The Only Route I Ran This Week

The Only Route I Ran This Week

🌼 Date: Wednesday, February 11, 2026 – Tuesday, February 17, 2026

⚡ Energy: Running on fumes, sarcasm, and stubborn survival.

😞 Status: Post-chemo crash. Body in revolt. Mouth staging a full protest. Legs currently identified as “Lipsky.”

🔮 Outlook: This is the ugly middle of healing — but it’s still healing. One wobbly step at a time.

I used to run bus routes.

This week?
The only route I ran was Bed → Couch → Bathroom → Couch → Bed.

No traffic. No passengers. No detours.
Just survival mode.

Nearly two weeks out from my last chemo infusion, and this final round absolutely kicked my ass. I had nothing left in the tank. If you saw me during this stretch, consider yourself special — it means you entered my extremely exclusive living room bubble.

I overheard someone say, “It must be nice to have five months off work.”

Oh.
Oh, honey.

Yes. Because cracked lips, mouth sores, dizziness, bone pain, and something called “chemo brain” are exactly how I prefer to spend my vacation time.

I won’t throw anyone under the bus.
But I will say this: nobody signs up for poison to get PTO.

There is nothing glamorous about this part. No inspirational music playing in the background. No slow-motion warrior walk. Just me, shuffling like a Victorian ghost through my house.

Speaking of shuffling…

In my quest to watch approximately everything on Netflix (a girl still needs goals), we stumbled across Poldark. There’s a character in there with knee problems they refer to as “Lipsky legs.”

Well friends, I now have Lipsky legs.

Between the dizziness and the complete lack of energy, my legs are not exactly dependable. They are more “suggestion” than structure. I stand up and we all just kind of hope for the best.

And then there’s my mouth.

The first week after chemo always brings mouth sores. This time? We did a greatest hits remix.

• Severely chapped lips
• Corners of my mouth cracked so I can’t open wide
• The inside of my cheeks and roof of my mouth feel like sandpaper with bonus texture
• Large bumps on the side of my tongue that I try not to bite
• New surprise feature: sores under my tongue so lifting it to form words feels like an Olympic event

Now pair that with chemo brain — where the word you’re looking for simply evaporates mid-sentence — and what you get is me sounding like I’m buffering in real life.

It’s humbling.

It’s frustrating.

It’s isolating.

And it is absolutely not a vacation.

This week wasn’t about bravery or bell ringing or milestone moments.
It was about endurance. It was about letting my body fall apart quietly so it can (hopefully) rebuild.

Sometimes healing looks like productivity.
Sometimes healing looks like pajamas all day.

This was a pajama week.

But here’s the thing — even when it feels like nothing is happening, something is. My body is recalibrating. Repairing. Trying to remember what “normal” feels like.

The world got very small this week.

And surviving that small world?
That was enough.

💗 Tina –

One Badass Day at a Time