1 year Cancer Free!

Last week was the anniversary of my surgery date, so (although the doctors will never say these words), it's my "cancer free anniversary". Two weeks before that, we celebrated with a family trip to the Children's Museum & Centennial Park for the anniversary of my diagnosis date. I wanted to just take a whole day to celebrate my life & our family. We have had a rough year in many ways, but we MADE it! We had a great time!

It was only after having lunch with some new, wonderful friends who are also cancer survivors that I realized my surgery date was my cancer free date! There was so much more preventative stuff that was done after my surgery that it seemed like it was only the beginning of the journey, but I was definitely considered "cancer free" when the tumor and the lymph nodes with cancer cells in them were removed from my body!

These two beautiful survivors were "introduced" to me through a mutual friend, our breast specialist's wife, who is also his surgery scheduler at his office. She is amazing, I think I've mentioned that before, and she connected the three of us through Facebook. We all decided to finally meet up over lunch after our children started school & it was such a breath of fresh air to be able to openly talk about our experiences, our fears about the future, our children & everything in between! Sometimes as survivors, you feel like everyone is so happy congratulating you that you're finally "out of the woods" they don't want to be bothered hearing about your extreme fear of cancer coming back, or the new issues you've developed since going through such a traumatic event. We all agreed that post-treatment was almost worse emotionally for us than the diagnosis, because now you have all these emotions coming up that you haven't dealt with being so busy fighting for your life and you don't want to sound all negative talking about them. It's not that you're not happy just to be alive, it's just a completely different feeling.

Anyway, we were all so happy to have met and connected. We are planning to make it a monthly lunch date, and I cannot wait to get to know them better!!!

So, on my official cancer free anniversary, I wanted to do something special but you know how life sometimes just gets in the way! The Little One doesn't go to school on Fridays, so we had the whole day together (working, much to her dismay). When the Hubby got home, we went to dinner and decided to go to a park to let some balloons go with something that we're thankful for written on them. It was dark by the time we finally got to do this, so I don't have all the pics I wanted, but everything can't always go the way you plan!

I helped the Little One write on her balloon, and she wanted me to put "Thank you God that my Mommy is done with cancer! I love my Mommy & Daddy" She is the sweetest little angel!

As I reflect on the past year of my life, I am amazed that it has only been one year since that horrible, horrible day in August, and since the craziness that was my life for so long began. It really seems like the longest year ever in some ways, but I am so very thankful for all the experiences I have had. Good or bad, that year is now a part of who I am, and I hope to be able to use it for good somehow. I am just so incredibly thankful to God for all His provisions for me and all the many ways He has watched over me and my family through this period. I honestly thought the healing from the mastectomy would never end, and that I would never be able to hug my family or hold my child again. I can honestly say that because of that experience, their hugs (especially from my girl) mean more to me than they ever would have before. Unfortunately, she is getting WAY too heavy to hold now, but I still try and will always cherish the special times we have had together since this has happened. (As she says..."When you laid on the couch and slept a lot" )! Although my life has changed in SO many ways since I heard those fateful words on August 13, 2009, I can honestly say I wouldn't change it. I would have made a few different decisions, but overall it has brought my family closer, and I firmly believe that God will use it (or maybe has already used it) for good. I'll never know why I was diagnosed with cancer at 29, but I'm at peace with it. My doctors, family & friends have been beyond amazing throughout this journey, and I know there have been angels all around me, helping me to "breathe in, breathe out, move on" through this whole ordeal.

The Little One is very compassionate and understanding since going through this, and I pray she always stays that way. It's something a child shouldn't have to go through, but I hope she takes something from it as well. The Hubby and I are also closer than ever and I believe that it has just made us appreciate one another more. For a while we just didn't know how bad it was, and therefore you always have those "Oh no, will I die?" moments, but he has been my rock through this, and was a great stand-in Mommy on lots of days when Mommy just couldn't be herself. I could not ask for a better partner in life, and I am so truly grateful to God for blessing me with him!

My parents and in-laws also were fantastic! I honestly don't know how we would've gotten through this without such wonderful, loving relatives and a few friends and neighbors who were more than willing to stand in the gap and just do whatever we needed!

