Dreaming of sun, sand and Relaxation

In less than 2 weeks our family will be enjoying ourselves in Maui.

Will and I have been talking about this trip for years. We wanted Liam to be 2, so that he would also have fun and would be easier to take care of than a baby. He will definitely have fun, not sure about the easy part though.

Maui is pretty much all I can think about these days. I am constantly googling pictures and places to go.

I have one more chemo treatment before we go. Fingers crossed it will go smoothly and there will be no more health issues to deal with before or during the trip.

Back on track

So things seem to be heading in the right direction again. I can just post a quick update, as I am in my iphone at Apex.

The week continued to be too full of hospital visits for my liking. We went to the ER one more time to deal with really painful cramping. Everything checked out though and I was sent home with some painkillers.

We showed up on Wednesday for chemo, but they were worried my stent had moved so we spent the day getting X-rays. There was no move, so chemo was moved to Thursday.

We were able to get my treatment on Thursday! Yippee!! Crossing our fingers we are back on track. I've felt fine the past few days, just really tired. Hoping to wake up feeling normal tomorrow!

Home Sweet Home

I am so happy to be back home. We were warned that I may need to spend a few nights in the hospital, so I was so happy to be released after one night.
Saturday we checked into the ER at 5am and hung out there until after 1pm. We were very entertained by the variety of crazy stuff we saw. In the late morning I was given the okay to drink clear fluids. We were moved to a room once there was a free bed, and by some total fluke I got a private room!!
The day went by really fast. I took morphine about every two hours so I was pretty comfortable. We watched lots of shows from the laptop and read some trashy magazines to pass the time.
I didn't sleep very well and the pain kept returning so I wasn't very optimistic about getting out. They took my blood at around 8, and I had resigned myself to spending another day there. Luckily I started feeling better and when the doctor came around noon I was feeling pretty good. My blood work showed a big improvement, so I had to eat a bit of food to make sure it didn't cause pain and then I was allowed to leave!
I have been told it will still take a few days to feel normal. I am quite comfy on the couch, but every time I get up or move too much it hurts. It is really hard to stay on the couch when the kids want you. Will has taken them to gymnastics this morning so I can rest and they can have fun.
I am so grateful for all the help we have had the past few days. It was so nice to have Will with me and to know the kids were having a blast. My plan for the next couple days is to rest and listen to my body. We have a doctor's appt on Wednesday and will find out if I get to have chemo that day.
Hope everyone had a good week.

A crazy few days

So I am currently hooked up to morphine and fluids at the hospital. It has been a crazy few days...

Wednesday we went in for our pre chemo bloodwork. We saw the doctor and my liver enzymes were elevated. My white blood cell count was good. Also they tested my tumor markers again and they are stil in normal range. So that was good. Doctor was concerned about liver so she wanted me to have a ct scan. Options were there was a blockage or cancer had spread making my liver not function.

That was a pretty crappy day. We were pretty stressed. Luckily we were able to get in for a ct scan that evening. There was no spread!!
The next morning the doctor called and although they couldn't see a blockage, she wanted me to have an ERCP..something goes down through my mouth and checks out the liver and if necessary they can put a stint in to help drain the blockage. We did that in Kelowna Friday morning. The doctor said it wasn't totally blocked but he put a stint in anyways to help. Hopefully this will bring my liver enzymes down and I can have chemo on Wednesday.

After getting home yesterday I was pretty uncomfortable. The pain got worse thought the night, so at 5am will and I came to the Er. They gave me some morphine for the pain and did some blood work. I have pancreatitis, which is a possible complication from the procedure. Basically my pancreas is inflamed. It will fix itself in a day or two. I can't have anything to eat or drink though. That sucks. At least I will get unlimited morphine! I have to stay in the hospital until its resolved. Hopefully just a day but it could take a few days.

Anyways, I'm pretty comfortable right now. I think I will get pretty bored pretty quick though. And I really miss my kids. I haven't been around much the past few days. Thankfully we have awesome families who are taking turns taking care of the kids and helping us out.

Thanks for thinking of me!

Happy New Year

Happy New Year everyone! 2012 was a year with ups and downs, to say the least. I can't, however, say that it was a bad year. The cancer diagnosis obviously sucked, but it, along with the chemo, did not outweigh all the good we had.

2012 saw Sophie and Liam develop into their own little personalities. Sophie is definitely a kid now, with her own thoughts and opinions. It is so much fun watching the world through her eyes. Liam also has his own thoughts and opinions, he just can't articulate them yet! This past year saw Liam's first steps and first words, he also started sleeping through the night! My sister married a great friend of ours and we had so much fun planning her wedding. The day was absolutely perfect. Will and I celebrated 5 years of being together. It's gone by so fast, but at the same time it's hard to remember life before him. 2012 also saw me reconnect with an aunt (who also happened to beat cancer in 2012!!),and it has really reaffirmed who my good friends are. I have been shown such care and generosity from friends, acquaintances and complete strangers. I also did my first ever bike race, and learned the very basics of mountain biking, something I have always wanted to do. This year has really put things into perspective for me and I feel like I am a much stronger person than I was last year.

