Remembrances of People I Love

I have a card (that a pastor from our old church in Navarre gave me) stuck to the door on the hutch to my desk.  (It actually is in a sleeve that you can stick to things.  The glue is pretty much worn out on the back of the sleeve, but I have it wedged in between the glass and wood of the hutch door.)  Of course, it is a bible verse (what else would Pastor Moritz have given me?).  It says, "Trust in Him at all times, ye people; pour out your heart before Him.  God is a refuge for us."  It comes from Psalm 62:8.  Under it it says "A reminder from Bob and Shirley Moritz".  It's been up there for probably 7 years.  When I am feeling tossed about and out of control, I find myself reading that and getting comfort. 

We never know how the things that we give to others might help them from one time to the  next.  I am not usually a keeper of 'things' but every once in a while I get a nugget like that one that feeds my soul and lifts my spirit. 

I also have a picture of my son, from when he was about 12, wedged into the other door to the hutch.  He has the largest, sweetest eyes and a precious grin on his face.  I love to look at that picture and remember when he was smaller and needed me in the way that only children need their moms.  He never went through the terrible teens.  He was always a quiet child as though he was thinking about things before he would ever speak.  Don't get me wrong...he wasn't perfect and he is making some of the usual mistakes in adulthood that I made but that's ok.  He has to learn from his own mistakes.  I know that I certainly learned from mine.  8-)

He wanted to come home and take care of me when I was first diagnosed but I had to explain to him that this was going to go on for months...there was no way he could come and stay that long.  I thought it was really sweet that he wanted to though.  He sends me a text message about every other day asking how I am.  He has a good heart. 

We had a psychologist tell us once that a child's brain isn't fully developed until it is 25.  I believe that to be true.  We have seen a great increase in maturity in our son this year.  He just turned 25 in August.

I have other things that I enjoy that people have given me as well.  Mom mom gives me the most unique gifts.  My house is filled with them but one in particular that I see everyday is a little turtle that states on the underside of its shell that it is from the Loose Neck Collection.  Here is a picture of it since there is no way I can explain it very clearly.  When you touch it's head, it wobbles around.  Very cute and colorful (like my Mom).

My sister gave me a gift of two girl statues (many years ago) and when you put them together, they are holding hands.  A representation of she and I.  (See Carol, I got the symbolism...lol)  She is the one whose hands are on the outside because she had to always be in charge.  8-)  I guess older sisters are just like that.  I look at these figurines and think of her often.

My son, mom, and sister are living in different states so I don't see them often and I like to have these little reminders of them sitting around where I can reflect on the way our lives have been woven together and apart over the years.  They are all little reminders that I am loved.  8-)

I have many gifts from my husband but the best one is his heart.  He continues to give daily with that gift.  I am truly thankful for all our years together.  There is no one in the world that I would rather have by my side with all the struggles that we are currently facing.

Starbuck's Habit

I told Tom not to get me Starbuck's Coffee this morning.  I've been getting Starbuck's every morning (during the work week) for over three years now.  It is a comfort food because it is flavorful and creamy and just plain old yummy.  I don't really need it though.  I have found in my life that I get into habits (some good and some bad) and I can always break them and move on.  Sometimes it is painful and sometimes it is just a redirecting of my thought processes.

Of course, he sends me an email saying how strange it was for him not to get me Starbuck's this morning.  (He's been doing that while I am going through Chemo treatments and working from home.)  He's not worried about me not having it so much as he is scared for the cat, he states, "If I find a cat, torn to shreds, with fur all over the house, I will know that I should have gotten you Starbucks this morning."  Funny guy.  I will have everyone know that the cat is currently sitting in front of the office window enjoying watching the birds.  I haven't laid a hand on her.  

Of course, the day is early yet...(Muwah hah hah)

Another Fine Day

Today was another fine day.  We watched Everybody Loves Raymond while we ate lunch and we got the curtains hung (finally).  They make the room much more cozy.  Below is a picture of the finished product. 

You can also see in this picture that I haven't killed Dub's funeral plant yet.  See...miracles do happen.  HA!

I really enjoyed the grocery store this afternoon.  I got to pick out fruits that I wanted.  I am very much a whimsical fruit shopper.  It is hard for me to say, "Pick me up 4 pears" if I don't know if their pears look good for that particular day.  Buying peaches is all about smell to me.  If they don't smell like peaches, I don't want them.  Apples, anyone can buy.  You just make sure they aren't beat up but I'm not so crazy about apples.  Grapes are easy so I've had a lot of grapes lately.  We got some Talapia to cook for tonight as well as all the other food we would need for the next few days. 

I've been having some double vision I need to ask the doctor about.  It comes and goes and just started last night.  This is the first time this has happened and I'm not really sure it is the chemo since it should be all out of my system by now.  I've had a lot of headaches and now this double vision...kinda weird.  I am beginning to feel like a hypochondriac with all these complaints...lol.  I'm just 'journaling' it in this blog so that I remember when it happened.

Not much else going on here today.  Hope everyone is having a great day!

Out in the World...

I am out in the WORLD!

We are zipping down the highway and the sun is shining and the air is crisp...my husband is yelling at the idiots...it just doesn't get any better than this.

I love technology...here we are driving along and I get to blog at the same time.

We are headed to Target to use my fifty dollar gift card towards a new curtain rod for the living room. I got the gift card from Boeing for taking the wellness survey. We'll probably go to Walmart and then Publix after Target. I know this doesn't sound like much to you guys but I've been stuck in the house for fifteen days. I'm bustin' out...breakin' free...runnin' loose...well, you get the picture.

We are almost there. I will get back to you guys later.

LATER...MUCH LATER...

So...we made it to Target and after a couple of hours there, I felt like a whipped dog.  I found a couple of new hats to wear, a new scarf, the curtain rod I actually went after and a couple of computer games for almost nothing.   Tom found some new sneakers, a computer game that he liked, and we both found a LAP Chill Mat for our computers since they seem to get so hot lately.  (I guess we're just burning them up playing Farmville...HA!)  I think mine is hot because Shadow insists on laying right next to the place where the fan cools it off.  I swear she just lays there and intentionally blocks the outlet.  I love her more than the computer so I usually don't say anything.  She IS 63 in human years so I know it just must feel good to her old bones.

We went on to Walmart and then we were going to go to Publix but after 4 hours out on the town I didn't have anything left to give.  We came on home instead of doing Publix and I made some vegetable soup for us and I feel much better now.  Maybe we will do Publix tomorrow. So much for all that ZIP I had when I started out...LOL.

It's been a really fun day today and we have nacho chips planned for supper tonight so that will be an easy fix.  8-)

I would usually have had my hair/nail appointment today but I had to let Nancy know that there wasn't anything left of my nails to work on.  The chemo has really attacked them this round and both toes and fingers are painful so I guess until all this is over, I don't get to have my fun with Nancy.  She is such a sweetheart.  I apologized to her for not being able to keep the appointment and she said not to be sorry to her.   She felt bad that I was in pain.  I just love that girl.  I hope she'll still have time to work on my hair and nails when I get them all back.

That's about it for now...Hope everyone else is having a great day too!!

The Good Week

So, this what I call "The Good Week". 

This is the third week after chemo.  It is obvious that my white and red cells have regenerated.  My energy level is up and my desire to live has risen as well.  Tom is home today and we've been spring cleaning (even though it is fall) because my allergies have been so bad and because it just needs to be done. 

Since the new curtains have arrived, we also cleaned the living room windows and blinds.  All the windows need cleaning but my energy only goes so far.  HA!  When we're done, all the furniture will be dusted and the floors cleaned.  I always feel so much better when I at least get that much cleaned.  (Yeah, I still have a bit of 'must be clean' phobia...but that's not really so bad, is it?)

Tom is so tolerant of my wants...I say, "Would you like to clean the outside of the living room windows?" and he honestly replies, "No...but I will if that is what you want me to do."   I just adore this guy.   Of course, it isn't enough that he does it, he has to do it MY way.  8-)  Over the years, he has learned this and patiently waits for me to direct.  He has a mind of his own, believe me, but he does pick his battles.  8-)  Of course, sometimes, he forges on with what he THINKS I want done and sometimes I bite my tongue and sometimes I tell him what I really want him to do.  This has always been a sore point between us and I try to bite my tongue more often than not.  During the third week after chemo it is pretty safe for him to forge on because I am actually able to bite my tongue and let him.  Week one or week two after chemo...nope...not so much.  No real control during those weeks so we don't plan on doing much 'together' during that time.  I pretty much hole up as far away from him as I can get so I don't do irreparable damage to our relationship.  He is my life.  I would really HATE to run him off.

This is Thaiday Friday.  Which means it's Friday and we eat Thai tonight.  I'll actually get to taste it this week.  Tomorrow we are going shopping and that will be a fun day.  I still need to find the curtain rod that will fit the living room windows.  We also need to get the regular stuff to survive next week with.  You know....the boring shopping of sundry items and groceries.  Not so boring to me right now.  I get to SEE PEOPLE out in the world.  WHOO WHOO!!  I always hated shopping before but now I just see it as an opportunity to get out of these four walls.