Standing on the other side Cancer Free is a wonderful feeling...one I pray I can always experience. If it comes back, I'll deal with that too, but I certainly hope that this is my one and only experience. As the saying goes "You never know how strong you are until being strong is the only choice you have". This has been proven true to me & I thank God for the people who were right beside me cheering me on through cards, letters, phone calls, gifts & meals. You guys helped keep me strong. Thank you a million times!

I have NOT forgotten you!

For all of you who haven't asked, I'm sure you have been wondering so I wanted to confirm that I am alive, and I haven't forgotten how to blog. My life has been crazy busy the past few weeks, and I'm hoping it's going to slow down a little in the coming weeks so I'll have more time to catch up with our lives in the blog world!

We have had a lot going on lately, none of which you would care to hear the details of, but has kept us all very busy.

I'll try to update you on the past few weeks as best I can...

Summer is coming to a close and we have tried to get in a few more fun times out in the sprinkler, pool, or anything else water related to soak up every bit of summer fun!

At the end of July, The Hubby and I went to Savannah, GA for a couple days with some good friends of ours, and had a wonderful time! I had never been, and I loved all the old buildings and history of the beautiful city! I hope we can go back very soon, we really enjoyed it!

Last weekend, My Mom & I took the little one to one of her favorite places, Build-a-Bear! She was SO excited to pick out a new friend, and she did a great job picking out her adorable new bear and all the accessories a girl's gotta have! Gammy bought her new bear "Shine" and they decked her out head to toe! Shine is a great friend to the other Build-a-Bear she got about a year ago, appropriately named "Sparkle". How cute are those random names that she came up with on her own?! She's such a little princess :)

So, that's a quick recap of our past few weeks, we're also getting used to the school schedule, and the Little One is really enjoying her school! I'm so thankful she's happy there, and she seems to be learning a lot, too! School pictures were this past week, and I got a sneak peek on the photography website. They are SO adorable, can't wait to share them with you!

I'll do another update soon, we had a couple big milestones recently I'll share with you, but It's literally taken me several hours to complete this post because I keep getting interrupted, so I better not start another!

My big girl!

The Little One started Pre-K this past week, and I am so very thankful that she loves it! She was very nervous on the first day (as you can see from the pics) but she did great, and went in like a big girl! I took her to her class and she hung up her bookbag, walked in and said "Bye Mommy, Love you, see you soon" and that was it! I was more upset than she was, I think, but I adjusted well also and am so glad she has kids her age (and especially little girls) to play with. She seemed to enjoy it the first week and only had minor little spells of not wanting to go or not thinking it was fun.
The work she is bringing home is great, and she told my Dad when he asked if her work was hard at school "Uh, G-Daddy, you know it's just Pre-K!" like she is somehow above that level. That girl is so crazy & keeps us laughing all the time!
Here are some pics of my baby girl on the first day of school. I am honestly still trying to figure out how this day came so quickly. It seems like just yesterday she was a little baby and now she's almost 5...Wow! Time flies! :'-(

Can't you tell how nervous she was?

She is starting to look like such a "big girl" now and not my baby anymore!

You didn't think she would skip the diva pose, did you?

Walking in to her school!

Thank you Lord for a wonderful first week at school, I'm praying for many more!

Surgery Schmurgery!

