I'm just here for the Piroshkies

New Blog

2010-07-29T16:11:00.001-07:00

There are a few people who asked me to keep writing a blog, so here it is:

abnormal is normal for me

Party Invite

2010-07-27T13:00:00.000-07:00

Waiting For My Real Life To Begin

2010-07-25T13:18:00.000-07:00

Nine months ago during a routine six week post-delivery check up after having Aurelia, Dr. Fisher noticed I had a large lump on my neck. She ordered an ultrasound which led to a CAT scan, which led to a fine need biopsy, which two months later led to a surgical biopsy in Seattle, which led to me being diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma Cancer. Nine months ago, my life changed dramatically, and it will never be the same, which I have now learned, isn’t always a bad thing.

During the past nine months I’ve had three surgical procedures, two PET scans, ten doses of chemotherapy, and seventeen radiation sessions. I’ve met with eight different doctors in three different states, five infusion nurses (Tamara was the best), and countless nurses and technicians. I’ve met dozens of people with cancer, and in the last three months alone, I’ve lost my aunt and one of my best friends to the disease.

Cancer Sucks.

I got home on Tuesday night after being away for a month. Not much has changed. The garden looks almost the same because nothing has neither died nor grown due to the lack of summer in Juneau. Addison did loads of work on the house and the kitten turned into a cat. Like me, the girls are excited to be home and back to our normal routine life, a life where mommy is done with treatments.

I may be done with treatments, but everything is not behind me. For the next two years I will need to meet with Dr. Fisher every three months, and then every six months for five years after that. She will check my lymph nodes to make sure they are not swelling and she will need to give me an overall physical examination. I will also need a CBC, CMR THS and ESR every three to six months. In six months, I need to have a CAT scan. If that comes back clean, my oncologist said I should never need another one unless I start having cancer-like symptoms. I will also need a yearly chest x-ray and I'll need to start doing mammograms earlier than most women because I am now susceptible to breast cancer after being exposed to radiation. Additionally, I'll need to start getting pneumococcal and flu vaccines regularly. I also learned that in a year to five years, my thyroid will quit functioning and I will need to take thyroid medication for the rest of my life, another issue caused by radiation. Oh and lastly, I'm at an increased risk for coronary artery disease. Phew, did I get it all? After my oncologist told me this he said he would not need to see me on a regular basis and I quote, "It is a real positive to be fired by a medical oncologist and I am very optomistic you will do well."

I may be able to move on to my post-cancer life, but the reminder of it will always be there. It’s not something I can easily put behind me and be done with it for the rest of my life. My focus will now shift from beating it, to now staying on top of it. I will do my best not dwell on fear that it may come back, but instead try to continue a healthy lifestyle and keep positive. I can’t say I won’t get nervous each time I’m awaiting my test results, but I will at the very least try to stay positive.

So what’s next? For starters, I’m planning my Juneau celebration party. It will be August 21st, 7 PM at the Juneau Arts and Culture Center (old Armory.) I hope many people can make it and help me celebrate. If you want to come in from out of town, we can stack people in like sardines at our house, or find other places for you to stay. The more the merrier. Aside from party planning, I’m eventually going to have to start training for the marathon. I gotta say, beating cancer wasn’t all that fun at times, but I can honestly say, I’ve feared the looming marathon more! For a girl who has never even run in a 5K race, a marathon is going to be quite the challenge. Brock suggested we run the San Francisco Nike Women’s Marathon in October of 2011. I’ll be seeking donations for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society soon, so if you’re interested, please let me know.

And in the near future, Addison and I are going to crack open a bottle of Veuve Clicquot my favorite champagne. He bought it for me Christmas of 2008, right before I found out I was pregnant. Due to pregnancy, breast feeding and then cancer, we still haven’t opened it. I think now is the time, and there’s definitely cause to celebrate.

Aside from celebration parties and running, who knows what the next year will bring for me. I am open to positive change. The past nine months have been a wild ride, but at the same time, I feel that aside from the possible future side effects of radiation, I am a better person as a result. I find myself happier, much more appreciative of everything I have, and willing and able to make positive changes in my life to make things better for myself and my family. Also, my hunch that I have the most amazing family and friends was proved to be correct. My family and friends held my hand during this entire time and wouldn’t leave my corner during this fight. I thank you so much. I will always be appreciative and indebted to you all.

I guess this is it; dare I say I’ve reached the end of my blog? Ending it would mean that I am thinking positive and that I won’t need to share the trials and tribulations of having cancer ever again. Thank you so much for reading and keeping me going. I really do hope that the next time I do go to Seattle it really will be to just go for the Piroshkies, and to see friends and family of course.

PS-Thanks to all the musicians/bands who gave me great song titles for the titles of my blog entries:

Waiting For My Real Life To Begin- Colin Hay
Today The Suns On Us- Sophie Ellis Bextor
Hasn’t Hit Me Yet- Blue Rodeo
Fall Apart Again- Brandi Carlile
Power of Two- Indigo Girls
I Don’t Want To Talk About It- Rod Steward
Man on The Run- Cowboy Mouth
No Miracle, No Dazzle- Blue Rodeo
Everything Old is New Again- Barenaked Ladies
Beautiful Day- U2
I Will- Beatles
Poker Face- Lady Gaga
Only a Dream- Mary Chapin Carpenter
I’d Rather Press On-Gordon Lightfoot
Reasons Why- Nickel Creek
Closer to Fine- Indigo Girls
Spring- Cheryl Wheeler
Nothing More's Gonna Get In My Way Supergrass
Fast As I Can- Great Big Sea
What Went Wrong (In Your Head)- Supergrass
Hope Alone-Indigo Girls
Where is My Mind-Pixies
Wisheries- John Gorka
Always Getting Better, Blue Rodeo
Sugar, Sugar- The Archies
As Cool as I Am – Dar Williams
Come Back Down – Toad the Wet Sprocket
Thank you – Tori Amos
Vacation – The Go-Go’s
Here Comes the Sun – The Beatles
Man on the Run – Cowboy Mouth
Sounds Strange –Captain Tractor
All I Want – Toad the Wet Sprocket
The Luckiest – Ben Folds
It Happens Every Day – Dar Williams
Pushing the Needle Too Far – Indigo Girls
We Didn’t Start the Fire (Okay, so maybe I did.) – Billy Joel
Who Needs Sleep? – Barenaked Ladies

Today The Sun's On Us

2010-07-18T22:36:00.000-07:00

At Wendy’s memorial on Saturday, her step-dad Dale told everyone that he’d been seeing a lot of yellow butterflies fluttering around since Wendy’s passing. I couldn’t really hear everything he was saying, but I am pretty sure he said he believed the butterflies were her spirit being present around us. I’ve always thought those types of things were coincidences or us trying to hobnail pieces together to make ourselves feel better. But, I have to say I do find it interesting that the moment Melissa and Desi (who are mutual friends of both Wendy and I) arrived for the picnic today, a yellow butterfly buzzed us and came right into our circle, did a fly by and then flew off. Later in the day a jogger ran by the picnic with a shirt that simply read, “Team Wendy.” I may be grasping at straws to feel connections with my departed friend, but I have to say, it was pretty darn awesome.

Speaking of awesome, wow, what a picnic! Twenty-one adults, seventeen kiddos, one dog, and I swear a near twenty pound chocolate cake made by Addi’s Aunt Jeanne gathered by Lake Washington for my celebration picnic today. The majority of people were classmates of mine from Ketchikan, some of whom I haven’t seen in over fifteen years! People drove from all over Washington and as far as Oregon and boy did I feel special. I tried to spend time with everyone who came, but found it hard to spend as much time with people as I wanted to. Five hours flies by fast when visiting with people one hasn’t seen in a long time. For me, the best part was watching our kids play with each other as if they’d known each other for years.

Strangely enough, getting cancer had its benefits. For one, my girls got to spend a lot more time with both their grandmother’s, which was beneficial not only for my girls, but for their grandma’s as well. Second, it put me back in contact with a lot of friends I had lost touch with over the years. I’ve also been able to spend time with friends that I only see once in a blue moon. And, I got to see Wendy twice before she died. It’s got me thinking that it’s unfortunate it had to take me getting cancer to help me see the value in seeing my friends and family more often, but it’s something I’ll never take for granted again.

My weekend started out cloudy and full of tears, but it ended with sunshine and smiles. I hear the weather has been cruddy in Juneau. Well get ready folks, because even if it’s cloudy, I’m bringing enough sunshine to go around.

Hasn't Hit Me Yet

2010-07-16T22:31:00.000-07:00

My friend Elizabeth flew in from Minnesota for the week and it really couldn’t have been at a better time. If she hadn’t of come, I probably would have holed up in the condo and swam in gloom and doom until my fingers were pruned.

Elizabeth and I met in college while doing a show together called Starmites. It’s a terribly written musical that takes place in outer space. I played the role of a Nazi Banshee and Elizabeth was the leader of the Banshee pack and her character’s name was simply Diva, which I might add really fits my friend. It’s a title she is okay with and we lovingly call her, “Diva E.” In auditions, I was the plain no make-up girl in a t-shirt, jeans and running shoes with my hair pulled back in a pony tail, and she was the girl with spandex, character shoes and hair as big as all the members in an 80s hair band combined. When she walked into the auditions (I swear she kicked the door open and the theme from Fame played) all I could think of was, “Please don’t sit by me, please don’t sit by me.” She sat right by me and we became the best of friends. As my dad says, Elizabeth is the one who taught me how to be a girl. She showed me how to do my makeup, fix my hair and taught me that it’s not a mortal sin to wear a dress. Lena’s middle name is Elizabeth, after her.

It is impossible to be sad around Elizabeth. Within an hour of Diva E. landing, she and Mini E. were singing all the songs from Annie and Sound of Music, with the perfect choreography to go with each song. I was laughing really hard and enjoying the show watching while Aurelia yearned to join them. Elizabeth accompanied me to my radiation in the mornings and she was with my on Wednesday when I walked in and the radiation team told me “Congratulations, it’s your last day!” My response was simply, “No it’s not.”

Back in June was I was given a calendar with all dates and time slots for my radiation and it went until July 20th, so when they told me on July 14th that I was done, I was a bit confused. It turns out they were right. There was a miscommunication between my doctor and the coordinator and I only had to do 17 treatments, not 20. Elizabeth and the radiation team were jumping up and down celebrating and I just stood there looking really confused, and most likely really stupid. I wasn’t ready to be done. I hadn’t mentally prepared myself that after 7 ½ months of treatments, that today would be my last day. I can’t really describe what I was feeling. There was a combination of shock, happiness, relief and fear. Yes, fear. As they bolted me into position, I was choking back tears as my mind flew a million miles a minute. There was relief that it was all finally over, but also fear that kept coming up in my head. What if this comes back some day and I have to go through all this again? I tried to push the thought out of my head, but it wouldn’t budge. And of course, I thought about Wendy.

When I came out of the radiation room, the team and Elizabeth clapped and cheered for me. They had me ring a bell three times to signal that I was done with radiation. I also received a certificate of completion.

Elizabeth and I celebrated by heading straight to Piroshky, Piroshky. I then went and bought Lena a dress. On all my trips to Seattle for chemo, I always bought a dress to bring back to Lena as a gift. For some reason, she calls them her “Alaska Airlines Dresses.” I wanted to get her a “Celebration Dress” to close out this chapter for her too. Then we went to Nordstrom’s where Elizabeth insisted I get a makeover at the Smashbox makeup counter. The makeup artist was super sweet and even “styled” my short hair for the first time since its grown back.

We ended our day by venturing up to Swedish Hospital to meet and visit with Janice who is a new friend of mine. She is currently undergoing chemo to fight cancer and is an avid reader of my blog. Her cousin Travis who I’ve known for years turned her onto my blog so she would know others are going through what she is going through. It was weird being back in a room filled with all the smells and drugs that made me sick at one time, but it also felt good being there as living proof that those drugs work and that it was all worth it. I look forward to keeping in touch with Janice as she too gets to celebrate her remission in the near future.

I’ve been asked a lot if my picnic is canceled on Sunday due to the fact that Wendy’s memorial is on Saturday. I’ve really thought hard and long about it. I can’t say that I’ve been in much of a celebratory mood, but I finally came to a conclusion. I am here, I am alive. People could be coming to my funeral instead of a party to celebrate the fact that I’m still here. The plain and simple fact of the matter is, I’d rather being going to a party with Wendy than without her and I hope my friends feel the same way about me. Too many times we don’t spend enough time in our lives celebrating our friendships and oftentimes, it’s too late. It’s a good lesson to be learned- we need celebrate our friendships and good health and the plain and simple fact that- we can.

With that said, Saturday is going to be hard. Even though I am aware of Wendy’s death and I’ve cried every day since Sunday, I can’t say it’s really hit me yet. None of this has hit me. I’ll still expect to see Brian on the Pacific Queen, I’ll still expect to hear Wendy’s loud voice booming through the crowd on Saturday, and after 7 ½ months, I can’t get used to the fact that I am done with all of this. When things are so ingrained in your life, it’s a bit of a shock when it’s all suddenly gone and over, whether it was welcomed or not.

So what’s next? I have Wendy’s memorial on Saturday, Sunday I’m having a Seattle celebration picnic (12:00 at Madrona Park,) and on Monday I am meeting with both my oncologist and my radiation specialist to discuss my future as a survivor in remission. Then finally, Tuesday I get to come back home to Juneau!

Fall Apart Again

2010-07-11T23:23:00.000-07:00

Wendy died today. I found out first on Facebook which is not the way I want to find out that one of my oldest and dearest friends has died. I wonder who takes pride on broadcasting someone’s death less than 20 minutes after they die, before her close friends even have the chance to hear about it. It was so unfathomable that I had to call my friend Melissa to confirm it. Unfortunately, Melissa confirmed exactly what I read on Facebook.

This comes less than 24 hours after hearing of a close family friend’s death who died on his boat just yesterday. And less than 12 hours since I called 911 because Aurelia was choking and my mom and I couldn’t get whatever was in her mouth out even though we were smacking her back so hard I thought for sure we were breaking ribs. Thankfully, while I was on the phone, she swallowed whatever it was and started breathing again. The fire department still came and gave her the thumbs up. But seriously; Brian’s death, Aurelia’s big scare, and now Wendy. I just can’t take this anymore. I have no more nerves left. I thought there would be a point where the tears have stopped flowing because there were none left, but I’ve cried what seems like buckets and they are still flowing.

Wendy’s death isn’t hitting me hard just because she is my friend. Wendy and I were diagnosed with cancer around the same time. Tonight I re-read the e-mail she sent me on January 20th, a couple weeks after I was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s. She told me she was having troubles breathing and that she had a lump on her lung and wondered what she should do about it. I told her to go see a doctor and insist on them doing a biopsy. Next thing I know, she has her lung removed and then less than three months after that, she’s gone. In the end, Wendy’s brain tumors got too big and started causing her to have strokes. She was supposed to start Radiation tomorrow to reduce the size of them, but she ended up in the hospital again just a few days after I saw her last week. Last night, she suffered a brain hemorrhage, was put on life support, and was taken off this morning. Even though I knew Wendy’s diagnosis was not good, I thought she’d have at least a year, not a few days. I wanted to be there to fight it with her and extend her life as long as she could fight it. I wanted to be able to hold her hand again, laugh at our mismatched friendship, and most importantly help her in any way that I could. She was not supposed to be the Hillary in this friendship, neither of were supposed to be. She lost this battle just as I was getting ready to celebrate my victory. It really takes the wind out of my sails leaving it difficult to even want to celebrate.

