Cancer Journal of Maureen Kennedy

       Jan 2006 - April 2008

This will be a brief synopsis of what happened to me.  This is how my life usually has gone, I did everything right (except stop smoking) and still things came out bad for me.  

Basically in the last year and couple of months, four things have happened to me health wise.  First during summer of 2005 I started having more general depression and gradually began to lose my desire to be artistic and make my beads.  I thought perhaps this was an offshoot of my concern over my younger sister's health problems at the time.  Then in Sept 2005 I twisted my ankle for the second time in 5 months and my left leg started swelling up to an alarming size - swelling started at ankle and traveled up to the thigh.  In December it was finally diagnosed as Lymphedema from unknown cause. Also a test the results of which were not told to me, said that I had Deep Vein Thrombosis and sometime in the past had had a blood clot! Either you are genetically born with this disposition to lymphedema which displays itself before the age of 30, or it is a side effect of chemotherapy and cancer treatment.  Only occasionally is it caused by repeated injury to lymph glands from accidents.  There is no cure for this condition, all you can do is elevate the foot/leg and wear granny stockings to help compress the fluid rich swollen tissue.  Then after Christmas 2005, I came down with pneumonia and for the first time started coughing up some blood in my sputum.  I quickly saw a doctor and got some antibiotics and he was concerned at the one spot shown on my lung.  He also was worried because I had weight loss of 20 pounds over a year's time, so he referred me to a Pulmonary doctor.  

So I was referred to Pulmonary doctor and Xray still showed spot on lung.  I requested a more heavy duty antibiotic (Having had pneumonia and bronchitis at least 18-20 time the amoxicillin just doesn't do it for me!)  So he gave me prescription and when I came back both the CAT scan and Xray showed the spot had decreased in size by about 1/3rd!  As he said then, cancer does not go down in size.  So just to be sure we would have CAT scans done every three months.  So ALL I KNEW for this entire time, was that I had ONE spot on my lung until Nov 2, 2006.  Then I found out he had been "tracking" another spot on my lungs which had gotten bigger which is why he said we had to do bronchospy then.  If someone had told me (pulmonary doctor or the emergency room doctor I saw in July when I had blood clots in my leg) that I had a SECOND spot on lungs, I would have done the bronchospy so much sooner.  Seeing the Cancer doctor in December reveals I have TWO tumors, the first spot which has metastasised into the lymph glands in the chest (May be outside the lung, not sure about this) which developed into a second tumor.  So we have lost 8 months in treating this, and perhaps 8 months earlier it would have been operational which it is not now, having the chest tumor between the heart and the spine.  I vowed to myself then at the cancer doctor's office, that I would not let my fears run my life as I had in the 8 months - the bronchospy was a breeze compared to what I thought it would be in my fears.  I will do everything they want me to do and do it as quick as possible. (Interestingly enough today (12/9) I was able to allay some fears of a friend who's doctor had suggested he do this procedure - by telling him of how easily it had gone and not to be afraid of it!)

But what is absolutely astounding is since the end of October, before I knew I had cancer, God has blessed me with feeling happy and such vitality that I am doing so many productive things and getting out and being with people. I have no fear anymore having turned it over to God, and yet I am happy most of the days now. Another amazing thing, the PET scan showed that at some time in the past I have had a stroke (Must have been when I was working and my blood pressure was uncontrollable and I remember having dimming vision then). So I am bless not to have had a bad stroke back then! I am also feeling the first stirrings of interest in starting to make stained glass jewelry boxes and kaleidoscopes again, as well as some beads.

CAT Scan done 10/27/06 - results known 11/02/06 - Pulmonary doctor felt highly suspicious of cancer now and wanted bronchospy done.  PET scan done 11/10/06 with bronchospy on 11/14/06 reveals biopsy found lung cancer in cells.

November 15, 2006 --Hi folks - well I did the bronchospy yesterday and it was not nearly as bad as I thought it would be, although I started fighting them towards the end of it as I was choking on excessive liquid in my lungs. Dr. said PET scan shows "high activity" in the two areas he was concerned with but it also showed high activity in my neck lymph gland and my nasal passage. I asked if this mean metasised? and he said sometimes this test can mask other things. I told him those neck glands were swollen on Sat and I had sore throat and reminded him that I felt like I had been fighting pneumonia for the last couple of weeks and felt some heaviness in my lung for last couple of days. So at this point he is not sure if he "got anything" (meaning what he was aiming for) but he did take a snip of something for biopsy. I am so darn confused by this whole thing - things he suggested he could see with this procedure over the last 6 months discussion, he told me in fact he could NOT get with this procedure (like checking out scarred tissue to see if cancer was hiding there). Anyhow, I see him again in a week. Of course, I did not get any antibiotics. But with my asthma and allergies, when I normally wake up in the morning both sinuses are very congested and I usually sound like I have bronchitis until my asthma meds kick in. So if this bronchospy doesn't find anything, then I guess it's the "needle through the back" test next. I guess he won't say I do have cancer until some lab test biopsy says I have it. 

November 21, 2006 -- Bad News today folks - it's lung cancer. He said we couldn't have discovered it any sooner than we did. I don't know anything more at this point, have to wait for oncology appointment where they will discuss options - but surgery is not one of them since it's in the lung's lymph glands. I don't want to talk about it anymore tonight, having just talked to my two sisters. So I will be back to the board tomorrow. Hugs to all!

November 22, 2006 --Hello Everyone - thanks for all your warm thoughts and prayers. One funny thing about this whole thing is that yesterday the doctor was so upset at telling me about the lung cancer, that I actually had to lean over and pat him on his knee and tell him that it is OK, that I did this to myself by smoking and that when I had started smoking neither my grandmother or father had died of lung cancer because of course I would never have started smoking if I had known that would happen. (my Grandmother never smoked, my Dad had stopped smoking 35 years earlier) Both my sisters are optimistic and upbeat (I think hoping since it was discovered so soon chances are better). So far, the PET scan shows it has not started anywhere else yet even though cancer cells are in the lymph glands in lung. So far the best way I seem to be able to handle this is not to be looking far into the future as to what may happen, but just take each day at a time right now.

For those religiously inclined, two amazing things have happened in "messages" from God. I read religious books (writings of the saints and others) as well as the Bible regularly. Well after the beginning of the month when doctor told me of CAT scan results, I just turned blindly to the bible and opened it as it willed to Peter 4:7 which basically says compose and calm yourself so you can pray, and then Monday night knowing already of the Pet Scan results and knowing Tuesday (yesterday) I would be learning of the bronchospy results, I again opened the Bible where it willed to Philippians 4:4 which basically says rejoice in the Lord and dismiss your anxiety and present your needs to God in every form of prayer. Now keep in mind I was not "trying" to do this, I just opened the Bible at random just to read some pages before going to sleep that night. The doctor really surprised me too in his concern, telling me to pray and ask others to pray for me - so again to console him I showed him my relic of St. Anthony Claret that I was wearing who had some miraculous cancer cures and is the order to which my uncle the priest belongs to. I guess he was surprised that I was taking it so calmly, perhaps thinking I was being fatalistic about it all, and he wanted me to "fight" for life. My twin wants me to "get angry" about having cancer (as a method of fighting it) - and yet who or what am I supposed to get angry with - certainly not God, certainly not my father who was smoking when I started smoking, perhaps I can get angry at the government in that the office I worked in for many years had asbestos in the insulation which we never knew about until HVAC system was replaced, but like Job getting angry to me it is just a waste of emotions and produces nothing except to make one feel worse. If I am fatalistic at all, it is in believing that everything is in God's hands and his will, will be done. Yesterday I visited that jukebox website of oldies but goodies songs of the late 50's 60's and played some of the songs, and listening to them made me happy - so I think I will start listening to music again. I called the Coumidin clinic and told them- because in my HMO experience they don't seem to tell other departments what they are doing. Chemo makes your blood thinner so they will have to adjust coumidin. Called Shrink's office today - they are getting me in today for appt rather than having to wait until the 12th. Oncology called today and appt with them is Dec 1. I emailed everybody I know to let them know (just didn't want to talk to everyone and have to repeat everything over and over (and didn't want to hear anyone say or imply that they "told me so") So I am taking care of business and rolling right along!

November 23, 2006 -- Hi Everyone - I had a wonderful time at my friends daughter's house (Thanksgiving Day). The food was wonderful and for the first time I ate a second helping of the Sweet potatoes as they were fixed in a way I have never had before (sort of made like pumpkin pie filling with raisins and walnuts in them with marshmallows on top). I was so relaxed and having such a good time I didn't even feel the need to smoke - and so often I get antsy being around people that I get nervous and feel I have to leave after an hour or hour and a half. I was there for 4 hours! I realized last night, after whining to myself for the last 6 years about not having a purpose to life, that now my purpose was to live life the best I could (last year I turned down this opportunity to eat with my friend and daughter' family and stayed home alone!) and that I now had a purpose to my life and that was to live the best and be the strongest I can for myself, when I have always been so strong for others in my life when they needed me. So on this thankful day, I am slapping a nicotine patch on myself tonight and will try very hard to stop smoking! (just don't ask me how it's going until I crow about how good I am doing!)

November 25, 2006 -- Religious thoughts if you want to skip it

Something really eerie happened last night and I don't know if I am being blessed, or cursed with over active imagination. I wrote a letter to my uncle the priest, who doesn't like to talk on the phone, telling him everything that has gone on. I told him of the two instances where I just happened to open the Bible to read and certain passages helped comfort me at the time I needed them. In the body of the letter, I was asking him if he would do the Catholic rite of Extreme Unction for me, which used to be only for when the person was almost to the point of death but has been changed in the last many years to a healing of the body, purification. I told him that I didn't know where the idea that I need some laying on of hands had come to me that day, it just popped into my head. Then I finished the letter, sealed it and took it downstairs to the mailboxes for the postman to pick up today. Three hours later, after watching TV and getting ready for bed, I pulled out the Bible again to read some pages and it opened to Acts 28:8 - and it told of the apostle St. Paul going into a man's room and he laid hands on the man and cured him. I was so astounded that my jaw literally dropped open. I don't know what to make of this - coincidence or a message from God. I will discuss it with my uncle when he gets back to me.

The four phone calls to friends that I had been dreading to make are done and they went much better than I could have hoped (for the most part). One friend in Minnesota in her late 70's is now caretaker to her husband who had some medical procedures which left him blind and being the very "helpless male" has left her practically his slave. I hated telling her adding to her burden of bad news but she took it very well and has strong faith too. She has had no break from 24/7 since the first of the year because he "won't hear of it" anyone else coming into the house. I told her to tell him tough, she needed time off for herself to just go shopping or out with the girls and just tell him she will be getting a babysitter for him!