So, this is my Good Week.  I'm definitely going to make the most of it but at the same time follow all the 'clean' routines of washing my hands often and staying out of large congregations of people. 

Remember I talked about our change in health care for next year?  Along with the changes, we have a requirement to do a "Boeing Wellness" survey.  Once you complete the survey, they tell you where your health problems lie.  HA HA HA...I am rolling here.  My one really bad area is stress.  NO KIDDING.  So, I have to go through a 4 week program addressing my stressors.  First stress tip they give me "Be selfish.  No matter how busy you are, set aside at least a few minutes for yourself everyday."  They have no idea.  I am totally selfish right now...don't think that's gonna make a difference.  HA!  How do you get rid of the stressors of Cancer...yeah...they aren't really looking at us as individuals...we are just Dilbert numbers.  Cattle in a cattle feed line.  This is TOO FUNNY.

So, now I am going through the "Learning to react to life stressors in a healthy way" section.  Here are the strategies.

Eating a healthy diet and getting regular exercise and plenty of sleep.
Practicing relaxation techniques
Fostering healthy friendships
Having a sense of humor
Seeking professional counseling when needed

I've covered all of those except the last one.  Since this really is a short term stressor, I think I can make it without bringing in the professionals.  LOL

OK, enough prattling on for today. 

Hope everyone is having a great day!

Babbling...

Today is an overcast day outside but everything inside feels good.

I worked out on the treadmill for an hour this morning.  Got all my blood circulating through my body, encouraging it to regenerate the good cells that I need again so I can go fry them in a week.  HA!  It does leave me feeling like I have accomplished something today though and I think that is important.  Every day should have some kind of accomplishment to it.  Otherwise, why am I here?

Next week will be my last Taxotere chemo and I will be halfway done.  Yeah ME!

We finished eating our apple pie and ice cream last night and that was kinda sad.  While I complained that he didn't get the right kind of pie stuff...it turned out excellent anyway.  YEAH TOM!!  We're having a Mexican casserole tonight which will be yummy.  (See how I go from exercising right to food...HA!)  But no more dessert this week.  I don't want to totally sabotage all the weight we lost last year.

We had two terrible storms hit here yesterday.  (Yeah, I can't believe I'm talking about the weather either.)  They had tornado watches all afternoon and the kids got out of school for half a day.  (Can you believe they get out of school for storms??)  There are leaves and sticks all over the back yard today.  I thought I would put a picture of it in here, but you really can't see the leaves and sticks as much as I thought you would be able to.  I'll put the picture in anyway since I went to all the trouble to go out there and click the picture for you.  I think the leaves are hard to see because the grass is going brown too.  I am looking out my office window and I see the yellow and orange and brown leaves so clearly.  Yeah, I know...why don't I take a picture out of my office window.  Well, I didn't think of it, the batteries are dead, and now I'm too lazy to walk back to the bedroom closet and get more for it.  I'll save that for tomorrow's accomplishment!  HA!!

I was just thinking that this is so much like letter writing in the old days.  Just keeping in touch with what is going on in our lives.  Think about the amazement that might come from someone from the 1800's if they saw this technology.  They waited weeks for letters from loved ones and they rarely had pictures.  How blessed we are (and cursed sometimes, I think) to live in these times of technological advancement.

I was just chatting with a friend online and she was telling me she already has her Christmas shopping done but needs to wrap it all.  HOW WRONG IS THAT?  She was complaining about how she hates to wrap.  I told her I love to wrap...hate to shop.  She says she'll shop for me if I wrap for her.  Sounds like a cool deal except I haven't a clue what I am going to get people this year.  Everyone needs to send me an email with what they want this year.  (tnt1799@bellsouth.net)  That would be a fine thing to get done soon.  That would be a great accomplishment.  WELL, that would be a bit of a miracle...

All Systems are GO!

All systems are 'Go' today.

Temperature - Check

Headache - Check

Neck Pain - Check

Stomach - Check

Energy Level - Check

Hormone Imbalance/Grouchiness - Check

Bone Pain - Check

Tooth Pain - Check

Looks like it is a good day to get something done.  There is a wonderful sweet breeze blowing through the house.  (Shadow insisted I open the windows this morning.  You have no idea how annoyingly she can insist on things being the way SHE wants them.  She has gotten much worse about complaining as she has gotten older.) The breeze in the house smells like the new promise of life.  WONDERFUL!!

Of course, now that most of the windows are open, she picked the guest bedroom where they aren't open to park herself.  She cracks me up!!

That blanket that she is laying on used to be folded perfectly so that I could use it when I got cold (I sit back in that bedroom when my energy is low because I have a computer table in there and I can rest my neck and back while I work.  She decided on Sunday, when I put it out, that it was her blanket and she proceeded to open it up so that she could lay on the underside of it.  I changed all the blankets in there over the weekend to get her cat hair out of the room.  I have to do that periodically.

My new living room curtains (I say new but there haven't ever been any in there before so it isn't like they are replacing existing ones) are arriving today according to an email I got yesterday.  I don't have the rod yet though.  We are DEFINITELY going shopping this weekend for a new rod and maybe some other fun things too.  I'm going to dance in the stores...Just three more days.  I am now on day 13 after my chemo so tomorrow should be the last of the low blood counts and then I'll be free as a bird ready to fly through the rest of the world for a whole week. 

Hope everyone else is having as good a day as I am.  (Hope you guys can keep up with my emotional roller-coaster ride...HA!)

Down Down Down...

I'll admit it.  I'm a little depressed. 

OK, I am crying at the drop of a hat.  I guess I am a lot depressed.  I mean...I am talking to the funniest guy at work and I am sitting there crying.  (He doesn't know he's making me cry...I mean, we are in an Instant Message and he can't see what I'm doing.)  What is up with all the tears?

I still think it is something I can handle without meds though.  I think the fact that this is a getting hard for my husband is making it something I don't want to do anymore.  I don't want to be the reason for him to get down and frustrated.  (Not that I couldn't do that to him without chemo...HA!)  If I could just control the way I react to everything, I think he would feel better and then I would feel better.

So, I know the answer to all this.  Why can't I do it?

If you pray for anything this week, pray that I will temper my responses to Tom and not be so picky about everything.  I have to do better about that.  I need to be strong for him so he can be strong for me. 

I think it is a need to feel in control of something in my life.  I don't feel like I have control of anything.  I called the Surgeon's office this morning to cancel my appointment with the surgeon because I don't want to go through the analyzing of the fluid in the cyst in my left breast.  She says she'll talk to the doctor but he will probably still want to do it.  WHAT IS THAT?  They can't MAKE me do the biopsy.  I tried to explain in the nicest way possible that I DIDN'T WANT the fluid analyzed.  She told me that she is not a medical expert and she would leave that decision up to the doctors to discuss.  (Apparently the surgeon and my cancer doc have to discuss all this before I can really get out of it?)  WHATEVER.  I thought I had a choice.  She also made me promise that I would tell the cancer doctor that I had canceled the appointment.  (I felt like a first grader promising the teacher that I would do my homework.) I have no problem telling the cancer doctor I don't want the fluid analyzed.  I don't even have a problem telling him I've had enough of chemo. 

I got a call from the radiation guy too.  He wants to know if I'm ready to start the radiation.  I told him maybe in January if I'm lucky.  He said they would call back in January.  Boy...nobody wants to miss a piece of this action, huh?  They must hear "CHA-CHING" every time they think of me.  HA!

So, it's kind of a down week but I am going to work on making it a better one.  8-)

Hope everyone is having a great day!

Blogging Defeat

Probably the first sin in blogging is admitting that you have nothing to blog about.

THOU SHALT NOT ADMIT BLOGGING DEFEAT

I think I have reached the point where I have come full circle in my chemo cycle and I really have nothing new to tell you about.  Oops. 

I have no life, so there isn't anything exciting going on here.  Well, I did just make up a grocery list for Tom to take to the store...whoo whoo...that was exciting (HEAVY sarcasm here).  Although, I did put something new and exciting on it.  I put the stuff on there to make an apple pie and added vanilla ice cream to it too.  That is my comfort food for this week.

I won't be leaving the house until next weekend and except for bathing our fat cat yesterday, nothing else happened yesterday except for my moaning and groaning about no energy and pain in my body.  Yeah...that's not too good as blog material.  Although, I could have put a picture of my fat wet cat on the blog, I won't embarrass her that way.  8-)

I'm still waiting for my sister to update her blog (She hasn't updated since Sept 5th...and it still has a title of "6 More Days" which references my Niece's wedding which happened on Sept 11th.  My sister's family all have blogs but they are too busy living life to update their blogs...lol.  Someday, I'll be there again.  I can't wait.  In the meantime, guys, I am bored and looking for what is going on in your lives.  I am really surprised that my sister didn't put something on her blog about passing her certification to be a Registered Sanitarian!  Hey, you missed an opportunity there.  (Of course, she called me which was way better than reading her blog!)  She's got this genius IQ and, after raising all her children and passing on all her smarts there, she decided to do something else with it.  Yeah, CAROL! 