When Wendy was here on Tuesday, I could tell that she was very afraid to die. She was very sad at the thought of leaving her children who meant the world to her. In a way I find comfort in the fact that she will not spend the next year worrying about leaving them behind, but I also feel for Austin and Kassi who were shortened time with their beautiful mother. I know she was in an incredible amount of pain, but I hope in her final moments, she did not know that she was dying.

The picture at the top is my favorite picture of the two of us. We're in seventh grade and Wendy was being her regular silly self. I was laughing so hard the smile on my face is about to burst. This is how I will remember my friend, always making me smile.

Goodbye Ydnew. I guess you got your way, you got to keep your hair. Although, I must say I was looking forward to you sporting a Harley Davidson Skull cap. Love, Secnarf.

I feel as though just as things were starting to improve in my life, I was just knocked back down. When will this end?

Power of Two

2010-07-07T16:46:00.000-07:00

Cristina and Bryan had a beautiful wedding, surrounded by giant trees, lavender, a few hundred brightly colored Chinese lanterns, beautiful local flowers, family, and friends. One couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful day as they exchanged their vows under an arch of lavender. I stood in place with the other bridesmaids and watched Lena prance down the aisle gracefully scattering flower petals with flourish, dramatically tossing her hands up in the air to make sure the petals were properly distributed. When she reached the end of the aisle, she tipped her basket upside down and shook it to make sure every last petal was out and in its place on the ground. I couldn’t help but laugh and cry at the same time.

Like most weddings, there was a lot to be done before the big day. I told Cristina I would put the flowers together, do the bridesmaids hair, and be the stand in wedding coordinator telling people what to do so she wouldn’t have to. I spent most the day on Friday assembling bouquets, boutonnières, and table arrangements. I had beautiful flowers to work with and I also used greenery and lavender from Cristina and Bryan’s property. It was a lot of work, but quite soothing at the same time to make something beautiful for a beautiful dear friend. It was Cristina who came to Seattle with me when I was getting my biopsy surgery back in January. It was Cristina who was with me when my oncologist told me I had cancer. It was Cristina who watched Aurelia that night because I was admitted to the hospital because I was too sick from the gas induction to go home. It’s Cristina who I e-mailed and texted several times a day the last six months using her wedding as a distraction from my cancer.

While I was in Oregon, I also had the chance to see Wendy who was freshly out of the hospital. Our visit was short because we knew we’d see each other in a few days when she came up to see her oncologist in Seattle. The Seattle visit was emotional and hard. Wendy got really bad news about her cancer while in Seattle. She kept saying it’s now all about the quality of her life verses the quantity. What do you say to that? I wanted to hug her and say, “It’s going to be okay.” But the truth of the matter is, the end result is not okay and I’m not going to lie to her. What can one say in a situation where you know one of your best friends is now looking at quality of life verses quantity? I chose to tell her that I love her and that she needs to stay strong and not give up and to fight it as long as she can. My mom and I also fed her lumpia and hot and sour soup, some of her favorite foods. It was good to see her eat a lot because she looks as though she’s wasting away.

Even though I put on a brave face for Wendy, her visit left me very depressed. She has an eleven year old girl and a thirteen year old boy. This is sadder than Terms of Endearment and Beaches combined, because this is my friend and I am feeling utterly helpless. I was really fretting going to sleep last night when all of a sudden I got a text from Penny who wanted to see how I was doing. After some texts, we realized she was staying in a hotel a mere ten minutes from me, six if I drove fast, which I did. It was awesome seeing her. We talked about Wendy, about our own lives, and about our cruise we’re taking in February. It was a short visit as she had to get up to fly to Buffalo in the morning and I had to get up early to have my port removed, but it was an awesome visit.

Yes, my port is history! As always, it wasn’t a straightforward procedure with me and I was thinking the whole time I wish Dr. Miller in Juneau was doing it. For one, the surgeon who was supposed to do it left me in the hands of his resident. And get this, he didn’t even do it, his intern did the procedure. The resident had to talk his intern through the whole procedure and I heard things like, “Okay, cut more. No, no, that’s too far. Okay, a little to the left, oh, too far, oh wait, no, more.” And, my personal favorite which I heard about ten times, “No! Don’t touch that, it’s not sterile!” They had a really difficult time removing it because they said it was about an inch and a half deeper than they usually are. I heard the resident say, “It’s like digging in a deep, bloody, hole.” Not really the image I wanted. I am afraid to see what my already wicked scar is going to look like now that they’ve butchered me once again. But, it’s out. It’s painful because I have a huge incision in me, but like I said, it’s out! One step closer to being finished.

Oh, and before I forget, I’m having a picnic/BBQ in Seattle on Sunday, July 18th. All Washington and Oregon residents welcome (well, I mean those that I know!) Not sure which park I’m having it at, but I should know in a few days. Stay tuned.

I Don't Want To Talk About It

2010-06-29T20:38:00.000-07:00

This week has been filled with bad news. The night before the marathon, I found out my Hodgkin’s buddy/Pen-Pal Eve in Georgia had her 3-month post chemo PET Scan where she was told her Hodgkin’s had returned. The chemo regimen we both completed did not kill all the cancer in her body, so they will now start her on a different regimen. This of course is a sucker-punch to Eve, but I have confidence she will still come through this okay. It does however leave me feeling uneasy for my 3-month check which will be at the end of August. I am hoping with the addition of radiation, which was not required for Eve, it will help terminate the cancer from my body for good.

The bad news doesn’t end there. In fact, it gets worse. Today my heart nearly broke in half when I found out that my friend Wendy is now in the fight of her life. The metastatic melanoma which they hoped they had knocked out when they removed her entire left lung three months ago, has now presented itself as aggressive tumors on her brain. This is not good news, not good news at all. The 5 year survival rate for metastatic melanoma is, well, I don’t even want to say it out loud nonetheless type it out.

I really don’t know what else to say about Wendy because I am in shock. The thoughts that are going through my head are not ones that I want to write down. It is hard for me to face this reality without being pessimistic at the same time. All I want to do is say a big screw you to cancer today. Stronger words come to mind, but someday my children might read this and I don’t want them to know mommy used the “F word.”

As one could imagine, this has put me in quite a funk, and I can’t be in a funk because this weekend is Cristina’s wedding and I've been looking forward to it for a long time. It’s been one of my goals that I’ve been reaching for to keep me going since January. I will enjoy myself and do whatever it takes to help Cristina have a beautiful wedding. I don’t want to talk about cancer all weekend because this is Cristina’s time and I want to enjoy it with her. Until Sunday, cancer does not exist in my world.

Man on the Run (Part II)

2010-06-26T22:11:00.000-07:00

Little did I know that when I met my friend Brock in a bar twelve years ago that he’d someday run a marathon in my honor with my name scrawled on the back of his shirt. This is exactly what I witnessed today. It’s almost incomprehensible to me. Why did Brock do this? Oh yeah, I had cancer, heck, I’m still getting radiation to rid myself of it for good. The whole thing still seems surreal.

Brock ran with the Canadian Prairie Division for Team in Training which raised money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society of Canada. He raised over $5,000 for the Society, way to go Brock! The night before the marathon, TNT had what they call the Inspiration Dinner. I met Brock and his girlfriend Ellie before the dinner and Brock gave me a shirt to wear- a survivor shirt with “Honouree” printed across the back which means Brock is running in my honour. (I’m being mindful to spell “honor” the Canadian way since that’s the way it’s printed on my shirt.)

We walked up to the giant banquet room and en route we encountered what Brock called “the red carpet.” Loads of people were staged along a path welcoming participants while clacking noise makers, cheering, and giving high-fives, it was like Mardi-Gras! We then got our food and sat down in the ballroom which seated over 800 people. The room was equipped with two giant projector screens that flashed photos of cancer survivors and cancer victims for whom the runners were running. As we ate our dinner, we heard from two speakers. The main speaker was quite enjoyable as he spoke with passion interwoven with humor. The next speaker was a mom whose infant daughter was diagnosed with a rare form of infant Leukemia in 2007 when she was only 11 weeks old. Her speech began with photos of her baby receiving chemo while a tear-jerking song played over the speakers. I could only take so much and quickly had to overt my eyes to the side wall. The mother told us how they fought for over three years and all the news they heard was bad and continued to get worse. It wasn’t until this April that they finally received good news that her son’s marrow transfer was working on her daughter and her daughter is doing much better. Talk about heart-wrenching. I rarely cry in public and it was all I could do to choke back the tears watching the pain on this mother’s face as she described the ordeal her family had been through- complete and utter hell.

At one point during the evening, they asked the survivors to stand up. This was really weird for me. For one, I have a really hard time drawing attention to myself in large crowds and two; sometimes I don’t feel like I qualify to call myself a “survivor.” At one point in the evening the speaker started talking about the fight people with cancer have to undergo at which point Brock reached out and patted me on the back and gave me a hug. It was a “What? Who? Me?” moment.

Truth be told, I don’t feel like I’ve had to put up much of a fight and I feel unworthy of any glory in comparison to other cancer patients. When I look at children, or people with really bad cancers who fight for their life, there is simply no comparison. Even though my cancer has been a part of my day every day for the past six months, it is simply something I’ve had to endure. I had to show up for my chemo and now I show up for my radiation. I’m just enduring it and going through the motions. Sure, it sucks, but I never have felt like I’m fighting for my life, and I feel really lucky as a result. My cancer has been somewhat surreal for me and perhaps someday I will wake up and say, “Oh my word, I had cancer! What the heck was that all about?” But right now, even though I talk about it openly, perhaps I still can’t comprehend the reality of it.

When I got home from the dinner, Lena and Aurelia were asleep. As I stared at them sleeping peacefully in their beds, tears welled up in my eyes and all I could think about was that mother’s talk earlier in the evening. When I crawled into bed I couldn’t sleep and I finally got out of bed and grabbed Aurelia and brought her into bed with me. I would have grabbed Lena too, but she was sleeping with my mom and I didn’t want to wake up my mom. I held sleeping Aurelia in my arms and I just kept thinking how thankful I was that cancer hit me instead of one of my children. That is something I would not have been able to endure. Eventually Aurelia woke up and that’s when I noticed her hair was dripping wet from my tears.

Today I met up with Ellie and we ventured to the finish line to watch Brock cross it. There were over 26,000 runners in the race and it was hard to get a view of the finish line. But we settled in just in time to see Brock cross with a huge smile on his face. He was really happy because he came in under four hours, a personal goal of his. It was a great feeling to be around thousands of happy people who just put their bodies through hell, but were still smiling. Thank you Brock for making me feels so awesome!

When I was first diagnosed back in January, I told Brock I wanted to run a marathon with him when I was in the clear. All along, I was planning on just keeping it local and doing the marathon in Juneau. Truth be told, the reason I wanted to do it was for myself, to prove that I could do it. Not anymore. After seeing what Brock has done with TNT, I want to run a marathon with TNT so I can raise money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. I truly believe that I will do better and be more motivated if I’m running for something bigger than my own goal. I even know who I want to honor when I run. I will be running in memory of my dear friend and second “dad” Don Goffinet who died of Leukemia two years ago. Don meant the world to me and was the one who taught me that education is important, but not as important as getting out and experiencing the world we live in and learning from real life experiences. Don would be so proud of me for running in a marathon and I can already hear him cheering for me.

I guess this is kind of like announcing my campaign run for election, except I’m announcing my run for TNT! Now I just have to figure out which marathon I’m going to run with TNT. Any suggestions Brock?

No Miracle, No Dazzle

2010-06-23T20:27:00.000-07:00

I had no clue what to expect from radiation, so going into it I was pretty unprepared. I had familiarized myself with all the side effects that may occur (skin burns, sore throat, and exhaustion are the lesser effects) and (lung cancer, breast cancer and heart disease are the biggies.) But the actual process of getting the radiation was a complete mystery. My doctor didn’t explain it to me, and I didn’t bother asking. So when it actually came down to it, I was prepared for anything.
I envisioned a dark room with a big machine that shot lasers at me which I would feel burning into my chest. It couldn’t have been further from that.

Here is how my day went. I checked in and sat in the waiting room for a very long time. The waiting room is a terribly depressing place. Oftentimes you are with families who just found out that someone they love has cancer. My first day was no exception and there was a family complete with grandkids that were just told their grandfather had cancer. They were all crying, including the patient’s son in his mid 40s who was sobbing uncontrollably. They kept saying, “He’s so young, he’s only 63.” I guess it’s all in the way you look at it.

Aside from families, there are also the patients who vary in age. I’m usually the youngest as kids who have cancer go to Children’s Hospital and young people like me who have cancer like Hodgkin’s rarely have to get radiation. I guess I was just one of the lucky ones! The patients are usually quite elderly and look like they’ve had the crap beat out of them. Lots of them are in wheel chairs and are usually accompanied by their 40 or 50 year old children who too look like they’ve been run through the wringer. All of us “patients” exchange sympathetic looks to each other and I think we may even be giving each other mental pats on the backs and hugs that say “you can do it!” or simply “I understand.”

I hate the waiting room, but thankfully I rarely have to be there long before I’m told to go change into my gown. After I get my gown on, I’m strapped (actually bolted) to the table by the form they made of my head and chest to hold me into place. Behind my neck, they place a hard plastic neck roll that thrusts my neck out and my head back. The first time they put the form on me I felt like someone was strangling me. I went into panic mode because I couldn’t breathe, swallow or talk. I started moaning and flapping my arms frantically and they quickly removed it. I gasped for air and told them the neck part cut off my ability to breath. They made a very minor adjustment and bolted me back in. It is still extremely painful to swallow and talk, but I just lay there and try my best to meditate and listen to my music. If you lay your hand on your neck and swallow, you can feel your neck pulse out a bit. Imagine lying down and having a weight placed on that spot applying constant pressure. That’s what it’s like for the duration of my therapy. Thankfully it only lasts about 5-6 minutes total, but I still hate it. The first day I was bolted in for an hour as they took x-rays. I will have to have the 45 minute to 1 hour sessions once a week to check on the tumors to make sure they’re shrinking.
After I’m bolted in and they’re sure I can’t move a millimeter, they start the radiation. I wasn’t sure if I should look or not. Years of watching my father weld taught me never to look at the nice bright sparks created by the torch. But, I quickly learned with radiation, there were no lights, nor laser beams, just nothing. In fact, I couldn’t even tell where it was coming from. The only way I know its happening is because of two long beeps that occur when it’s being administered. I guess I wanted more than that. Something along the lines of the sounds and colors the Star Wars lightsabers make as they whiz through the air. That would have at least been something worth getting excited about.

After it’s done, they quickly unbolt me from the table and I’m free to go. On the first day, they had me wait a few minutes while they took pictures of tape they laid over my form so they’d know how to do it the next time. I can sort of see out of my cast, but they really can’t see in to see my facial expressions or my eyes. After the resident took the last picture I mumbled, “Wait, you’ll have to do it again, I blinked on that last one.” It got a good chuckle.

So far I’ve had three sessions, only 25 more to go until I’m done. I’m waiting for the sunburn to start appearing and the sore throat. They say it starts around the beginning of the 2nd week in. We’ll see what happens.

Everything Old Is New Again

2010-06-14T11:29:00.000-07:00

This Friday was the first “every other Friday” since January that I didn’t receive chemotherapy. Wow. It felt very odd as I’ve had a standing date with my chemo cocktail for the past six months. The day went by without much fanfare. I did however find myself in the chemo infusion room at Bartlett, this time to give Tamara an armful of rhubarb from my garden that I had promised her. She greeted me warmly and gave me a huge hug along with a video about moving on after cancer, which I haven’t watched yet.