My other friend in Florida who helped me caretaker Mom at the end and who had a son die with multiple myoloma's two years ago and who has lost most of her sight to macular degeneration and who has amazingly found love and married at this time in her life (late 60's) - took the news better than I thought and had some encouraging words for me on how to get through treatments.

My other friend, the stained glass lady in her early 80's who has always nagged me about smoking and has a very critical nature (she finds flaws with whatever you do - like a mother! LOL) called me Thanksgiving night and so I told her and we had a very long and rewarding talk with no "I told you so's".

And I got to thinking last night, if you are so inclined, besides saying prayers for me, could you include my two sisters Eileen and Doreen because in spite of their up-beat front for me, I know they are devastated because they can't do anything to help me now.

It's still amazing to me how up I feel and am doing real well. I cooked a big turkey last night, and just hope I can find room in my freezer for some of the meat to use for other meals in addition to the turkey soup that I love to make.

Hope you all are having a good day and night.

November 27, 2006 -- Well I received some information today that may help others. Lynn was so nice that she found out the American Cancer Society local office in my city (which I could not find on their national website). Anyhow I called them today and found out that they have a transportation service called Road to Recovery that helps people get too and from their treatments. This has been my biggest concern in the last week since my sisters live so far away and my uncles are in the 80's and don't drive anymore. She also mentioned that they give people free wigs as well (and here I was trying to think of where I could get knitted snow caps to keep my head warm).You all have been such a blessing to me - you go through life and think you never made an impact on others and it is quite thrilling to know that others care about you after all! It is thrilling and humbling at the same time. God Bless you ALL!  Hugs   Maureen

Well I have already started to do things that I need to do. Went out today and bought new phone with 3 handsets so I can have one at all the critical areas where I spend my day. Started thinking of how to re-arrange my living room to give me more furniture to hold onto as I progress from bedroom to kitchen (thinking of weakness, etc). Started a list of foods I need to shop for before chemo starts (hints others have given me). One thing I have to do is stop researching on the net - scared myself today with things that MIGHT happen (that's looking a head again, and I said I wasn't going to do that). Took my weight so I can keep track of that. Need to start a notebook with all these medical test results so I can keep track of that too as well as appointments. I just feel like I have to get organized to help myself now while I can.

December 2, 2006  --Well the prognosis is not good and it is all in God's hands now. I am stage 3 with two tumors, one of which is between heart and spine so it is inoperable. (Actually this is area where chest lymph glands are located and cancer cells migrated there (metastasised) and developed a tumor involving all those lymph glands) We are starting on Monday with the most powerful combination of Chemo drugs and just hoping for the best. The tumors are small by cancer's definition about 17 mm each, and it is non small cell cancer which does not grow as fast but is more lethal. I could not get her to confirm when she thought I should have been seen by her having the pulmonary doctor making me do the bronchospy before he did  (I think she was leery of me since I was tape recording the conversation since I was alone and was afraid I would not hear everything  being stuck in my own mind on one thing she might say while continuing to talk about other things)  - other than to say nothing could have been done in Jan 2006 because the tumors were not showing then - which means my April CAT scan should have been acted upon and I have lost 8 months with which this could have been addressed sooner (and perhaps before the second tumor of the lymph glands that is behind heart and in front of spine).  Perhaps this is why my Pulmonary doctor was so upset for me,  urging me to pray and have others pray for me?  I am going to Parish priest on Tuesday (If I am up to it) for Anointing of the Sick. I had wanted my uncle the priest to do it, but he is 88 and in retirement home and says they do not do the sacraments there.

One brightest of all bright stars though is the absolutely wonderful Gift from Teresa Laliberte Lavender Creek Glass sent me from Germany. I had gotten my mail before I drove down to the cancer doctor's office for my appointment, and since I arrived early I opened the package while in my car. I was so stunned at the beautiful Dancing Queen she sent me that I started crying. That bead just EXUDES Joy of Life! Here's this woman proud of herself being a woman, just dancing and throwing her arms up in joy! What Teresa doesn't know is that I almost bid on that bead! I have always admired and liked her other tribal women beads, but this particular one just snuck into my heart. Common sense prevailed upon me not to buy it, since I haven't been selling beads for months and not had that income, I am somewhat broke at this time. So instead, Teresa through her generous heart sent me the bead I wanted the most - and I showed it to the cancer doctor and her bead will be my mascot and always with me through this ordeal.

BTW the pictures just do not do justice to the energy and vibrancy of this bead!

Another good thing, I gave my nieces 26 pounds of beads several months ago when one was down here visiting - they were all individuals or partial sets and I just felt like they were millstones around my neck. Well my two nieces started making jewelry with them, and at a "by invitation" show being held today, my sister says the people are just going wild about the beads and pandemonium is reigning with people buying the jewelry and just digging through the box of loose beads. So that lifted my spirits too, making me think perhaps I should clean the couple of dozens of beads I have made sporadically over the last few months and perhaps try selling them on the Bay again. Think I will just buy dollar stamps and over-postage boxes so I don't have to wait in line for them to be weighed.

So I am doing well, no point in crying over spilt milk is the way I was raised, I will just be doing what I need to be doing to get through this. Thanks again everyone.

December 3. 2006 --Well hello Everyone! I had a busy day yesterday doing things to get ready for tomorrow and afterwards. Went out for a lovely luncheon with stained glass ladies today- there were 11 of us and was fun seeing everyone again. Then I stopped at grocery store and stocked up on things I would need for the next 3-4 weeks (just in case I get too tired to go shopping). My hair turned out lousy (I chopped off 8 inches last night)- just doesn't want to curl right (course it may be the stylist! LOL and something I won't have to worry about for some time). Got off the phone with my sister, and she asked how I felt about tomorrow. I told her I have no feelings about it - just something I have to do. If I did have feelings, it would be gladness that we are starting to do something about this problem. The sweet girl in Germany that sent me the bead, said that when she read what I had posted on beadmaker's board, she just felt that I had to have just that bead - when she sent it to me. She was amazed how quickly it made itself here from Germany too. So I am doing good, am prepared and I think things will go well. Take care!  Oh yes, in case you would like to see recent picture of me - here is link to one done just a couple of weeks ago for my 59th birthday - I am the one in black. (just so you have a pic for your prayers)My younger sister, her husband, niece and her boyfriend.  So that is me at 59, and the one below is at age 58.

December 4, 2006 --Well things went pretty well today. But it was a long and tiring day, left the house at 8am and didn't get back till 5:30. There was some mixup, some blood tests didn't get ordered on Friday so I had to do that and wait for results before chemo could start. Then there was a mix up and I wouldn't let chemo start until I had talked to the doctor (she had told me Friday that all would be done in one sessions and the nurses told me it would be two sessions a week apart). Because I am on Coumidin, I cannot have a shunt for the chemo but must have intravenous injections (which actually I would prefer because I am such a klutz I would probably manage to tear out the shunt).  There was no pain.  Then after chemo I had to go to two different HMO pharmacies to get anti nausea pills since one pharmacy didn't have them all in stock. I clutched my dancing queen tightly to my hand  during chemo- though I must admit that I was sorely tempted to pass it  (the bead) on to a very tired and sad looking big black woman who could have posed for the bead! I resisted for this for now, knowing I will probably be seeing her again in the future (or maybe I will try making a duplicate for her or just a bead of my own since I doubt very much I could reproduce Teresa's bead!) So far I am feeling great, getting things done (spending lots of time on the phone with the sisters, nieces, etc).

Well it happened again last night, I said a rosary and after that I opened the bible to a page in Timothy - where Paul talks about laying hands on Timothy! I finally had to say - OK God, I got it, I am doing that Tuesday! LOL

I will say I am starting to get interested in getting back into making stained glass items again, some bevel hearts for sis's and nieces (something that doesn't cost me anything cause I have thousands of dollars in stained glass stuff already!). I gave up making stained glass items after Mom died, my doing so was just too intertwined with taking care of her that my grief at her passing passed into the stained glass as well.  Tomorrow I am finally gonna clean some beads and see if I can take some decent pictures and hope to put up some auctions on the Bay and see what happens. Oh yes, the nieces made over $1,400 selling my beads and jewelry they made with it!

For those of you who are interested, I am starting a cancer BLOG with updates about myself so it is easier than emailing people I know and posting it on every chat board - so if you want to keep reading it you may do so at http://www173.pair.com/mirish2u/cancer.htm  I never thought I would be blogging, primarily because my life had been so inactive and I felt I would have nothing to say.  You also reveal a lot of personal life information on these blogs, but in my case of right now, I want to do so to reassure my friends and also reveal God working through me that I might help others with what I have to say.

Don't you all get too tired shopping!      Hugs  Maureen

December 6, 2006 --I went to the Anointing for Healing yesterday and found myself uplifted and joyous with a wonderful talk with the priest. I felt so very chipper and got a lot of things done and I even got into a salon and got my hair cut so short (like a boy in the back with a front flip in the front)- it feels weird as if I have my hair up in a chignon but without any weight. Am going to try and see if someone can take a pic of me, my sister's will be shocked.
Came home to find Hewlett Packard (Compaq computer) did not repair my laptop and returned it to me unrepaired and after hours on the phone found that they found "debris" inside the computer which allegedly cause the LCD screen not to work right in displaying colors (or in other words, it would cost more to fix than they want to do - sort of like totaling out your car). (I uneasily wonder if cleaning my bead release from beads, even though in water, may be the cause of this debris since I do it on the kitchen table where the laptop sits even though it is always closed when I do so.) I also said I had never completely opened the computer and the debris could only have come when they repaired the "heat sink" in August!  I asked if that meant they would refund the extension of the insurance I paid them in July for $120 since in essence they are saying they will never repair my laptop anymore? No - they don't refund that! The packing box they sent it back in had flimsy rubber cushioning so nothing worked on the computer - had to open and reset memory and hard drive, and then it would boot up but they cleaned the keyboard and nothing would key in any keystrokes so the keyboard didn't work. I could live with the lousy colors (black being red, white being turquoise, turquoise being pinkish - but I can't live without a keyboard not working. So they are sending me another packing box and will re-look at it again and get the keyboard working. When did computer repair insurance get like car insurance? Nothing but a big ripoff!!!