Of course, my Mom does get her blog updated a couple of times a week so I always know what is going on there.  8-)  She leads such a busy life it makes me tired.  

My  husband was in a bad mood for a nanosecond this morning.  I said something to him, he snapped my head off and I asked him what was wrong (I mostly asked because it really surprised me.  He almost never gets like that and I hadn't done anything this morning to provoke it.  [Well, nothing that my chemo brain could remember, anyway]).  He said nothing and then said that he didn't know.  He must be having house-itis too...HA.  (Or...he could be getting tired of me whining...NAH...that can't be it.  LOL)  I'm glad he's getting out and going shopping.  You know this cancer thing is as hard on Tom as it is on me.  He got over his snappiness pretty quickly though....he is amazing like that.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful day!  It's so beautiful here we're going to grill steaks later today.  8-)

Brothers and Sisters

We have been watching the fourth season of Brothers and Sisters.

(CAUTION:  Spoilers to the show if your haven't seen it yet...)

This season Kitty Walker has cancer.

They did a really good job portraying the different stages of the process.  (It's funny how nearly every show now is about cancer.  Tom says I'm probably just more tuned into it  now.)  I find myself (of course) rooting for Kitty.  Saying things like, "YES...that is exactly what it's like.  I'm so glad to see that others want to stop the chemo too."  or "You GO writers...you did your research on that one." when Kitty says at one point that she is so full of steroids that she finds herself up in the middle of the night cleaning the entire house and her mother doesn't even realize it happened. 

I found myself crying with her when she is shaving her hair off realizing again that this is just something everyone that does chemo is going through.  (Hated her when she was so cute bald.  Wow...they really picked the right actress to have cancer.)  When her husband sees her with no hair and acts like nothing has changed and tells her she is beautiful.  Only later, when he is talking to her bother, finding out that it hit him really hard and he felt he couldn't let her know how it made him realize how close to death she was.  I am glad that my husband was honest and didn't try to tell me I was beautiful (even though I teased him about that during the show saying, "Why didn't you tell me I was beautiful?"  HA!).  I am always ever thankful for his honesty.

This show has been good for me to realize that this affects my family as much as it does me.  I seem to go through each day thinking it is all about me when really, it's all about the whole family.  Maybe they aren't here and they aren't really seeing the ravages to my body but they are seeing it in words and experiencing it virtually.  (I'm making sure they get a fairly accurate picture here on the blog...HA!)  Some, like my sister, have been going through something similar with her husband, who has Multiple Myeloma.   She is a great source of strength to me and I'm sure she doesn't even realize it.  Her experience keeps me remembering that others have experienced this and lived to tell tales about it...so get over myself.  8-)

I don't think they did a really good depiction of the husband's role in the show.  My husband is having to handle the mean chemo drunk girl and pick up my slack around the house when I just can't do it all anymore. (Kitty is so nice and perfect to everyone through the whole thing...is it just me or is that possible for anyone to really be nice and perfect all the time while going through chemo treatments?  It could be I just have flaws that others don't have...hmmm...pondering that one.  NO WAY.)   Tom does most all of the shopping and cleaning up after meals.  Rob Lowe just continued to be a California Senator while Kitty's family took care of her.  He came home every once in a while to make love to her (not seen but implied in the show) which is a plus for him but did she really care about sex while going through chemo?  Considering chemo wipes out all your estrogen, it is hard to believe her libido was really into that.  Other than that, it was pretty much business as usual for him.  Of course, you find out later, that he was getting some mental health counseling which made me think that maybe Tom could use some of that too...I know I have to be driving him crazy with the ups and downs.  

I did find myself a little jealous when the chemo wasn't working and they decided to do a stem cell transplant.  One surgery and all of a sudden she is in remission.  No more chemo or anything.  Of course, it was a very risk filled surgery and they had to find a donor but still.  POOF and she's gonna be fine. 

Oh well, I just have to get through 5 more treatments and POOF, I will get to recover from it all and be fine too.  Come February, I should be going around the corner into recovery too.  8-)

Good News!!

It is just wrong how excited I am about to leaving the house to get a sonogram.  HA! 

While I dread the sonogram and any results from it, I can't wait to get in the truck and go bye-bye.  (hehe...like a little baby here.)

I know that my white and red counts are very low right now because I am in nadir (Days 4-14 post chemo).  I can tell my reds are low because my head hurts and my heart is beating irregularly and I am totally out of breath today.  It's not as easy to tell about white counts being low.  I have a small temp which may mean that I picked something up on Monday when I went to see the doctor.  I'll just keep an eye on that.


BUT...I get to go outside...how cool is that?  The sun is shining and the air is crisp today.  I'm gonna wear my red hat and red shirt with some jeans today (I get to dress up...cool) and look all 'fally' too.  I guess I'll need to wear my jacket too since it is so cool.

I got the house cleaned yesterday except for the bathrooms.  I was so happy to be feeling like I could clean.  When I was done, I was exhausted and my heart hurt but I was so glad to have all the floors cleaned and most everything dusted.  (Yeah, there is ALWAYS more dust and cat hair than I can keep up with...)  The house smelled all good and fresh and not like chemo.  YEAH CLEAN!!  I asked Tom if he could help with the bathrooms this weekend.  He loves to clean the bathrooms...(right...lol)

I also forced myself to do 3 miles on the treadmill yesterday.  By the time I went to bed everything ached.  I was so glad to crawl into bed.  8-)

OK, I'm back from the sonogram.  The cyst is fluid filled and nothing to worry about according to them so I am going to cancel my apt with the surgeon.  I know the cancer doc said he wanted the fluid analyzed but I have cysts all the time so I don't see any reason to worry about it.  If he doesn't like that I canceled it, he can remake after my next chemo treatment.  Let me know if you guys think that is a bad choice.  I'm really just tired of all the poking and prodding.

Tom and I stopped and got McDonald's on the way to the apt.  I haven't had McDonald's fries in a year.  I was actually sadly disappointed.  They were hot and crisp like they should have been but all I could taste was grease.  Then I was nauseous for a few minutes until my stomach accepted the grease.  I guess I've flushed all that junk out of my body and now it is rebelling.  I guess I should be happy about that.  It doesn't make me want to eat junk now.  HA!

Hope everyone is having a great day!  Mine certainly got better.  8-)

What Did I Do?

When you are first diagnosed with cancer, you find you ask yourself, "What did I do that caused this?" (Over and over again because you really don't have a clue what the answer is.)  Then you start looking at your life to see if you can change anything that might have caused it.  Below are the top ten things that, even if they caused cancer, I probably wouldn't change.  8-)

1.  Eating Ice Cream. (Wow..first thing that popped into my head...weird.)

2. When I bake pork chops in butter and season them with adobo seasoning, it leaves little particles of the seasoning cooked in the butter.  After we have finished eating, I like to find those particles and eat them.  I wouldn't stop doing this...(Hmm...food in the top two items....)

3.  Playing on the computer.  (Self explanatory)

4.  Driving a car.  (Although there are times when I HATE to drive, in general, I really enjoy driving and would miss it if I couldn't do it.)

5.  Being married.  (Sorry, honey...no refection on you that this is number 5 instead of number 1...it's just the order that it fell in my thoughts.  You know you're my soul-mate.)

6.  Enjoying the sunshine on my face.  (I know that too much sun causes cancer but I still love that feeling on my face.  Of all the things in this world, it probably makes me feel the most alive.)

7.  Cooking in a microwave.  (I love the way you can create miracles of food quickly in a microwave...how sad it would be to not be able to do that anymore.  Oh..yeah...I fell back into food again here, didn't I?  Recurring theme?)

8.  Living in a house.  (I really like 4 walls around me...)

9.  Drinking water.  (How sad would it be if water caused cancer?  There's nothing like cold water when you're all hot from doing physical work.)

10.  Eating steak.  (Wow...food again!  I love a good filet mignon barbecued out on the grill...)

I am obviously a little 'food' focused here.  For the past year we have changed our diet a lot...which actually seemed to put me in better shape to handle this whole chemo routine.  I lost 30 lbs from last October to March, which put me back in the green area for weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, energy, etc.  It hasn't stopped us from eating ice cream though.  8-)  That is our treat every day, no matter what else we aren't eating on this 'life change' diet.  (The entire diet consists of eating no junk food..i.e. chips, candy, etc.)  With no junk food, that left room for fruits and vegetables...go figure.  We always get Thai food on Fridays and pizza one other day of the week.  (Usually Saturday)  You gotta have rewards!  I could probably give up pizza and Thai food if they caused cancer but it would be a sad day indeed.  8-)

In the end, one never really knows what caused cancer...except God, I guess.

Hope everyone is having a great day!