I have my own version of moving on and that’s to return to normal as soon as humanly possible. There are so many things that I missed from my daily life that I just haven’t been able to manage for the past six months. I realize that this whole ordeal is definitely not over as I still have a month of radiation in Seattle, and that will be as far from normal as I could possibly get.

In the meantime though, I can’t help but think of the things I’ve missed. I’ve missed myself a lot; I don’t even recognize myself in the mirror. Since January I’ve gained 20 lbs. This is the most I’ve weighed without being pregnant and it’s hard on me to not fit into my clothes. The other thing I really miss is my hair.

When I first cut all my hair off back in January, people kept telling me how much they liked it and how I should just keep it short. Where I appreciated the compliments, all I could think was, “I want my long hair back.” My hair is growing back, but it’s pretty thin and you can see through the little stubs of hair right to the scalp. I’m still not comfortable taking off my hat in public because I look a little silly. But, it will soon start filling back in and I don’t want to cut it until its back to normal. Okay, maybe I’ll get it slightly “styled” along the way, but I just want it back to where it was when this whole thing began.

My physical appearance will return with time, but other aspects of my life will not. For example, I am down to only one job. A few months ago my job at the state ended. It was grant funded and the grant expired. Then we applied for a new grant to keep the project going and unfortunately, we didn’t get it. So I am down to my opera job which is only part-time. I’d love to work only part-time as I’ve been working full time ever since Lena was born, but I don’t see that happening as daycare for the girls is more than I make in a part-time job. I have a lot of figuring out to do.

Another aspect of moving on from all things cancer is getting the port-a-cath out of my chest. It’s been bothering me a lot lately as it tightens up and sharply pinches me. I had a surgery scheduled to have it removed last Wednesday, but right after Dr. Miller (AKA the Mikado) explained the procedure and said, “See you tomorrow,” he came back in the room and asked me when my last chemo was. After telling him the date, he told me there was no way he felt comfortable doing the procedure when I was entering into my nadir state (where my white blood cell count was the lowest it could be.) It posed too much of a risk and he just didn’t feel comfortable. I understood, but at the same time I was really bummed out. This means I’ll have it removed in Seattle by the surgeon I wasn’t such a fan of. I guess he was okay, but I have a sneaking suspicion his attendees did the two procedures I had performed and they left two careless and over the top scars on me. Also, one of his attendees was really blunt and was the first to tell me I had cancer- before I even had surgery to prove it. He delivered the news casually and bluntly, like I had heard it a thousand times. He even used the word Leukemia in the sentence which sent me and my friend Cristina into near hysterics. I was hoping to never see them again, but I guess I won’t be that lucky.

Addison and I have also enjoyed being back to a family of four humans and two pets. Since October when Aurelia was born, we really haven’t been without a grandma for an extended period of time. The month of December was the longest stint we had without someone here, and even then, my folks were here for Christmas. Where I’ve appreciated having the help, I have to admit it’s been nice to get back into the old swing of things. We even had our spontaneous dance break during dish washing last week. We used to always crank music while washing dishes, which inevitably in our family means dancing! It was so fun to watch Lena and Addison dancing carefree in the living room with huge smiles on their faces. Aurelia joined in by waiving her arms up and down to the beat. And yes, even Yasha participated and was my dance partner. We might have the only dancing dog in the world. She prefers Celtic rock, and sometimes ABBA. Our family normalness won’t last for long as in less than a week, the girls and I head off to Seattle for one month.

So yes, moving on and returning back to normal, or as normal as my life can be. When I told my friend Amelia that I wanted to return back to normal, she laughed and said, “Franny, your life has never been normal.” She has a good point. Maybe returning back to normal for me is returning back to the abnormal. I’ll take that.

Beautiful Day

2010-05-31T22:13:00.000-07:00

Graduation Day!

I had my last chemo infusion on Friday and I feel fantastic!! I have only felt queasy a few times so I don’t want to take my medications, but my mom is making me anyway. It is so fantastic to know that I am finished with chemo, finished with shots, nearly finished with all the nastiness that chemo offers, and ready to flush tons of pills down the toilet. Since January I have taken about 360 pills (not including my vitamin D and salmon oil supplements, fiber pills, antibiotics, or the 2-180 pill bottles of Tylenol PM, or the 24 shots to boost white blood cells!) I am so ready to be done being a pill popper and just go back to my vitamins.

While in Seattle I stayed again with my friends Anne and Jeremy which has become my home away from home while undergoing chemo. I love their giant Great Dane Sirus, as well as their lovely and slobbering blind 10 year old mastiff; Bava (means drool in Italian.) Anne actually called the guest room, “your room,” on Friday. It does feel like my room and I love staying in their cute little house that they have poured their blood and sweat into renovating. Jeremy is a wonderful chef and Anne’s laugh can put a smile on anyone’s face. Anne took the day off work to go with me to get chemo and she stood guard as I curled up and took a 30 minute nap in the radiation waiting room between my chemo infusion and my planning appointment for radiation. She was also my official photographer for my graduation day happily taking pictures of me with my oncologist and proudly holding my chemo diploma. I feel lucky to have so many friends in Seattle that I’ve had the chance to go to dinner with, share my chemo day with, and allow me to stay in their house. I am really looking forward to being down in Seattle for a month so I will have more of a chance to see my friends and family.

Dr. Malpass (my oncologist) Truly a man with a heart of gold!

During my preliminary radiation appointment, they fitted me for my “cast.” It was a plastic-like apparatus that they got wet and then molded over my face. They then bolted it to the table and I was trapped. They performed a CAT scan on me while the cast dried. I can’t say I liked it, and in my chemo induced state, I think I remember Anne asking me something about what happened if I there was an earthquake and I was bolted in. Maybe I was just imagining that part, but I have a faint recollection of her asking me that question. It was the type of question Anne would ask since she’s a civil engineer who designs bridges to withstand earthquakes. I was also given a tattoo that is about the size of a pin head. They said they’ll give me more when I come back on the 21st of June. I've actually been wanting to get another tattoo, but little blue/black dots up and down my chest are not exactly what I had in mind.

My Spittin' Image

My mom and I have been talking about our “move” to Seattle starting on the 20th of June and ending sometime around July 22nd. We’re lucky to be staying in a lovely condo provided by my friend Nicholle. Anne is letting us borrow all sorts of baby things so we don’t need to pack extra stuff and I’m preparing the “Honey Do” list for Addison (mostly reminding him not to let the garden and all my flowers die of dehydration.) I’m also trying to get my opera job in order and get things done before I leave, even though I’ll be working from Seattle. I’ve been very lucky that my opera job has been so flexible; all my board members are incredibly understanding and really stepped in to help when needed.

Right now I am counting down the days until I can resume eating the off limit food items. Doctors recommend that people undergoing chemo don’t eat undercooked meat, runny eggs, raw veggies, or moldy cheeses (the lack of blue cheese in my diet is really getting the best of me!) I haven’t been perfect in following the rules, but I’ve been careful, especially when it comes to the cheese and undercooked meats. In a few weeks, I can’t wait to sink my teeth into a medium rare cut of meat and cambozola. Yummy! Oh, and I haven’t been drinking either, so my martini with an olive stuffed with blue cheese will have to accompany my steak. I can’t wait!

I Will

2010-05-20T11:13:00.000-07:00

My Aunt Pat died Monday of ovarian cancer. She died on my mother’s birthday. I had a feeling this would happen, a strange premonition that my mom’s little sister would leave us on my mom’s birthday. My mom’s response was quite composed and through her tears she said, “This way she could be with me today.” Strong words that I wouldn’t have been able to muster up.

Aunt Pat had been fighting her cancer for three years. She’d undergone chemo on three different occasions and at one time, her doctors thought she was a miracle for kicking all the cancer out of her body when it had at one time been so incredibly advanced they thought she’d never recover. She was a fighter. My aunt kept her amazing sense of humor throughout all her treatments. She made other cancer patients laugh and get through difficult times, including me.

The first time I met my aunt I was in 4th grade. She was living in Lake Tahoe at the time and my parents left me with her while they attended fish expo. I was nervous about being left with someone I didn’t know, but she quickly learned the way to my heart was through my stomach and started feeding me. She made the most amazing enchilada sauce that we dipped fried chicken in. Fried chicken and enchilada sauce sounds like a totally weird combination, but let me tell you, it was amazing. After she fed me, we watched the Wizard of Oz. She was amazed I’d never seen it, and to this day, I still haven’t seen the whole thing because we ended up talking the entire time the movie was on so I didn’t pay attention to the movie.

There’s a part of me that doesn’t feel like celebrating to the level I should be because it’s hard to celebrate me being cancer free when I just had an aunt die of it, but my aunt would not like that. In her honor, not only will I kick cancer’s ass and tell it that it has no business ever screwing with my family ever again, I will make her fried chicken and enchilada sauce recipe. She would like that.

Poker Face

2010-05-14T20:45:00.000-07:00

It’s my last day of receiving chemo in Juneau! Definitely a day to celebrate, but it was hard to get too excited this morning as I tried to get out of the house. I had hoped to get things done last night in preparation for today, but all hell broke out when Aurelia ate a plant leaf and I had to call poison control. Then I developed a migraine so all pre-plans got pushed to this morning. To say our morning was slightly chaotic would be an understatement. Lena went to bed at 10 and woke up at 6 am. Aurelia went to bed at 11 and joined her sister at 6 am. This does not make for hapapy girlies. Aurelia peed through her diaper and jammies and her sheets needed to be changed first thing. I was running around the house trying to get all my work done that needs to be done before checking out for the next four days. Chillcat was flying from wall to wall attacking anyone that dare cross his path. Addison was trying to pack for his bear hunt because he leaves tomorrow AM. My mom who flew in last night was trying to recover from Chillcat scratching her neck and pouncing on her face while she slept resulting in her eyes turning red and bulging out. Meanwhile, Yasha hid like an ostrich with her head under our bed and the rest of her body sheepishly sticking out. Yasha knows when to stay out of the way and remove herself from the chaos. I wish I could stick my head under the bed on certain days and just let the world around me spin out of control.

My last chemo treatment was the worst. I felt sick from the moment I walked into the hospital. I saw Dr. Urata this week because Dr. Fisher is out of town. He suggested I take one of my anti-anxiety pills before going into the hospital and that should help with the feeling of wanting to ralph every time my port is flushed. Tamara is also going to wait a bit longer before starting the chemo and let my anti-nausea meds kick in. We’ll see how it goes this weekend. I am going to try to stay on top of my anti-nausea med and keep a very positive attitude.

I am looking forward to being near the end of the finish line, but there is something holding me back from jumping up and down and running across it, and that’s my Aunt Pat.

I mentioned previously that my Aunt Patti has ovarian cancer. She has done a remarkable job fighting it for years, but right about the time my cancer was diagnosed, hers came back, more aggressive than ever. Aunt Patti is such a fighter that she refuses to give up, her will to live is incredibly strong which is why she didn’t die a few years ago. But sometimes a person’s will to live is trumped by the reality of the situation. The surgeons have said they will no longer operate on her. The doctor has said she will no longer be getting chemo. They removed her food tube. She has now requested to leave the hospital and go home where she can be in comfort. I don’t want to use the word die in comfort because Aunt Pat is still not giving in. Her body may fail her and give in to the cancer, but she never will. I admire that type of courage. She’s been drinking milkshakes lately, so she is allowed some happiness throughout her day. We’re kind of just waiting. It could be days, it could be weeks. Months are optimistic.

Yes, it’s hard to celebrate me being near the end of being sick when someone I care about is near her end. It’s such a crap shoot who will be given a treatable cancer, who will be given a cancer that stays in remission for a long time, and who will be given a cancer that kills them only after a few years. It’s a shot in the dark who will live and who will die. A man my exact age has been getting chemo treatments for sarcoma on many of the days I get treated here at Bartlett. He died two weeks ago.
Until my diagnoses, I only knew 8 people who had cancer 2 are still with us, 5 have left us, and 1 is hanging on as hard as she can hang. Since being diagnosed, my number of encounters of people who have cancer has spun out of control, especially those I know on a personal level. I’ve got Wendy, a childhood friend who has a rare form of melanoma and they’ve given her anywhere from 2 months to an unknown amount of years for it to possibly come back. Then there’s Brynn who has Non-Hodgkin’s, another terminal cancer. My pen-pal Eve in Georgia who I was introduced to by a mutual friend when she found out we both had Hodgkin’s. Eve is cancer free now and done with all her treatments! And lastly, there’s my friend James’s little five year boy old who has been fighting a terminal sarcoma cancer since he was 18 months old. That boy has been through so much chemo that it’s amazing they know his actual hair color is practically neon orange, just like his daddy’s. I didn’t even touch on all the people I meet every two weeks as I come in to get my infusions. I guess my point is, it’s everywhere and no one is immune no matter how safe you play it.

So I don’t really know where I’m going on this. I am super high right now as I’ve been given more meds than I usually take to combat the nausea. I guess I just don’t understand how the cards are dealt in situations like these. For a child to get cancer has got to be one of the cruelest and crappiest deals ever. For brides about to get married, for mothers with young kids, for pregnant ladies, for fathers, brothers, grandfathers, and grandmothers….it’s all the same.

To my mother’s regret and sadness, I’ve never liked gambling because I think it’s a waste of time and money. (My mother is a slot machine queen!) I don’t like it because you never know what cards you’re going to be dealt, so I like to hold my money in my pocket, spend my money on a fancy meal, and watch others take the gamble.

Unfortunately in life, you don’t always have that option of not taking a gamble. So when you’re forced into playing the game, you might as well just stay coy and put your game face on. My Aunt Pat has been my role model for this whole thing. Even though she was dealt one of the worst cancers she could have been dealt, she has remained strong for those around her, wearing her poker face proudly and encouraging other cancer patients to do the same. She’ll do it till the day she dies, even though inside behind the face, she’s already lost the game.

My infusion chair for all my infusions at Bartlett. It wasn't nearly as deary as it looks.

The girls wait for me outside the hosptial.

My infusion nurse Tamara. She is amazing! We both got teary-eyed saying our goodbyes.

Only A Dream

2010-05-08T20:26:00.000-07:00

I’ve been having a hard time sleeping lately. I don’t have insomnia like I had before, but instead; I’m having restless nights of sleep. I’ve been having the most stressful dreams.

The first dream I had took place at my friend Cristina’s wedding. Instead of getting married on her lavender farm (which is what she’s actually doing) she decided to get married on a river boat sailing the Rogue River. I had the girls with me and I was also a bridesmaid, so I was juggling a few balls. On top of it, I got incredibly drunk, lost the girls, and somehow my cat Chillcat got on board and peed on Cristina’s wedding dress. You’re laughing now, but I can assure it, it wasn’t funny while it was happening.

The next night I dreamed that my friend Penny and I were on our cruise. (I haven’t talked about that yet, but I will below.) Anyway, we were boarding the ship and our families came to wish us bon voyage and the next thing we know, our husbands left and ditched us with the kids (in real life- we’re going sans kiddos.) The next thing I know, I’m off to find our cabin and when I open the door, I am thrilled to see it is much larger than the inside, lowest level, no window, economy cabin we actually booked. Instead, it is huge, has a balcony, and even a wet bar. The only problem is; it doubles as the ship’s Gap clothing store so people are continually going through our room to buy clothes.

Both these dreams rival the Brendan Fraser dream I had about a year ago where I was once again drunk and dressed like an orca whale, flying on an Alaskan Airlines flight having to pose as a stewardess so I could get home. Seeing as it was my first time meeting Brendan Fraser, he was not impressed by the fact that I was drunk, nor that my orca tail kept hitting him as I walked down the aisle serving people.

Sigh…

So, needless to say, these dreams have left me exhausted.

