights again, albeit 8-pounders.

5. Rows: Here the modification depends on your injury. If my general chest/breast issue was the problem, I would just do something else entirely, like crunches. If my chest was feeling ok but the arm was giving me trouble, I’d do the row, but with less weight/resistance, and alternate. Today I can usually do them normally.

6. Chest-flys: This is just not advisable soon after surgery. Your breast will feel like it’s on fire. It ain’t worth it. If your class is doing this while lying on the ground or a ball, do regular chest presses but with lighter weights than usual. If that still hurts, sit on the ball, or kneel on the ground (again, try to be less distracting to folks) and do hammer curls instead. I always default to planks or bicep exercises when I can’t do something else. All is not lost; you will at least have those Michelle Obama arms going on. (Here’s a shout out to my husband, one of the few men in America who really likes and cares about women’s arms. I live with comments like “Damn your arms are looking hot baby!” Is this normal?)

7. Side planks: Again, not very advisable on the affected side. If you’re up to it, do the plank on that side on your forearm (I always do side planks on my forearms, not extended arms—these are really hard for me on either side, cancer or no) but rest your weight on your knees rather than extending your legs out and up. You will still work your obliques. If that doesn’t work, do a regular plank.

8. V-ups: Don’t do it. This is just kind of unnecessary if you ask me.

9. Shoulder raises: do these exercises—I think it actually really helps with range of motion after lymph nodes are removed. Just use tiny weights if it’s close to post-surgery. Or don’t use any weights at all—the motion of moving your arms straight ahead or straight to the sides is good for you. If anyone looks at you weird because you’re doing a side raise with invisible weights, just give them that death stare with your big eyes that look scary underneath that bald head. That’s what I did, and believe me, it works.

10. Dead lifts: This seems obvious, but if it hurts your affected arm too much to hold your arms "dead," just bend at the elbows and hold the weight by your chest. You will still work your hamstrings and stabilizers.

11. General weight-bearing exercises or arm exercises: If your arm bugs you, use less weight. This is common sense; don’t do what I did and use the same, higher weight on the “good” side because you think you have something to prove. You will get strong muscles on that side and then your back and shoulders will kill you. So use less on both sides. This is not a contest.

12. Running: I have no advice here. I hate running. I even had trouble walking right after surgery because any motion or bounce was excruciating in my breast, though I’m small-breasted. I still took long walks every day, however, and suffered through it. Sometimes that’s the best advice, I suppose. Just suffer. It won’t last forever, probably, or at least theoretically.

13. Swimming: don’t listen to me, listen to your doctor and his or her advice on getting wounds wet, contracting germs, etc. I stopped swimming and doing water aerobics during the latter half of chemo and for all of radiation (it was forbidden during radiation). And no, I didn’t get fat.

14. Pilates or yoga: do these, especially during chemo and radiation. Now those who know me know I hate yoga. I need to be doing something faster or else I get bored, so I did pilates several times a week during treatment. The point is, your joints will hurt at different points during chemo, and your skin will feel tight and painful during radiation. You will be crazy tired, not tired even—fatigued in a way you didn’t know was possible. The overall body work and stretching with pilates and yoga will help. Trust me. If you need to bow out of certain exercises or poses, do it. Just pick a studio or class where people aren’t judgmental jerks and you’ll be fine.

15. Lifting heavy things: don’t be an idiot. If the heavy thing is not your child about to be hit by a bus, it probably doesn’t need to be lifted by you while you’re still recovering. Not today, maybe not ever. Just flirt with some guy and he’ll do it for you.

16. Getting out of bed: hey, if you can’t do it, you can’t do it. Your muscles won’t atrophy in a day. Let your husband/mom/neighbor/friend/cousin take care of the kids or the chores, and get up tomorrow, or later tonight. Watch some stupid shit on tv. You have cancer. You don’t have to follow the normal rules.

Wow, it felt kind of good to get all that down. This makes me think that I should write down some other general-life breast cancer modifications:

• Underwire bras: Just chuck them. I was the lingerie queen, the girl who wore matching lace bras and panties when I was 14. Breast cancer put the kabosh on all that. Wear soft-cup bras, or nursing bras even. Don’t wear one at all if you don’t have to, but I would say that the more your boob hurts, the more support and compression you actually need, even if it sounds illogical. I know this bra advice doesn’t work for women with mastectomies. Sorry—I didn’t have one, so I have no clue and won’t pretend that I do. My boobs are basically the same size and shape, which makes me think that the large amount of tissue that was removed on the left was just replaced by scar tissue and firmness from radiation. So I can wear cute bras now, but no underwire.

• Food and nutrition: When the kind nutrition specialist meets with you during chemo, listen politely and then laugh when she walks out the door. When all of your well-meaning friends tell you what you should eat to maintain energy, smile and nod. Your job is to eat whatever the hell you can so that your weight doesn’t get too low and your body can safely absorb the poison. If that means you eat only pudding, or you eat weird things like Frosted Flakes and fresh spinach (my chemo dinner of champions), so be it. When I got down to 110 pounds after my first round of chemo, from 117, and everyone worried about me, I listened to them tell me I needed to ingest more calories, that I needed to eat more than fruit and rice. I secretly thought, screw you. I have CANCER. I’m doing CHEMO. I’m not going to starve to death; eating is the least of my problems. I will eat what I can stomach and worry about the right diet later. Your body helps you with this process. I actually craved goat cheese and spinach all the time on chemo. These things are mild and have protein and if you eat them, you will be fine. Your body isn’t stupid. Whenever I complain about the little pooch I have on my stomach, Gabe first scoffs and asks what the hell I’m talking about. Then he says women are supposed to have some softness, that’s supposed to be there, if you have nothing what would protect you from famine? (Can you tell this line of argument comes from a guy who was often hungry as a kid?) At 110 pounds, I went back to that thought. I said well shit, here it is. This is my chemo famine. My body will protect me. And it did. I got weaker, but not too weak. I made it through.

