Thankfully the transplant and aftermath went well. It took a
couple of weeks to feel better physically. Emotionally it took longer. Even
more hair fell out. I thought I looked bald before. Now I wished I had the few
strands of hair I had back in June. I refused to go to bed without wearing a
knitted cap. I looked like something out of Dickens rather than Victoria’s
Secret. As well as my bald head, all the hair on my body had pretty much fallen
out too, including the hair from my legs, arms, underarms, pubic area and most
of my eyebrows. I hated looking in the mirror at the victim looking back and my
body language spoke volumes. So out of respect for my recuperation, my mental
state and probably my strange night time attire, Alex didn’t touch me. I didn’t
worry about it. To be honest I was glad.
By the end of
August, six weeks after my transplant, except for the stubborn baldness and
lack of full eyebrows, you wouldn’t know I had ever been sick. I had a complete
turnaround physically. I felt absolutely fine. I was eating well and putting on
weight. I no longer had rocks in my gut. With no symptoms and no procedures
scheduled, my stress was greatly reduced. I wanted sex again. Alex was happy to
comply and it resumed to the level it was before I found out I was sick. Alex
and I equally initiated lovemaking with a simple nod towards the bedroom.
It is amazing how
a physical change can affect your mental status. Instead of being continually
horrified at my hair loss, I began to love that I didn’t have to shave my legs
or wax my underarms. My whole body was sleek and shiny like an Olympic
swimmer’s. I even came around to the idea that the loss of my pubic hair was
sexy, then very sexy. It was an amusing anecdote to our congress, an added
talking point if nothing else, like a sex toy with no batteries. My confidence
grew. I didn’t care if my knitted hat fell off in the throes of passion. It
never fazed Alex at all, maybe Dickens turned him on. I don’t know. But it
helped my confidence even more.
It could have
been because I was incredibly appreciative of a second chance at life, that my
body had a new appreciation of sex. By September it was performing better than
ever. My orgasms arrived faster and became more intense than they had ever
been. Sex had gone from non-existent to fabulous. Alex started taking more note
of TV ads about Viagra, joking that he might not always be able to keep up with
me. I had the key to the secret garden. I had been given the gift of a new
level of pleasure and I wasn’t going to squander it.
Akin to the
overwhelming sense of peace dying people have as they walked toward the white
light, I suspected my heightened level of sexual satisfaction was a parting
gift from the universe. I might be dying but the BIG GIANT FOOT was at least
going to make sure I literally went out with a bang. It was a gift I accepted
wholeheartedly - with a wink and a nudge.
By November, we
had settled back into a normal pre-cancer routine of sex which looked like it
would stay with us, at least until the next crisis. It was warm and loving and
calm, fun and flirty and sexy like it had always been. I looked back over the
year and was amazed by how many different twists and turns our sex life had
taken. From the frenzy for sex, to the inability to have it, to the aversion to
it, to the craving for it, it had been a long battle of mind over body. With a
broken mind and diseased body I was never sure who the winner would be.
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