About this cruise. It all started when I thought it would be great for Penny and me to fly down south when this whole thing is over and see the Indigo Girls live in concert. Unfortunately, they have nothing booked on the west coast over the course of the next year, but they were doing this thing called “Cayamo” in February of 2011. It is a cruise on a cruise ship in the Caribbean with loads of musicians, including the Indigo Girls. It’s not your normal cruise, musicians such as Patty Griffin, Steve Earl, John Prine and numerous others are going to be on it, and every night, you get to see them in concert while during the day, they’re out mingling with the cruisers. I told Penny about it and she said we had to do it. After much hemming and hawing (mostly wishing and consulting with Addison,) I decided that one of the things having cancer has taught me, it’s to enjoy my life, enjoy my family, and enjoy my friends. Penny was my travel partner for two months as we backpacked around Europe in 1999 so we’re well attuned to each other’s traveling traits. I’m the plan-ahead mother hen and she’s the free spirited wild card, its how our friendship works and it works great while traveling. Since high school, she’s always been the one to get us on the edge of trouble, and I’m the one to get us out of it. It keeps things fun and interesting and I can’t wait to see what happens on our cruise. Taking a vacation like this with Penny is normally something I would only wish and dream about, so it’s really exciting to see this wish come true. And it doesn’t stop there. I am happy to say that Addison and the girls and I are planning a trip to Hawaii in March! I can’t wait to see the girls play in the sand while Addison surfs the waves. They’ve been through just as much as me the past few months, and they deserve some fun in the sun too. It seems a bit insane to take two frivolous vacations less than two months apart, but we’d been saving for a Hawaiian vacation for a few years, so I’m stoked we’re finally doing it!

Speaking of dreams and wishes, I told Addison that I know my cancer was never at the point of life threatening, and I know I’m not a young child, but it still would have been cool to be granted a wish through The Make A Wish Foundation. What would that wish be? My wish would be to be a guest judge on Iron Chef America- as long as their secret ingredient wasn’t sardines.

I'd Rather Press On

2010-05-02T03:04:00.000-07:00

I’m still living off the high of being cancer free because each day, I run into someone who doesn’t know and I get to share the good news. The most recent trip was to Valley Medical. I’ve come to know lots of the nurses and the receptionist; they all know me by name and always ask how I’m doing. On Wednesday and Thursday I kept seeing them in the medical center and sharing my good news. They all were elated and said things like, “that just made the rest of my day!” One of the receptionist who I have a great fondness for actually came out from behind the counter and gave me a huge hug with tears in her eyes (she’s a young mom too and we used to attend the same camp in Haines as kids.)

I never get sick of sharing the good news. However, that doesn’t mean I’m not getting sick. Each chemo treatment is hitting me harder and harder.
Have you ever gotten sick and then you can’t stand the taste or smell of the last thing you ate? For me it’s Cambell’s chicken noodle soup and roast beef sandwiches on white bread. In 7th grade, that was the last thing I ate before coming down with a terrible stomach bug that had me puking for days. I also can’t go near Tequila anymore thanks to an entire pint glass and my friend Dave Rubin. (I shouldn’t blame Dave, he handed me the cup for a “sip” and I drank the entire pint. C’est la vie.)

The same now goes for chemo. Brynn was saying the other day that every time she gets near Swedish hospital, her stomach turns. I completely agree with her. For me it’s not only driving by Bartlett or Virginia Mason, it’s also the clothes I put on. Every other Friday, I put on the same camisole. I call it my chemo camisole because it’s easy for the nurse to access the port when I wear it. My stomach turns when I look at it. I think I’m going to burn it after my last treatment.

There are a few other things that set me off too. The rubbing alcohol that is used to sterilize my skin before accessing my port is nasty. I actually have gag reflexes at the smell. I hold a candle up to my nose and try to smell the candle instead, but the rubbing alcohol is so potent, it permeates my nostrils and makes me want to run for the bathroom. The other thing that is truly disgusting is saline solution. They use it to flush my port to make sure it’s clear and getting proper blood flow. But get this; I can taste it in my mouth when they flush it! It is the most disgusting taste and smell ever. It’s very odd to think that there are veins in my chest that carry the taste up to my mouth, a taste even Jolly Ranchers can’t mask.

My mom flew in Thursday night to get me through this next treatment. She’s going to bounce back and forth between here and Ketchikan this month. I’ve been really lucky to have her and previously Addi’s mom around. I know Lena has especially enjoyed having grandma time. My mom came loaded with fresh lingcod that my dad just caught and frozen lumpia that she made. I’m going to have to wait until after this weekend to eat these items as I don’t want my favorite foods to become one of the off limits list later.

I was told with each chemo treatment it gets harder, and boy is that true. The day of chemo is proving to be the hardest. I came home at 2 PM and didn’t move from my bed until 3:40 AM. For the past two nights, Lena has been concerned about me and has snuggled in a bit after dinnertime and has slept all night with me. I wouldn’t be surprised if Lena announced one day she’s going to be a tu-tu wielding doctor, nurse or veterinarian. She toted her vet’s kit to the veterinarian office the other day and impressed Dr. New as she assisted in giving Yasha her exam.

I found out great news the other day. Remember my friend Brock who is running the Team In Training marathon to raise money for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society of Canada? He is running the race to honor his friends and family who have had or are currently battling Leukemia/Lymphoma, and I’m one of the ones he’s honoring! Originally, he was going to run the race in San Diego, but serendipitously changed his location to Seattle and it just happened to be the time I’m there getting my radiation! I am going to be able to be there to cheer him on and I couldn’t be more excited. He’s very close to his fundraising goal, so if you want to pitch in to make it happen, visit this link: http://my.e2rm.com/personalPage.aspx?registrationID=813208. I can’t wait to stand behind that finish line and see Brock cross! Brock is also the person who is going to run my first marathon with me in August of 2011. It will be a great moment.

I have two more chemo treatments left, thank goodness! I really see why people quit and just say enough is enough. Because I'm really starting to hate chemo. But in the beginning, I said I wouldn't give up and I'd do whatever I had to do to get better. So I will keep doing this. I want to make a shirt that says, “Chemo Grad May 2010” to wear to my last chemo appointment on the 28th. I can’t wait for chemo to be behind me. Can’t friggin’ wait!

Reasons Why

2010-04-26T10:21:00.000-07:00

Three more chemotherapy treatments, six more shots, twenty more days of feel nauseas, six more days of post chemo sore throats, nine more days of post chemo migraines, one more month of numb finger tips, approximately fifteen days of not being able to taste anything and feeling like my tongue has died, and twenty radiation treatments….the countdown is on and it’s really all I can think about it.

Many people have been asking me if the cancer is gone why I have to still undergo three more treatments of chemo and the four weeks of radiation therapy. The answer is simple, it’s insurance. Typically Hodgkin’s patients can just be treated with chemotherapy, but when their tumors are considered bulky and over 10 cm, radiation is always required. My biggest tumor was 9.6 cm and after the tumor board met (yes, there’s a tumor board) they decided to have me do the radiation. When my doctor originally told me about having to do radiation, he said the reason why they want me to do it is because I’m a young mom with two little girls and they want me to live. Okay, so who can really argue with that?
I know there are risks involved with radiation, most notably developing other cancers like lung and breast cancer. Supposedly I am out of the high risk category for developing breast cancer because that typically shows up in women who had radiation when they were teenagers. The other big risk is heart disease because the radiation can affect the ventricles leading to the heart.

Yes, there’s risk involved. But I will be less upset if I develop one of these diseases than I will be if my Hodgkin’s comes back because I didn’t finish the recommended treatment. I’m looking at it like antibiotics. You may feel better, but it’s the rule that you need to finish all the pills for it to work.

Thanks to the generosity of my friend Nicholle, I have been offered a condo in the Seattle area for the entire time I’m getting radiation. The girls are going to come with me and my mom, Addison and possibly some other friends/family will take turns helping me. Supposedly my symptoms during radiation will be tiredness and a sore throat. I can live with that seeing all the other stuff I’ve been dealing with.

Closer to Fine

2010-04-17T13:56:00.001-07:00

I cried three times on Thursday. They were all tears of joy and relief.

The first time I cried was while waiting for my MUga test. I got an e-mail from my sister who told me that my nephew Mitch is back from Iraq safe and sound back on US soil. I was so happy to hear the news that my fears of the tests I had lined up for the day seemed to dissipate. Tears welled up in my eyes as I felt the relief that he’s home safe. Now I just have to worry about him getting hit by a car while riding a skateboard.

I had my MUga test and then a PET scan. About an hour after my PET scan, I met my radiologist, Dr. Yao. She is young and very zippy with a lot of compassion and appears to have a lot of knowledge. She said she knew I was probably eagerly awaiting to see the results of my PET scan so that’s the first thing she would do. First she pulled up my scan from January. It showed my neck and chest with 10-15 bulging black blobs that used to be my lymph nodes. Then she showed me the scan from that day and voilà, the black bulges were gone- ALL GONE! She then said the words I will always remember, “Complete Response, no more cancer.” I let out the longest sigh ever, like I had been holding my breath for four months and then came the tears. I told Dr. Yao, “I’m just so happy, so happy.”

After I left Dr. Yao’s office, I called Addison, my mom and dad, my brother, my sister, and friends. Everyone I talked to had the same response, a big sigh of relief like they’d been holding their breaths for months and then tears.

I had an early dinner with friends and then headed back to my hotel. I had a beautiful hotel with filtered views of Puget Sound and Lake Union. The sun was starting to set and I sat on the window seat just looking out at all the beauty, that’s when the final tears of the day came. They were not like any tears I’d ever experienced. Not tears that come from a broken heart, or tears of sadness when someone has died, nor tears of grief. They were tears of pure and utter relief and happiness that this is all going to be behind me very soon. The tears were a backlog of tears that I had been holding back for six months since we brought Aurelia to the ER at 2 am in November, since dealing with my placenta accreta, and then my cancer. The black cloud of bad luck that has been following behind me closely had just been halted in its tracks. Like a stalker, it’s been there following closely behind me and I’ve just been trying to ignore it and charge ahead not letting it overtake me. But on Thursday, I feel like I turned around and screamed at it to GET LOST because I have won and I refuse to get overtaken by the storm. I won, I won. I WON.

After my crying fit I called more people to tell them the good news, including Dr. Fisher who initially discovered the lump on my neck and I who I credit for saving my life. Dr. Fisher was elated and also just happened to be in Seattle and suggested we get together for dinner the next night to celebrate, but unfortunately I was leaving town too early for dinner. There will be plenty of time in the future to celebrate!

On Friday I got round 4A of chemo. My oncologist decided that he would knock one cycle of chemo off my treatment plan and he also knocked off the drug Bleomycin because he felt it may be doing damage to my lungs. Dr. Malpass and Dr. Yao decided on 4 weeks of radiation starting two weeks after my last round of chemo on May 28. Only three more rounds of chemotherapy sounds pretty good to me!

My excitement didn’t end there. Dr. Yao asked me what I was going to do for the next seven hours before my flight left. I joked that I’d probably just wander around downtown high on chemo drugs. She laughed and then said I should take an earlier flight at which point she went to the AK air site and found an earlier flight for me. I opted to have a four hour layover in Ketchikan instead. It was so wonderful to see my parents, Perry, Becca and niece Lexie. My friend Penny even swung by and we all went out to dinner at my favorite place in Ketchikan- Diaz Café where they just happened to have my favorite dish as the special. My fortune in my cookie read: “Your luck is about to change.’ I think it is, I think it really is.

Spring

2010-04-11T21:29:00.000-07:00

It’s been a long time since I’ve written. I’ve been busy with the girls and doing a bit of work here and there. I guess I’ll just start with an update.

First things first…I had the most wonderful Easter. The best part is, not only did I feel good, I remember every detail about it. I hid eggs and baskets, I made Eggs Benedict, I got the girls in cute Easter outfits and off to church, Jan made a wonderful Easter dinner, and I was able to eat it. Lena opened her birthday presents and I remembered to take pictures. I even bumped eggs with Lena. I feel very lucky that I was able to enjoy my Easter.

On Wednesday I leave to go to Seattle for tests, tests and more tests.
Here is my schedule:

Wednesday:
11:30 PM- arrive into Seattle

Thursday:
7 am- PET Scan. This two hour test will show if the cancer has left my body and show that the chemotherapy is working.

11 am- Pulmonary function test to make sure my lungs are still working. One of the chemo drugs I’m on is very harmful to lungs, so this test will make sure the drug is not damaging them.

12:00- Wig. Yes, I have an appointment to get a wig, though I can't promise I'll wear it.

1:00- MUGA test. This is a MUltiple Gated Acquisition scan which will make sure my heart is not being negatively affected by the chemo.

2:30- Radiation consultation. At this meeting, I will meet with the radiation doctor who will go over my radiation treatment plan with me.

Friday:
8 am- Chemo and appointment with my oncologist.

6:00 pm-Fly back to Juneau.

It’s going to be a whirlwind trip and I’m nervous about some of the tests, most especially the PET Scan. I want to feel confident that everything is going to come back good and that they say, “Congratulations, you are now cancer free!” But, I admit to harboring fear and apprehension. With that said, I do feel better and a lot of my symptoms are gone. My rashes have dissipated, I am not utterly exhausted all the time, I no longer have night sweats, my joints are not aching, and I’m not having unexplained dizzy spells. To me, this says the drugs are working. I just hope the tests say the same thing.

This afternoon Lena and I worked in my garden beds ripping out last year’s dead foliage. I never got around to it last fall because I was too pregnant to bend over and scale our rock walls.

Today Lena strolled around in a pink frilly dress and X-tra Tuff boots helping me pull up the dead leaves and stems. I kept showing her the new sprouts and telling her to be careful not to pull them up as well. She was quite curious about the whole process and why we threw away the dead leaves but left the new ones. I found myself explaining to her that the green sprout leaves were new life and wilted brown leaves were dead.

It was very therapeutic for me ripping out the dead stems and exposing the fresh new buds of spring. It gave me hope of brighter things to come like the tulips and rhubarb that will bud in June, and the lilies and iris’ that blossom in July. Come the end of June, I will be done with chemo and by the end of July; I will be done with radiation and hopefully done with cancer forever. When I think of the things yet to come like 6 more chemo treatments and radiation therapy in Seattle away from my family; June and July seem very far away and nearly unreachable. But when I can already see the sprouts of my tulips, rhubarb, lilies and iris’ forcing their way through the hard dirt and spots of snow, June and July seem a lot closer.

Nothing More's Gonna Get In My Way

2010-04-02T16:44:00.000-07:00

Easter is my favorite holiday, it always has been. Most people like Christmas or Thanksgiving, maybe even Halloween because they get to dress up, but I like Easter.

The reason I love Easter is because of all the wonderful memories I have of Easter when I was a child. It all starts with dying Easter eggs the night before. As a kid (and even as an adult at home) we’d all gather around the kitchen table and dye eggs with food coloring. We’d nag my dad to come to the table and partake until he’d eventually come and plop an egg in each color only to then walk away saying that’s all he was going to do, leaving all the colors unusable due to his eggs hogging the cups. Laughing, there was always laughing while dying eggs.

In the morning I’d awake to a jelly bean trail starting at my bedroom door that would lead me to the living room where the hunt for eggs and my basket was on. After finding eggs hidden in plants, under the piano peddles and under the couch, it was time to eat my mother’s Eggs Benedict and Cherry-Go-Round sweet bread for breakfast. When I was really little we’d go the church for a pancake and ham breakfast put on by the youth group. The thing I remember most about the meal is that it was one of the few times the church used their church china and silver tea set, and I remember that being very special. After breakfast, it was time for church. I always remember wearing a brand new dress that my mother had made for me and I’d usually have a new stuffed rabbit that was tucked inside my Easter basket.