Today had some problem with coughing up blood with my asthmatic sputum cough - called the coumidin clinic and cancer offices - no temperature so no infection.  Coumidin clinic said stop pills for two days - for the first time in many a long time no sinus problems today which means that I must usually have a sinus infection because I normally have to take 3 or more sudafed type decongestants because of my asthma allergies every day.  Chemo is supposed to cause dry mouth and that, and considering no dripping sinuses since I am on antibiotics for sinus infection,  I guess I just dried out too much .  We'll see how it goes. Today I went to gallery owner's house to fix her computer, and of course I forgot all my resolves to not hug and kiss people anymore because of lowered immunity - got to remember to stand away!

December 7, 2006 - - Well I decided my sister's needed pictures of me to help them get through this, so I went down to Sears today and got some pictures taken.  They make it sound so cheap, only $15 for a sheet of pictures, etc.  What they don't tell you is that if you want "enhancement" (which is where they blur the whole picture which is done with a click of a button - and you want this when you are old and have wrinkles! LOL) they charge you $7 plus tax for each sheet they do it to - which came out over $30 more!  Anyhow, this is the first time in my life I got pictures taken - didn't even have any wedding photos since I eloped to Vegas those many years ago.  My sister's will be so shocked to see how short my hair is, it has never been this short and just a week and a half ago it was half way down my back (cheaper not to cut it and just let it grow!)  My face looks so bloated now from weight gain in the last couple of years from inactivity, and while I might have wanted to wait until I lost some weight (the only good thing about chemo besides it's killing effect on cancer) I wouldn't have any hair then for the picture.  The blood in my cough is better, almost gone, woke up very dry again this morning so I think I will run small room humidifier for more moisture when I am sleeping.  While I was at Sears I had to kill some time while waiting for the pictures and bought a new "bed in a bag" with comforter and that for my bed.  My current one is 16 years old and probably so full of dust from the years as it is almost impossible to wash it.  So tonight I managed to wrestle the top mattress off the bed, clean behind the bed, put the skirt on the box springs (which are just wooden slats) and remake the bed with comforter and shams.  I am absolutely amazing myself at all the energy I have been having lately and how every day I am doing things that are so productive when for literally years I have been sitting here doing nothing! I also had to run down to gallery owner's house and fix one more thing on her computer.  Computer is always working right when I leave, but somehow when she goes to use it, it doesn't work right again?   Other wise, I am doing great!  

Today is Pearl Harbor Day.  My father enlisted in the Navy within the month (had to finish his semester at college) and was then in the service for over 5 years.  Dad served in the South Pacific and until the day he died he would tear up when talking about what they found of American soldiers on the pacific islands after the Japanese had been through there - the mutilations of the bodies.  War is war, people expect death, people did not expect wanton mutilation of the dead.And maybe it is not politically correct to still remember that the Japanese did these horrible things, because only we are expected to feel guilty because of the atomic bombs. Dad had a poignant story of watching the Japanese sink a ship and while he was watching he saw the pastors, priests, rabbi's give their life vests to soldiers without one, and then they died when the ship went down.   So I am honoring my Dad in mentioning these things today.

December 9, 2006 -- Hello Everyone! I had a fabulous day today - and God's wonders never cease to amaze me! I got up later than I hoped, but I still managed to drive down to Gardena and join in on a bead maker's meeting at Pacific Art glass (a store). I was able to see people I haven't seen for years, and share with them my Tribal bead. I was able to comfort a man who's doctor has just told him he needs to have a bronchospy (because he's coughing up blood and the dye injected test caused him to go into shock for which he was hospitalized). I told him about my fears for 8 months that I didn't want to do it, and afterwards it was a breeze and he shouldn't be afraid. I splurged a bit and bought myself the same book that I had bought as a Christmas gift for my stained glass lady - and was told that they had run completely out of the books but had just found those three that morning! (was it meant for me? LOL). Then on driving part of the way home, I realized my St. Anthony Claret relic was missing off my chain and I made a beeline back there to the store. I had visions of people stepping on it and being broken and was heart sick. They were getting ready to close, when I walked in and said something terrible had happened holding up my empty chain around my neck - she knew exactly what I was going to say and said someone found it, didn't know what it was, but turned it in. I was ever so grateful and thankful that it had been found. Since that place is only a few miles from my uncle's retirement home (which I never knew is on the historical registry as it is San Pedro Adobe Home of the Dominguez family of So. Calif) I stopped in to see him. Sometimes I ever wonder how he made it as a priest as he always seems nervous being around me - maybe it's me? (but my sister says the same thing about him) Anyway we had a lovely talk and he blessed me, and I managed to fill a small bottle of holy water from the St. Anthony Claret church there on the premises. So all in all, it was a wonderful day. I got to "counting" my blessing during the last 5 weeks I have had more social doings than I have in the last couple of years. I just seem to have this energy and I don't know where it comes from, except from God's grace. I am certainly sad to hear of other people having to go through the cancer scare themselves and will pray for them as well as all you others that have illnesses!

December 10, 2006 - Boy am I sick today with a raging cold.  Now for most people this is not threatening, but they told me that if my temperature hit 100.5 degrees I have to go to the emergency room and perhaps be hospitalized.  So I called Kaiser's 24 hour nurses line to ask them if I could take an aspirin (such a simple thing) which I am not supposed to take because of the Coumidin blood thinner I take.  So of course they told me no.  Well my temperature was 100 degrees and I said forget this, and took 1/2 an aspirin and will skip the coumidin pill tonight.  Then will call Coumidin clinic tomorrow as well as call the Cancer doctor's office to see if I can take chemo which is scheduled for tomorrow.  If I go to get the Chemo - believe me I shall wear a mask on my face to protect all those other people who will be taking chemo themselves and who's condition is weakened from lots of chemo treatments.  I knew I should be more protective of myself wearing a mask when I got out - it's amazing how weak your defenses get from this chemo.

December 11, 2006 -- Hello Everyone! Well they canceled my chemo today because of the raging cold I have, and the fact I had temp of 100.2 last night (but I had to go down there anyway and have blood tests and wait and wait to be seen by doctor!) . Now catch this, incongruous, you have to be in good health to get chemo to kill cancer! I was disappointed, I wanted the chemo to be chasing those cancer cell parasites! I did wear a surgical mask thing today to protect others from getting my cold germs - I bet I looked funny!  So instead I got a more powerful antibiotic and won't go back to chemo's second cycle on 12/26. I got another bead in the mail from a lovely lurker on the bead makers boards - she makes stylistic dragonfly (in other words, lines that look like dragonfly) beads and sent me a lovely writing about dragonflies. I tell you, people are just amazing to me.

December 12, 2006 --You know, I am constantly amazed at how people like Phyllis there are that think so well of me. I never thought there was anything special about me. My primary goal in life was to help other people if I could. I got to thinking that sometimes the only time we tell people nice things about them, is when we think they need to hear it. It's just something we don't do routinely. And with that thought in mind, I called my laptop computer case manager who reluctantly authorized the second return of my laptop to be fixed, when the first time HP returned it without repairing it saying indirectly that I caused the damage to it because they found "debris" in the interior. (Now I wonder if it was bead release they found - they couldn't identify it) and while I clean out my beads in water, there is always release hanging around my table from beads still on the mandrel, etc which can enter computer through the keyboard.) Anyhow, this lady suggested I have the geek squad or someone open my computer and spray canned air into it, so when the repair facility sees it again they don't see any release. The heck with paying Best Buy to do this, I took all the screws off the back and got the back up partially and sprayed the great majority of it with air - then shipped it back to them. So today I get the computer returned and I am dreading opening it up - thinking they have returned it unrepaired and I will have to buy a new laptop! Well, they did repair it, replaced the cables causing the color problems and replaced the keyboard so I am a very happy camper! So I called the case manager up but had to leave a message on her number and thanked her very much for her help and intercession on my laptop and told her how happy I was that everything got repaired. Sometimes people need to be thanked, even for doing their job, even when they are not expecting it (It's especially important for people who usually only hear complaints all day long as part of their job!)

And I am feeling very good today - just one day on the new antibiotics and I am 90% better than I was yesterday and earlier! So I emailed doctor telling her of this and asking couldn't we have the second dose of chemo sometime this week. (I also read on a website that it is NOT good to skip chemo doses as it takes your body out of it's cyle. So nurses called me back and we have rescheduled chemo on Friday (Yeah! every minute those killer chemo meds are in me is another minute that cancer parasite is going to hit the dust.! I was just thinking about what I said on home page, that I never thought I would have enough to write a blog, and here I have been spouting off with all sorts of things. Ah, the creative freedom! LOL

December 13, 2006 --Well whoever I got the cold from, wasn't sick with the cold when our path's met or I would have stayed my distance. I have decided that I am wearing a mask whenever I go out, especially to the hospital to get Chemo. I am also going to buy those disinfective swipes and people can just start calling me Mrs. Monk! (I love that show, he's so cool) LOL After just two days on the new antibiotics, my cold is just about gone (so it couldn't have been a cold, right? I think I had been fighting bronchitis for almost two months but everyone ignored it because of the cancer. So I emailed doctor and asked couldn't I have chemo rescheduled this week (Imagine someone begging for chemo!) so I am now going to be slipped in on Friday. It's been 10 days now and no hair has fallen out - maybe after this next batch. My sister and niece sent me the cutest snow caps to wear. I was emptying my bathroom trash can and found a lot of the long strips of hair I cut off and put them together. I was thinking of running them through sewing machine sewing it to strip of fabric, and then using it to position a bang under my caps!

December 15, 2006 -- Well I have had another "God works in mysterious ways" again. I was supposed to get Chemo on Monday - but after waiting several hours doctor decided I was too sick to get it. So after start of new antibiotic I felt so much better I emailed Doc and said "can't we do it this week, after all?" (You don't hear too many people begging for chemo, I bet!) So today I got chemo again (another long day left at 8:30 and got home at 3p.m. ) When ever I get up early (like the first chemo time) I get so paranoid about being late that I just keep waking up every 20 minutes or so checking the clock to make sure I haven't overslept. So last night was no different, cept I slept 1 hour and then just plain got up. Anyhow, last night sis was telling me that my plan to go to other sister's house Christmas Day and then sleep over so I wouldn't have to drive home in holiday traffic (which would be about 3-4 hours for 65 miles) couldn't be done, because my next scheduled Chemo was 12/26 at 11 am! Oh My Gosh, that ruined all my plans - I just knew I would be too tired to fight that traffic to get home so I could get chemo - and I couldn't leave her house morning of 12/26 in rush hour traffic to get to chemo so I was practically in tears thinking I might have to skip Christmas at Sister's house. Well by begging for chemo for today, that ends up changing when I should return for next batch until Jan 5 - meaning I can now proceed with my plans at staying at my sister's overnight Christmas Day evening. Now if I had just left things the way the doctor wanted, I would have been screwed for Christmas!