• Sex: do this as often as you want, as vigorously as you can, if and when you are able. If you are in the nadir portion of chemo, you might want to abstain for a few days, lest you get motion sickness from the act itself (don’t laugh, ya’ll know that happened to me). If you go through early menopause due to chemo or surgery, use silicone-based lube. All the other stuff just doesn’t compare, and no one will tell you this. If you don’t have an understanding partner, dump him or her. It is that person’s job to modify and figure out what works for you so you can enjoy sex again. If you are lucky like me and you completely come out of menopause to be a woman with monthly (if irregular) cycles and a surprisingly high sex drive, say hallelujah and have fun! When doctors and friends tell you that sexual problems are the least of your concerns, that at least your husband still wants you, or some other bullshit, realize that at that moment in time, those people are assholes. Maybe not all the time, but right then, they just suck. It’s important—don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Nothing—not having cancer, not weaning my son, not being bald, not mentally preparing my own memorial service—made me feel as old and depressed as the sexual changes I went through from chemo-induced menopause. The fact that I came out of it is something that I revel in every day, or at least every other day, depending on how tired Gabe and I are that week.

• Parenting: don’t try to be superwoman, or the parent who protects her child from all things cancer-related, or the one who is saintly in the face of tragedy. Don’t be a martyr. No matter what you do, you will never protect your kids from knowing you have cancer, or from knowing that cancer is very very bad. So just be the parent you were before, to the extent that it’s possible. If you didn’t do crafts with your kids before cancer, by God don’t start doing them now. Your kids will really think you’re dying (at least that’s what mine would think). Modify your expectations of yourself and what you can do as a parent on a daily, or even momentary, basis. I received so much conflicting advice about what to tell Lenny; no one could have suggested that I just tell her the whole thing, kit and caboodle, in the middle of dinner, starting with, are you wondering why the phone is always ringing? No one could have predicted our collective relief when it was out in the open. Similarly, no one could have prepared me for the moment when my hand was shaking too much to feed Augie his lunch last July. I was utterly shocked that I couldn’t do it. But shit, the child needed to eat. So I put my elbow on the highchair tray, steadied that arm with the other hand, and fed him. He’s a crazy little bruiser now, so no harm, no foul. All I'm saying is, if luck is in your corner you will live a while after this, at which point all the other things are but minor considerations that your kids will one day forgive.

• Moods: Do not expect to keep everything together all the time. Cancer taught me to carry Kleenex in my purse. If my body wasn’t too bone-dry on chemo to physically cry, I just wept all the time, for months. It was like an alien being had invaded my stoic little body. This might manifest differently for you. You might feel angry, or hollow, or manic, or terrified, and all these things might come out of nowhere. Don’t begrudge yourself this new aspect of your personality. The rest is still in there, but you just got buried under some massive bullshit and you need some different tools to find your way out. So again, cut yourself some slack.

• Hair: Let it go. Literally. Being bald isn’t that bad. If you do decide to wear a wig or a scarf, make it a point to learn to study your face. You will see it with more clarity when there’s no hair to distract you.

• Friends: keep some. It’s important. Maybe they’re old friends you haven’t seen in years, maybe there are only a few you can really count on when the shit hits the fan, maybe there’s only one person who still treats you the same. It doesn’t matter, just keep those folks close.

• Ridiculously insensitive or just plain weird comments: Let them slide. People are clueless in general. When it comes to something like cancer, especially if a young person has cancer, the whole of the world seems to take leave of its senses. You must modify your reactions to these people, mostly by acting as if they are not even there. “Hell no, you’re bald!” “All of my aunts died from breast cancer.” “Your head isn't shaped funny, at least.” “You look great! I wish I could lose weight that fast!” “You have breast cancer? Your boobs look nice. And symmetrical.” “Oh. That must run in your family.” I mean seriously. If you have to physically shut your own mouth to stop that witty reply from coming out, do it. Unless that reply is my personal favorite, in which case I give you permission to respond to a compliment on your looks with “Thanks, but I don’t have cancer of the face.” It’s great to still feel beautiful while going through this crap, but as the last picture here attests (taken a few days after my first surgery), breast cancer is one hell of an ugly disease.

And finally, don’t modify too much. You have cancer, or you are recovering from cancer and its treatment. You’re not dead, not yet, at least. Keep exercising, eating, sleeping, hanging out with your kids, talking, having sex, working, bitching in cyberspace, all to the extent that you can for as long as you can. If nothing else, you’ll get some of that weight of the world off of your chest. Even if said chest is bruised, or scarred, or burned, or tattooed, or lopsided, you can get some of that weight off just by being yourself. That’s why I’m glad I’m not a Pollyannish, sunshiny, cheerleader type now that I’m supposedly recovered from cancer. If that were the case, cancer would’ve won. People would say, where in the world is Katy Jacob? Right here, son. Now shut up and stop asking me questions!