After church we’d go to the Cusack’s Easter Egg Hunt where they lived at the New England Fish Company. They had a sprawling grass yard where they hid real eggs and plastic eggs. The kids would run around looking for the “big money” egg while the parents stayed indoors and ate, chatted and drank Penny Cusack’s orange blossom drinks. Fun was always had by all. (An orange blossom is vodka mixed with orange sherbet—oh yum!)

We’d then come home and mom would start making dinner and thus would commence the “egg bumping” competition. Egg bumping is a family tradition brought from my mother’s side of the family that no one has heard of except my family and people think we’re crazy for it. When I took a Russian Christianity History class in college I read that egg bumping was a Slavic Pagan tradition, which makes sense because my mom’s family all hails from Poland/Ukraine. When it comes time to crack the eggs to make deviled eggs or other edibles, we each take one of the eggs we painted and partner up and bump eggs. The one whose egg doesn’t crack is declared the winner. Usually there is one egg that has miraculously survived being cracked up against everyone else’s eggs with great force. One year we couldn’t understand how Perry’s egg could survive everything (even when it was beat up against the counter) until we learned Perry put glue on one end for reinforcement. You gotta watch my brother.

I admit to being kind of a nut when it comes to Easter. I decorate the house, force my family to dye Easter eggs, I make Eggs Benedict and Cherry-Go-Round for breakfast, I hide everyone’s Easter baskets and the eggs, I make a huge and complex Easter dinner and I love every minute of it. However, not much of this will happen this Easter because as I write this, chemo is being pumped into me. I won’t have the energy to do much of anything on Easter let alone even remember it. However, I am going to try. Tonight before I get too loopy, I hope to dye eggs with Lena. Earlier this week I bought everything for Easter baskets and they are all separated in bags so all I have to do is dump them into the baskets and hide them. I am going to set my alarm for 5 AM Sunday morning and hope to hide the baskets and eggs before Lena wakes up at the crack of dawn. I’m going to have to let a few things slide like the Eggs Benedict and cooking an elaborate meal. Maybe I’ll feel like bumping a few eggs, maybe not. I’ll try to make it to church, but I’m not promising anything. Addison told me the last Sunday I was recovering from chemo I didn’t come out of the bedroom all day. The funny thing is, I don’t even remember. Oh, and to top things off, it’s Lena’s birthday on Sunday. We’ve already celebrated with parties, but it still bums me out that on her actual birthday, I’ll be under the influence of chemicals and drugs. The good thing is Lena is forgiving and understanding. I am so lucky in that way.

Many people wonder why I’d even bother waking up at 5 am to hide eggs when Lena wouldn’t even notice if I didn’t. I do it so that I can keep some normalcy, it makes me feel good. I recognize I need to slow down, but at the same time I still want to live my life. I don’t want to be treated like I'm fragile; I don’t want to have people do everything for me. I want to cook meals when I can because I enjoy it. I want to drive Lena to school and wake up in the middle of the night to feed Aurelia. I want to continue working. I want to host parties. I want to go dancing! I want to wake up at 5 am to hide Easter eggs for my three year old so I can hear her giggle as she totes her baskets around discovering eggs that the Easter Bunny hid for her. I know my limitations and ask for help when I need it, and I appreciate the help I receive. But, I still need to find enjoyment in the doing of things. It’s in my nature and I can’t help it. This is why I’ll get up at 5 am, put on bunny ears, and hide eggs with a giant smile on my face. Then I’ll go back to bed until Lena wakes me up.

The Last Saskatchewan Pirate

2010-03-28T21:50:00.000-07:00

On Saturday, we celebrated Lena’s third birthday. Her birthday isn’t until April 4, but knowing I am scheduled to have chemo two days before her birthday, we opted to do it this weekend. We had a small party with a few of her friends and their parents- toddlers don’t do parties solo yet! The kids ate ice cream and cake while the dad’s ran outside and hid Easter eggs in the grass. The kids put on their raincoats and boots and scampered through our soggy yard unphased by the cold and damp weather. They carried their Easter baskets and happily tromped across dead raspberry bushes and bright red heads of rhubarb peeking its way through the dirt. I think they might have killed our garlic and possibly the tulips that were just beginning to sprout, but that’s okay because they had fun. After they loaded their baskets with brightly covered plastic eggs, they came inside and unloaded their loot. One kid exclaimed it was just like Halloween stuffed into eggs. Lena had a marvelous time and asked me if we could do it again tomorrow.

Before the kids arrived, I had wished I had kept my hair one more week. I was worried that they’d ask questions and point out that Lena’s mom had no hair. Amazingly, not a single one said anything. Maybe they were too busy to even notice, maybe to a toddler, women without hair are just like men without hair. To see the world through the eyes of a toddler would be a wonderful thing. They observe differences in nearly everything--except people. I love that.

I wasn’t so lucky today while grocery shopping. I’ve been wearing a scarf lately instead of a hat and today I made the mistake of putting on hoop earrings. While wandering the frozen vegetable aisle, a kid about 8 years old grabbed me and yelled, “Look mom, a Pirate!” I wriggled free from his grips because honestly it freaked me out that he felt the need to grab me, and then I laughed and hurried along my way. However, I kept crossing paths with them in the store and each time, he would point at me and yell out “pirate!” I was torn between finding it humorous and annoying at the same time. I chose to find humor in it and on the drive home considered finding a fake parrot to mount on my shoulder for future outings.

Fast As I Can

2010-03-27T10:46:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Arlo, my head shave is documented in video. I feel so hi-tech. All I can say is Arlo and Oksana sure move fast.

What Went Wrong (In Your Head)

2010-03-23T16:30:00.000-07:00

Actually, nothing went wrong, it all went right. I may have jumped the gun a bit, but I did it, I shaved my head. I didn’t shave it myself; my friend Arlo actually did the deed of making me bald.

My hair had just been coming out so much that I couldn't keep up with it. It was getting depressing finding it everywhere from my pillow to my bathroom sink and I just thought I had nothing to lose- except it. There's so little I have control of with the cancer, I thought I might as well just take charge and do it. I probably could have had hair for another month, but alas, I jumped the gun.

When it came time to shave it, I called Arlo and asked if he would do the honors. A pro at shaving his own head, he kindly obliged. I also knew his wife Oksana would be able to make a stellar Mohawk, something I wanted to do for my nephew Mitchell who has always been infatuated with Mohawks. Mitch is in Iraq right now, but has already seen photos and said “You rocked the hell out of that Mohawk; it put both of mine to shame.” I’m here to please Mitch, here to please. The funny thing is that now that my head is shaved, I look a lot like Mitch. Even my niece Lexie said I look like Cousin Mitch.

When I told Lena I was going to cut all my hair off she looked at me and said, “Just like Arlo and Scott.” (Our two friends with shaved heads.) She seemed reasonably unaffected by the suggestion and when she pulled my hat off my head this morning, all she could do was giggle. Aurelia thinks it’s funny too. I guess I do too.

It was a fun evening spent with good friends who helped me make light of the situation. I can’t say it was tear-free because as Arlo shaved the final spot, I did get a little teary eyed. But, I was laughing soon after as Arlo and I compared our bald heads for the camera.

Enjoy the show…

On other news, Cristina is going to see the Indigo Girls tonight, live! They are performing at the LaSalle Stewart Center at Oregon State University, a stage I have performed on! I can now say I’ve sung on the same stage as the Indigo Girls. But that’s not the most exciting part; Cristina’s going to call me while they’re playing so I can listen in. Whohoo!!

Hope Alone

2010-03-19T18:05:00.000-07:00

Today I brought the Indigo Girls with me to do my chemotherapy. They were the perfect companions; they always know what to say and how to say it. Old friends since Jr. High, they’ve been with me through good times and bad over the past 20 years.

Right after my first chemo session in Seattle, I went and got 10 inches cut off my hair. The hairdresser asked me if I wanted to listen to music and said to give her a band I liked. It didn’t take any time at all for me to say, “Indigo Girls.” She typed their name into Pandora and as she was getting ready to make the first cut, the first song to come on was the Indigo Girl song called, “Secure Yourself.” As all my hair fell to the floor the words, "secure yourself to heaven, hold on tight, the night has come. Fasten up your earthy burdens, you have just begun.” drifted through the air. It was one of those near omen moments where I couldn’t laugh off the fact that I had cancer.

I hate to admit their music had been absent from my life the past few years. I hadn’t bought one of their albums since 2004 and just recently they came into my head and told my friend Cristina that I didn’t have any of their new stuff, so she quickly sent me some in the mail. It’s been so long since I’ve had new music. It brought me right back to high school. When I was fishing with my parents I would buy new CDs on a near weekly basis. I’d retreat to the fo’c’sle of the boat with a new CD and frantically rip the cellophane packaging off and then carefully lift the shiny new CD from its jewel case and place it in my Discman. I’d then remove the sleeve and unfold the crisp glossy paper, smelling its newness. I’d hit play on the CD and read each lyric, savoring the music and lyrics. I would listen to that CD over and over the whole 7 hours to the fishing grounds. When Cristina sent me the new CD, it rushed me right back to sitting on my bunk in the fo’c’sle. It made me feel great, made me feel young, made me feel healthy.

I’ve been having anxiety about the looming date of April 16th when I have a PET scan to find out if my cancer is shrinking and the chemo is working. I feel better and a lot of my previous symptoms are diminishing, but there’s always the “what if?” Tamara told me today she’s only lost one patient out of ten who had Hodgkin’s. It was a young man, same age as me with three kids. The treatment just didn’t work for him and couldn’t save him.

I’ve also been upset about the fact that I’m not able to be present in things that are going on around me or be there for people who need me. I’ve noticed my friends and family gingerly sharing their tribulations with me (or not sharing them with me at all) as to not involve me or worry me. It bugs me because I’m may be not well, but I’m still here. And here I sit, dissolving my worries away by listening to the songs of the Indigo Girls.

I have two friends that share my love for the Indigo Girls, Cristina and Penny. Penny and I used to walk from our neighborhood of 2nd and 3rd avenue to downtown Ketchikan and back, about an hour long walk. We’d sing Indigo Girls songs the entire walk, often both launching into the harmony leaving the melody behind without anyone singing it, which inevitably sparked humorous arguments over who was going high and who was going low. Our favorite song is Watershed, a song about waking up and finding your best laid plans didn’t work out and now being faced with difficult choices on starting over. I miss those days and wish I could walk arm and arm up and down the streets of K-town with Penny Lane, without any cares in the world. I’d even let her sing all the harmonies.

Cristina and I met in college and instantly shared our fondness of the Indigo Girls. Our favorite song is Power Two, mostly because the first verse “Now the parking lot is empty, everyone’s gone somewhere.” My freshman year of college, Cristina and I had a similar moment on Easter weekend when we woke up to an empty Oregon State campus because all the other students went home for Easter. Being from SE Alaska Cristina and I were stuck with just each other, so we put on bunny ears and Groucho Marx glasses (our trademark) and drove to the coast and hit the Tillamook cheese factory, now tradition when we find ourselves together in Oregon. Even in my 30s, I’d be willing to don rabbit ears and Grouch Marx glasses to go sample cheese curds with a good friend.

So here I sit, listening to the Girls and thinking of my two friends far away. I’ve got my ear phones in my ears (now the music comes from my iPhone instead of a Discman) and I’m also wearing a tiara because I was nominated Valentine Queen by my sorority sisters. It’s like Penny, Cristina, Amy and Emily are all here with me cramped behind the infusion curtain. They are the best company I could ask for and they’re not even here.

My new favorite song by the Girls is Fleet of Hope. I think it’s going to be by cancer mantra song.
The chorus goes:
‘Cause the fleet of hope is so pretty when she’s shining in the port.
And the harbor clings to the jetty for protection and support.
Out in the choppier waters the sharks swim and play
You’re all washed up when Poseidon has his day.

(I like to think of Poseidon kicking the cancer cell’s ass.)

Hope. It’s all about hope now. Hope for a cure for cancer for those who are struggling more than me, hope that my tumors are shrinking and the cancer is leaving my body, hope for happier futures, hope for healing, hope for love and acceptance, hope to have a partner in crime (or bunny ears) when parking lots are empty. Hope, and hope alone.

Where is My Mind

2010-03-18T12:00:00.000-07:00

I have round 3A of chemo tomorrow (in layman’s terms, that’s my 5th treatment- 8 more to go!) The first few I galloped into them unaware and unafraid of what was to come. But as I become more of a veteran of chemo, I get more and more apprehensive to run head first into battle. I know it’s something I have to do, but the anxiety starts to rise and I want to turn around and run the opposite direction. I’m seeing more and more of the side effects that come with the treatment. My hair is falling out rapidly. I can’t keep up with the hair floating around our bathroom; it looks like Cousin It has taken up residency. My finger tips are completely numb and that’s a symptom that may last beyond chemo, hopefully not. There's the constant hunger because of the steroids resulting in me gaining 12 pounds since January. None of my clothes fit me anymore and someone asked me if I was pregnant. Then there is there’s the week I’m completely absent from the world.

One of my goals for getting through cancer is that it doesn’t have much of an effect on Lena and Aurelia, especially Lena. I don’t want Lena to remember this part of her childhood as the time when mommy laid around on the couch and couldn’t rough house with her because every time she knocked into mommy’s port-a-cath, mommy winced in pain. I don’t want her to remember that 4 days out of the week; mommy was too knocked out of her gourd on medication to drive to her to school.

So far, Lena doesn’t understand the illness and I’m fine with that. When we say “mommy’s not feeling well,” she looks me over and tells me I look fine to her. She holds my hand and rubs my temple when Addison gives me my shots and says, “You’re doing good mommy. This won’t hurt a bit.” So far, she seems reasonably unaffected and I’m hoping it stays that way, I’m hoping she just doesn’t remember.

But what about me? What will I remember about this time? I woke up the other morning and found my once chubby legged toddler was wearing nothing but underwear and pink ballet flats with glitter. Her new long and lean legs bounced around the house as she sang Do-Re-Me in perfect pitch. Aurelia went from size 2 month clothes to 6-9 months overnight. I don’t remember her even being in 4 month clothing. How is this possible? My children are growing up and I’m missing it.

I’m trying to remember to take lots of pictures, but half the time I can’t remember where I placed the camera (or where Lena absconded with it.) But even if I take pictures, I feel they won’t do justice. I feel as though I’m missing so much. I once heard the phrase, “I’m just sitting around watching my baby grow before my eyes.” It’s so true when they are this young.

They call it chemo brain and I don’t like it. I feel lucky it’s just every other week, but that’s every other week that I’m not present in my kiddo’s lives. Sigh. I was going to end this by saying there’s no way to end this on a positive note, but what am I thinking? Yes, there is. At least I know I’ll be here for them in the future. There may be six months that mommy’s not quite all there, but at least I’ll be there for their future.

PS- Wendy is doing great! The doctor was able to remove the entire tumor, which of course resulted in the removal of her entire left lung. The good news is the doctor thinks its sarcoma and not melanoma. This is good news as far as cancers go. Wendy is healing remarkable and giving the doctors and nurses hell, which means Wendy is back in business.

Wisheries

2010-03-11T16:32:00.000-08:00

“Cancer is the new wedding card for our generation,” Jeremy said last week while I was in Seattle visiting with him and Anne. Anne practically snorted her water out of her nose at his comment. I agreed 100% with Jeremy. First it’s the save the date, then it’s the wedding invitation, then it’s the baby announcement, then it’s the we’ve bought a house and don’t forget to change our address, oh, and now comes, one of us has cancer. It just seems like so many people we know are being diagnosed.

