My "girls"

Soooo...I have less than 48 hours left with the twins and I am starting to think I should have enjoyed them more than I have.....

After all...they never got to experience Mardi Gras and getting beads, they've not seen the sun..EVER(ok well at least not since I was out of diapers anyway), they have never been to the east side, or really even on a bar dancing, heck they don't even really pop out of any of my clothes, and they have never helped me do a jello shot or put on lipstick a la Molly Ringwald in Breakfast Club, the poor girls have led a rather shelter life and it will soon be over.....I am feeling kind of neglectful-LOL

Ok, I kid....mostly anyway. I wouldn't actually have the nerve to do most of that stuff anyway! But I am starting to feel a bit sad that they will be gone soon. Don't get me wrong, I am still going to have the surgery, no question about that, and I will still have reconstruction and get my perky new boobs(YAY) but ..... they have been a part of me forever..like my whole life(LOL) and it will be strange to not have them anymore. So I am slightly melancholy about it at the moment.

I did have one nice moment this weekend though....I was doing laundry and emptying the dryer and found a bra that I had missed pulling out beforehand and I was very unhappy because it is one of my favorites until I realized...after Wed. I won't need them anymore!!!! And eventually even if I do want to wear a bra...it won't be this size anyway!!!!!! So no harm was done and it made me smile, so yes, there is still a big silver lining to it all:)

Hope you all had a nice weekend and are ready or fall weather finally, I certainly am:)

Blog ya later-
K

The Good, the BAD and the Ugly!

Of cancer...and chemo in particular!(I am sure I will do this again after all of the boob stuff)

I have been compiling my list of these things all summer long and have decided to share...I've shared pretty much everything else so why not, eh? I am going to go backwards with the list though....

The Ugly.....
Only one thing really comes to mind...my scar from the port. Its not even that big, but it is in a spot that will be forever visible. I don't consider the other scar(from the lymph nodes) as ugly because it is a-under my arm and b- in the shape of a smiley face which I happen to think was a sign since the cancer had not spread and so it is a happy reminder of that:)

The BAD.....
chemo itself....I mean the meds are all about killing cells...'nuff said
nausea
pain
hot flashes(which are really coming on strong at the moment and are not fun at all)
losing my hair
feeling out of control
tiredness
having to explain to my girls
telling my mom and dad
telling Ed

The Good.....
There are a few things that are not so bad side effects of chemo and I figured they deserve their time in the spotlight since they are some of the things which I have actually enjoyed or learned from...

Not having to shave my legs or armpits!!!!!!
No period since June!!!!!
Being able to eat really super spicy foods(no taste buds:P )
Reconnecting with old friends
Finding out who my friends were
Finding out I had more friends than I realized
Realizing life can be short so enjoying every moment
Finding out that my girls are very strong young women already
Being reminded again of just how amazing of a man I married
Accepting that once again....it is not about my plans and timetables, but His
Allowing my ego and self to take a back burner and let others care for me
Finding out I am strong too

And am sure I will think of more....or maybe they will just evolve with the boob stuff!

Anyway.....thank you all for being with me on this journey, I wish none of us would have had to make it at all but I am glad you were with me:)

Blog ya later-
K

I am pink already!!!

So I set up my "site" for the Passionately Pink for the Cure campaign and I already have had an overwhelming response and it hasn't even been 24 hours yet!!!!

I honestly didn't plan on sending an email to everyone that had been on that list but I couldn't figure out how to get it to only highlight some people so I finally gave up and just hit send to all.....and wow...what a response:)

I have literally been teary eyed since last night when the first pledges started coming up and it hasn't stopped....I am beginning to wonder if I will dehydrate myself from all the crying!

But I have also been thinking about what to wear and the girls have been working on several designs for our tshirts and are still arguing over who has the better one so it will be a few days before I figure out how to compromise judiciously between the two:P I will then post it though so you all can see and if you want to make one feel free to be creative or just to wear pink...heck I don't care I'm gonna be blinded by my tears for the next month anyway:D

I did have one thought though.....I would love to be able to get a picture of everyone together who is going pink. Now I realize that won't be possible for those who live out of town, but I would love for you to send me a pic of your pink and I promise I won't post it unless you say ok, I mostly just want to see how pink everyone gets. For those that are in town, and specifically at the girls' school, I would love to have everyone wear their pink to the fall festival and then get a picture with everyone in it.

If you want to be included send me an email or drop a note here and as it gets closer I will figure out the time and place to take the pic.

Once again, thanks to all the angels out there who are holding me up....without you all I would not be able to be here. I love you all.

