Looking forward to Chemo

I truly hate to say that, it makes me sound more than a little crazy, but I really am. Why? I need a break, and chemo week is usually that if nothing else. Not that I'm overly excited about the side effects, but I've had a crappy week and I'm looking forward to being able to nap during the day, turn the phone off without feeling guilty, and being alone during the day with nothing terribly pressing on the schedule. Well, that's my plan we'll see how the week pans out.

Do you ever have those days (or maybe weeks) where you just feel bad, everything seems to go wrong, and you don't really like people in general? I won't bore you with all the details of how much I've hated this week, how much I still have to do before the weekend, and how incredibly tired I am. But, I'll tell you that I lost my phone among other exciting things this week, and my replacement just came...maybe things are looking up already!

That's what I'm telling myself :-) Hope you have a fabulous weekend!

This is me mentally going back to this day at this beautiful beach, hopefully it will work!

"Are you wearing a wig?"

My 4 year old is embarrassed of her mother...already. Lord help me! Throughout the whole cancer and chemotherapy conversations I have had with the Little One, all she has really been concerned with is that her Mommy is going to (and then did) lose her hair. I would imagine that is confusing and hard to swallow for a young child because it completely changes the way you look. She stopped making comments about scarves or skull caps, and really doesn't talk much about it anymore but she still hasn't wanted to see me without something covering my head. She will say "Can I see you take your scarf off?" I'll ask if she's sure, to which she always replies "No no, I changed my mind, I don't want to". I should probably just let her see, but to tell the truth, I'm a little afraid she'll talk openly about it when we're out in public. I can just see her telling the cashier at the grocery store "My mommy doesn't have any hair" or "Did you know my Mommy is bald?" or something equally traumatizing for me. So, I let her keep whatever crazy image she has in her head of what I look like under the scarf. Will it damage her? I can only hope not. I have some pics that I'll show her one day when this is all over.

Well, I say ALL that to tell you this story: The other morning I was getting ready for a day of running errands and going several places with the Little One in tow. She was in the bedroom with me, watching tv while I dressed. I got all ready, but still had a scarf on my head because I didn't want her to see me put my 'hair' on. She looks at me very seriously and says "Are you wearing a wig today?" I wanted to see where her mind was so I said "No, I'm ready to go, aren't you?" She actually said to me "No, I don't want to go anymore, I'll just stay home" I asked if it was because I was going to leave the house wearing a scarf & she said "Yes and I don't want to go". So I told her I couldn't believe she was embarrassed of me & that I was just kidding, I was wearing a wig. We left and went about our day.
The next morning, she was getting ready to go to the babysitter's and we were talking about her day. I had a scarf on my head at the time and she says very sweetly "It's ok, you can wear a scarf today, I'm not embarrassed anymore". Bless her little heart! I don't really know how she knows what embarrassed means, but I guess she figured it hurt my feelings and felt bad...well that or she knew I was only going to drop her off and she wouldn't die of embarrassment if the people there saw me. If she's embarrassed of me now, imagine how fun life will be when I'm taking her to school at 14...Wow!
She loves me, hair or not and I'm thankful that she understands as much as she does. She's SO excited that I only have one more Chemo treatment, and also that my hair is growing back! Oh, did I tell you that yet? It really truly is and I couldn't be happier about it!!!

I wish I was bold enough to post the picture I took after this one, without the hat, but I am just NOT that brave. Sorry! Maybe when I have a full head of hair again I'll feel good enough to show you what I looked like as a bald chick. Probably not though ;-)

This is a recent pic of me trying my very best to not look like a cancer patient. Eyebrow pencils & heavy eyeliner (which had faded by this time of day) were things I knew nothing of before chemo. Guess it's a fair trade-off that the time I'm saving on doing my hair is now spent 'putting on my face'!

She's a Diva!

Little one did this all by herself while I was getting dressed the other day. She's in her PJ's, boots, my hat & scarf, an old necklace of my Mom's and her sunglasses. She came into the bedroom checking herself out in the mirror saying "Mommy Look at me, I'm gorgeous!" and then proceeded to do this random model pose. Cracks me up!

Circus Fun!

The circus is in town! We have never taken the little one to the circus, honestly because I have strong feelings about the animals and how they shouldn't have to live like that, animal rights, blah blah, I know you think I'm crazy. It's ok, so does my husband. The last time I went I was all upset and swore I wouldn't go back...well, that was one of the many oaths I made BEFORE I was a Mom and have since broken.

Some friends of ours called a while back & said they were going and wanted us to go with them. Our girls just love each other, and don't get to be together very often, so we agreed. We had SO much fun! The little one loves animals, and really enjoyed seeing the elephants, tigers and dog acts especially. She said her favorite was the women being shot from a cannon. That act was definitely interesting!
It was a little sad that the circus performers kept singing this "Do not try this at home" song repeatedly before every dangerous human act...I mean seriously? Is the legal system so crazy in this country that people's kids would do something stupid like that and then Ringling Bros. could be sued...really?

Anyway, here are some pics from our evening.

Snow Day!