The conversation arose when I told Anne that our friend Wendy was just diagnosed with cancer. From the first day we met in 7th grade, Wendy and I competed at absolutely everything we did. Both tall brunettes who participated in theater and music, and who both who wanted the attention of our friends and those around us, we continually butted heads, but somehow always came out best of friends and supportive of each other. Our favorite movie as kids was Beaches. You know it, The Wind Beneath My Wings movie with Bette Midler and Barbara Hershey. Growing up, I always viewed Wendy as the Bette Midler character CC- loud, always saying what was on her mind, never PC, and oftentimes embarrassing me in public. I viewed myself as the more “refined” character Hillary that Barbara Hershey played. If you don’t know the story, Hillary ends up developing cancer and dying from it and CC comes in and raises Hillary’s daughter. Tear jerker movie.

When I told Wendy I had cancer, I have to say we both probably laughed a bit at the irony of the story. We also knew this cancer isn’t going to take my life, so we were light hearted about it. Wendy wrote me an e-mail and ended it with “you are the Wind Beneath My Wings Franny.”

A week later, Wendy e-mailed me and asked what she should do about a lump on her lung. My first reaction was bad. I thought, hold it, is she upstaging me once again? I have cancer, so now she has to get it too? Very bratty to think that I know, but I have to admit to being in utter shock that this could possibly be happening to her. I knew that a lump on her lung was not a good sign and quickly encouraged her to seek a second opinion from another doctor and to be hasty about it. Turns out, yes, she is upstaging me again and it’s quite serious. She was diagnosed with melanoma that has moved beyond the skin surface and has now taken over 1/3 of her lung. It has also moved into her lymph nodes near her lungs.

Surgeons are removing her lung today and hoping to get all the cancer out. She will not be eligible for traditional treatments due to the fact that her lung capacity will be diminished. I’m just hoping for a successful surgery and that they are able to get everything out. I’m not willing to think about the other possibilities at this point.

I am dumfounded that this is actually happening to us. What are the odds that two friends who were inseparable for nearly 6 years are both diagnosed with cancer within a few weeks of each other? I know we have two completely different types of cancer which are completely unrelated to each other, but before we knew Wendy’s diagnosis of melanoma, I was curious what we could have gotten into that would have caused this. I stand on the belief that my cancer is environmental. Before Wendy’s diagnoses, I couldn’t help but think it was the self tanning lotion we used to put on. I remember putting on about 10 applications one evening while watching Beaches and when my mom picked me up in the morning, I was so orange I looked like an Oompa Loompa. All I know is I don’t have the answers as to why this is happening and right now, I’m feeling frustrated.

I wish Wendy and her family did not have to go through this. I wish she could have the type of cancer I have. But, I mostly wish and hope that her surgery went well today and that they are able to get all the cancer out of her. I think a girl deserves a wish to come true, don't you?

Always Getting Better

2010-03-09T03:35:00.000-08:00

I have so much to write tonight, so grab your coffee, tea, or whatever…
For starters, it’s a good thing I’m on anti-anxiety meds because right now I’d be flying through the roof. Today Aurelia had her 4 month shots. She was supposed to have 4 shots (although three combined in one, so technically 6.) I am already leery of immunizations for babies so I made the decision to have them broken up and we’d come back for the triple shot at a later date. Aurelia did as “okay” as a 4 month old does after getting three shots, but when we got home, let’s just say her mother did not.

There was a message from the nurse telling me to call her at the clinic. She inadvertently gave Aurelia a shot 9 days past expiration date so she’d have to come in and get it again. She said not to worry, that it probably is affective (causing no ill side effects of it being past due), but they have to be on the safe side and have her come in again so it “counts.” So this could potentially mean double dosing and it royally irks me. It doesn’t help matters that Aurelia ran a fever this evening and writhed in pain as she cried. It brought back scary memories of her illness at three weeks old we fumbled through the What to Expect book and struggled with taking her temperature. Addison held her and walked with her until she fell asleep, and so far, so good. We’ll see what tomorrow brings. Poor Lena was so stressed over it, that she woke up at 1 am telling me to take her temperature too. She was fine, but it’s engrained in all of us at this point to worry.

So here it is 2 in the morning and I can’t sleep. It’s situations like these that to me make me not worry about myself. But, since this blog is supposed to track this chapter in my life, I’ll talk about Seattle this week.

First, there were no Piroshkies. It wasn’t the sugar thing, it was the time thing. I simply ran out of time, which is fine. Maybe I’m not meant to get them until I’m all done, perhaps? And for the record, I’m doing pretty good on the anti-sugar kick. Although, Stephanie did e-mail me back and said I should be having some in my diet and not to cut it all out.

I flew into Seattle on Thursday allotting myself plenty of time to make it in case of flight delays. Addison’s Aunt Jeanne picked me up from the airport and we set off on an adventure to find linens for Lena and Aurelia’s room. No linens to be had, but it wasn’t from lack of shopping. I had a lovely dinner with Jeanne and Dave at an Italian restaurant that Dave’s been dining at since he was in the service. Afterwards, I went to stay with Anne and Jeremy, my home away from home in Seattle.

I spent practically all day Friday at Virginia Mason Hospital. I didn’t like being back there, but thankfully had the comfort of a good childhood friend Mariah who I haven’t seen in ages. We have always been friends through mutual friends, but after Friday, I think we forged a firmer friendship without the legs of others to support us. Mariah met me at a café near the hospital where we dined on Eggs Benedict and she gave me gifts of slippers and a shawl. We ventured over to VM and I introduced her to the fun of chemo. Poor Mariah puked halfway through treatment. She wasn’t sure if it was the ham from the Egg’s Bennie (a recent vegetarian gone carnivore) or if it was watching someone get poked and pumped full of chemicals. Thankfully, she recovered quickly and she made me laugh with her great smile and stories. She made me forget about why I was there in the first place.

My port hooked up. It looks like a little butterfly sitting on my chest. The next one is the nurse manually pushing the "Red Devil" treatment.

The point of the trip south was to see my oncologist, Dr. Malplass, and boy did I ask him questions. They ranged from insomnia to depression and he gave me a lot of insight. He was bummed I didn’t have Aurelia because he said he wanted to play with the baby, a true sign of a caring man.

Insomnia I’m going to have to deal with. I’m taking Tylenol PM as suggested previously by my Hodgkin’s pen-pal Eve in Georgia. Dr. Malpass said that was probably my best bet. Unfortunately, insomnia is a sign of the meds and there’s not much to be done. He did give me some advice though with the depression. He confirmed I was coming down from the meds, but also told me I was most likely going through menopause, another side effect of chemo. Don’t worry, it’s only temporary and I’ll get to go through it all again when it’s my natural time to go through it, yeah me. In the meantime, he’s extended some of my pills to help wean me off of them instead of the hard crash. Day one starts tomorrow, we’ll see how it goes.

As Dr. Malpass was leaving my room, he patted me on my knee and said to his intern, “This is why I’m in this business. This is the highlight of my day, seeing someone I know is going to be fine and is going to make it through this.” If that doesn’t give me a vote of confidence, I don’t know what would. My oncologist is a wonderful man.

After chemo, it was nearly 4:00 and Mariah and I met her boyfriend Caspian, also an old friend of mine, for “lunch.” It's so nice that so many of my Ketchikan friends have flocked to the Seattle area. I told Anne that even under the morbid circumstances, I fell lucky to be able to see my friends so often on my Seattle trips.

After lunch, Caspian and Mariah dropped me off at Anne’s office in downtown and I immediately started feeling sick. I quickly popped some anti-nausea meds so I wouldn’t throw up on the bus ride home. They said each treatment would progressively get worse with sickness and I’m starting to recognize that.

Mariah and I saying our goodbyes.

I had a nice evening with Anne and Jeremy, but once again, it was one of those times where I remember I was there, but I can’t tell you the details. I remember Jeremy helping me measure out my medicine before I went to bed, nice guy!

Made it home (another one of those applause landings on the plane due to high winds) and was greeted by my cheerful family with a sign made my Lena and her grandma Jan. I’m glad I’m home too Lena.

Lena with her welcome home sign.

PS- I am a third of the way done with my treatments!

Sugar, Sugar

2010-03-03T12:38:00.000-08:00

Thus begins the healthy eating phase in my life. It all started last month when I overheard Tamara my infusion nurse lecturing the man receiving chemo next to me on the importance of staying hydrated. “But I hate water,” he lamented, “Can I drink Gatorade instead?” Then Tamara quickly said, “Gatorade has sugar. Sugar causes cancer!” Um, excuse me? Did she just say sugar causes cancer?

Then this week I had two more run-ins with sugar and cancer. The first one came in reading a blog by a woman in Craig named Brynn who was diagnosed with Lymphoma about the same time my diagnoses came in. (Side-note: I feel as though I have a strange connection with Brynn. Though I’m not sure if we’ve met, I’m friends with her sister, and her brother was my favorite teacher in high school. I’ve been meaning to contact her and now that it’s in print, I really should since we’re going through some of the same things.) Anyway, Brynn wrote in her blog that she was eliminating sugar from her diet because of the cancer connection. Then today, I ran into my co-worker Abby and she told me she had all sorts of handouts for me on diets while undergoing cancer treatment. She told me to eliminate, you guessed it, sugar!

Finally I gave it the tried and true test- -Google. If you type “sugar causes” into the Google search bar, the first suggestion is “sugar causes acne” but the second is “sugar causes cancer.” The amount of literature is amazing. Mostly it says sugar feeds cancer.

I have always considered myself a healthy eater. We don’t buy beef and only eat game in our house. We eat fish and we get an organic veggie and fruit box every other week. I dislike the taste of processed foods and rarely have them in the house. Sugar is something I don’t consider a necessity. I can’t stomach sweets for breakfast thus eliminating things like sugary cereals, pancakes and French toast. The mere sight of maple syrup in the morning turns my stomach, which happens a lot since I live with a Vermonter. I’ll only order dessert in restaurants if they have crème brule. I don’t like chocolate, never really have. I make cookies maybe three times a year (my girls are going to hate me.) In the evening when I need a snack, I reach for salty foods instead. Okay, so this won’t be hard, right? We’ll see…

My friend Stephanie is a dietician and I’d love to hear what she says about this. She thinks high fructose corn syrup is the devil, but hasn’t said much to me about sugar. Unfortunately, Stephanie is traveling in Africa and Europe with her husband so I’m not able to use her as my personal resource when it comes to things like this. Stephanie always tells me everything is okay in moderation, though I think this time, I’m going to error on the side of caution and just cut it out completely. I hadn’t been diagnosed before Stephanie left on her trip, and she told me if I ended up getting diagnosed with cancer, she’d kill me. She also told me to eat an apple a day (a cancer fighter), which I honestly tried, but they are too sweet for me so I stopped forcing them down after day four.

I head out for Seattle tomorrow morning for chemo and will be there until Saturday. I was planning a trip to Piroshky, Piroshky to get my standard Vatrushka roll (sweetened cream cheese and raspberries) but I guess I’m going to have to get the sauerkraut, cabbage, carrot and onion roll which is equally as good. This also means Addison, Lena and Jan are going to be responsible for finishing off the cookies I made last weekend (it was one of the three times a year.)

Okay, off to e-mail Brynn and catch up on all my other un-answered e-mails. I’ve gotten really bad about responding lately, I’m sorry.

As Cool as I Am

2010-02-28T08:46:00.000-08:00

Two car seats, one stroller, two pairs of shoes, two coats, one laptop, one bag of liquid formula, one Mary Poppin’s size carry-on full of tricks, one adult, one toddler wearing only one hot pink sock, one infant, and a partridge in a pear tree hobbled through the Las Vegas airport security on Friday en route back to Juneau. We took up the entire conveyer belt and the metal prepping tables, it was quite the sight!

Earlier that morning, my friend Cristina suggested that I just make believe the flight from Las Vegas to Seattle was going to be easy, “Live in the Land of Mr. Rogers.” I took it to heart, even as people glared at me while going through security because I was taking so long.

Seeing that it took a quarter of a century to get through security, by the time we got to our gate, boarding had already started. The gate agent saw the herd approaching and fast tracked us to boarding, cutting us in front of the MVPS and Gold Star Elite. Most people were happy to move and let us go ahead, except for one woman who glared at me while loudly whispering to her husband, “If this woman and her kids think she’s getting ahead of me, she’s got another thing coming!” I didn’t know a woman traveling with two children were considered the plague, but I learn something new every day! Afraid of “what might come” if I went ahead of her, I just smiled and dramatically and gracefully bowed and motioned her ahead- she didn’t know what hit her. There was a nasty twinge inside of me that wanted to whisper to her- “And while you’re judging me, I just want you to know I have cancer- take that!”

When we got on the plane, I handed Aurelia to the flight attendant and went about installing Lena’s car seat into the airplane seat, something one needs an engineering degree to do. When all was staged and Lena was fastened safely in her car seat, the stewardess returned Aurelia and asked where our final destination was. I said Juneau and she said and I quote, “No wonder. Juneau people are always so easy-going, cool, calm, and collected.” SCREEEEEEECH!! Put on the breaks! Was I just described as “easy-going, cool, calm, and collected?!” I had sweat dripping off my forehead and my blood pressure was probably through the roof, but I, Frances H. Field was just described as “easy-going, cool, calm, and collected.” Life was good and living in the land of make believe was definitely working in my favor.

Lena was an angel on the flight. The man in front of her seat complimented her and said it was the first time he had a child sitting behind him who didn’t try to perform chiropractic procedures on his back mid-flight. The best part was when we hit severe turbulence and it was so bad that the woman behind us (obviously fearful of flying) started sobbing. Lena started singing the words to The Black Eyed Peas “I Got a Feeling” at the top of her lungs (she didn’t mean to, her ears were plugged) and by the time Lena threw her hand up in toasting position and shouted the lyric “Mazeltov” the woman was laughing.

Addison’s mom met us in Seattle at the top of our gate. She’s coming to stay with us for the month of March to help out which I am so looking forward to. When I saw her I knew we had made it and survived the flight. Yippee! It was also when we saw Addison’s mom that she told us we were on the milk-run all the way to Juneau stopping in Ketchikan and Sitka before arriving in Juneau five hours later. Somehow the fact that we had three more flights instead of the 2 hour direct flight from Seattle escaped my memory. At least I’d have Grandma Field to help entertain.

Nearly 7 hours later when we finally made it to Juneau; Lena disembarked the plane and happily skipped up towards the airport in her Arizona sundress and sandals as the cold wind shook the gangway. When she came through the doors into the boarding area, she threw up her hands in the air and cheerfully exclaimed, “We actually made it!” It was greeted by laughter by the people waiting to board their flight.

There is a good lesson to be learned here. One, it was a historic day because I, Frances H. Field was described as “easy-going, cool, calm, and collected.” But more importantly, I’m learning that there’s no point in letting a thing such as a solo flight with a toddler and infant get the best of me, I’ve got bigger hurdles to overcome and I best save my energy for them. I don’t think we can expect a changed Frances over night, but I’m sure as heck going to try.

Come Back Down

2010-02-25T06:54:00.000-08:00

Two weeks ago when I had my meltdown on the kitchen floor, I didn’t quite comprehend the depths of why it was happening-- that is until it started happening again. This time, it hit me at the same exact time, day 5 after chemo and I didn’t come out of it until the evening of day 6 (tonight.)

The past two days have been really hard and until now, it wasn’t making sense to me why. Here I am “relaxing” in Lake Havasu with my parents, getting the extra help with the girls, and yet I can’t seem to shake the funk of being overwhelmed, depressed, confused, and basically not myself. I have no patience, I’m exhausted (yet can’t sleep), and I can’t make simple decisions. My mom really noticed it today and raised concern. I snapped at her and said “tough, there’s nothing I can do about it!”