Blog ya later-
K

Passionately Pink

So I went and signed up officially for my passionately pink day! I will give the link at the end of this post to where you can send in a donation.
I have decided to have two days that you could choose from. My birthday is Friday Oct.24th but my kiddos and many of yours have that day off school. So my girls asked if they could wear their pink on Thursday the 23rd instead and I of course said yes:) So I am giving you the option of either or heck...both if you want:D

It is something I will be doing every year from here on out, just so you know, and I would love to have all of you participate each year as well. This year when you sign up I will then send you a pin to wear so don't forget to put down an address for me to send it to. For next year I will have plenty of time to get crafty so keep that in mind. As for what you wear...I don't have a set outfit in mind...or even a set amount of pink. You can just wear the little pin or you could literally go head to toe in pink if that is your desire:) Personally I don't have that much pink...just not a pink person in my clothing choices so I will have to search my drawers to find a shirt:) Although I may just go to the Komen site and get something new to celebrate my new bday this year.

Anyhoo...you may have received an email by now promoting this campaign...possibly two(sorry couldn't get it to work precisely how I wanted) but if not, here is the link to my page for the PP4aC where you can directly donate to Komen online.

Thanks again to everyone who has supported me in all the various ways through this summer.

I love ya more than words:)

Blog ya later-
K

http://www.komendonations.org/site/TR/PassionatelyPink/PassionatelyPink?px=2932719&pg=personal&fr_id=1080&et=2ieVghJR-He44TCy3XYhRw..&s_tafId=10350

and if that link doesn't work...leave a comment and I will try and figure it out again.

PS...if you by chance don't have anything pink to wear...check out the Komen site...they have a ton of stuff. You can get it directly from the main Komen site or go to a local affliate sight and buy from them, and in that case the money goes directly to the affliate not the general fund. But a percentage of every proceeds go towards fighting breast cancer and you can't beat that:)

Friday Night Lights

Well, tonight we went across the street to the high school to watch B cheer with the "big girls" at a football game. It also happened to be a night where they were honoring a fallen firefighter who went to school there, you may know him, or of him at least, Ryan Hummert. It was quite moving to see all of the cheerleaders wearing t-shirts with his number on it and the four local elementary schools raised over $1000 dollars from the kids just today to help with a scholarship fund in his name. It is nice to know that the community will always come together in honor of someone special.

As for B....she was highly entertaining, as usual:) She jumped and cheered and screamed her little heart out and loved every minute. L was able to ...wander with her friends and she had a great time as well, the only kink in her night was that we wouldn't let her stay for the whole game! However she does have vb early and it was hot and starting to wear on me a bit...but I assured her that soon enough she would be walking across the street by herself to the games and we wouldn't even be there.....well maybe we still will, but not in the same parent watcher-overer capacity. Anyhoo...made me realize just how fast they are growing up and how very much I don't like that one bit!

As for me....the days of pain have begun, although it hasn't been too bad so far(still I did just knock on wood) but I can at least look forward to not having to go through it again either! I am looking ahead to everything to come and thinking way too much about it as always but one thing I have thought a great deal about is next month's "Think Pink" campaign. If you haven't committed to doing that for/with anyone yet..mark the 24th off on your calendar. It will be my 36th(egads!) bday and I would like to celebrate it by supporting breast cancer research through Komen and the "Think Pink" campaign. If you would like to join me, you pledge between $1 and $5 and then wear pink on that day...its really pretty simple, but it means so much.

Sooooo...if you want to do this please email me or if you don't have my email, leave me a "comment" here as they are totally confidential and you can give me your email so I can send you more information and I will never post it on the blog.

I will post more on it soon.

Thanks for all of your thoughts these past few months, they truly have carried me through.

Blog ya later-
K

Happy Dance Time!

C'mon y'all get up and do a happy dance with me...I am done with chemo!!!!!!!!

I had my last treatment yesterday and am kind of in shock.....albeit a good kind of stupor, but...I have been so focused for the past four months on getting through chemo and now that I am .... I'm not quite sure what to do anymore!! But don't worry too much, I am sure I will find multiple things to occupy my mind and time:)

I also went in today to meet with my surgeon and the bilateral mastectomy surgery is scheduled for Oct.1, with the reconstruction to follow in early Dec. hopefully. She also said that she was fairly sure that I wouldn't need radiation, which is very nice. So as long as it all goes well and the pathology comes back as all clear I should be good:)

So...I am on cloud nine..until Thursday when the 3 days of pain kick in...but I can deal with that ...after all I have some pretty good pain pills still:P

Hope you all are well and stayed mostly high and dry through this past weekend of crazy Ike insanity.

Blog ya later-
K

New Surgeon, New Plan

Well, I went to see the new plastic surgeon yesterday....and both mom and I really like her. That and she told me facts and options that weren't even covered with the other one, oh...and insurance totally covers everything with her:) So I am going with her.

But that once again means a total change in plans...ya think I'd be used to that by now! Basically what we are going to do now is have the bilateral mastectomy in early Oct. as planned, but that is it for that point. It will mean a much lower complication rate, a much, much shorter(only one week) recovery time and then we will see how my body will heal and if I would need radiation. This plan is the way I am going for several reasons including those listed above, but also the fact that because of my ginormous boobs, there is no way to tell how much of my skin was dependant on certain blood vessels and such that will no longer be there. Which if the skin then died, would require a new operation to get rid of it and that could cause more complications if the implants were already in there.