Continued Random Musings

I've always been 'almost' a loner.  I like to be by myself but I also have always liked to have no more than one close friend.  I have lots of acquaintances but only one close friend at a time.  I see this as being 'almost' a loner. 

If I had more than one friend it seemed to get too complicated.

My husband is my closest friend and confidant.  I can tell him anything (although sometimes he pulls out the "TMI" card....[too much information]).  Sometimes I like to tell him too much just to see how far I can go.  (Muh wah wah wah - Evil Laugh)

I have seen on TV shows how they think that 'loners' are nefarious beings...yeah, I'm not so nefarious...just selective.  8-)  When I get my clearance for work, I am always afraid that my lack of friends is going to keep me from getting it but it never has so far so I guess as long as I have a long list of acquaintances then I'm ok.  HA!

One thing I have learned in the last few months is that I am not as much of a loner as I thought I was.

When faced with the isolation that I am currently going through, I find myself even thinking of reaching out to get to know the neighbors.

Then I slap myself silly and move on.  8-)  I like my privacy.  I definitely don't want neighbors running in and out of my house when they feel like visiting.  HA!

I am glad to be connecting with family again though.  It isn't that we didn't connect before...we just didn't connect as much as we are now.  They have become a big support system for me (whether they realize it or not) and I am glad that I can need them right now because I am normally very self-sufficient and un-needy (this is probably another word that isn't a word...) and maybe this makes them feel a little good.  (or not...lol)

(TANGENT WARNING)

I got up to brush my teeth because my mouth tasted all icky after my Starbucks coffee (one of the side affects of the chemo is everything tastes weird) and was thinking that I still needed to get a soft toothbrush so that I would quit making sores in my mouth from the hard one I've got.  I went into the linen closet where extra shampoos and sundry items are kept and lo and behold I found a SOFT TOOTHBRUSH.  (Sorry, Tom, this was probably yours because it had our dentist's name on it and I never get one when I go because I like the ones I usually buy)  How cool is THAT?  So I got to brush my teeth with a nice soft toothbrush and it was like getting an early Christmas present. 

(BACK ON TRACK WARNING)

OK, I lied...I have no idea how to get back to that original thought.  HA!

I have this feeling that they upped my chemo treatment dosage this time.  I am having much more severe reactions to it so my paranoia is kicking in.  They had asked me before my treatments if I was having bone pain and I explained that since they didn't give me Neulasta last time that I didn't have bone pain.  He seemed to find that hard to believe.  He said the Taxotere should have caused some bone pain.  I'm thinking "So, it didn't...isn't that ok?" but I'm just looking at him and not saying anything else.  Now I have the bone pain all the time for the last few days.  Maybe he wasn't going to be happy until I had bone pain so he upped my dose.  I guess it could just be that my bones are now damaged enough after the third dose to hurt.  Ah...one of the many things we'll never really know the answer to.  I am also WAY more tired than the other two times.  I just want to lay my widdle bald head down and sleep all the time but there is too much to get done to waste time with that.  8-}

Hope everyone is having a great day!  Looks like the rest of my day is filled with 'work related' meetings.

Ugh.

Update to Saturday's Post

I went to the doctor today about the lump I found on Saturday in my left breast.

The doctor agreed that it is a new lump.  Yeah, believe it or not, I traveled all the way into town just to be told what I already know but...you know...that is part of the process.

I have a sonogram scheduled for this Thursday, the 21st, and an appointment with the Surgeon for Wednesday, the 27th. 

The doctor says that even if it is fluid filled, he wants the fluid analyzed for cancer cells. 

I think that the worst that could happen is they do another surgery to remove the lump and we keep pressing on with the chemo.  This was the 'impression' that I got, but he basically said that he didn't want to talk about the next step until we get the lump analyzed.

Alrighty then...and that's 'the rest of the story'...for now.  8-) 

I'm ALLLLL Right

Somehow, she finds herself climbing the same mountain that she had conquered before.

She is armed with the knife called Survival, which she holds in her mouth because she needs both hands to hang on to the side of the mountain.

The pain in her mind and body are more than she feels she can possibly bear. She looks around and sees that she is not alone. Climbing with her is the one called "Husband".  On her other side is the one called "Sister".  Husband has a knife called "Clarity" and Sister has one called "Sanity".

Inside her mind, nothing seems normal or real. The fatigue that wracks her body is debilitating but she knows she has to conquer this mountain or everyone's efforts will be for nothing.

Yeah...yada yada yada...

Yesterday really sucked. I was the mean and unhappy Chemo Girl. I don't really know how else to describe it. Since they changed my chemo delivery day to Thursday, this means the worst day falls on Sunday. It used to fall on Monday and Tom was able to be at work and miss all my evilness. Bless his heart...he got it full force yesterday. I got to sit around crying and feeling like I'm going insane with the pain and confused feelings and he was left trying to find something to make me happy.

I really couldn't talk to anyone yesterday and kind of left Mom hanging wondering how I was (Sorry Mom).

It is two-thirty in the morning and today is going to be a long day but it should be a better one. Now my body and mind are working on the mending part after being ravaged by the poisons. It's a little like the scene in "It's a Wonderful Life" where uncle Billy is walking away from George and you hear him falling into a bunch of trash cans and he yells "I'm ALLLLL right...I'm all right.".

Today is a new day with new hope..."I'm ALLLLL right.."  8-)

Panic Attack

I'm in kind of panic mode today.  I found another lump in my breast.  This time it is in my left breast.  So, what do I do with that information? 

I don't think I can go through this whole process again.  Tom has tried to reassure me.  I say tried because my terror has taken over.  He is looking at it logically....here are his points of value.

1. They just did a pet scan about 6 weeks ago.  This should have shown any large tumors.  (In my head "It wasn't a large tumor six weeks ago...I felt nothing then.")

2.  They just did a mammogram in July and it didn't show anything.  (In my head, "That was three months ago...it probably wouldn't have shown up then.")

I don't know how fast cancer grows.  They said the one in the right breast was aggressive.  They also said that if I get cancer in my left breast that it would be a different cancer because cancer doesn't spread from breast to breast...(Yeah, that is reassuring, I guess.) 

I was thinking that I would have to start all over again with my OB/GYN doctor and get the mammogram and biopsy if necessary but Tom thinks I should just go to Dr. Waples my cancer doctor and let him figure it out.  He's probably right.  I know he is thinking more clearly than I am right now.

I guess another question would be, if I am doing the chemotherapy right now, would I have to do it again after they took the lump out of the left breast?  Surely not. 

Alright...breathing, breathing, breathing.  I'm probably just being silly.  I've had lumpy breasts all my life.  Why should that stop now and why should I worry more than I ever did?  (Inside head, "Because I'm in a terrible place right now because of one lump in my right breast...and I don't think I can do this all over again.")

I'll call Dr. Waples on Monday.  He'll know what to do.

I'm gonna go do the treadmill and get rid of this anxiety.  Thanks for listening to me panic...I promise to try to have a more positive post tomorrow.  8-}

Moments in Time

I had a 'moment' yesterday when I was waiting for my blood to be drawn at the lab.  Tom and I were sitting in the waiting area and this other 'bald' lady was sitting there also.  She got my attention and said how much she liked my do-rag.  She asked where I had gotten it and I told her all about the braided part of it that goes around the actual turban.  That way you can mix and match to whatever clothes you are wearing that day.  Then I asked her about her hat...it was really a cute beaded hat and she actually had gotten hers locally and told me where to get one.  It wasn't really my style but it looked cute on her.  Anyway, after I chatted with her and they called her in, I just burst into tears.  It had felt really good to talk to someone that is going through the same thing without really dwelling on the fact that we were going through the same thing.  I am undecided as to whether I need to get involved in a 'support group' which would probably just make me cry all the time or not.  I sure don't want to have more moments like that one. But I did enjoy talking to her.  (You can see how confused I am about what I need here.)

I finally finished decorating the new TV area and below is a picture of the final product.  I have never really decorated the living room (we've been here for three years and still had not gotten it done).  I was always so tired all the time (before diagnosis of cancer) that every thought of decorating was just too much to handle.  I don't know how long I've had cancer but something has really been sapping the strength out of me for quite a while.  I was just telling Tom that I feel better the third week after chemo than I have in many years.  The next thing I'm going to do is find some 'toppers' for the windows in the living room.  I believe in a nice burgundy to go with the rug on the floor and the vase stuff.  Of course, I didn't really get the burgundy of the rug showing in this picture...you'll just have to trust me on that one.  8-)

Anyway, this is just a good sign that I am mentally coping and ready to move on with my life from my own viewpoint.

Hope everyone is doing well and having a great day! 

Sitting In The "Chair"

Here I am...sitting in chair eleven. They have numbered all the chairs at the Cancer Center. I guess it is like waitressing...you know how they number the tables for the waitresses so they know which ones are their tables?  It's the same only here it is nurses that take care of the patients in chairs.