We went to dinner tonight and noticed the restaurant we were dining at had an early bird special for seniors, which mom noted thankfully we missed because the seniors would be out in full force! I told my mom, “What are talking about mom, you’re one of them!” She looked at me with tears in her eyes and said, “That’s my Frances, you’re back.” I nodded back with tears in my eyes and said, “I am. It’s hard mom. It’s really hard.”

So here I sit with insomnia trying to figure out why on earth this is hitting me this way. Where do I go and who the heck am I on day 5 and 6? Then duh! It hits me. I’m coming down.

The meds they give me after chemo are an upper. They keep me elevated and loopy so that I don’t get sick. So, for the first four days that I’m on them, I’m pretty numb. I can wander through the first four days just happy I’m not puking my guts out. But after day four, no more drugs. At least I think that’s what’s going on. I absolutely hate it and wonder if I’d be better puking my guts out than feeling so low that I feel I’ll never get out of the hole I’m in.

I’m seeing my oncologist in Seattle next Friday and I am going to talk with him about this. When I was first diagnosed he said I’d survive this as long as the meds didn’t make me crazy and make me want to stop treatment. I thought he was kidding. No fear, I’m not close to wanting to stop treatment, but perhaps they can give me something else that makes me less crazy, because right now, I feel like a loon and I’m not so fond of that.

Thank you

2010-02-22T20:43:00.000-08:00

The amount of help and sense of love I have received since I’ve been diagnosed with cancer is unbelievable. From flowers and cards immediately sent to my hotel and house, from friends and family driving to be with me in Seattle, babysitting (me and the kiddos), telephone calls, hats, scarves, gift certificates for massages, my Facebook support group, e-mails, meals, head shaving and hair dying, presents, wristband wearing friends and coworkers, lending of an electric blanket, state sick leave donations, and money to help with medical and travel expenses—I can’t even begin to express how loved I feel.

I was floored when Addison came home from the work the day we were leaving for Arizona and said, “This is for you,” as he clumsily handed me a thick envelope. I asked him what it was as I fumbled to open it and found bill after bill of cash and check after check and two cards filled to the brim with well wishes. I couldn’t even speak; I just held the envelope and cried. I finally muttered, “oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh.” Addison couldn’t look towards me and instead just looked out our bedroom window and said, “There’s over six hundred dollars in there.” The money came from his coworkers and volunteers at the Juneau Douglas City Museum and Parks and Recreation (the division that oversees the museum and a place I briefly worked when we first moved to Juneau.) Addison’s boss Jane, a cancer survivor, organized the effort.

I can’t write this entry without tears coming to my eyes. It’s not the money (although greatly appreciated) it’s the people in our lives that I see maybe once a month (if that) who care so much to do such great things. It dumbfounds me and leaves me embarrassed and speechless. I just hope that I can be half the friend and support that everyone has been to me if any of my friends or coworkers is ever in need. Heck, if anyone is need. I’ve heard people I don’t even know have donated leave to me for my state job.

All I can say is get ready for a party. Get ready for a huge thank you party come August! Everyone is invited, even the neighbors we don’t know yet. There has been talk of a Hawaiian luau party and a roasted pig, or perhaps renting the Spinning Pig BBQ. (I don’t know why the pig keeps coming up in conversation of party planning; we’re not really pig people, although my grandfather was a pig farmer) But anyway, stay tuned everyone. The party will be big and you all are invited. You all are part of this recovery effort and believe me when I say I couldn’t make it through without you. If love alone can cure cancer, I’m set.

Vacation

2010-02-19T10:00:00.000-08:00

Today I’m getting chemo in Lake Havasu City, Arizona. We’re visiting my parents who have joined the rest of the snowbirds from the North Country and flown south for the winter. It’s been very relaxing and the kids seem to be really enjoying themselves. Lena is living in shorts and although battling a cold, Aurelia is chipper and full of smiles. Highlights include cruising around the block in grandpa’s ’32 Vicky.

Lake Havasu is the third place I’ve received chemo and it’s different everywhere I go. Maybe I should go on a world chemo tour and become a travel writer hunting out the best places to get chemo. My first book could be entitled “Chemo on the Go: The Best Places to Receive Chemo.”

My medical experience in Lake Havasu has definitely been interesting to say the least. I first met with the local oncologist. His office was decorated in the colors of teal, coral and cream with wicker furniture and cactuses. He looked like an older Ken Doll wearing frayed white jeans, brown loafers, a light blue button up shirt that was only buttoned as far as his naval with a giant gold cross necklace draped around his neck. He was a far cry from stylish Dr. Fisher in Juneau. The purpose of my pre-chemo appointment is for the Dr. to give me a quick physical to make sure I’m strong enough for chemo and that I have no blaring illnesses. Ken Doll simply looked at me and listened to my heart and then left. Okay, guess I’m good to go!

My mom came with me to chemo this morning and was quickly turned away at the door as they only allow patients in the dingy room with old overstuffed brown leather Lazy Boy recliners. Monk was on TV and all I could think was Monk would not want to sit in the dirty looking Lazy Boy- neither did I! They didn’t have any of my medications that I’m supposed to take prior to starting chemo so my mom had to run to Walgreens to get it. Unfortunately, because they didn’t give it to me before they started, I’m already feeling dizzy and nauseous and I’m not even done receiving all of it. This may make for a tough next few days.

The infusion nurse here is nice, but not as efficient as Tamara back in Juneau. Tamara dots all her I’s and crosses all her T’s. Given the trouble I’ve had with my port, I like that Tamara takes such care to make sure it’s working before she begins. The nurse here just jabbed the needle in my port (with no numbing agents) and immediately started the infusions. Also, at Virginia Mason and Bartlett, they continually check to make sure I am indeed Frances Field and confirm my birth date each time they start a new drug. Then they tell me what they are giving me before starting the medication. This time, the nurse just hooked things up and went to town pumping me full of the drugs. I just hope I got the right things and not someone else’s meds.

So far, Lake Havasu would be low on my travel list for where to get chemo, although high on my list of places to visit just for fun!

Here Comes the Sun

2010-02-12T14:01:00.000-08:00

I admit it, I had a rotten week. I made it through chemo weekend only to find myself exhausted the rest of the week with a fuzzy head, a sick Lena, a messy house and way too much to do before we were to leave on vacation. I haven’t been in the mood to write because my goal for this blog is if I don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all. However, an anxiety attack on the kitchen floor this Tuesday taught me that I’m just going to have to accept that not every day is going to be roses the next 6 months.

Tuesday was pretty rough. Lena had a temp of 102.3 at 2 am, so I kept her home from school. Of course all day Tuesday she was wired like a puppy on espresso. She was bouncing off the walls, climbing the ceiling and singing at the top of her lungs. Aurelia chose Tuesday to be her one fussy day this week and wanted to be held all day long. The cat was as energetic as Lena, and poor Yasha was so stressed, she was hiding her head under the bed like an ostrich. (Yasha reads me like a book.) This was the one day that I had set aside loads of opera work that I had been procrastinating and my rigid-self just couldn’t accept that I wasn’t going to get a darn thing done. I don’t like being unproductive and I like the feeling I get when I cross things off my list.

My mind started to wander to the “how unfair” mode. It was at that time my friend Kris called and asked if I was going to the meeting that night. Okay, I have a confession to make to the outside world- I am in a sorority. (College friends: this is your cue to put your hand over your foreheads, gasp and faint.) That’s right, I, Frances H. Field am in a sorority. But don’t worry, we don’t wear pearls and cardigans, or drink cheerleader beer, and I don’t think a single one of us married a Frat Boy. Basically, we get together once a month to talk, eat dessert, drink wine, present a program, play a game, or do a community service project. They are a great group of women and I am honored to be associated with them. Many of them have been cooking us meals and dropping them by the house which I truly appreciate on my chemo days.

When Kris called there was a part of me that didn’t want to go, but I knew I’d have a good time if I went. So I told her I’d go and then she reminded me we were having a Valentine gift exchange. Crap. I had forgotten and didn’t even buy a gift. Kris said not to worry; she would bring an extra one for me. In my pre-cancer days, I would never have accepted her offer, but I’m trying to learn to accept help so I thanked her and happily accepted.

The meeting turned out to be great as always and even though I went feeling exhausted, I left feeling energized. There’s something to be said about spending an evening with good friends who are incredibly loving and supportive, especially after a bad day. I need to continually remind myself this. It’s the support of my family and friends that are going to get me through this next six months. They are here for me, I just need to learn when to ask for help.

We’re leaving tonight to go to Arizona. We are all looking forward to the break and sunshine. Lena’s had her coat (and snow boots) on since 7 am. I can’t say I blame her. In my head, I’ve had my shorts and flip-flops on for over a month.

Man on the Run

2010-02-07T17:26:00.000-08:00

12 years ago, my friend Gretchen introduced me to a Canadian band called Captain Tractor and convinced me to go see them play in Eugene. It was that night in Eugene that I met one of my dearest friends Brock who just happened to be in the band. I made a fool of myself while doing the Kozatsky (Russian kick dance) to one of their songs and we instantly became friends. Even though Brock lives in Canada and I have lived in multiple cities over the past 12 years, we have remained good friends and geekily admit to playing a near daily online game of chess or scrabble. (which is why Addison refuses to play chess with me. 12 years of playing non stop can actually give someone an edge!)

From the moment Brock heard I was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s, he has been a tremendous support system to me from afar. Brock has a lot of people in his life who are lymphoma survivors, and he has also lost family members to lymphoma and Leukemia.

In 2003 Brock started having heart troubles at the ripe age of 31 and was diagnosed with Myocarditis. Shortly after his diagnoses, he started training to run marathons somewhat under doctor's orders to prove to himself that he was okay. (Proving to myself that I am going to be okay is something I can completely relate to.)

Brock’s first marathon was in Oct 2007, The Royal Victoria Marathon. Since then he has run 7 full marathons, 4 half marathons, 2 triathlons, a couple 10 & 15ks and an Ironbike. He has raised, to date, $7,720.00 for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society of Canada and donated countless volunteer hours as a mentor.

For over a year now, Brock has also been a run/walk coach in the The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's Team In Training® (TNT) . On June 6th, 2010 Brock will be once again running for a personal best at the San Diego Marathon. A personal best in speed AND in fund raising as a member of Team In Training raising money for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society of Canada (LLSC). So, he is asking friends and (I am asking my friends) to help by making a contribution! When you contribute, you are supporting LLSC’s mission to cure leukemia, lymphoma, Hodgkin’s disease and myeloma, and improve the quality of life of patients and their families.

Two years ago I told Brock I wanted to run a marathon with him, and then I got pregnant with Aurelia. So we postponed it to the next summer. Then I got diagnosed with Hodgkin’s. That now puts us out to summer of 2011. But I will run a marathon with him and I look forward to having Brock (and any other friends who want to join me) run it by my side.

Thanks Brock for being such an awesome friend to me and for having such great devotion to your cause.

To check out Brock’s donation page, please visit: http://tinyurl.com/brock-tnt

Sounds Strange

2010-02-04T17:29:00.001-08:00

This is going to sound incredibly odd, but I had the best chemo treatment today at Bartlett Hospital. I opted to go alone and leave Addison at home with Aurelia because I just wanted a break from everything. Don’t get me wrong, I love my girls and Addison, but I just wanted a few hours to myself that didn’t involve wiping noses, changing diapers, chasing Lena, or cleaning up messes. For the 4 1/2 hours I was at the hospital, I almost felt like I was at a relaxation spa, except instead of getting a massage and pedicure, chemicals were being pumped into my body.

I was a little nervous because right before I left, my port incision started leaking a bit of fluid- drat! It hadn’t leaked at all since last Friday, but wouldn’t you know it, right before I need to go in, it starts up again. Dr. Fisher said if it was bad, they would give me chemo in my arm. Tamara the infusion nurse was not pleased when she saw it, but felt it was good enough to go ahead. I am really hoping this thing heals and stops causing problems.

Tamara is so amazing. She is the only nurse in the chemo unit and does the work of 10. She runs around between patients like a jumping jack firecracker, popping in to reset alarms and check on people. She runs a tight ship with warmth and compassion, and everyone loves her for it.

Aside from getting chemo, today was spent working on Aurelia’s baby book, watching a movie on my laptop, resting, and reading. I was a little worried because I didn’t eat breakfast before coming and I was going to be here through lunch, but no fear, Tamara ordered everyone lunch from the cafeteria. Three cheers for Tamara! To say I was excited was an understatement. Most my lunches are eaten standing up while holding Aurelia and usually consist of something I can make with one hand. Then Lena usually asks for every other bite resulting in me not getting much to eat. My lunch today consisted of hot roast beef, mashed potatoes, gravy, vegetable barley soup and vanilla pudding with whipped cream, it was heavenly, and I actually considered licking my plate, but the curtain wasn’t drawn and I didn’t want to look silly. The two men next to me couldn’t finish their lunches; they must not have kids under two.

I left chemo feeling really relaxed and rested (and kind of high.) The man next to me was also relaxed; he was snoring so loudly, I swear he was the one who set the car alarm off outside. But even his lumber sawing couldn’t annoy me today. I am happy this is a place where people can come and get the rest and care they need. Who knew chemo could be so enjoyable? (Knock on wood!)

All I Want

2010-02-03T10:41:00.000-08:00

For the past week, I’ve been saying all I want is to have cancer, receive my chemo and be done with it. I don’t want an infected port, I don’t want my white blood cell count to be low, I don’t want to be a burden to people, just give it to me and let me fight it. But from what I’ve been told all the extras are part of having cancer and I’m just going to have to deal with it.

I was supposed to have surgery yesterday to remove my infected port. They were going to remove it, place a pick line in my arm, and then the following week, remove the pick line and put another port back in my chest. The surgeon who was going to remove it is one of the most well known performers for the opera company that I am employed by. When I found out he was the one who was going to do it, I called my mom and said, “Guess what, The Mikado is operating on me tomorrow!” It was very odd sitting on the examination table not talking about opera, but instead talking about if he was going to have to cut me open or not.

Since I was a new patient, I had to fill out the standard health history form. For the first time in my life I had to check yes to the “Have you had or do you have cancer” box. It was a very odd feeling checking that box, almost like I had to confess, no jokes about it, just the facts ma’am.

Turns out The Mikado (AKA Dr. Miller) said it didn’t appear my port was infected, so he didn’t feel the need to take it out. Great news! Tomorrow when I have chemo, they are going to do a culture, just to be on the safe side. But that’s tomorrow. Today I’m just a woman with cancer receiving chemo to fight it.

The Luckiest

2010-02-02T09:09:00.000-08:00

Having Hodgkin’s has re-opened many lost connections that I used to have. It’s been great getting back in touch with people, even if it is because I am sick. One of the connections I made was with a college friend Aria. She is a lactation consultant who lives in Oregon. For the past month, Aria has been my personal consultant when it came to the drugs I was on. She’d look up the drugs and then let me know if could keep nursing.

Before I found out I had cancer, I had froze lots of milk just in case I was going to have to stop nursing. After I was diagnosed and had my first round of chemo Aurelia was put on formula. Addison and I noticed she didn’t throw up nearly as much on formula as she did with my milk. Immediately red flags went off and I thought for sure my milk must have been toxic to make her throw up so much. Could the Hodgkin’s have an affect on her? Aria didn’t think so and thought it probably had to do with acid reflux and/or positioning, but just in case, she threw it out to a world-wide listserv of lactation consultants. I mean, what luck, I’m getting expert advice from all around the world!