So, I will heal for 2-3 months and then begin the implantation process(that sounds rather Borgish-lol). That also will have a much lower complication rate, only 2% vs 30% when combining the surgeries, and a much quicker recovery at 2 weeks vs the 5-6 when it is all combined! Overall it will take more time, but I think I would rather take a bit more time and have semi nice boobs than just "get it done with" and possibly have problems. Not to mention that should I have to have radiation(which at this point we are still thinking no, keep your fingers crossed) I could do that and not destroy the implant which is what happens when you do radiation with an implant, b/c mine wouldn't be there!

And one final bonus to my new Dr....she gets to use gummy bear boobs!!!!!! Now laugh away b/c I did, but listen to how cool this is. There is a newer type of implant that they have nicknamed "gummy bear boobs" due to the gel material inside and how it behaves. When you cut the implant open, it stays together like the inside of a gummy bear!!! Pretty darn cool in case anything would happen. There is the chance for leakage and severe complications if the other implants should burst or split or anything of that nature but not with these! And they are projected to last at least 12 years if not 15-20, vs.5-8 with the others...isn't that something they should tell you at the visit too?!?!?! Especially since I would have to eventually get replacements! So, she is one of 65 Dr.s in the U.S. who is certified to use these and I was lucky enough to find her...thanks Sue and Sue's friend:)

That is the plan for now. Of course things can always change, but hopefully not by much more than week of waiting for something from now on:)

As for me....it is again my 3 days of pain weekend, although this round it started on day 2!!! But, I have stopped trying to be a hero and just started popping the pain pills when I hurt because....well that's what they are for and it hurts! I have also started having a bit of neuropathy...and "I feel it in my fingers...I feel it in my toes"..sing it with me if you know it:P It's not actually bad at this point, just a bit tingly. And really only in my pointer finger on my right hand, my pinky on my left, and my big toe on my right foot...go figure! So it is actually kind of fun as I just check them every few minutes to make sure they are still there, gives me something to do!

One last thing.......I broke down.....and bought a wig!!!! Now, just a slight...ok, a huge warning....if you know/knew me....you will not recognize me at all! With the girls help I picked out an auburn colored wig that has bangs, face framing layers and is past shoulder length! The only thing similar to my old hair is the length! I said I wanted something completely different and it really, really, really is:) But that is the fun of it:) I won't be wearing it all the time but it will be nice to have for special occasions and for when it gets cold.....especially since my hair seems to be in stall mode as far as growing back! And...when I do get my hair back...rest assured it will be blonde.....no matter what, it will be blonde:D So I can still use the wig then for my secret spy missions:)

Hope you all are enjoying this beautiful weather!

Blog ya later-
K

Did you stand up?

I hope you did.....I hope you all did for yourselves, your spouses, parents, children, siblings, family and friends. No one should ever have to go through what someone who is diagnosed with cancer does. I have been so very lucky to have caught it early, had exceptional doctors and an incredible network of you all supporting me. Unfortunately not everyone is so lucky.

It is a dream I have that by the time L and B are old enough for this gene they might carry to possibly affect them, it will no longer be an issue. There will be a simple vaccine or procedure and that is it.....nothing more. It's not a very complicated dream but it is one that can only be realized with the medical research and the dedication from all sectors of America to stem this horrible disease.

I hope....that you hope too.

K

Only One Left!!!!

Well I had my 7th(can you believe it!) treatment yesterday so only one left now......WOOOOOHOOOOO!

It went well except I took the wrong pain pill last night and it didn't quite counteract the steroids as well as I hoped and I was up most of the night. But on a positive note, I planned out all my Brownie stuff for the year, made a design for my paper making press, planned how to add special fonts and extras into the paper, wrote three chapters in the chemo book and read half a romance novel, so it wasn't a complete waste of time:P

As for the whole insurance thing of the last post......the Dr.s office has said that they just don't deal with the insurance anymore but will only charge me what my in-network co-pays would be...and that sounds nice and all but I am just not sure how that will work so I now have to call the insurance company and find out exactly what those would entail including any deductibles. In the meantime I did find another plastic surgeon who does take my insurance, is a women and was highly recommended by a friend of a friend and so I have an appt. with her on Friday. I think I am going to go and see how I like her and then make my decision. It just seems that it might be easier for me to not have to worry about there being any chance of us getting screwed on a bill rather than just going with someone who will process it all for me. Of course I will first have to see if I like her but I am hoping for the best.

Other than that we are chugging along here as the calendar slowly fills with all of the extra activities that come with a school year:)

Hope you all are well.

Blog ya later-
K

PS......if you haven't already, please take time to click on the two buttons to fill out the survey at the top right corner of the blog. It doesn't ask for your name or anything else but I am just very curious as to who reads this....thanks-K