Previously on The Murder of Ted…
After reuniting with the Crazy Townsfolk and sharing my first book signing with Mama Bear, I was beginning to feel a little more like myself. But Ted wasn’t finished causing trouble. An unexpected trip back to LW’s resulted in draining Dead Ted’s Lake and starting antibiotics. With the medications behind me, my brain fog began to lift, my energy returned, and I even managed to decorate for Halloween.
This Week: This week, the clues we’ve been following lead to news we weren’t hoping to find. Between tears, prayers, and family time, the mission may be changing, but we’re not giving up. And as Season One comes to a close, one thing is becoming clear: Ted hasn’t won the whole story.
Thank you for joining me on this unexpected, uncozy adventure.
The Murder of Ted
A Series of Unfortunate Events, an Uncozy Adventure
Chapter 20: The Enemy Within
Season One Finale
Every sleuth knows that just when you think you’ve solved the case, the rules can change.
Some adventures are fun. Some are memorable. And then there are the adventures you wish you could return for a refund.
Unfortunately, this one fell into the last category.
After last week’s aspiration, Ted was throwing up. I didn’t love cleaning up after him, but I did love that it was him this time instead of me. He would stop, swell up, open back up, and sink back into my breast. He did a sick little dance, still trying to evade capture.
It was finally time for another PET scan, and I was becoming increasingly concerned about my hip. The pain had been getting worse every day. I was having to slow down when I walked, and things that had once been easy were becoming more challenging. I tried not to jump to conclusions. I would push those dangerous thoughts out as soon as I had them, but they would continue to circle back to me.
The book signing was fun and gave me a taste of real life again. I hadn’t seen some of my friends in weeks, Rena being one of them, so after the scan, I met up with her for coffee.
We talked about the scan, my hip pain, and all sorts of other things. Of course, we eventually got around to our readers and the fun things we could do together. We even started tossing around ideas for a YouTube channel. Oh, the ways we could have a blast! Of course, we don’t have enough projects already, so naturally starting a YouTube/podcast was nothing. I had already decided that The Murder of Ted would become a podcast, but doing something with Rena sounded like even more fun.
We imagined what we could create, and for a little while, I forgot I had cancer. Planning the future with Ted around my ankle was a healthy aspiration. We said our goodbyes; I was exhausted, and I wanted to get home and look at the disc the tech supplied me. I have seen enough images to know what to look for.
My son had set up an old computer that I’m pretty sure a hamster was its power source because the medical community lives in the dark ages and still hands out CD-ROMs for imaging. Have you ever heard of a thumb drive or the cloud? I guess not. I powered up the little hamster, talked nice to it, and patiently waited a very long time for it to come to life and load the images. I wasn’t quite as bad as dial-up days, but it wasn’t far from it.
When I looked at the images, Ted’s ugly compound still showed sizeable activity, but to the untrained eye it looked like my chest wall was safe. My lymph nodes still shone as well. But hey, the breast stage right was dark! I scanned farther down the body, and there it was, a glowing Lego hand. My right hip had been compromised. My worst fears began to come true. Ted had built another fortress. He had crossed the line we hoped so badly he would not.
I turned to my husband and said, “It’s in my hip.” I started to cry.
My husband frantically tried to get the official report to load so we could confirm our suspicions, but the site was down. We tried every browser the computer had, trying to see if the report was in.
I knew what I was looking at, bones don’t glow, but hoped against hope I was wrong. Finally, my husband got the report to download. I scanned it for those terrible words, and there they were: “abnormal activity in the right iliac wing concerning for bony metastasis.”
There are moments when you know your life is about to change, but you still hold on to that tiny bit of hope that maybe, just maybe, you’ve misunderstood. Ted had crossed the line to permanent threat. He had outsmarted us and would forever be a permanent resident. You see, when you get a stage 4 mTNBC diagnosis, there is no cure, no way to get rid of him. This disease is so advanced researchers still do not know what to do with it.
I can’t say I was entirely surprised. The pain had been increasing for weeks, and I had been hoping it was simply my previous spine issues flaring up during treatment.
My husband and I held each other and cried. We sat in silence for a long while. There was no clever detective work, no humor to lighten the moment, and no way to pretend this was just another bump in the road. We were now facing a much more serious situation, and the prognosis and survival chances were frighteningly bleak.
It was one of those moments when the enormity of what you’re facing finally catches up with you. How could this happen? I fought so hard.
I shared the news with my round table friends and updated my family. Almost immediately, the prayers, messages, and encouragement began pouring in.
I am continually amazed by how many people are willing to stop what they’re doing and lift someone else up in prayer. I may not always have the words to respond to everyone, but please know how much it means.
We had a choice to make. We could spend every waking moment dwelling on the bad news, or we could acknowledge how bleak the road looked and still leave room for hope.
We chose hope. There was nothing we could do until we met with LW six agonizingly long days later.
Since it was Halloween season, we decided Ted wasn’t going to have all the fun. He may have won this round, but the battle isn’t over yet!
We had a pumpkin-carving party and a caramel apple bar with the family. There were pumpkins to decorate, apples to dip, and memories to make. My husband carved a pumpkin that looked like a skull, but when you look closer, it was two people holding hands over a graveyard. I chose the picture because it felt like what we were facing, and it was romantic. He is my true love.
My son chose a cat butthole, so there’s something to change the mood!
We laughed, cried, and ate good food. It was so much fun; we are doing gingerbread houses in December.
Cancer wasn’t getting an invitation to run the holiday. Ted might be causing trouble, but he wasn’t going to get to cancel everything else.