Isn't it amazing that there would be a Cancer CENTER here.  Actually there are more than one in town.  Kinda makes this town a suspect for causing cancer (paranoia dancing around in my head...LOL).   I think it is natural when you end up with cancer to wonder why you got it.  I wonder that a lot...I SURE don't want to do whatever it was again. 

I have the pleasure of having Kendra as my nurse today. I had an allergic reaction to the saline they were putting into my port to clean it out. Allergic to saline...can you believe it? It caused my throat to close up just like when I have an asthma attack. It eventually passed but it was pretty scary.

Kendra just told me a story about how once, when she was giving a patient her steroids, her patient said she was on fire in her "personal area". The woman asked for a glass of water and so Kendra goes to get her one thinking the woman is thirsty. When she gets back with the water, the woman proceeds to pour the water down her pants. She wanted to put the "fire" out...how crazy is that? I absolutely rolled on the floor laughing at her as she told this story.  She is a very graphic story teller.  8-)

The doctor has once again said that I can do without the neulasta shot...YIPPEE. No bone pain this time either. I am greatly relieved about that.

I wrote the portion above while getting the chemo treatment.  I stopped writing while there because I was on my IPAD and while the IPAD is a cool toy, it leaves much to be desired for typing data in.  We are home now after having a nice meal at Cracker Barrel.  (Breakfast for me, lunch for Tom)

We went to Walmart after we ate and I found a Thanksgiving Wreath for the front door and two big vases for the living room with some stuff to go in the vases.  I had spent so much time decorating for fall in FarmVille (Reference online game) that I thought I might as well do something decorative in 'real life' too.  I spend so much time here right now, it is good to shake up the scenery now and again.  8-)

I was happy to see that my new puppy in Farmville (whom I named "Fickle" because he runs away if you don't feed him every 24 hours) had not run away while I was gone since I wasn't able to feed it on time today.  (Thanks Mom for the hints and tips for puppy raising!)  My mom, sister, husband and I all play Farmville together...we have a lot of fun passing gifts back and forth.  It feeds my giving spirit.   lol

I feel fine after the chemo treatment...the steroids of course have me on an artificial "I can do anything" high.  This will last at least until tomorrow night so I'm gonna go take advantage of it and do some treadmilling in a little while. 

Hope everyone is having a great day!

More Random Musings

Here I am again.  Tomorrow is my next chemo treatment and as usual I feel like running in the opposite direction.

I've been feeling really good the last few days and have even been doing the treadmill.  I hate to go back to the bad feelings that chemo brings on but I guess I don't have any choice.  I've been feeling so good that when I sent out an email for work this morning, to all the schedulers here, someone accused me of being "perky".  HA. 

There is very little going on new here.  It rained really hard last night...BIG storm.  I had my earplugs in and I heard it crashing around out there.  The birds are all happy and singing outside right now.  I have the windows open so I can hear them and to torment the cat with them...muwah wah wah.   (See wide body tormented cat below)

 

There is this girl at work who is kind of mean all the time to people.  One day a bunch of us were standing at the guy's cube that is next to hers just chatting and laughing (ok, yeah, I have a big laugh and it might have been a little loud) and she stands up and says "Could you guys SHUT UP...I'm on a telecon."  We all kind of looked at each other and skulked away.  (We moved to my office and had a good laugh over it.)

Today she has all these women at her cube and of course I'm working from home and chatting on the IM with the guy she told to shut up and he says they are all laughing and cutting up at her cube.  I told him that he should say, "Could you guys SHUT UP...I'm on an IM."  I thought it would be funny but he wouldn't do it.  So much for my fun today at work.  I SO would have done it if it had been me.  (Of course, I would have made it into a joke...and she would have been laughing by the time we were done.)

Now that we have the new TV hooked up it is really amazing.  It is like being there in the movie with the actors...it is so clear and sharp.  I'll bet actors hate the new LED TVs because it shows every wrinkle on their face in great detail.  I know I wouldn't want to be seen in that great a detail on any screen.  HA!

Hope everyone has a great day!  I'm going to go enjoy the rest of mine.  8-)

What a Dream...

I don't sleep all that well since the diagnosis of cancer.  But that is ok...I just stay in bed until I have gotten enough to get through the day.

Last night I SLEPT.  Big deep sleep with lots of dreams.  The one just before I woke up for good was a doozy.

I dreamed that I was at work and I had all these really hard things to get accomplished.  I wasn't well and I couldn't figure out why I wasn't well.  At some point in the dream, my sister was telling me she wasn't well either.  Then we found out that she was pregnant.  (Good one on you, Sis.  HA!)

Apparently I was doing really really well at my job because my boss calls me into her office and says to call all my family together because she wants to give me an award.  (This was a woman whom I had never seen before...I have two male bosses so this was particularly weird.)

Well, the award ceremony was in this big building with a dance floor.  They had live music and my mother and father came and my aunt Imazo came.  There were lots of people from my work place.  I remember that part of my clothing kept ending up in my hands instead of on my body (yeah, aren't dreams really weird?).  I remember pulling Mom aside and asking her what we were going to tell my boss about my Dad being there when he was supposed to be dead.  She started to tell me what to say but I got pulled away.

When my sister arrived, I corralled her to take me to the restroom so I could put all my clothes back on.  (Luckily the parts missing were undergarments and not outer garments...HA)  I remember I had this suitcase with all these clothes in it and medical papers.  I'm in the restroom telling my sister about her pregnancy and then I'm telling her that I'm pregnant too.  (Yeah...that one is pretty much impossible since I had a hysterectomy when I was 30.)

We went back to the party and my mom and dad were sleeping in cots that someone had pulled out for them. 

Crazy nightmare.  That's about all the parts I remember but I basically just remember it was crazy to me even while I was having it.  I knew it all wasn't right but when you're in dreamland, there's nothing you can do but play out the dreams.

Only thing I do know is that I never got the award in the dream.  HA!!

Fun DAY!!

So, Saturday was a really fun day.  I had my 'beauty' appointment and Nancy made me as beautiful as she could by doing a manicure and pedicure.  Since my head is completely bald we worked on one of my wigs to make it socially acceptable.  Nancy is probably the nicest, most caring person that has ever taken care of my beauty needs.  Bless her heart, she has so little to work with...lol.  But she always makes me feel happy and attractive by the time the appointment is over.  8-)

I wore the wig all over town and felt fairly comfortable in it but it does get hot so I am still thinking my 'do-rags' and hats will be the most comfortable.  (My husband HATES this term for the head wear...he says it's the 'rags' part he doesn't like.)

We went to Sam's first because we needed some bulk items and of course had to browse through the electronics.  We are both really bad electronic addicts.  I wonder if there is an EA (Electronics Anonymous) meeting somewhere that we should be going to?  Anyway, other people in Alabama go to football games for entertainment, we like to browse through the electronics.  8-) 

We found this really amazing flat screen TV that we were both drooling over.  55 inch flat panel, LED, 1080p, etc...you get the idea.  The picture was extremely sharp and crisp.  We've been wanting to upgrade the living room TV to a larger screen for quite a while but keep putting it off.  We already have a wall mount in the living room that our current 46 inch is resting on so I told him that I thought it was time to upgrade if we could fit this TV on the existing wall mount.  (I love to watch the excitement in his eyes when he thinks we are going to actually buy something instead of just look at it.)  8-)  I just don't want to have to put more holes in the wall than we already have there.  So we took some measurements and finished our shopping there and at Wal-Mart.

We were both pretty wiped by this time but came home and looked at the TV that was currently on the wall.  It turns out that the TV that is a 46 inch is actually 20.5 lbs heavier than the 55 inch that we want to replace it with.  Our current mount is very universal so it would work with the new TV all around without any problems.  So, we started the rotation of the TVs.

The first problem we had was that the TV on the wall would require the feet to be put back on it.  For the first couple of years, the feet were on that TV and everytime I looked at it hanging on the wall, it would annoy me that we hadn't taken the feet off yet so, of course, a few months ago I 'suggested' that we remove the feet. (This required the removal of the TV from the wall so 'we' could unscrew the legs and remove them...Using the Royal WE again here.) 

We got all that accomplished and then hid the feet somewhere in the house or the attic.  You know how that goes...you think, "I'll never need those again." and stuff them somewhere that you'll never remember. 

So the first thing we had to do was find the feet.   Ugh...

I looked in the piece of furniture that was under the TV thinking we might have cubby holed them in it so we could easily find them in the future.  Nope...not there.

I looked in all the dresser drawers (WELL...you just never know where we might have put them) but to no avail. 

Tom started looking back in our exercise room in the two closets in there.  (We keep tons of electronic stuff back there...we are the pack rats of electronics.)  Again...no luck.

After checking out any possible drawers or closets in the house, we knew what had to happen next. 

(Creepy Eerie Music Here....)

WE HAD TO GO INTO THE ATTIC.

Double Ugh.

We pulled down the stairs and proceeded to climb.

