So after 4 months of “hanging out” at home, I went back to work today. It was a bit surreal. First of all, I couldn’t find my badge, I didn’t remember any of my passwords that I had to change 2x while out and none of my wires/headphones/chargers were close by. It felt like first day of school of severely disorganized 3rd grader.

I made it into the office with lots of phone/SMS cheers/FB wishes – thank you for the encouragement. While I think driving to the office and hanging out without napping is not worth celebrating or congratulating, it certainly was a milestone. It was also reassuring that not much has changed at work in 4 months, literally. Even though I had little blanks on some details, I realized I probably tried to push those as far away in my brain anyway – so they are just temporarily resting somewhere in my lobes to be awaken by giant roars, I am sure. (hint – cost allocation, revenue recognition/sharing – aggh).

On my way to work, I was thinking about December 1 a lot – how I told my 2 pm and 3 pm calls that I will be right back as I have to run to a quick MRI, how I Slack-apologized for missing the 5 pm call because I may be stuck there a few more hours – and then cautiously moving my Friday calls to Monday as I may have a weekend emergency. Phew – would you call me an optimist or in a complete denial? Neither really – just unaware how quickly life changes. Here I was today, a brain mass and 20 lbs lighter, a bit more radioactive, full of new perspective, ready to fight anything ahead of me – driving to work like everyone else on 400 in Atlanta traffic (with chia pudding breakfast in bag – bet you not like everyone on 400!).

Big thanks to my awesome (not sucking up) boss for making my 4 months off so easy, yet making me feeling not forgotten – and the lunches, texts and coffees that came with it. First workday was fun, intellectually different/challenging than my past 160 days combined and my brain was focused on something “new”. I was grateful my close friend brain was there, even though lighter – still present and ready to kick it. No, I didn’t overdo it, Mum.

So this is a throwback to my radiation playlist that kept me sane and a song that also came up in my conversation at work today 🙂

Look out ’cause here I come
And I’m marching on to the beat I drum
I’m not scared to be seen – I make no apologies, this is me