We headed back to LW’s to regroup and get a new plan. I had hoped to see more of my cancer-table friends while I was there, but so many had already returned home. I sure missed seeing everyone.
When I walked in, LW stood up, and I could see the emotion on his face. He looked as though he wanted to cry. He opened his arms and hugged me tightly for a couple of minutes. LW told me he was very unhappy with my results. In fact, he said I was the first patient in his history to respond this way. Ted had “exploded in me.”
Triple-negative breast cancer is notorious for resisting treatment and adapting. I suspect that’s exactly what Ted did after we saw that 25 percent reduction. It wasn’t long before he began growing again.
Rather than simply throwing more of the same treatment at him, LW referred me to a radiation oncologist. He wanted the hip radiated quickly and hoped they would also be willing to radiate the breast, as well. We desperately need to get ahead of Ted.
I started to cry when he asked if I was willing to go back to the State Agency to see what else they could offer. I told him that, with the way they treated me, I had a better chance at doing nothing and living my days out with Ted.
He was quick to scold me, saying, “No! You keep your head in the game. I know you can beat this. We may need their help. I need you to put on your business hat, take whatever they say to you and get what you can out of them.”
I told him I could do it.
He wanted to remain involved in my care and planned to take my case to a major oncology conference the following week to ask other specialists about me.
It wasn’t the hopeful conversation we had wanted, but LW wasn’t giving up on me.
We didn’t have a complete plan yet. I might end up doing more treatment with LW, but we needed to see what the radiation team recommended before making a decision.
In the meantime, LW started me on chlorine dioxide and apricot seeds. An unconventional approach, but we had tried to throw everything but the kitchen sink at Ted.
So Ted, here comes the sink too!
Death by a thousand paper cuts wasn’t going to be enough. We need death by ten thousand paper cuts.
I get to add mad scientist to my list of the many hats I wear. Fitting for a true story turned fiction, I should say!
The part of the appointment that was perhaps the hardest to walk away from was that my prognosis wasn’t good. There wasn’t a lot more LW could do for me with the treatments we had already tried, and I was sent home to reflect on why I had cancer.
I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do with that. I had been reflecting for weeks, and I have grown as a human being both physically and spiritually throughout this.
Was I supposed to find an even deeper reason? Was there something I hadn’t figured out? Was this the Lord’s way of telling me it was time to let go of something?
I kept coming back to my author career. I had spent years working toward this dream. Writing books, building a readership, creating characters and stories that brought people a little happiness. But with everything looking so bleak, I couldn’t help wondering if God was telling me to give it up.
Was I supposed to stop chasing the dream and put my energy somewhere else? Maybe it wasn’t about me? Maybe someone else needed my help?
I didn’t have the answers to the mountain of questions, but I did know one thing: the Lord wasn’t finished with me. There was so much more work to do.
I needed to meet with my priest to help me sort through my thoughts, my faith, and everything that was happening.
While we were waiting to get in to see the radiation oncologist, I sent LW a message asking whether he would consider giving me a different chemotherapy while we waited. Ted was growing so quickly that I didn’t want to waste time. Ted had had 3 weeks of very little to attack him. There was another concern, too. There was a new area of redness near the existing breast tumor, and LW thought it might erupt again next to the current spot.
After hearing the news of Ted’s latest antics, my friend Rena had sent me a wonderful surprise: Wonder Woman cuffs and a crown. She said it was because I was Wonder Woman and Ted was still going down!
I had originally hoped to be a sewing pin cushion for Halloween. I had the idea and inspiration since that is exactly what I had become over the last four months. I was a human pin cushion. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the energy to pull it together.
Halloween night arrived, and I was looking at the Wonder Woman cuffs and crown when it hit me. That was the perfect costume! My daughter had a shiny blue superhero dance dress that worked beautifully. Everyone knew who I was.
I may not have felt much like Wonder Woman physically, but mentally, I was ready to keep fighting.
I wasn’t ready to give up on the holidays, the family fun, the laughter, or the things that made my life so blessed and beautiful all these years.
Maybe I couldn’t control what Ted was doing, but I could still decide how much of my life I was willing to hand over to him.
Ted had better watch out.
And with that, we come to the end of Season One of The Murder of Ted: A Series of Unfortunate Events and Uncozy Adventures.
When this adventure began, the mission was simple: find Ted, eliminate him, and get back to life as I knew it.
But sometimes the mystery doesn’t unfold the way you expect. Sometimes the clues lead somewhere you never wanted to go, and the original mission has to change.
We’re not giving him the satisfaction of taking over the whole story. We’re going after his strongholds, pushing him back, and doing everything we can to silence him.
Every mystery has a turning point, but not every turning point leads to freedom.
Ted may have reset our plans, but this mystery isn’t over yet.
Don’t go too far. The Murder of Ted will return next Friday with Season Two: The Silencing of Ted. Chapter 21: A New Hope
Until Next Season… Happy Halloween, everyone!
Stay tuned for the next episode: Season Two: The Silencing of Ted. Chapter 21: A New Hope
Intrested in more of my writing?
Start with Party Planning for Murder, Book One of the Taryn O’Kelly Mysteries, then follow Taryn through Frost and Foul Play, Cruises, Cocktails, and Corpses, and Sparks, S’mores, and Scandals.
And don’t forget, the antidote to the uncozy is a cozy mystery.
Until next chapter…
Happy reading.
As always, thanks for stopping by for some Salty Inspirations! -Michelle ❤️
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