Now, in my defense, I am just a little bit ADD.  (Okay...they say ADD was discovered just because of me....whatever.)  We get up there and the first box I open has an old old old old (get the idea?) photo album in it which I start browsing through.

Tom, of course, is totally focused on the job at hand.  "MUST FIND THE FEET."  (You go guy!)

I am walking over to him with the photo album saying things like, "Wow, look at how much hair you had back then."  "Is this you with your parents as a little boy?"  "Don't you look tired feeding that baby?"  Well, you get the idea.  I am working hard at distracting him because I am totally into the pictures by this time and had forgotten what we were up there for.  Sigh.  Between ADD and chemo brain, he had lost me.  Poor Tom.

After about 15 minutes of him digging through boxes, I hear is a jubilant "AHA...found them." and I am brought back to the reality of the search.  Hurrah for my hero!  We were done up there so I dropped the photo album back in the box and re-focused on our current task.  (Wow, that was easy...lol)

So, we proceeded to add those feet to the TV in the living room, move the TV from the bedroom to the guest bedroom, move the living room TV to the bedroom, and he went to get the new TV. 

I am supposed to be figuring out how to reprogram the bedroom TV to the DVD player in there but as you can see, I got a little distracted by my Blog...oops.  Heading back to do what I was supposed to be doing now.  8-)

Tribute to Mom

So now, as my kids would have said years ago, I've 'dissed' my father publicly yesterday...oops.  It was a mild dissing though.  8-)

My mom on the other hand was pretty amazing when we were growing up (and still is!).  After the divorce, she pursued higher education and achieved her masters degree.  She then proceeded to snag us back up from our grandparents house and raised us.

All my friends thought she was the 'cool' mom.  She was very lenient and pretty much let us do whatever we wanted to (within reason).  We were good kids so that was fairly easy on her.  (I think anyway...lol)  My friend Connie would come over to spend the night and my mom would let us have her big bed to sleep in and I remember once Connie and I were throwing grapes into each others mouths and laughing so much it hurt.  The two of us were always laughing.  Once we even got asked to leave a store because we were laughing so much.  They probably thought we were high but really we just found humor in everything.  Connie was my best friend growing up and I think fondly of her often.  Another story for another time.  8-)

Well, back to my mom.

She taught us that we could do anything that we really wanted to do.  I never felt limited when it came to accomplishing something because I knew that if I just applied myself that I could do it. 

She taught us that God should be the center of our lives no matter what we were doing.

She taught us that we could count on her during the hard times.  I remember several times in my life that she helped me when I was sick. (Remember Arkansas fever, Mom?)  She drove all the way from TN to AK to take me to the hospital when I was running an unexplained fever.  I was 18 or 19 at the time and we had just moved to Arkansas and I was too sick to take myself and my husband was working all the time.

She taught us to love each other.  My sister and I fought all the time growing up.  Just give two teenage girls only one phone and you'll see what it was like for her...lol.  She continually encouraged us to love each other in spite of our differences.  Yeah...that worked.  We love each other a lot now.  Of course, it is easier after you have grown up.

She taught me the value of friendship.  She is my friend.  I know that I can always count on her just as I would a best friend. 

She is very fun loving and outgoing.   I like to go places with mom because I am shy and she is outgoing.  So all the pressure is off of me to do or say anything to anyone.  8-) 

Anyway, you get the idea.  She was the stable part of our lives growing up.  She loved us and through loving us taught us to love those around us.  She  helped us become strong and independent women.  I believe that my sister and I owe a lot of our success in life to her.

Thanks for the good genes, Mom!

Who Am I?

I was looking through the 'My Documents' folder on my computer this morning.  Such a random tangle of things.  There are letters to people (some that I never even sent...that's pretty typical), medical analysis that I had done, Donna Word's eulogy to my dad, stuff about our daughter, Myranda (who died in 2007 of Cystic Fibrosis), a standing grocery list to make shopping easier, a list of groceries that were in our freezer at one time (HA, lots of use for that now), a weight chart, and a "Who Am I" document that I started when I was feeling my mortality for some unknown reason last December.   

I guess today, if anyone dies, you can just look in their "My Documents" folder to see what threads were parts of their daily lives.

My "Who Am I" document talked about all the jobs I've held in my lifetime, my children, and where I came from.  But all of that still doesn't tell who I am.  Some days, I still don't think I know who I am.  We are just an amalgamation of all of our life experiences, I believe.  We are what God makes us into if we have followed His direction and path all of our lives.  We also become what the people around us shape us into.  If they are untrustworthy then we fear to trust.  If they are loving and giving, then we develop kinder traits.

Well, you get the idea.  The simplest thing can change us for our entire lives.

I remember, when I was five, my parents were divorced.  When my father was leaving us at my grandparents, I remember that I had been playing in the dirt and was really a mess (apparently) because I ran over to give my father a good-bye hug and he said I was too dirty to hug.  Since that time, I've been fastidious about cleanliness.  I am sure that he never gave that comment another thought but it changed me forever.  I always felt that to be accepted, I had to keep everything clean and in order.  I had to always be ready for any hug that might be given.

I'm pretty much over that now...lol.  You can ask my husband....I have become much more relaxed.  I only have to clean the house once a week now.  8-)  His constant acceptance of who I am (no matter what state I am in) has changed the damage that my father inflicted. 

Well, it's time to go clean the bathrooms now.  8-)  HA!

Adjusting to Hardships

I am now truly a picture of how we (as humans) can adjust to anything that is hard our lives.  Throughout this blog I have whined and complained and moaned about how tough these chemo treatments are, how bald my head is, how adjusting to all these changes are so tough...blah blah blah.  (Sorry, that was the whole purpose of the blog.  I normally have nothing to say about anything...)  I have adjusted to the Taxotere chemo treatments now to a point where it isn't an all consuming 'thing' in my life.  (Today anyway) YEAH! 

(Wait, did I hear someone say, "Yet, here she is talking about it again...sheesh.")

I promise...when I leave this blog, the last thing on my mind will be cancer and chemo treatments.  I get a whole week to praise God for feeling good.  LOL  (Unfortunately, since you don't follow me out of the blog, you don't get to enjoy that part...sorry...)

I chose the heavy dose of Taxotere every three weeks (as opposed to a lighter dose every week) because I wanted to have more good days than bad ones during the treatment and so far that is working out fairly well.  I am now in the "Thank you, Lord, it feels good to be alive again" stage instead of the "Lord, why don't you just kill me and get it over with" stage.  LOL 

My oncologist keeps reminding me with every visit that the AC chemo (which starts around Thanksgiving) is going to be a lot worse than the taxotere chemo.  (Nothing like fear of the unknown to keep you going...lol)  The day of (and for about twelve days after) the taxotere treatment I keep wondering...how could it get worse?  Then I have days like today and realize that it probably could get a lot worse.

OK, in a week, when I'm going through my third treatment, I may get a little whiny again.  HA!  Feel free to steer clear of my little blogging rants then.  8-)

What Do I DO?

I have a career in Integrated Scheduling.  Yeah...you're asking "WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?"

Not really that much...lol.  All projects for my company must have a 'plan'.  A 'plan' is a schedule of events that keep the project on task.

I used to have to build schedules.  Now I teach other schedulers how to build schedules, help them with tool problems, and give them training.  Some days are fun.  Some...not so much.

I also create a visual each week of how all the schedules are doing with something called "OPP Diagnostics".  These are a kind of 'health metric' for the schedule. 

There are two major parts to the OPP Diagnostics.  The errors and the warnings.  This week I was praising all the schedulers because they were all green in the error part of the diagnostics.  First time in two years, they finally achieved MY goal.  Amazing.  However, the warnings were still showing up with some red and yellow.  In the same email, I encouraged them to work their warnings now that they had their errors cleaned up.

One scheduler writes me back "We ignore warnings."

Nice.

I can see how my work day is going to go.  HA.

Health Insurance

My company's health insurance is changing for next year.  I work for Boeing and they are worried about having to pay the 'Cadillac Tax' because of O'bama's new health care bill.  (Thanks, Dude!)  Cadillac Tax is "an excise tax on premium insurance plans that would be used to offset the estimated $940 billion price tag for health care reform."

( See full article from WalletPop: http://srph.it/cpq1YT )

Currently my health insurance pays 100% on most everything and I am just responsible for a $200 deductible and a $15 copay per visit.  I don't have to pay for either of these because we also have Tricare as a secondary insurance.  So, other than $30 for a three month prescription (or less depending on whether it is generic or not), we do very well with our health insurance. 

Now they are talking about lowering the percentage that they pay and charging us more for the health insurance.  Oh yeah, that makes sense.  (NOT)

I am finding out that cancer is a very expensive disease.  Before Cancer (BC in my head) I only went to the doctor to get prescriptions for refills.

I won't bore you with the specific details but suffice it to say, we've gotten through two surgeries (breast and port) and gotten the bill for one chemo treatment and we are up to $58,816.43 that they charged to my insurance company and the insurance company has only had to pay $17,280.77.  (Which is still a nice chunk of change but amazingly lower than they were charged.)  The good news is I don't have to make up the difference.  (Really...that wasn't the specific details, I promise.)