I have lots of hopes for 2013. Good health for myself and my family is at the top of my list. I hope that the drugs continue to work, my body continues to recover after the treatments and the doctors have continued wisdom in treating me. I hope our kids have a year full of fun and adventure. I hope we continue to have lots of good times with our family and friends. I hope I am given another niece or nephew to love (no pressure!). I hope Will and I continue to take time out from everything to have fun and and just be us. I hope I am able to pay forward all the kindness that I have been shown. I also hope that our team has a blast doing the Elevator Relay. I'm not going to tell you the name, I'll just say that I came up with it while on a fair amount of drugs during one of my treatments.

Thank you again for all your support. Happy 2013!

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone! We had a fantastic Christmas! Sophie has been so excited all month, so it was really special to watch her open gifts and celebrate the day with family. On Christmas Eve, we had dinner at my parents house. We missed my sister and her husband, as they were at Everest base camp...I know, crazy! It was a nice night and the kids were in such great spirits. After we got the kids to bed, my parents came over to our place for a nice visit. True to form, Sophie and Liam woke us bright and early Christmas morning. Every single morning Sophie has to take purple dolly, a magic wand, and two books downstairs with her. She also insists on having slippers on. However, realizing that the quicker she got downstairs the sooner she got to see if Santa came, she declared, "I don't need to get my stuff organized on Christmas and I don't need to wear my slippers. Let's just go downstairs, okay mommy?" It was pretty cute. Gift opening was fun, although a little hectic. Liam was in a pretty bad mood (he was pretty much screaming the whole time). Afterwards was amazing though. They were so excited to play with their new stuff. Sophie is really into games right now, so we played her new pig game and go fish and did her puzzles. Liam gradually got happier. We then went to Will's parents for a nice brunch. I think Liam ate about 3 plates of pancakes. Even after he was done, he kept going back into the kitchen and helping himself to more. Little piggy! We came home and relaxed for a few hours and then headed to Will's sister's house for Christmas dinner. It was great. The kids had so much fun playing with each other and chasing each other around the house. The food was amazing and it was just a fantastic way to end the day.

The week before Christmas the kids got really sick. Sophie ended up living on the couch for about 5 days. And then Liam got it. They were up multiple times each night. It was no fun. Because of the sick kids, we weren't able to do a few things we traditionally do each year. (Santa pictures, decorate cookies, make a homemade gift for Will, family picture in front of the tree). I mean we could have done them, but it would have been zero fun, both kids would have been screaming and coughing and throwing up and I would have been super stressed. At first it really bothered me, but then I realized it doesn't really matter. Who cares if we are missing a Santa picture from this year? We still did lots of fun holiday things and we will continue to do lots of great stuff all winter.

Today the kids and I are having a relaxing day at home. Hopefully we will be able to put some stuff away and get the house somewhat back in order. My aunt is going to come by for a visit later and then tonight Will and I are going on a date! We get to spend tons of time together, but most of it revolves around appointments, so it will be nice to get out.

I had to go get blood work done today and then chemo tomorrow. At one point it looked like I was going to be getting my chemo on the 24th so I am very grateful that the date changed and I was able to really enjoy Christmas.

I hope everyone is enjoying the holidays.

Thank you for your continued prayers and support!

A little hiccup

So I had chemo yesterday and completely overreacted to something. It has taken me until today to completely calm down, which is really silly, because it wasn't a big deal at all. We go into oncology early to get my blood drawn. It then gets sent to the lab "stat" so that it will be done in time for me to see the doctor and have treatment. The nurse got me all hooked up and then I could tell something wasn't right. I don't watch what she's doing, but it seemed like something was different. She then told me that she couldn't draw any blood. I got a huge pit in my stomach and started crying. She explained that this happens with port-a-caths and that it is really common and not a big deal. My choices were have something injected into it so that it would clear (this would take an hour and make me late for my doctors appointment and treatment) or I could get my blood drawn the old fashioned way from the lab. I choose the lab, because that seemed the 'easiest'. As much as I hate extra needles, I'm not doing anything to jeopardize not getting my chemo. Luckily we saw a tech who we know and she was very fast and it was pretty painless. After, we went back to oncology were I had the injection to clear out my port. Everything is back to working order.

The doctor's appointment went fine, all my blood work is still looking good. I somehow managed to drop a couple of pounds though. I think becasue my weight had stabilized, I stopped actively trying to gain weight. Oops. Back on the eating as much fat and calories as possible diet. I'm guessing if I stopped with all the clean eating and started eating Christmas goodies I would gain it back pretty fast, but I think that would cause me more harm than good. I'm pretty confident I'll gain it back by my next appointment. I have just found a recipe for raw, sugarless, nanaimo bars that looks pretty good. I think that might help.

Yesterday completely exhausted me. It was a really busy day in oncology so we didn't get home until almost 6pm! The stress of the blood test really took a toll on me as well. I had a good sleep last night though and am feeling really well today. We put up and decorated our tree and made some Christmas puppets. Sophie and I put on a puppet show for Will and Liam. It was quite entertaining.

Tomorrow should be interesting....Will is removing my port-a-cath for me. I have total confidence in him, but  I am still a little nervous. Wish us luck!