Living in Georgia is so fun when the threat of snow is upon us. The entire state gets in an uproar and shuts down with the possibility of flakes descending. This past Friday was mass hysteria! I wish I would've gone to school to be a Meteorologist (who am I kidding, I can't even spell that word) as boring and hard as I'm sure that is, just so I could have the complete power to shut down a southern town in a single broadcast.
Anyway, Friday the forecast was "For SURE snow is coming...go to the grocery store, get your milk and bread, it is happening people!" So the little one and I did our Georgia citizenly duty and stayed home just in case. We waited and waited, me trying to get some work done, still feeling rough from Chemo. Which, by the way hit me really late this time and Thursday and Friday were ugh! Not terrible, just ugh.
The little one, however, did not care about my pitiful-ness, being 4 and all, and just kept staring out the window checking for falling snow. It finally started around 1:00, and didn't stop until late in the evening. This event is so rare for our area, of course it has to be played in immediately!

I was excited too, I will admit, and loved watching the snow fall! It was truly beautiful, I just couldn't believe we got so MUCH! I didn't feel well enough to play in it myself (or take really good pictures unfortunately) on Friday, but it stayed around until Saturday afternoon so I played with the little one and some neighbors on Saturday morning before the big meltdown.

We had a really fun time, and an even better time warming up with hot chocolate, cookies and a warm fire when the playing was over.


Playing in the falling snow! It was messy, but so much fun :)

Snowball Fight!!!

Of course she HAD to eat a little snow, too!

This is a winter wonderland for us in the South! It was so beautiful while it lasted.

They had to try and "sled" down any hill they could find!

Hope you enjoyed playing in the snow a little, too! I hear it was pretty much in every state this time.

7 down, 1 to go!!!!!!

Today was Chemo #7 & I only have ONE more treatment!!! YAY! I'm SO excited to be so close to the end of this part of the journey!
I have to admit that today, however was filled with mixed emotions for me. The Oncology suite in the hospital where I receive chemo was drama filled today, and thankfully my treatment went as expected, but there are so many others that my heart is heavy for this evening.
One of the precious chemo nurses called a patient's home this morning (and I overheard the phone conversation). He called to see if the patient was still coming for his treatment. He was informed by the patient's relative that he passed away on Saturday. SO Sad! A person that normally recieves chemo on the same days as me and was going through his own trying battle lost over the weekend, and it hit me kind of hard! Not that we were close at all, but still it was really hard to hear.
Another lady that I sit beside a lot couldn't receive her treatment today (again) because her platelets and white blood cell counts were down. Bless her heart, she is going through her 3rd or 4th chemotherapy stint because cancer keeps coming back on her. First in her uterus, then in one lung, now in both lungs. Her veins are shot from having to get chemo for so long, and the nurse has to spend about 30 minutes sticking her repeatedly, finally finding a vein, and 90% of the time this sweet lady goes home without even being able to receive the drugs that will help save her life. She was so depressed today and I felt terrible for her!
Next up was a man that also gets chemo on the same days as me and is always very quiet and reserved. He had his first or second round of Taxol today as well, and had a really bad allergic reaction where his tongue started swelling up. You can only imagine the fear that went through the room as no one knew what would happen. This poor man was reduced to tears pleading to "just go home" over and over after he was scared to death from the reaction!
Another poor lady who's a teacher also with breast cancer was feeling sick all morning and started throwing up just before she left. I could tell she felt horrible!
It was a heavy day for the chemo patients to say the least! I have to say I was doing the best when I left, which is a rare event.
This was the case even though the hospital also had some kind of gunman on the loose situation and the police, s.w.a.t. team, k-9 units and helicopters were everywhere trying to find him. No, that wasn't nerve wracking at all, especially when I went to get on the elevator praying a crazed gunman looking for a hostage wasn't waiting for a victim! All was well by then, thankfully and the cops were gone for the most part when I left.
I have to say it was a good day for ME, knowing I'm almost done, and received my 7th treatment pretty incident free. Today was such a hard day for so many others that I wanted to share so maybe you could pray for them, too.

I really feel impressed upon to turn my situation into a ministry opportunity somehow, but don't know in which direction to go with it. Please also pray that I will be directed in what to do about this. I just feel like my getting breast cancer at a young age will be in vain (except of course from the things my family has taken from it) if I just go about my life and don't help other people dealing with the same thing in some way, even if it's small. I want to make a difference, and just don't know how to begin or what to do. Please let me know if you know of any organizations that could be useful, or have any ideas also. I'm certainly open to suggestions!

Just when I thought I was done complaining...

My eyebrows and eyelashes decide to fall out! Dang, really?! I thought with me receiving the Taxol now, which is not supposed to be as toxic of a drug as the others, and not as LIKELY to cause hairloss, that maybe I lucked out & they would hang on...not so much! Maybe it's because I had done SO much complaining and fretting over the loss of hair on my head, God decided to really give me something to complain about...do you think he works like that? I'm undecided.

Well, everyone has been really nice about this too of course (which I appreciate even if they are just being nice, which I highly suspect), and says that with makeup on you can hardly tell, but believe me...I CAN TELL, and I feel like an even bigger freak!

So, if you see someone out in public looking all "incognito" with a wig, hat, glasses and lots of makeup, it's probably just me. If I don't acknowledge you, feel free to call me out and come up to me. I probably can't see you with all my gear on, or I am trying not to make eye contact with anyone lest they notice my crazy new "look". I don't mean to be rude at all!

Just in case you were wondering how I felt about the whole situation ;-)