Next year, if they only pay 80%, then if one chemo treatment costs $6386.78 (which is what the insurance company  pays now) then I will have to pay $1277.36 of that amount.  Luckily I only have one treatment currently scheduled for the new year.  I should be done by the second week in January.  But still....THANKS O'Bama.  Health insurance was one of the things that set my company apart from working for other companies.  They just lost that edge.

Don't get me wrong...I appreciate that people who have no health insurance will now get a chance to go to the doctor but it is frustrating as I try to prepare my family for retirement that they keep sucking money out of me to pay for everyone else. 

OK...totally selfish outlook.  Bad me.  I know there are people out there who haven't had the opportunities that I have had to succeed in life.  I am glad they are getting help but every time the government 'helps' someone, it would be nice if I didn't have to pay for it.

House-ITIS

I've been in this house for the last 9 days.  I definitely have house-itis.  (Yeah, house-itis isn't really a word but I KNOW you get what I mean.)

I don't leave because this is the season of colds and flu and I am afraid of getting sick on top of being sick.  (Note for any new readers...I was diagnosed with breast cancer in July and am now going through Chemotherapy to make sure they kill any cancer cells that are remaining in the blood stream...more fun than a barrel of monkeys, I can assure you.)

I am looking forward to this weekend because I go see Nancy to get my pedicure and manicure (She usually does my hair too but there really isn't anything for her to work with up there right now.)  This time I'm gonna see if she can shape up one of my wigs so I have some actual hair to wear.  8-)  Right now I hate my wigs but am hoping she can make me love them.  (Good luck with that, Nancy!)  There are very few people in the salon when she does my hair so I don't worry about getting sick there plus my white count should be on the rise by the time this weekend rolls around.

I have several hats and do-rags to wear out in public though so I am not totally without acceptable head wear. 

Anyway, back to the house-itis...

I've always considered myself a 'homebody'.  I loved to be at home.  Of course that was when I was AT work all day five days a week.  (Right now I still work but it is from home...)  I loved to come home and be home.  I hated it when we'd have to do shopping runs on the weekend. 

NOW...I can't wait to walk out that door.  Sometimes, I go out and sit on the patio just to leave the house.  How pathetic is that??

I shake up the scenery inside the house by picking different rooms to sit and work in during the day.  I never sit in the living room during the day because that is where Tom and I relax in the evenings.  I sit in the office in the morning when the heavy duty work for my job is going on.  Afternoons are a little quieter so I move myself to the guest bedroom where there is a tray for my work computer to sit on while I sit in the bed.  (I am usually pretty wiped out by afternoon so this also allows me to stretch out while I work and get some rest to my body even if not my mind.)

I believe that I just may change my thinking about wanting to be at home in all my off time after these next few months.  The outside world is looking pretty good right now.  HA! 

Nadir and Autumn Chills

I really have no theme today.  I normally start these with one thought in mind but I've been sick the last couple of days so I don't really have one big thought to fill this up with.

I have been in what they call 'Nadir' for the last few days.  This means it is the point in time between chemotherapy cycles in which I experience low blood counts.  Basically no energy and just feel like saying 'ugh' about everything. 

I'm feeling quite a bit better this afternoon so I thought I might try a few thoughts.

It has definitely turned into fall here in Alabama.  We opened the windows this morning all over the house and enjoyed the brisk fall-like feeling. 

At one point, I went out to the mailbox and found that my scarf from Coldwater Creek had arrived yesterday.  (oops...too tired yesterday to walk out to the mailbox...see how I'm improving!!  I walked all the way out there today.) 

It was very cold in the house by this time so I put the scarf around my neck (I already had sweats, warm woolly socks, and a sweater on) and put on my new leather coat that we got a couple of weeks ago and came modeling it in to my husband. 

"What do you think of my new scarf, honey?"  I ask him.

He gives me a sideways glance while still working at his computer.  "I think if it is too cold in the house, we should shut the windows."

I told him that would be nice and continued to wear my coat and scarf for a while until it warmed up after he shut the windows.

So much for the fashion show...lol.

The Story of a Tree and a Geek

My husband is a computer geek. 

Now I mean that in the most complimentary way.  8-)  He is super smart with computers.  I've learned most of what I know about computers from him.

Neither one of us are outside people (reference older blog where I confessed to killing all things green.).  He cuts a mean lawn...he excels at that, but other stuff...well, he's a computer geek...how much can one man be good at?

Once upon a time, we were feeling extremely energetic.  It was the first spring after we had moved into the house here in AL.  We decided we needed to clear off some of what I call the 'south 40' part of our land.  [We have an extremely large back yard with some brush and trees on the back part of it.  (Also on this back yard is a gazebo, a large tool shed which houses his mower and other extraneous cluttering items, and his Sky Shed Pod).  The brush and trees are beyond all these items.]

We had some vines up in the trees that we started pulling down to clean up the trees and then I noticed this one tree that looked dead.  "Honey", I started...thinking, thinking, thinking. 

He says, "Huh?" ever so cautiously because he recognizes that word as meaning much more than just "Hi, Honey...". 

I say, "Look at that tree."  He says, "What about it?" 

I say, "It looks dead to me."  He says, "So?" 

I say, "But it could fall on the house..."  He says, "The house is WAY over there, it isn't tall enough to fall on the house."    (See picture below where I am standing about where the tree was and way on the other side of the gazebo is where the house is located.  Keep in mind that the gazebo was not there when we were looking at this dead tree.)

OK, so in my mind I was really thinking "The dead tree might hit the gazebo that I am going to suggest we build there (after we get all this stuff cleaned out of the south 40)".  But I couldn't say that yet. 

Finally, he sighs and says, "What do you want to do?" 

I am feeling all 'Paul Bunyany' so I say "Let's cut it down...I think WE can do this." 

He looks at me like I have three heads. 

In his head I am sure that he is going over his lack of outdoor tools for this kind of task.  I encourage him..."It's just a SMALL tree."  We look up at the 25 ft tree squinting at the sun in order to see the top of it.

"Hmmph"  I hear from him.  "If you want to try it, we will try to cut it down."  (See how he loves me.  8-)   So he goes to get his 'saw'.  See visual of saw below.

I ask him, "Is that all we've got?"  He assures me it is and I just kind of tilt my head and look at him and then at it.  "Well, if it is what we have, then we'll just have to do it with that." 

Now you must remember, it is the royal 'We' that I was talking about.  (We = Him)

He proceeded to start cutting the tree down and we are noticing how difficult it is to cut but he keeps plugging away at it.  Finally, it looks like maybe we could push it over and break it off.  After we push and push and nothing happens, he starts getting inventive and wraps a rope around it and starts walking away with the rope in his hands and pulling.  I'm thinking "He's gonna pull that tree right down on top of his head." 

Again, the tree would not be budged from it's standing position. 

But, after sawing a bit more, with me pushing on the tree and him pulling on the rope, the rope trick did it and the tree came crashing down.  Somehow, it even missed landing on the man with the rope.  (I kept worrying the whole time I was pushing that we had no idea what we were doing and I was probably going to get charged with murder when this stupid tree landed on him and killed him.)

[Side Note from story:  I am sure that we have always been amusing to the neighbors.  The first year we lived here we were always up to something in the backyard that was beyond our scope of abilities...and they were all just saying to themselves, "Why don't they just plant some flowers?"...HA!]

I noticed that it had an awful lot of green in the trunk.  OOPS.  I guess that tree wasn't dead after all. 

Later that spring the poor tree tried to grow new shoots and we (he) continued to cut them down to encourage it not to grow anymore.  Wow...these Alabama trees just won't give it up.  I thought just by my touching it that the stupid tree would die.

Now the stump looks like this.  It is finally dead.  HA! (Nearly three years later)

Last year he bought a chain saw so that he could eventually get it flat with the ground to make it easier to mow over.  As you can see, this is a slow process but his 'geekiness' is showing even here with those little criss-crosses that he has done with the blade.  8-) 

He has gone out today to finish the slaughter of the stump.  Bye-bye little tree.  8-)

Lady, You've Got a Fat Cat

My cat, Shadow, is one of the joys in my life.  8-)

We got her nine years ago this Thanksgiving.  She is a mutt cat but looks like a Russian Blue.  We rescued her from a cat shelter in Florida called, SOCKS (Save Our Cats and Kittens).  I'm not going to even pretend that I own her...she definitely owns me.  She was my empty nest syndrome resolution and it worked really well.  After four kids, it was nice to have something to care for that pretty much cared for herself.  8-)

When she was about a year old, I was concerned because her belly (and only her belly) seemed to be enlarged so I took her to the vet to make sure she was ok.  He examined her thoroughly and while feeling of her belly, looks at me and says, "Lady, you have a fat cat." and proceeded to tell me to put her on this skimpy little diet and play with her more.  Yeah, that didn't work so well.  Eight years later, she is still a fat and lazy cat. 