The doctor was a little upset with me today - seems I have been taking anti-nausea pills wrongly. The nurse told me to take them "for at least 3 days after chemo" making me think it was voluntary to take them or not after the 3rd day so I just kept taking them as if they were regularly daily pills - even though they said "if needed for nausea. So I had brought my bottles in and asked if there were refills on the meds. She flipped because she said one bottle where only 9 pills were given cost $42 each pill, and Kaiser would blow a gasket if I refilled that too often. So I guess now I am to wait until I get sickish before I take them. (though I am eating yogurt for my tummy and sucking on salt in sunflower seeds always helps sick stomach - as well as flat coke or flat 7-up. The nurse was most surprised that my hair has not fallen out yet (day 12 from first chemo). I asked doctor if it was normal for cancer patients to have this "nesting syndrome" meaning I was so full of energy and wanting to clean house, re-arrange furniture, go through belongings and toss or set aside to give away (meaning clean up my act from a lazy 6 years). She didn't reply to that question, but instead said one of the anti-nausea pills causes people to be antsy! LOL

Oh yes, my youngest sister thought my "joke" about sewing my hair to a piece of ribbon, so I would have a "bang" of my own hair under a knitted cap was gross! I said to her - what do yu think they do with Hair for Locks (?) they make it into human hair wigs! I told her that's as close as I possibly could ever get to "gallows" humor. hahaha

I am happy I finally listed some beads, all of today's sold and I sorely can use the money! So I am a happy camper

December 16, 2006 -- What a day I had, another amazing experience day! This morning I woke up with a feeling that I needed to go to the fabric store and buy some fabric. Now keep in mind that I had not made any clothing in 11 years and have given away 38 U-haul boxes of fabric after moving into my apartment, about 5 years ago. I used to sew all the time and still have several (make that many) U-Haul boxes filled with patterns, zippers, trims, etc as well as clothing fabric "in case" I ever wanted to sew again. So I debated what has caused this feeling (cause I didn't look at or do anything to create this feeling). I didn't have this feeling when I watched the Runway program of designers on Bravo. Now the last time I remember having a feeling like this was 12 years ago when some intuition made me buy fancy brocades, velvets and sequined materials when they were on sale - something said to me you might be needing these. And at that time it was a crazy thing for me to do, since I didn't go anywhere where I might need such fancy dresses. Then 3 months later I joined a social club (when this fabric including velvets were no longer on sale) and the club met every Friday night at a dance place and we all danced together and got to know each other. So every week I would make a fancy dress for me to wear to these parties - each week a stunning new look! (I was thinner then!)

Well maybe something unconsciously made me think of sewing, in that my ratty old bathrobe (don't we all have one?) is at least 20 years old and with my bad habit of putting my elbows on the table, has worn a BIG hole in the left elbow (by big - I mean 2" x 3") and I had been pondering on how I could put a patch on it so my elbow would not be so drafty anymore (it's turned very cold here lately). Yes, that's right, I love that bathrobe because it is the only one I have ever had that goes all the way down to my ankles and keeps them warm (fleece ). Now I have 2 perfectly new bathrobes given to me as gifts in the past, one I am saving for when I need something special (like being on holiday with my sisters so I have something nice to wear- gosh I sound like my grandmother now!- but I LIVE in my bathrobes.) And the other one isn't warm enough and both only come to mid way between knee and ankles requiring me to have to have a lap rob to keep my legs and ankles warm. Have you tried lately to stand up and walk while your ankles and feet are twirled inside a crocheted afghan? I also had cleaned out a closet a couple of weeks ago and was going to give away a lot of clothes that I can't fit into anymore (till I remembered that if chemo causes me to lose weight then perhaps I could fit into them again). So I have this pile of clothing in the other bedroom with all the fancy dresses on top of the heap (cause I was thinking - gee, even if I can't wear them perhaps I could cut them up to make Barbie doll clothes again (yeah, which I haven't done since 1965) since I was thinking perhaps I could join the senior citizen's doll maker's club.

So I take measurements on my ratty bathrobe and go on down to the fabric store. Lo and behold, they are having a fantastic sale! One I didn't even know about till a customer told me. Most of the fabric is on sale 50% off, and all the $14 patterns are on sale for $2 each! (My God, $14 for ONE dress pattern! No wonder women don't sew anymore). I found this most beautiful boucle flouncy fleece that doesn't look like any fleece I have ever seen, and the colors were my favorite pinkish purple and turquoise. I still have an Evan Picone jacket made with both these colors combined in a lined sweater type jacket. So of course I have to have both fabrics and decided I will make two bathrobes. As I was walking to the cutting tables, my eyes happened to spot this gorgeous chiffony material with iridescent butterflies and so I stopped to look at it as my sister loves butterflies. I held it up to the air and marveled at the sheerness of the fabric which just made the butterflies sparkle in their rainbow of colors which included - you got it- pinkish purple and turquoise! I stopped thinking of my sister, and immediately saw it draped on the fabric below and said my gosh, it matches both colors, and perhaps I should make some cloche type hats and could use some of this material for a scarf around the hat band.

With visions of the wonderful things I could make with this (it's so sheer I will have to do Hermes finishing on the edges - hand rolled seam), I put it in my cart cause it was on sale too from $10 a yard to $4.99 a yard. Because of these visions and knowing the pattern boxes at home probably did not have the right size I thought I would look at the pattern books. Once I opened them and started looking at the normal prices of $14 for one pattern, I gasped out loud and said "they are $14 each!" that the lady next to me told me of the $2 sale. So I got a bathrobe pattern, a cloche type hat pattern and of course, some Barbie doll patterns. For my senior project in high school I had to hand sew an entire Barbie doll trousseau (because my mother would not let me use the expensive sewing machine she had) so this was the compromise the teacher and I arrived at. My younger sister was still into Barbie dolls then and was thrilled at my largesse. I got an A on the project and to this day my sister still has all those Barbie doll clothes!

So unlike many years before, when my greed (and pocketbook)knew no bounds and I bought fabric on speculation (not financial speculation - just plain old speculation as to when I would use it all!) I took my treasures to the cutting table. And while we were measuring out 6.5 yards of fabrics for the robes, and when we got to the butterflies a real thrill went through my body when my mind decided that one yard was just not enough - and maybe I could cut out butterflies and applique them to the Baltimore Album quilt blocks that I started and will finish (one day). I was talking to the ladies there who were exclaiming how well the butterfly materials went with the other fabric and I told them my plan to make scarf for chemo caps with it (and maybe a real scarf too). So daringly I said I would take 3 yards of it (after all it was on sale!) So at Joanne's fabrics they give you this interim receipt of fabric and the total cost. As I started to walk towards the register, I saw that the butterfly fabric was totaling at $30. I went back to the aisle with the fabric and sure enough it said $4.99 on the sign. It mentioned several different makers of fabrics that the sale applied to, but I couldn't read what was on the cardboard bolt- so I grabbed the material and walked back to the cutting table.

Then I asked to talk to someone (not the lady that did the cutting for me) about what I thought was a mistake and was told that the sale only applied to certain silky fabrics and this wasn't one of them. I made the remark then, not bitingly just as an aside, that perhaps they should pull the ones that the sale did not apply to since it certainly was deceptive to have a sale price right over the top of the fabrics and I would not have bought 3 yards of it if I had known it was $9.99 a yard. They offered to take the material back, but I said No, I already had my heart set on it and I would keep it.

So I went to stand in line for the cash register, when a few minutes later someone comes up to me and says the lady I was talking about decided to give me the fabric for 50% off. So she marked over the price on the receipt that cashier looks at in totaling things. I asked why she was doing such a nice thing to me (as I certainly was not looking to take advantage of my chemo cap talk). So I went over to the lady and thanked her and gave her a hug.

Wonderful things like this keep happening to me lately, and I shake my head and give thanks. Sometimes I wonder if God is trying to show me all the things I have missed out on during the last 6 years, as a way to make me change my life. Then again, sometimes I think perhaps he is giving me a “good send off”.

Today I lost my first small clump of hair. The comb hit a snarl and in slight yank to pull the comb through, out comes this clump. But I will say this, I opened the Bible again last night to exact place where for the 4th time, “laying on of hands” was mentioned. I didn’t even know so many different places existed in the New Testament that talked about this.

At this time I don’t know what God has in store for me, but I find myself now more eagerly awaiting it.

December 17, 2006 -- Another amazing thing happened today. I have been at odds for 6 years with the lady who is considered the caretaker of this building. I've had run ins with her adult children who live elsewhere, with her being two faced about things with the owner, and my biggest grievance is how she is always trying to catch me feeding the ally cats and she throws rocks (even if they are laying underneath my car) and hurts them if she sees them (and I think she hurt my cat too). Well at the Anointing of the sick, you say your confession and I confessed harboring ill will towards this lady (and a couple of others in this building) that really isn't hate, but certainly not warm thoughts. Well the priest had me say a rosary for each one - and that was that I thought. I had told her about my cancer and chemo (after all I figured she would know when she saw me with no hair eventually) and was surprised when she and her daughter offered to do anything to help me - drive to doctor or store, etc. Well today she comes to my door and brings me a bowl of just made delicious Mexican Abigondas soup! You could have knocked me over with a feather. Now I have given her things in the past, A stained glass panel I didn't want anymore, liquor I was getting rid of for her son, clothes and appliances to her daughter, etc. This is the first time she has ever given me anything, and she was so nice in giving it to me. (I have to get that recipe it was that good!) This definitely has to be God's hand doing this because it certainly wasn't mine!

December 18, 2006 -- A year ago My Uncle's book was supposed to be published, the one about the Rosary and Mary. Anyhow they finally got it published by the Claritian press in the Phillipines, but it is so costly to send mail here that they batch up books for one shipment. So My uncle has been waiting for his copies for some time. I checked their web page and saw it listed for sale, so I emailed them about it. After a couple of weeks, they emailed me back asking how many copies I wanted so they could figure out the cost and postage. So I emailed back to them and apologized for the delay because of tests and that for cancer. Today I received the 4 paperback books - found them at my door returning from hospital for more tests today. I ran the currency converter and it cost $33 to mail 4 paperback books airmail and took 12 days. No invoice or anything. So I called my uncle and told him I got them - and he's the author and he is still waiting to see his own book.! The last couple of days this chemo has finally started to affect me - been lacking that energy and vitality I was feeling, actually feeling poorly enough to lay down. Other side effects too. I see why they say don't eat spicy foods - I thought it was because it caused nausea, nope, it must be because of the way your tongue changes - because everything spicy tastes real hot. Sat I decided everytime I reached for a cigarette, I should put a small dot of cayenne pepper on my tongue - that's primarily how I found out about when that side effect started! Yeoooowwww!