This is going to be my new attitude...the doctor tells me they need to do surgery, I say "Sure, why not? It's what I do!"
I believe I mentioned a while back that the "girl doctor" found a really large cyst on one of my ovaries and decided it was imperative it be removed. Well, the ultrasound and CT Scan (that I got the bill for today...dear lord help me!) were about 3 weeks ago but the doctors seemed to think that I would know for certain if it burst on it's own because of it's size and I would be in massive pain.
Since that didn't happen, the surgery was continued last Monday. The Friday before was the pre-op appointments, and I was thinking it was a minor, no big deal surgery and then they started explaining that I could lose one or both of my ovaries when the cysts were removed if it was too difficult to cut around, or if they had attached to anything else, etc. I left thinking "Oh crap, what have I agreed to?"
Oh, let me not forget to tell you about the "bowel prep" I had to do before surgery all day Sunday which consisted of only clear liquids to drink and hard candy all day and then a bottle of Magnesium Citrate (major laxative action) in the evening...let's just say that was NOT a fun day. Period!
Anyway, Monday morning came and I went in for surgery. I had to wait for.e.ver. for the surgeon and I honestly thought my stomach was going to eat itself before they finally took me back at 12:45ish. After the surgery and I came to I asked my Mom how bad it was, just holding my breath for her to not say they took both my ovaries. She hesitantly tells me that the cysts seemed to have dissolved, everything looked completely normal!
I am SO incredibly thankful for that, don't get me wrong, things could've been SO very ugly, but I do wish the surgery wouldn't have happened. Well, now I have 2 new scars to add to my 'collection' I'm starting to look like a bad dissection job of a science experiment!
Anyway, the healing has been a little un-fun, but I know it would've been a lot worse if there was internal 'cutting' involved. Maybe, just maybe I won't have to do any more of that for a long time. Anesthesia takes weeks to get out of my system...or maybe that's just my excuse for being exhaustedly tired all the time!

Hair is a fantastic luxury!

My hair has finally come back enough to stop covering my head and not feel like I look a hot mess all the time! It took me a couple weeks to be fully comfortable with my short, short 'do, but I have learned to embrace it and I figure it's a symbol of a fresh start in more ways than one. I not only get a do-over with my hair and now have fine, never been colored or flat ironed or over processed hair, but I get a do-over with my life also. Let's hope I don't mess either one up!

Here's what I'm looking like these days, it's a little longer than it was in the last pic I posted because of the most wonderful hair product ever (well, if you need your hair to grow or thicken up), Nioxin. I use the shampoo, conditioner and a scalp activating spray daily and I'm telling you the stuff is fantastic! I'm going to get the vitamins also because I hear they work wonders for your hair, skin and nails, but I can't confirm that for sure yet.
Here I am, and here's a side view so you can see all my little curls. I haven't had curly hair in at least 5 years, but haven't had really curly hair since I was really young. I'm interested to see how it looks as it gets longer. Hopefully I won't have a curly afro, how hard will that be to grow out?! :-)

Now that my hair is curly, maybe people will stop asking us where the Little One gets her curls from. Bless her heart she gets asked that question ALL the time!

It's still a strange color if you ask me. It's an ash brown shade, but I guess it works since it seems to blend in with my grey hairs and doesn't make them stand out quite as much as they did with my old natural color, which was a lot darker. It would be nice if I didn't have to color it to hide the grey all the time, we'll see if that works out! I'm a bit of a chameleon when it comes to hair...well, I was when I had some ;-) I love to play with hairstyles and colors, maybe I'll have to tame that down with my new curly mane!

So, I say all that to tell you: YAY FOR HAIR!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I LOVE HAIR :)

Family Visit!

Last week The Hubby's Aunt, Uncle, Brother and our little family all met their cousin's wife and 3 precious children at a restaurant in town. We had a nice time catching up, and the kids had a blast! After dinner the Aunt & Uncle wanted to take the kids to the Dollar Store and let them pick out a few things, and that was hilarious! It was the hardest decision for all of them, I couldn't believe it!

We so wish they could see each other more often and grow up being close. Their family lives near Orlando, and we don't get down there often and they have 3 little ones (and one on the way!) so needless to say they don't travel often either! They act like no time has passed when they do get together though, hopefully that will always be the case :)

Another fun visit!

Last weekend some friends that moved away recently came into town for the day and we were able to visit for a while. Our kids have so much fun together, and when we told the Little One who she was going to see we asked if she remembered them and she said "Yes, I think about them EVERY day!" She might be a little dramatic, I don't know, but they are too cute together!

He even told us that she was his girlfriend which she acted like was disgusting to her, but she loved every second of it :-)

They were born on the same day at the same hospital. The Little One thinks this is SO cool! Here they are this weekend:

Funny Faces :-P

And here they are on the day they were born: Yeah, my little one was a week late and hers was a few weeks early so they had a big size difference...and we were holding each other's babies in the pic in case you couldn't tell!

They have another little boy that's 2 who came also but he didn't want to pose for any pics. He's way too busy for that!

We were glad to be able to see them, hope to be able to spend a little more time together soon (and that I can get more pics)!