We tried cutting back her food but she loudly complained about that.  Not little complaints...large caterwalling.  You would have thought we were abusing her if you were listening from outside.

We tried playing with her but she would just look at us and yawn.   We would put a string over her for her to jump up and get and she would roll over on her back and bat at the air (nowhere near the stupid string) and wait for us to drop it low enough for her to grab.  Yeah, we fell for that trick over and over.  We were trainable.  Yessiree....

Wherever I am, there she must be also.  Normally, when I am at my desk, she parks herself BEHIND my work computer and lays her head on the washcloth that I have there for her.  This allows her to peak at me from between the computers and not miss any action in case there might be FOOD coming with me to the computer.  (Yes, I am guilty of giving her leftovers that I can't eat...bad me...I KNOW)  This might also explain why she seems to be another appendage to my body...(things that make you go "hmmmmmm")

This morning, however, she insisted on planting herself BETWEEN my two computers with her tail basically in my face.  Nothing I could do would move her. Considering that, at that point, she owned the mouse to my work computer, there wasn't much work I was going to get done without moving her either.  Since she wouldn't be moved, I pulled gently on the mouse cord to get enough to enable me to get my work done.  (Is this ridiculous or what??)

I was going to take her picture on the guest bed this morning (She owns the guest bedroom...I guess we should call it Shadow's bedroom) but she decided she was curious enough to see what I was up to.   In the picture below you can almost hear her grunting as she gets up to see what I am doing with that stupid camera again.  "Ugh...must move this tonnage I have for a body.  I know I can pull it up, give me just a minute."  NO, those are not muscles rippling on her body...that is fat shaking...

In the picture below, you can almost see her pondering her life but what she is really doing is looking outside at the birds and wondering how she is going to make her escape to take them down.  For nine long years she's been planning that escape.  8-) 

 We love her just the way she is though...even if she is fat and lazy.  8-)

Top Ten

So...I've whined and complained in this blog environment.  Now I'd like to talk about the good things due to the cancer situation.

Yeah...there are some good things.  Here are the top 10:  (Not necessarily in order of importance)

1.  My husband gets me Starbucks every morning.  (I LOVE Starbucks)

2.  I am more connected to people even though I never see them (Family AND friends)

3.  I get to work from home

4.  I get to eat ANYTHING I want to eat and still lose weight.

5.  I get to sleep in til 6:30 (if I can)....I used to have to get up around 5ish...ugh.

6.  I can sit around the house in shorts and a T-shirt and not worry so much about 'how' I look each day.

7.  Not only are others getting to know me better through the blog but I'm getting to know me better.  8-)  Lots of time for introspection whether I want to do it or not...HA!

8.  My cat has gotten over her separation anxiety that she acquired from our Christmas Train trip to North Dakota last year since I have been home with her ALL the time now.  (Another story for another time)

9.  I get to see how loving and caring my husband really is.  (I knew he was before but he is really digging deep now to take care of me.)

10.  I don't have to fix my hair every day.  (OH, I don't have to fix it ever because there is no hair..LOL)

I guess no matter how bad something is, there is always a positive side if you look hard enough.  Things could be a lot worse...like my boss could have said I had to physically come into work every day, my husband could have said "get your own coffee or do without", and my family could have just said "Good luck with that cancer business" instead of being so supportive.  I am very very blessed to have the family and bosses (yeah, I have two of them) that I have. 

As my blog friend Clara would say, "God is good....all the time!"

Morning Ritual

I go through a ritual each morning when I wake up for a couple of  weeks after chemo now.

Temp - check to see if over 100.5

Intestines -  well, I won't go into this one but suffice it to say one does not want to be bleeding in this area...lol

Extreme fatigue - check if I have any energy today

Mouth sores - check if they are present or if gums are red and swollen

Nausea - check if medicine does not help it go away

Swelling of ankles or stomach or weight gain (yeah, weight gain certainly isn't a problem so far)

New bruises on body - check this because it is an indication of platelet problems

Yellowing of eyes or skin - check this because it is an indication of liver problems

Short of breath - Yeah, not sure what this is a result of.  I'm not short of breath, so I'm not worried about it...lol.

Any of these require a call to the doctor's office. 

Yeah...I never call. 

I would call if my temp went up too much because that means my white cells are too low and I would need a booster shot to increase them.  Last time they gave me the booster shot immediately before I needed it and there was a lot of bone pain.  (Most people don't get bone pain from the Neulasta shot...lucky me.)  SO glad they said I didn't have to do that this time unless my white count dropped.  I guess I might call them if I was so fatigued that I couldn't do self -care also because apparently they have something for that too and since it is related to anemia then I would definitely want that fixed.  Must have energy.  8-)  So far I have been very blessed. 

Tom and I have realized that I probably should be keeping some kind of journal because this time I can't remember what happened last time and if it was just normal.  I totally got over whatever side affects happened last time by the third week so I don't want to call if it will just pass without intervention.  I mean, no ones wants to be a complainer to the doctor's office.  Then when you really have something wrong they would just be going "OH, it's HER again." instead of taking you seriously.  Besides...I don't want to take any more medication than I have to...ugh.

So out of all these symptoms, the ones that hit me the hardest are the sore gums (I am doing the baking soda and salt rinse like they told me to but they still hurt.), nausea, and fatigue.  I have been very blessed that my chemo reactions are not any worse than they are. 

Funny they don't put your EMOTIONS on the list.  Those are probably the most debilitating...lol.  I really think those might be related to the fact that the chemo kills all your estrogen so it puts you into full blown menopause.  Just imagine a woman who isn't gradually (as God intended) going through menopause  but just jumps right into it full force. 

As you can imagine, Tom needs your prayers more than I do...HA!  8-)

A Good Day

Gloomy Rainy Day ... the kind of weather that makes my head hurt. 

I got some good laughs this morning from my husband though. 

I asked him a few weeks ago (I can't even remember how long ago it was...how odd.) to play Farmville with me because I needed 'friends' and I knew he would be my 'friend'.  (muwah wah....evil laugh)  I am usually asleep when he leaves but my headache pushed me out of bed this morning and I walk into our office in my pajamas with my little bald head and he is sitting there following his routine of playing before he leaves so I'll get some goodies out of the game when I get up.  I sit down at my desk and I hear him say, "If I could find as many bushels of wheat as I am finding Queen Bees, I'd have it made."  The comment struck me as so funny because my head wasn't in Farmville yet and here I've got my husband so involved in the game that the first thing out of his mouth in the morning is a comment like that.  HA! 

I've sucked everyone I could think of into this game to play with me.  My Sister, my Mom, friends at work.   Almost all are addicted.  I must have some evil side to me to pull them into this silly game.  Now my sister is only pretending to play and I get that.  She's nice like that.  She doesn't have time for it (and I SEE HER NOT PLANTING ANY CROPS so I'm onto her...) but just the fact that she keeps the game going is sweet.  Hello, Sis, Mom is passing you up in the game...is there no competitive nature in you? 

My mom on the other hand is totally addicted.  I saw that she was on 2 hours before I was up at 5:30 this morning.  Uh, Mom...you need SLEEP too.   I promise the animals won't die if you don't feed them in the middle of the night.  I see where I get my obsessive compulsive brain.  8-) (And I mean that in the nicest way, Mom.)

Today is a much better day than yesterday.  No deep thoughts (as you can see) flying around my widdle brain.  I should be able to focus on work today. 

Today is going to be a good day!!  And look outside....the rain just quit!

Happy Monday!

Things That Change Us

I was thinking about my grandmother this morning.

What would she think of our world today?  (So many technology distractions that pull us away from reality...)

I always got the impression that she felt TV was a sin and a big waste of time.  What would she think about it now?   TV has changed so much, due to lack of censorship, that my husband and I don't even subscribe to cable anymore.  If my grandmother were alive today, the commercials alone would embarrass her.

She lived a very simple and God centered life.  She worked hard all her life but she knew how to laugh and have fun.  She had a good balance to her life, I think.  Now you have to realize that I am looking back at her from probably 38 + years ago.  I had a child's view and our world was so different then.

She was always trying to make us into better people.  She read us the Bible and insisted we go to church.  She sent us after 'switches' when we were errant.  She also told us wonderful scary stories about ghosts...supposedly true stories she had experienced.  I have loved science fiction all my life and I think it is because of these stories.  She had these 'sayings' she would preach to us such as "Things that you do, do with your might, things done by halves are never done right."  I don't know the times I took out stitches in something I was sewing that wasn't just perfect or rewrote a paper for school because I knew I wasn't living up to my potential.  At what point did trying to be 'perfect' take over my life? 

We influence those in our lives in many ways that we probably don't even realize.  When faced with our own mortality, don't we find ourselves wondering if we've made any difference in the lives around us?  Do we change because we wonder this? 

Well...that was all too deep...see what 'crashing' puts on my blog...lol.