December 19, 2006 -- Hi everyone - well the last two days has taken a toll on me - and getting tired quicker - even managing to fall asleep for 3 hour naps. My sister called and want me to go to Knotts Berry Farm with them tomorrow - and as much as I wanted to go last year and they didn't, I decided against going this year primarily because of the crowd and that I better conserve my energy for things I need to do around here. My lymphedema in my legs has been acting up badly since the chemo started - much more swelling and I decided too much walking would not be fun for me. Now if they had just wanted to go to lunch, I would have met them for that. The apartment owner was here yesterday so I told him, and he was so sorry he actually hugged me! That was a shock. Anyhow I gave him permission to come into my apartment if there was ever a buildup of papers in front of my door, to check on me but I told him I had phones all over the place in case of a fall. I shall be giving him and caretaker an up to date listing of relatives and phone numbers for emergency purposes. (I don't really believe anything will happen, but you never know - Just better to be prepared.) So I am doing things in little spurts and then resting, then some more, etc.

December 21, 2006 -- Well today starts the big day of hair loss - not that it's coming out in clumps.  Run a comb through it and the comb is full of hairs - coming out sort of like when you pet your cat, running your hand the length of her back, and all those loose hairs are left on your hand. (and clothing, furniture, you name it! lol)  I knew it was gonna happen, but nevertheless it is still a disappointment.  Good thing my sister and niece sent me some caps last week, so I am ready.  At least a little at a time is better than just waking up bald with all the hair on my pillow - gives you time to adjust to it.  Still am tired, took another 2.5 hour nap today.  I went to have blood drawn for coumidin clinic and pick up some meds at the pharmacy.  My God, one prescription of 20 pills costs $751 !!!!!  That's more expensive than GOLD! because those pills didn't even weigh an ounce.   There is something inherently obscene with a drug company making that kind of money from pills.  So they had R&D costs - I can't believe it cost that much for pills to run this expensive.  No wonder people in poor countries cannot afford the AIDS medications -- and everyone else who has no health insurance.  Belonging to an HMO I only had to pay $25 for them.  Tonight was the big Ebay Book Board Christmas Party - a virtual party we have held almost 8 years now.  We all get a buddy's name and buy them presents and send them across the country and then all meet online at a certain time and open our presents and just enjoy one another's company.  I got some lovely things, a crocheted afghan which matches my living room colors, some CD's of 50's and 60's Doo Wop songs, candy and a leather journal, all from a lovely lady living in CT.  Unfortunately my gift to my buddy in Maine was delayed - I couldn't mail it last week cause she was in the hospital, and I dare not go to PO on Monday, so I didn't get it mailed till Tuesday.  So I emailed her and explained the delay and she was OK with that.  Some people don't ever tell their buddy who they are, leaves them guessing and guessing, etc. hehehe

December 24, 2006 -- Hello Everyone! Well it looks like I will be getting my Christmas Wish after all - I will still have hair for Christmas! It started coming out earlier this week, and I kept worrying it would all be gone by Christmas. This is more a thinning type of hair loss - so I still have enough to look nice tomorrow but by next week it will be gone for sure. My sister mailed me two caps but they seem to be all the same size which is just not quite big enough - so I will have to knit some myself. I went to Christmas mass tonight with a pollen mask over my nose and mouth, and while I got some funny looks at least I was protecting myself from germs. Taking the host and being offered wine, I asked if I could just dip the host in wine and that was allowed. Ugh - the thought of drinking from wine glass even if wiped with napkin made me shudder. It's not worth being sick and maybe ending up hospitalized just for sociability. Tomorrow I drive up to my sister's house for dinner and being with family. I may not spend the night . Otherwise things have been going well here - sometimes I get a little tired but this is normal for this time frame after chemo. From here my energy should be going up (meaning my white blood cells). No more startling or amazing things happening to me, probably because I have kept pretty much to myself this last week conserving my energy.  I have everything set for tomorrow and plan on having a great time!  All of you have a wonderful and joyous day tomorrow with friends and family!

December 28, 2006 --Somehow in the last week my happy, happy feelings have disappeared. I have been getting more and more tired, and taking naps of 2-3 hours. Unfortunately my Christmas plans did not work out, I did not stay over night because my sister's MIL was also going to stay and she just drives me nuts. She ordered my sister around so much, in my sister's own house and kitchen(we just have to get these dishes all done before we sit down because it drives her nuts) , that my sister couldn't even get a chance to sit down and just talk with me. So we didn't have a nice talk after all by the time I had to leave to try and avoid most of the traffic going back to my place. Then I find out the MIL is taking her entire family (including my sister, niece and BIL) to New Orleans next June whereas my twin sister is canceling her June vacation in order to be on hand if I need help then. Today I am down emotionally. I started with a few tears last night as my hair is leaving my body by leaps and bounds and after a shower I looked like I have lost 2/3rds of it already. I really had like my long hair! Today I looked at myself in the mirror and said to myself "when did you get that drawn gray look to your face, like you saw on other chemo patients when you first started?". I looked just plain tired, sad, even after sleeping all night waking up to wisps of my hair in my face, mouth, whatever from it being on the pillow case. Yesterday I called and got the figures on what my life insurance amount is which will leave my sisters pretty well off. Had to give list of NOK to landlord and caretaker today in case I am found too sick in my apartment. (doing things which are not conducive to lifting one's spirits but necessary) I got a jury duty summons which I had to take to doctor's office yesterday, and then go back to doctor's office today to pick it up - diagnosis on it was lung cancer or death, prognosis - poor. I finally researched estrogen and lung cancer as doctor had first mentioned to me to try and not take it - and I see if has direct correlation to lung cancer, believed to help fuel lung tumors just like breast tumors. So I stopped taking it and perhaps this is causing emotional shifts - I know my body and my bones just ache when I forget to take it for several days - so how am I going to get along without it all together? Right now I am practically in tears, for the very first time since all this was known. Sure hope it is hormonal and that I will get over it! Going to the doctor's office has worn me out, 1.5 hour driving round trip and lots of walking - feel like I am ready to lay down again. And I am supposed to be on my upward swing of the cycle since I have chemo again in 7 days. Oh, I don't like feeling this way!!!!!!!!

December 29, 2006 --I am somewhat over it now. Last night I was thinking about my long hair, how I loved the feel of it while washing it and putting conditioner on it and having my hair fall straight and silky down my shoulders. Then I got thinking about St. Paul's admonition about women should cover their hair, which led into thinking about Nun's who in the old days had to have their head shaved when taking their vows - that hair was a woman's shining glory. So now my short hair is slicked back, like an Italian mafioso from the 20's! LOL I can say one thing definitely - I do not look good as a man (hair style wise). And yes, I did make some beads last night and they turned out lovely - will make some more tonight to finish the set. Felt good to make something I liked!

I just received the most gorgeous bouquet of flowers today from some good friends in Utah. The prettiest things I have ever seen with absolutely clear yellow and clear reds (no blue in them) - those primary colors with red carnations and purple zinnias and stock flowers are just so awesome together.  Today I had to go to a different doctor's office for drawn blood for the coumidin clinic (blood clots).  My ankles are so swollen I just can't get down to the post office and stand in line to mail some beads, will have to do it next Wednesday since the post office is closed Monday for the first and Tuesday for national mourning for President Ford.

January 2, 2007 -- Well for those of you old enough to remember, I became a "conehead" today - having the remaining 1/8th of my hair shaved off. It feels funny, like as if my scalp is sweating. (and I am not wearing a cap at home). I am not one of those lucky enough to look good bald. Now the dread is gone, maybe I will look into getting a wig and maybe not. The hair stylist was so nice, exclaiming how I can try all these new fancy hair colors in wigs now!

Don't know if I told you I got hit with summons for jury duty. Had to go to the doctor's office twice last week to have medical excuse part of the form completed. The diagnosis put down was - lung cancer and death. Prognosis - poor. That set me back a bit - thinking about it. Then my twin asks me "how do you feel about that." And it really bugs me that she asks me that same question on significant things that are happening - like I don't know what she is trying to get me to say or am I supposed to start weeping and wailing?? Anyhow, I responded to her - "at first it upset me making me sad, but then I realized that whatever the doctor says does not take into account what God wants for me." And I am operating on the belief that God wants me to survive this and that I will. It's just deep inside me that I feel God has decided this for me. Is it denial, I don't think so. But I am doing the things I need to do in case I don't make it - primarily for the comfort of my sisters.

Actually I am doing real well considering that the chemo being given me is supposed to the the strongest that they have, since it metasised. I haven't even had to use the nausea pills, and I am ravenous and eating a lot (actually gained 4 pounds - when I am already 50 pounds overweight!). Only on the days I go to the doctor, since I have to do a lot of walking, am I tired enough that I will lay down and take a nap. The blessing I have is that I am retired and do not have to look after a family, do not have to try and work having a pension coming in, and don't have to push myself to exertion. So these are blessing to me that are helping make things easier for me, and for which I am grateful.

January 3, 2007 - last night someone said of me on a chat board, that I was courageous.  I really don't feel I am courageous or doing anything unusual.  My reply was "I am not really courageous folks. I just don't have any fear and strong faith that I will get through this. When I think of courage, I think of Jesus who knew every minutest detail of what was going to happen to him, and still he went and did it and let it happen. Sort of like soldiers in war, they know exactly all the horrible things that can happen to them (having seen it happen to their fellow soldiers) and yet they do their duty - that is truly courageous behavior. So while I have the internet and have researched a few things (found out tonight my ravenous hunger is caused most likely by the restriction of the estrogen) and found out things like the tumor in the middle of the chest under the heart that if it grows will cut off blood supply to heart by pressing on the aorta - I just simply refuse to think about it, who knows if that will happen and then I will have wasted what time I have being so fearful of things that didn't happen. I already did that once in being afraid of the bronchospy and I refuse to be that way again. That's all there is to it, nothing really courageous!"  And so last night, as I picked up the Bible - what should my eyes fall to but this exact text  "I should like you to be free of all worries".  At some time in the past I had yellow-lined those words, reading them in a different context then, so my eyes were naturally drawn to that sentence last night.  The rest of the paragraph does not apply to me and now, but it is just eerie that these things keep happening to me.  

The Priest at the anointing had said to me, "It sounds like you already have a special relationship with God", when I related to him several happenings in my life.  I think I am now meant to be a witness to you all that read this blog of what I experienced over 10 years ago, of whom I have only told 3 priests and several friends and my sisters.  I have only told people this when I thought they needed some special comfort (including my oncologist who herself has passed through some tough physical times and was still undergoing therapy for injuries).  So check out my Scripture page in several days and I will tell you of the Blessed Consolation I received from the Lord.  I will tell you of it, even though some of you might think I am a crackpot!