Responses flowed in and basically all said Hodgkin’s is not transferrable and therefore, no, my milk was not bad for Aurelia. She probably just does better feeding from a bottle. Good news for me. But, there was a response about a mother in the Netherlands that really got my attention.

A woman pregnant with twins in The Netherlands was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s at 9 weeks pregnant. She’s been undergoing chemo treatments while pregnant. I can’t even imagine. I was told I’ve most likely had this before I was pregnant, but I’m thinking perhaps it was a good thing I didn’t know. Maybe they would have caught it earlier, but the thought of me having to undergo chemo while pregnant scares the daylights out of me. My heart really goes out to this mom.

I’ve never felt very lucky. Bad luck always seems to find me. Friends used to say, “If it’s going to happen to anyone, it will happen to Frances.” But here's the thing, since being diagnosed, I’ve been feeling so lucky, so very lucky. I feel lucky I got Hodgkin’s as opposed to another cancer, I feel lucky that my doctor caught it on a whim just by looking at me, I feel lucky I have someone like Aria to ask the world questions for me, I feel lucky I didn’t have to undergo chemo while pregnant, I feel lucky I have a great family and so many friends who are supporting me. I feel lucky. That’s all.

It Happens Every Day

2010-02-01T00:31:00.000-08:00

Making white blood cells hurts! Here we are, going about our daily lives making white blood cells and not even thinking about it, but as soon as we are given an injection to help us make more- watch out! I spent the much of the Saturday curled up on the couch groaning in pain. Addison had to give me my second shot on Saturday morning and it really set me over the edge. My lovely nurse Lena held my hand and stroked my head and said, “Its okay mommy, this won’t hurt a bit!” as Addison jabbed the needle into my stomach. Lena was right, the shot itself didn’t hurt, but the effect of the meds did. A few hours later, I had shooting spasms up and down my spine that brought up memories of child birth. My joints hurt so bad I was stumbling around the house, trying not to move. I am not looking forward to doing this every time I have chemo.

So, make sure you thank your bone marrow for making white blood cells every day without the help of drugs. It works very hard and deserves a pat on the back, leg, arm, or wherever bone marrow is present!

Pushing the Needle Too Far

2010-01-29T17:45:00.000-08:00

Aurelia dropped off at sitter? Check. Lena dropped off at school? Check. Make it to my chemo appointment in time? Check. Blood drawn? Check. Proceed with chemo? No.

My white blood cell count was too low to proceed and they can’t risk it because if I got sick, I wouldn’t be able to fight an infection. My WBC needed to be 1200 and I am only at 800. My oncologist in Seattle doesn’t want me to have the Neulasta shot which would boost my cell count up, instead he wants me to wait a week and let my body do it on its own. He did allow me to have a shot of Neupogen which will work with my body to create new white blood cells. I took one dose today and will take another tomorrow. The nurse had Addison give it to me and he will do it tomorrow too. Addison doesn’t like needles and I don’t like the idea of getting a shot from someone who doesn’t regularly administer shots, but he actually did quite well.

To top things off, my port-a-cath is infected so next week they are going to remove it and put another one in. This will be my 5th surgical procedure since November. My infected port-a-cath has me worried most of all, the idea of having an infection from a surgery does not sit well with me. Especially since my WBC count is so low I can’t fight off an infection at this time.

My chemo being thrown off a week has fouled lots of things up. I was supposed to get my next round on the 12th here in Juneau and then we were headed out to Arizona. On the way back through I was going to stop in Seattle and get my fourth dose there. Now, I am behind a week which means I need to set up to receive chemo in Arizona, cancel my hotel and flight reservations for Seattle, and make new arrangements to go back to Seattle a week after I return from Arizona. It’s kind of a headache because everyone wants doctor notes and some have cancellation penalty fees. It’s just a bunch of extra steps I don’t feel like dealing with.

Also, I called my oncologist today because I got tired of waiting for the letter that has yet to arrive. I wanted to confirm that the tumor board suggested radiology and what that meant. I was told at one time that if I had to undergo radiology, that my chemo would be shortened from 6 months to 3 months. However, after talking with my oncologist, such is not the case. I still have to do the full 6 months and then I will do the radiation after all is said and done. Not the news I wanted to hear….sigh.

The one thing I am learning with this disease is that you can’t plan very well in advance. Not only do you not have a choice in whether or not you get it, you don’t have a choice on when you get to fight it, how long you have to fight it, or if your body is even strong enough to take the drugs to fight it. Flexibility is key and I’m slowly learning to just go with the flow. And now, I have to allow Addison to squeeze my belly fat and give me a shot in the stomach- now that is flexibility!

We Didn’t Start the Fire (Okay, so maybe I did.)

2010-01-28T22:49:00.000-08:00

I have chemo tomorrow. It will be my first round in Juneau and I’m a little nervous. I’ve been preparing for it the past few days. When I get nervous, I clean and I cook. As Addison would say, I have a case of the Monica’s. (Monica was the super clean neat freak on the sitcom Friends.) I did all the laundry, cleaned the house from top to bottom, crossed most everything off my “To Do” list (including the Christmas thank you letters that I’ve been procrastinating for over a month) and I made one of my favorite dinners tonight, My great Aunt Frankie’s Tortellini Soup, and I even tackled garlic knots inspired by my friend Ali whom I chatted with earlier today.

Tackling the dinner was kind of over the edge as Lena didn’t take a nap today and instead chose to watch Annie while singing all the songs at the top of her lungs while simultaneously bouncing on the couch like one of the orphans. This soon prompted poor Aurelia to start to scream in frustration. While the chaos was reaching a peak, I carelessly placed the paper towel roll too close to the burner hence starting a fire. The fire then spread into the pot where there was grease and yes, it got ugly. This was my first kitchen fire and I managed to get it out very quickly without destroying dinner or my kitchen, but I did manage to singe my hair in the process (good thing I’m going to lose it anyway.) The commotion in the kitchen stopped Lena in a rousing rendition of “Tomorrow” and led her to gasp, “What happened mommy?” I told her I had a small fire, but it’s okay now because it’s out. Her response was classic, “It happens.” Then she went back to singing “Tomorrow.”

After the fire, I started working on the garlic knots. I thought of Ali and the conversation I had with her earlier in the day. Ali and I met in graduate school in DC back in 2000. She was my first friend in DC and I made a point of making friends with her quickly because she was the only girl in my orientation class besides me wearing jeans, a fleece jacket and no makeup. Some things are just meant to be. Ali and her mom introduced me to garlic knots when I went home with her to New Jersey one weekend. They are served at most pizzerias in NJ and they are quite tasty. Ali told me that a pizza place isn’t a pizza place without them. I remember that weekend well as it was the first and last time I met her mom as she died of lung cancer a few months later (she was never a smoker.) Ali had lost her dad a few years earlier so when her mom passed, it left only her and her sister. Ali remained strong throughout her mom’s illness and even after her death. She kept her strong sense of wit and even managed to study for and take her comprehensive graduate exams. I was so impressed that she was able to just keep moving forward. I can’t even imagine being that strong. I probably would have dropped out of grad school if I had gone through what she had.

Today Ali told me I was her hero and I had to laugh that it came out of her mouth. I haven’t done anything that is hero worthy when compared to someone like Ali. When I need to be strong, I channel my strength from my friends and family. I think of Ali and how she lost both her parents before she was 30. I think of my Aunt Pat who is on her third round of chemo fighting ovarian cancer. I think of my brother who has overcome addictions. I think of Addison’s mom who is a breast cancer survivor. I think of my friend Brock who in his early 30s started having serious heart problems, but now he is an avid marathon runner. I think of Aurelia who at three weeks old fought for her life to shake a virus. The list could go on. There are so many people in my life who demonstrate enormous amounts of strength and courage, and I feel fortunate to have them as models. If I can have a tenth of the strength and courage of what my family and friends posses, I’ll be fine. I draw my strength from them. I’ll be fine- even if I do set my dinner on fire every now and then.

Who Needs Sleep?

2010-01-28T04:49:00.000-08:00

It’s shortly before 3 am and I can’t sleep. Aurelia needed a bottle at 2:00 so Addi made it and I fed it to her. While feeding her, I was a zombie, hardly able to keep my eyes open, but as soon as she finished and fell asleep, PING! I am wide awake. Insomnia has been creeping in the past few weeks. It’s a combination of the steroids I’m on as well as a gene I inherited from my father- restlessness. Dad always has said if he could be granted one wish it would be to be as tired at night as he feels in the morning. I full heartedly agree.

I tend to let my mind wander and get off track. Right now I’m thinking about my nephew in Iraq, the orphans in Haiti, my friend Cristina and if she’ll find the right shoes to match her wedding dress. Should I wear a wig to her wedding in July or a scarf? Will I catch the cold that Lena and Addison are battling? When will the letter come from my oncologist? He mailed it on Friday from Seattle; shouldn’t it be here by now? I wish we could adopt an orphan from Haiti. Is the infusion therapist going to call me to set up my chemo on Friday or should I just call her? Will my port-a-cath ever heal? Is Lena going to ask for chocolate pudding for breakfast and when I refuse is she going to have a meltdown?

I mean seriously. Let it go Frances.

I try to meditate and just breathe, but things keep popping into my head. The “To Do” list is making its way into my thoughts now, there’s no turning back when the “To Do” list comes in.

Maybe it’s time to watch some Wings episodes. It’s my sick little obsession. Have you seen Wings? It’s a sitcom that was on in the 90s about a little airport on Nantucket. I used to fall asleep watching it when I was in high school on nights when my “To Do” lists and worries kept me awake. Addison can’t stand it (although he laughs harder than I do when it’s on) but I’ve had an ongoing relationship with the Hacket Brothers, Helen, Lowell, Roy, Fay and Antonio for nearly 20 years now. Addison has his WWII documentaries and I have Wings. I broke down and bought all seven seasons last year. There’s something about it that makes me completely forget everything and I can usually fall asleep before I finish one episode.

Chillcat the kitten is up and tearing through the house. He just did a sneak attack on a very sleeping Lena which didn’t go so well. Perhaps I should introduce him to Wings.

Six months is really just a half of a year...

2010-01-26T21:48:00.000-08:00

A little over two weeks ago I was told I had Hodgkin's Lymphoma. When I was told I had cancer, the doctor could have just as well said I was actually a Martian and would soon be sprouting antennas out of head. Basically, the notion was absolutely ridiculous, inside I was laughing hard at the absurdity of all that has happened in the last three months. Three months ago I had a baby. Two months ago that baby got really sick and gave me enough medical related stress to last a lifetime. In the past two months, I had two D&C’s to help with post delivery problems due to placenta accreta. And lastly, I was recently told I shouldn’t have more children due to the risks involved. Of course I have cancer, because life isn’t complicated enough at the moment. The phrase, “kick me when I’m down” has been floating through my head lately.

Ever since I was told, I’ve been in a bit of a fog, almost in denial. Outwardly, I’ve tried to be very positive and cheerful. Truth of the matter is, I’m not really sure how to react. Many emotions have gone through my head in the past two weeks: sad, grateful, pissed off, lucky, numb, thankful, and accepting. The fact of the matter is this is a very curable disease and I will make it through it- I don’t have a choice. I actually feel quite lucky. As my oncologist said, “If you’re going to get cancer, this is the one to get.” I also feel very fortunate my doctor noticed the lump on my neck while sitting across from me during my 6 week post delivery checkup. (Dr. Sharon Fisher, you are amazing!) But nonetheless, the past few weeks have been a roller coast of emotions of thoughts and scenarios. The hardest part for me has been weaning Aurelia at only three months. Because of the chemotherapy, I have no choice. For some this may be hard to understand why I’m making a big deal of it, but given the fact that she was so sick and that she is my last “baby”, it was and continues to be the hardest part for me about acquiring this disease.

I feel so very fortunate to have family and friends who are so incredibly supportive. My friend Cristina was there for me in Seattle when I found out I had cancer and continues to be a tremendous support system. My sister Trish drove up to Seattle for the day just to be with me after the news broke. My friends Anne and Jeremy put me up in their house for a few days. My mom flew up to Seattle and Juneau leaving my dad and new house in Arizona behind to get me through my first session of chemo. Addison and the girls continue to brighten my days with smile, hugs and love. Susan, Wendy, Doug and Kris for being my Lena support crew. My friend Steve in Haines started a Facebook fan page for me complete now with over 250 fans. I’ve always been a “fan” of Steve’s for his amazing swim from Skagway to Juneau to protest the road, and now feel like an absolute rock star as a result of the support system he set up for me. He even shaved his head! My friend Chuck shaved his head too, and lots of my friends are dying purple and green (lymphoma support colors) streaks in their hair to show support. My friend Hannah (who is in elementary school) dyed her light blonde hair with green streaks. When she got up to explain to the class why she did it, she told them, “When you love your friends and they are sick you do fun things to support then so they know you love them.” From the cards, flowers, e-mails, shaved and dyed hair, phone calls, meals on wheels, and special boxes of hats and goodies, I am feeling the love and support everyone. I am truly feeling the love.

My treatment will be chemotherapy, every two weeks for a total of six months. I will do most my treatments here in Juneau, but every third will be in Seattle. I was also informed today that I will indeed need radiation. This came as quite a blow to me and Addison. At first this was something my doctors thought I could avoid, but when a “bulky mass” (aka a swollen lymph node) is larger than 10 cm radiation is administered. I have one that is 9.7 cm. I like to think of my 15 swollen nodes as pieces of citrus fruit. They range from the size of a lime to a grapefruit. The medical board met and decided that they really want me to kick this (which is good that they are on my side) and determined the best approach is to give me the radiation. I don’t like this idea at all. Radiation can lead to lung cancer, heart disease and many other nasty things I’d like to avoid. But, I have been told I am not going to have to do as intense of radiation and they will only have me do it for a few days as opposed to several weeks. I want to beat this, and I’m going to do everything it takes (even radiation) to overcome it.

My next round of chemo is this coming Friday here in Juneau. I handled the first round okay and mostly had side effects from the drugs they gave me to prevent me from getting sick. I hope it continues to not treat me too badly. After my first treatment, I lopped off all my hair and put purple streaks in it. I have always wanted purple hair and I felt since I was going to lose it; I might as well do something fun. I was lucky enough to have enough hair that I was able to meet the requirement to donate it to

Locks of Love, a non-profit organization that provides wigs made of real hair for children who have lost theirs from cancer or other illnesses. I love this non-profit and have donated my hair to them in the past. This time it had a much more significant meaning.

I am going to try to blog as much as possible about this experience. Why the name “I’m Just Here for the Piroshkies?” As most of you know, I’m a bona fide foodie. The name is about my favorite Russian Bakery in Seattle:

Piroshky, Piroshky. I’ve always said I’d go to Seattle just to get a Vatrushka or Vladimir roll from them as they are simply the best. Since I’ll be traveling to Seattle quite a bit for treatments, I’m looking at it as a chance to eat as many Vatrushka rolls as possible (although I’ve been warned about eating my favorite foods while on chemo.) Addi also supported the name because he said if I got bored of talking about my cancer, I could talk about food. He’s got a good point!

The next six months are not going to be fun, but I am just going to look at each treatment as a hurdle I have to overcome. I’m also looking at it as a chance to learn to be more appreciative of my family and friends and life in general. I’ve been on auto pilot for awhile now, not really stopping to take time for things. I’m also going to try my best to keep my chin up and save my tears for tears of joy when I’m told I am cancer free in six months or when I cross the finish line of my first marathon which I plan on running in the summer of 2011. (It’s in print now Brock- you can hold me to it.)

Keep tuning in folks, I'll be here. XXOO Franny