Virtually reconnecting

Under normal circumstances, Andrea and I would be in Toronto this weekend to attend the fourth PodCamp Toronto (PCTO2010), a social media “unconference”. It’s one of two annual events we make a point of being a part of at which we reconnect with longtime social media friends, make new ones and get exposed to new ideas about connecting and engaging with people online.

These are not normal circumstances.

Andrea underwent her fourth chemo treatment yesterday. That’s right! We’re two-thirds through her chemo program. By the way, she’s doing amazingly well. Throughout most of this process, Andrea has exercised, walked, skated, baked, cooked and even organized our house. I thank my lucky stars each day that she’s doing so well.

It’s difficult for us that we can’t be with our friends or our daughters this weekend. We really need this time to recover from chemo, rest and take care of ourselves. At the same time, it’s nice that the PCTO speaking sessions and panels are all live streamed on the Internet. Andrea and I have been watching the sessions and even participating by exchanging Twitter messages with our friends at the conference.

Something that’s particularly special is our friend Daniele Rossi has been running around collecting good wishes for Andrea and posting them online under the name JustOneMoreVibe (I love it!). It’s really nice to hear our friends’ voices even if we can’t be there with them.

If only we could virtually be at the social events, too.



Mark is primary support, cheerleader and project manager of Andrea's recovery. You can read more from Mark here and on Mark's real blog, MarkBlevis.com.

Difficult Decisions

Being decisive is hard, especially when new information causes you to constantly revisit, rethink and even reverse your decisions. That’s par for the course when you’re dealing with something like cancer-related surgery.

We’ve had our audio recorders running during a good chunk of our journey. This includes conversations and telephone calls as we considered which of either a lumpectomy or bilateral mastectomy was the best course of action.

It was interesting distilling three hours of recorded conversations to this 10 minute story, and particularly surprising to think this process dates back three months already (this audio was recorded leading up to Andrea’s first surgery, October 26, 2009).

CREDITS

• Opening theme prepared by John Meadows
• Closing song, Session, by the Robert Farrell Band
• Phone message from Henry Winkler (learn more about this message here)

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We’ve had our audio recorders running during a good chunk of our journey. You can hear more audio collages here.