Tonight I had a delightful dinner with my friend Susan, whom I taught to be a bead maker.  We always have good fellowship and enjoy each other's company.  She is the lovely lady who invited me to Thanksgiving at her daughter's house. She is the first person I have shown my head to, having worn a cap my sister gave me to the restaurant.  She thinks I have a nice looking bald head! LOL   But I told her that having had my hair shaved off left a stubble of about 1/8th inch, and that it is painful to sleep on that stubble!  Have you ever pressed velvet material, how you are supposed to have like a wide flat comb of many tiny needles to keep the material fluffed, well that's what it felt like sleeping on my "bald" head.  Every time I moved last night, I was awakened by the "pain" (at least 50 times) and now I know why my cat almost bites me if I ruff her fur backwards - because it is painful!  If I had known this I would not have had it done.  Hopefully all that stubble will fall out too, but just think of what it means to have it grow back after chemo!

January 5, 2007 --I went for chemo today - good news is that what ever I have experienced so far is how well it will go through all the rest of the treatments. So you do not get worse with the continuing treatments. Bad news - Bone scan indicates possible spread of cancer to 5 vertabrae in spine and spot in sternum, which changes me to stage 4. Lung cancer just loves bone, I was told today. Good news is the chemo I am on now, is the same set they use for bone cancer. She kept asking me if I had any pain in back and I kept saying no. Good news is that the PET scan indicated possible cancer site in brain by sinuses, which has now been ruled out by this bone scan. Also said nothing wrong with adrenal glands and bladder. Next step is a MRI to see if it can rule out some of these suspicious spots on the vertabrae. I will admit to a few tears while doing chemo, till I remembered Pet scan and how that ended up being false positive. So I am still hanging in there hoping for the best.  I remembered thinking to myself "Well God, it looks like you will have to work a little harder" and then I thought, dummy, God doesn't have to work hard at all with just a thought he could cure  me of this if that is his will. So while this has not shaken my faith in God, it perhaps has shaken my faith in myself thinking that I know the outcome of this all.  Looking for hope does funny things to one. 

On another board someone posted about having to hear of other peoples illness and I replied:  I can understand about not wanting to hear about other's illnesses - I am being bombarded on other boards through emails about other peoples experiences with C and I just really don't want to hear about it, neither the good nor the bad. I have these horse blinders on that look only straight ahead for just me. And maybe that is selfish, but I need to conserve all emotional and physical energy just for myself at this time. I spent 30 years in a job where every single day I heard about troubles and problems and illnesses of others (Social Security death claims, retirement claims when unwanted retirement, disability claims) and it finally burned me out - I couldn't take anymore hearing about things that I could not help anyone with. Now if I can help someone with a Social Security problem, I do so and have helped people regain a lot of money because certain sections of the law were not applied correctly to their case. That friend I have in MN, I helped reduce her SSA over payment from $134,000 to $54,000 and still have it under appeal to reduce it even further to $24.000. This is not by pulling the wool over someone's eyes - it is in demanding and forcing the agency to apply the laws that were meant to help beneficiaries that the employees of SSA were too lazy to look up or apply rightly. (I was somewhat of a technician). Even now I am getting emails from complete strangers wanting to come out here and "take care of me" even when my blog shows that I don't need it now. It's disconcerting to me to even have to answer these emails of well meaning people - sometimes I just can't find the right words. I just try to be gracious and reply that I thank them but at present I am doing well. I just don't know what else to say. Actually sometimes I find the outpouring astonishing and bewildering as I am the one that usually helped others in their times of need (but that was when they asked me). I certainly don't intend to report icky things - other than perhaps remarking that I will be missing from the board several days so people don't start a flurry of emails to me.

January 10, 2007 -- Today I realized how callous my last remarks sounded, and that truly was not my intention.  When I wrote that I was thinking of my building caretaker who was extolling the history of three of her brothers who had bowel cancer, when finally I had to say to her that I couldn't hear any more about it and I had to go.  It's unique that in illness people seem to feel that they are comforting in telling you how bad someone else has had something!  But also hearing of good stories of lung cancer survival makes me feel like I am teetering on a seesaw because I don't know if the same will apply to me.  Thinking about it, I realized about Job, that God let him get just about to the point of death before saving his life.   I also realized that I haven't written for a while.

I had Chemo again last Friday, and unlike what she said, I have been having some trouble with nausea.  So I have been popping the nausea pills and still have that slight nausea that doesn't really go away.  Having never been pregnant, I would assume it's like morning sickness that lasts all day?  Today I had a violent episode of nausea but was able to control myself to where I could take those Big Buck pills which immediately helped.  

Well in the last week I was scammed by a fraudulent Ebay seller.  A perfectly legitimate Ebay seller some how compromised their Ebay identity and password and a thief got hold of it and started a lot of auctions.  Well people have been saying to me to do things that make me happy and uplifted and I decided to checkout prices of the TV series Farscape DVD's which I have wanted for a long time, but could not afford.  The SCIFI channel had an 80 hour marathon of the shows a few years ago, and I taped them but they all have commercials and some "burps" in the digital recordings.  So I did everything you are supposed to do, I checked out the auction, I checked out the feedback which was good.  The auctions did not say where they were being shipped from.  Upon hindsight, if I had checked the only two auctions of different items in the last 30 days, I would have seen that the original Ebay seller lived in NJ.  Anyhow they had a Buy It Now price, so I clicked it and went to Paypal to pay for them.  Now I had thought I had clicked use my credit card (I always do that in case I need to charge back) but evidently I did not and instead the money was debited from my checking account.  The day afterwards Ebay sends me a notice that the account had been highjacked and they had canceled the auction (thereby deleting the auction page so you can't see it any more).  So I immediately go to Paypal and initiate a dispute and escalate the dispute immediately into a "claim".  The thief used Paypal's own internal system setup to send me a email telling me that the item had already been shipped giving me a phony Postal Service shipping number - which lulls the person into thinking everything is legitimate. (Even Paypal thought it was legitimate too!)  I had been watching my credit card history online and still didn't see any charges, when I realized it was direct debit from my checking account.  I called the bank, and yes, the money had been debited!  What's particularly frustrating about this robbery, is that there is no name, no address, anything which you can use to make a complaint to the FBI or local police with this kind of robbery.  Well the upshot of this all, is that I got my Money Back!  Evidently I was quick enough in initiating a "claim" that the money could not be transferred out by the thief, and since they never responded to Paypal, Paypal reversed the money back to me!  So I feel particularly blessed by getting my money back and decided perhaps I should just make do with the VHS tapes I made from the TV.

Well today is Wednesday and I still have not heard about the MRI, so I called that department.  Evidently protocol is to have radiologist review a doctor's request for appropriateness (meaning have less expensive tests been done first with diagnosis confirmed) and I told the girl everything has already been confirmed with other tests (CT scan, Pet Scan, etc) so she will expedite MRI review for today.  I just want to get the show on the road and do what needs to be done.  If bone cancer is confirmed then a new medication needs to be started as soon as possible.

January 13, 2007 - Well the earliest my local Kaiser hospital could do the MRI test is not until 2/16/07!!!! She said other hospitals were not as congested, so I called around and found another one fairly close by and got a MRI scheduled for Jan 18.  Then I see the doctor again on 1/25 so we find out for sure about the spinal cancer.  It makes sense though, where the test says it's at, because the second tumor is between the heart and spine and I would guess that the tumor top and bottom are touching the spine.  Below is a picture of all the sites mentioned to me so far.  Because I had chemo again yesterday, they give you a IV drip of some anti-nausea medication which really made me feel chipper yesterday, but then the nausea is back today.  While it is discomforting, it's not as bad as when I had acid reflux which involved a lot of pain and almost instantaneous upchuck of acid if I moved the wrong way.  

Yesterday while in waiting room for chemo, the social worker came in with someone else she had helped and on her way out I stopped her to ask her some questions.  I had started noticing some real imbalance  (stumbling) when I got up out of my bed and when I arose from lower couch, and ask about procedure to get a 4 prong cane.  I've been looking all over for my Dad's old cane (solitary wooden cane) and can't find it anywhere.  I then started to give her a suggestion, that Kaiser doctor should have explained more fully how insignificant the aspects of the bronchospy was, when I broke into tears and cried like I haven't done before this. She suggested I make appointment to see the doctor and tell him of my feelings and then just move on from it.  Right, like I should wait a month and pay money just to tell him something he should already know ?   It's just the thought that if we had those lost 8 months to work with now, I wouldn't have this cancer on my spine.  I also did some research on spine cancer, which is generally from a progression of other tumors in other sites. The doctor had mentioned that besides taking another pill, that radiation treatments would probably be done on the bone sites as well.  What really got me down was the figures 5-10% survive 12 months!  I've started praying for God to let me know one way or the other which way it's gonna be for me.  I mean I really hate the idea of saying and projecting that God is going to let me survive this, and then end up being dead after all and really crushing all of you hoping and praying for me.  That's the problem with being so open about this - I don't want my demise to be a real negative effect on you all if that is God's will.

So while I was still feeling down today I posted on Wet Canvas my feelings.  And then I got the sweetest post from a complete stranger saying the nicest things to me. "I have spent the past month going back and looking at postings from many years ago to learn more. I have been totally blown away by your posts over the years. You have been so helpful to so many people, so willing and ready to give tips when others would not. You, more than anyone else, jumped in to coach and encourage. In viewing all of the many entries, I have learned so very much. You have and continue to leave a huge positive mark on this community and especially on myself."  It really helps having such positive feedback from people.  The "support" I got from kaiser was just to tell me to call a support group at a more local hospital here! I thought the heck with that, I get more support from my cyber friends! 

January 16, 2007 -- For the third time in a month I am having to turn down an outing with family or friends because I cannot walk far. In addition to the cancer, I have lymphedema of the ankles and legs which cause swelling, COPD with shortness of breath upon exertion and just fatigue (whether from the cancer drugs or from just plain inaction which causes you to be tired out because of no exercise.) When I had talked to the social worker about a cane, I have decided to ask the doctor next week for other items that will improve my quality of life - such as a wheelchair and a bathing seat (since I worry about falling over in the shower while trying to wash my feet). Now while I don't really need a wheelchair as far as a physical inability to walk, a wheelchair would allow me the opportunity to go out with people to places or events that require a lot of walking. I have never been ashamed to use some device that would make things easier for me. My mom who had Parkinson's disease made her life so restricted because she just would not go out in her wheelchair, because "people would look at her" (her shaking). There was so much I could have done for her as her caretaker to give her pleasure by getting out of the house that she absolutely refused because of this fear (or vanity?) Anyhow, even in just getting exercise it would help me, because I could walk behind it pushing it as I walked, and then have a place to sit down when I got tired. Already walking from the parking lot at the hospital to the doctor's office, I have to stop twice to rest before I go on, and there is no where to sit so resting is done standing up and catching my breath. People often stop to ask me if I am OK during this progression. There is nothing wrong with my arms and I can use them to propel me in the chair and if that became too tiring, then asking someone to push me. HMO rents these things and gives them to you as long as you need them. So I know my sisters will be shocked (I asked my sister that when the rest of the family went to Disneyland to see my niece at the restaurant where she works, whether Disneyland offered wheelchairs for people - I never got an answer).  (Disney DOES have wheelchairs to rent!) So I would not need a wheelchair in my apartment, I think I will keep it stored in the trunk of my car for when I have to go out and walk some distance.

Some people would "fight" having to have a wheelchair as evidence of deterioration, where as I feel it would be a blessing both to strengthen me when I can walk, and help me when I am fatigued. Would you allow someone to help you when they offer you their arm to lean on? If so, why not use the devices that God has made available to us by the creation of inventions from someone's mind? I feel this same way about medical treatments, having just read that in the UK they have come up with a new drug that does actually eat cancers (especially lung cancer) because cancer cells give off a certain chemical that this drug is attracted to and it attacks those cancer cells. God's miracles are all around us, sometimes they might be able to help us and others may not reach us in time but be available for others down the line. Just like the cervical cancer shot, what a miracle that is!  

a Sweet person on a chat board emailed me to tell me that the American Cancer Society often has these devices which they give you free!  So I hope this information can help others.

January 19, 2007 -- Hello Everyone!  Yesterday I went down for the MRI which actually turned out to be two MRI's, one with and one without dye.  I don't hold any hope that it will discount all SIX spots as having no cancer, just seems to be too many of them for the bone scan to have mistaken that many.  So I hope that in cutting a month off in having gotten the test done just means we can start the medication and the radiation that will be needed.  Actually, the only "control" I have over this entire situation is in getting the medical treatment since my body is betraying me and running away with itself.  

The nausea is pretty much gone, but I am left with some pain in my stomach as if my ulcer has come back.  I take pills for excessive gastric acids and now am having to take prilosec as well.  Will have to discuss this with doc next week.  One thing I forgot to mention is that in stopping taking the estrogen and pregesterone I have not had any hot flashes or bone aching.  Since taking the chemo I have been feeling cold, much colder than usual because all my life I have been hot.  For at least 20 years I have slept with an air conditioner on every night (but also because I liked bundling up with quilt even in the midst of the summer! LOL).  So that's a positive, no air conditioner running means lower electric bills!

Today I went to the American Cancer Society and spoke to a lovely woman there.  I got a free wig there today, much different from what I normally wear and a lighter brown color.  My sister is visiting tomorrow so I am going to see if she can take pic of me wearing it.  The lady also queried me if I would be interested in taking part of Trials on Chemo treatment and I said I would only do that if I was NOT a placebo person, otherwise no.  Since those trials don't give you an option, I would only consider it if all options for treatment had been closed off and I was told to go home and die.  It was somewhat depressing in that the literature she gave me shows only 2 percent of people live over 5 years.  Sorry I read that stuff.  I have been reading the bible but no new startling revelations - was reading Jesus parable about praying long and hard about the woman who kept on complaining to the judge for some justice on her case, who decided to rule in her favor just to get her off his back.  Had to really laugh at that one but at the same time really wondered if he truly meant it that only those praying so fervently would be answered when I always thought that the Holy Spirit who knows all things in your heart would not need all the wailing and gnashing of teeth to know you really meant it!

January 21, 2007 - Well yesterday I just had a fabulous day!  My sister and Brother in Law came down to visit me.  When my sister saw my cone head she just about burst into tears.  The bald head sort of gives it away that you are a cancer patient and on chemo - which to me is sort of a stigma as I have said before, there is more to me than being a cancer patient!  Anyhow I then went and put on my new wig and she just loved it!  We just had such a wonderful talk about lots of things, and then went to lunch at our favorite Red Lobster and met up with my niece.  So much fun and such wonderful company, she can't have any idea how much I treasured yesterday!  She said it's hard to realize that I am sick, because I don't look it.  You can't really see my swollen ankles and leg.  My color is good and I just look healthy (plump).  I told her that is what was so surreal about all of this, I know I am terribly sick yet I really am not in any pain or really having terrible problems except for some nausea.  People say I am handling this with "grace" but I say let's wait and see how much "Grace" I have if this gets really painful and worse.  (Oh yes, we both just happened to wear purple yesterday!)

I told my sister about something that had happened this last week that I haven't written about, and some times my sister can be snooty and yet she wasn't and hit the nail on the head when she said I had received a Gift of Love!  A lady who had read on a chat board about how tight money was for me, because I had not been selling beads for a long time, sent me a gift of cash "just Because".  I was so stunned by this generosity from a complete unknown stranger.  In December I had to spend over $300 on medicines and co-pays for doctor and test visits, so I did not even buy any Christmas presents for my family this year.  After Christmas the downstair family of 2 adults and 6 children (in 1 bedroom apartment) sent their better english speaking daughter up to me and asked if they could borrow $100 from me, and I said No because I thought I didn't have that much on hand.  Now a year ago when the sewer backed up in the building and sent sewage into their bathroom and hallway, the owner wouldn't really do anything about their plight and since it happened on a Sunday he would not pay triple time for plumber to come out.  I gave money to the caretaker's daughter to take them all to a motel for the night to get out of that pest hole.  Now I know these are proud people and would not have asked unless the need was great.  So I figured out exactly how much money I had which was $140 so I went to the bank and drew out and gave them $120 which they intended to repay.  Then the entire family went away for some time.  When they came back they repaid me and I found out that their sister was dying in Mexico  (she did) and they had to make an emergency trip down there.  That's how low I was getting on cash at the end of the month, but figured I didn't need anything till the next pension check came.  (which I didn't) So this amazing gift comes to me out of the blue from this totally unknown lovely lady who just wanted to help me!  Such an angel, and so now I have it stashed away for emergencies.  (my sister gets so mad a me when I do things like this because she thinks people are taking advantage of me - sometimes they pay me back and sometimes they don't - she thinks I need to build more reserves for myself rather than helping other people)

January 25, 2007 - Well some excellent good news for today!  I had really been feeling pessimistic about the MRI results, thinking that there was no way so many suspicious spots could be discounted.  Well the MRI has ruled out cancer on ALL the spots!  (although it does warn that sometimes bone scans can show the earliest start of cancer).  But the doctor felt confident of saying I had no cancer in the spine.  What the MRI showed, especially in those areas the bone scan had mentioned) was that I have bulging discs and a lot of arthritis in my spine, with two discs fused together in lower lumbar area.  Doctor was amazed that I do not have back pain from all that.  During my life I have always been klutzy, I can remember at least 7 times I have fallen on my back from being bucked off a horse and landing in inverted vee on my spine, to slipping at top of basement stairs and sliding down stairway on my back (bumpty bump bump) to slipping on ice and falling on my back, then there was playing pogo stick as child and falling with my lower back ending up on top of the pogo stick foot area, or like when I was hanging upside down from the swingset and my sister tickled my feet to much I peed my pants and landed on my back, and so forth! LOL) So these results take me out of stage 4 back to stage 3a.  The doctor wrote out the prescription for all the medical equipment I wanted, after questioning "who would be pushing me in a wheelchair?" (cause I guess she remembered from December when I said I had no one to help me through this.) So I told her first I would be pushing it and when I got too tired I would have a place to sit and that I had to turn down invitations because I could not walk that far.  She also filled out a handicap sticker form which I immediately took down to Auto Club and got the placard today.  I couldn't take chemo today as she said my platelets were too low, and I told her I just had chemo on 1/12 and she said no wonder, you are in middle of your cycle and rescheduled me to come ack 2/8.  

Funniest thing on the way to doctor's appointment this morning.  I have prayed off and on for a "sign" from God as to how this was going to go with me, especially since the cancer in my spine was indicated.  I wasn't thinking actively about anything, just to get there in time with the traffic.  A white SUV cut in front of me a few blocks from the hospital and their back window was black - and in the window was the words No Fear in white in lower right corner.  Now googling those words I see it can be a clothing item manufacturer or a gaming thing - but why today and those words?   

January 29, 2007 -  Nothing much new happening here.  I have been real lazy the last several days - I just don't seem to get much done even though I have all day to do things - which I don't do.  I was thinking last night about "Signs" - why we wish for signs in our life as to the direction we are taking and whether wanting them is a sign of lack of faith.  "Signs" seem an integral part of the Bible to me, in portending the future.  While people are prohibited from using soothsayers and mediums in trying to portend the future, the Bible points out signs that people are to look for to know that a certain prophecy is to become true at that point.  We have not had any prophets in the last 2,000 years.  All the prophets are in the Old Testament and generally dealt with the  Israeli people and nation.  In the New Testament, we have John the Baptist, Jesus and John's revelations.  And none since then.  The letters of Paul talk about people having the gift of prophecy but none are recorded which leads me to believe what they had to say was not very significant!  We have had a whole lot of saints though in the last 2,000 years, some of them relating what God has said to them.  The big difference seems to be that in the saints, God did not tell them to take his message out to the people as an addendum to the Bible.  What he told them was private, but made public only in the Church's order for the people to write about their experiences to use in validating them as a saint.  So God has given signs and messages in private to select people.  Even though Paul decries people "wanting signs" saying the only signs to watch for are those of the second coming, that cannot stop the human desire to know we are "on the right track" with how we are leading our life and the direction in which we are going. In my own journey I don't think it wrong in wanting a sign from God on how this is going to turn out.  It's kind of hard to be uplifting to others at the miracles of God and how he is going to preserve my life, and yet turn around and try to temper that with if I should die it's God's will and plan for purposes that I know nothing about.  The real problem in asking for signs, is that you don't know if what you get is really a sign or coincidence, yet how many coincidences does it take to make it a sign.  In relying on "signs" can we take the wrong path?  Perhaps this is what is wrong in asking for a sign, that we get bound up in potentially misleading things rather than praying and directing our mind onto God. So perhaps this is what Jesus meant when talking about the widow and the judge - that we should pray fervently and often keeping our mind on God.

Bad news on the beadmaking front today, another beadmaker has cancer (of tongue and mouth).  So please keep in your prayers Rachel and Beth.

February 1, 2007 -- Well I got my wheelchair today, and I got it from the American Cancer Society.  My HMO plan called for a monthly co-pay since they rent them from a company.  So I called the ACS back and within two days I have a nice wheelchair that's not too heavy for me to lift.  So keep this in mind if you have a relative who just plain gets tuckered out from fatigue (keep in mind that I had a personal interview with them for the wig, so perhaps that's why it went so fast for me).

 For some time people have been saying that my attitude is marvelous, and I couldn't figure out why they said that.  Then yesterday I read a blog of another person who has cancer and I can see how it is to be really depressed and really have a blackness of spirit.  This woman had a tumor in her breast, did not have a mastectomy but went with lumpectomy and is now undergoing chemo.  She has been told that her DNA has mutation which means cancer will probably come back and doctors want to cut off both breasts and do hysterectomy. (They (the internet) says smoking changes the DNA in your lung cells so I have DNA mutations as well!)  She is also having a bad time with the chemo treatments and considers it poison dripping into her body.  It made me very depressed to read her blog, I did not like her descriptions of people in cancer support group nor descriptions of chemo patients.  I would think this woman is younger than me, she has husband and family to help support her through this and yet she acts as if her world has ended.  I had emailed her and told her to be happy that they could cut her cancer out and just throw it away!  Even if I go into remission, my cancer will always be there waiting to come back again.  Breast cancer is the most survivable of all cancers now, whereas my life expectancy is not so good.  I don't find the people doing chemo with me are depressing, most of us are just bored waiting for the chemo drip to end.  I don't consider chemo poison, I consider it like little crime fighters getting ready to round up and destroy those cancer cells. Without chemo, I wouldn't have any chance at all since my cancer in inoperable! (Besides, I already take poison since Coumidin is rat poison that I need for blood clots!)  She found hearing stories of other cancer patients too much to bear - which is why I already knew that I would not want to join such a group and depress myself with other peoples experiences.  I guess she hasn't come into reality where you know you are looking to the future and glad that these medications and surgeries can save your life - I guess I am experiencing gladness and hope while she is experiencing blackness and loss so I shall certainly pray for her mental health to come into balance.  And I really don't want to make a statement about someone's ability to find comfort in the Bible as I have found, so I will just pray that she turns to it.

February 8, 2007 -- Well today was an unusual one, to say the least.  I went in for my third round of chemo today and somehow I managed to get the doctor so upset that she actually shouted and screamed at me telling me I was "difficult".  It started off fine, with her seeing my wheelchair which was a big help to me today.  A fellow here at my apartment building carried it down the stairs for me and I stored it in my backseat as it wouldn't fit in the trunk.  I got it out at parking ramp, and used it as a walker pushing it ahead of me, and then when I had to get in a line at blood desk and patient check in, I just opened it up and sat on it.  Never realized how heavy my purse was till I didn't have to carry it but could wheel it around.  So I told doctor about getting it free from the American Cancer Society, which she didn't know about and suggested she tell her patients who might not be able to afford a copay with Kaiser.  Well it started off with me telling her of 2 weeks of nausea after start of last chemo round, and that it was mild and controlled by the most part by Prevacid.  She found that strange and questioned whether I was using the anti-nausea pills she had given me and I said yes I had used some of those too but that I found if I eat something that helps the nausea  (reminding her that I have excessive gastritis) - and she said most patients just couldn't eat anything when they are nauseated.  Oh well, I am different.  Then I told her of a few times I have had trouble swallowing liquid, it feels like I have swallowed a large vitamin that is slowly going down my gullet giving me some pain.  This is when things started going wrong.  She looked at my records on the computer and said we should do CT scan and barium test and perhaps endoscopy to see if tumor is pushing on the esophagus, but that Kaiser did not like to do radiation treatment on tumors for people with cancer in the bones --- at this point I interrupted her and said I don't have cancer in the bones or so you told me last time I was here.  So she had to look some more on the computer and saw she had not updated her notes to herself from the MRI results and started talking about endoscopy where they push a needle through my esophagus into the lymph gland and do radiation through that.  I guess I interrupted her again, and said - but you said they couldn't do radiation on the lymph gland because it was between my heart and spine. At this point I am confused as to what she means and where she means - do I not have tumors but just two engulfed lymph glands?   At this point she lost it.  We are communicating on two different levels and my being difficult is that I ask questions and do not let her go through her little spiel.  She just about had me in tears.  In setting the next appointment, she asked if I would go through nurse and I said OK, but she said you are so difficult always wanting something that the nurses do not want to take responsibility for, like last time wanting the prescriptions for equipment and this time problems with swallowing.  As she was inputting into the computer I said to her softly - since I have never been through something like this before I don't know what is normal or not and whether to brings things up or not. And I said that if I had seen nurse only I would not have brought it up.   And she said yes to bring it up which is why a doctor is needed to manage care.  So she ordered tests and I already found a message on my recorder when I got home to se up appointment for barium test.  I am making allowances for her today - she was late in appointments by over an hour and could have come from a really bad patient and I noticed that she had one shoe untied (she had bad fall that shattered a leg and foot - so I think she was in pain herself).  I think she felt badly about it later in that while I was having the chemo drip she brought by nurse and asked me if I had the chemo talk with the nurse yet - which I had in December.  Anyhow the rest of the day went fine but it was another long one from 9:30 till 6 when I got home.  I am glad we are going to do another CT scan now, as it will show if the tumor/lymph gland? has gotten larger or smaller as I asked if it was possible I was just gulping air as I drank which could cause that effect which she said it could.

Earlier this weeks I was full of energy on Monday and Tuesday and was able to get many loads of laundry done (up and down those stairs) and clean my craft room and do other things that had been put off too long.  I only seem to get 1-2 days a months when I have this energy and need to do as much as I can.  Other days in the month, it's all I can do to make my own meal and stand doing dishes or talking my garbage downstairs.  Good thing I live alone and can let things go when I want to.

February 16, 2007 - Well I passed my half way point yesterday - 6 of 12 chemo sessions done! I guess I was a "difficult" patient yesterday in that my blood counts were low ( for the first time), so the nurse had to go to the doctor for the OK to give me chemo. But I didn't have to see the doctor, who OK'd the session for me. Next week is the CT scan and Upper GI to see about size of tumor and whether it is pressing on esophagus - which I think it is because I am having symptoms when eating now. (But I have always been a "gulper" and now am more cautious about gulping food and liquid).  I asked nurse yesterday whether there was anything I could do with diet to help increase the blood counts and she said no.  All I know is the last few times I have had chemo I have been dramatically hungry especially craving to eat more meat.  

Got some GREAT news - my twin who lives 14 hours away is coming down for the first week in June to visit me (I haven't seen her in 6 years) and to help me get done things around here. Knowing her, she will have me entirely organized! She and hubby are coming to help me get rid of things I want to, scrub walls and do whatever I need to have done around here as well as visit Disneyland with me in wheelchair and the rest of the family. I am so excited about this! I have finally gone through all my credit cards finding out which ones are still active, since I haven't used many of them for years.  Did so in writing list of places for my sister to "notify in the event".  It's amazing how many places have to be notified from public library card (to check if I have books outstanding) to union membership (retired active -union member since 1973) to car insurance to DMV, etc.  My list is now 5 pages long (with all the numbers, addresses and info about each). Finally finished the last draft of my holographic will.  Still working on the "bequest" pages - which will not be part of the will since I really don't have enough of anything to have to have an estate probated.  Otherwise I am feeling pretty good - so far doing good on nausea this last week.

Funny thing - two days after encounter above -I got a questionnaire to fill out about my visit with same doctor on Jan 25.  I was tempted to complete it based upon Feb 8 visit, but decided against it.  If I have trouble like that again, I will be more confrontative with doctor and always have access to more formal complaint process with Kaiser.  Both my sisters wanted to go and "beat her up:! LOL

February 23, 2007 - Thing are remaining the same lately, cept I notice that my memory has been slipping a bit.  This week was the week for tests for the esophagus problem, and Tuesday I did the upper GI, and I thought Thursday was the day for the CT scan.  I get down to the hospital a half an hour early and come to find out the appointment was for Friday.  The guy was just going to turn me away when another girl popped up when I asked if there was a cancellation or something where they could slip me in.  So she called and checked and I got slipped in being told it was a slow day.  When I got home I see I had misread my calendar! So that was a blessing that I didn't have to go back again for that test.  On the way home I realized I couldn't hear the tick, tick of my turn signal and checked it, and sure enough it wasn't working.  So I stopped at my mechanic and not only the turn signals didn't work but the brake lights didn't work.  (Thank God no one rear-ended me!  So I had them keep the car to check it out and they drove me home.  Turns out today that the turn signal switch in the driving column is broken and minimum cost to fix is $350.  Add on top of that the $800 for a new crown that has to be paid for on Wednesday and all I can say is Thank God for credit cards!  Thankfully I am not having nausea like I did the last cycle.  I was reading something interesting in the magazine Cure that someone enrolled me in (about cancer) and it said Serontonin has been linked to people having a lot of problems with nausea.  Serontonin is the chemical in your brain which effects emotions and a lack of it causes chemical depression (which I have).  Anti-depressants depress your body's elimination of Serontonin so that your mood remain more stable.  I take anti-depressant pills every day, but evidently there still is not enough serontonin in my brain to activate this terrible nausea so many people have with chemo.  So that's another blessing (the other side of the coin of depression, I would say).  My biggest problem right now is the terrible swelling I am getting in both ankles, which does get slightly painful.  Even wearing the granny stockings does not suppress the swelling - and I guess fluid retention is a side effect of chemo but I also have lymphedema which also causes fluid retention.  So I have a double whammy with both - but it's bearable - just limits a lot of walking. So I am doing OK folks, getting by and getting everything I need to get done.

March 8, 2007 - God is Great!  God is Merciful!

Today I received the results of the CT scan I had done on 2/23.  The scan shows ALL tumors have disappeared! I am still so stunned about this, even hours later writing about it on this blog.  I was to go in for chemo today (the start of my 4th cycle of 6 cycles) It was obvious to me that the doctor had not read the results that the nurse had printed out and attached to my folder, and only started to read the results when in the room with me. Her jaw fell open and her face had a stunned look on it and she read the results to me that both inoperable tumors were completely gone.  She gave me the written report to keep.  She said this was extraordinary and rarely happened.  She then hastened to add that this did not mean I was "cured".  I asked her and yes, we will continue with the 3 more months of chemo.  I don't believe they consider a person cured, just in remission, when cancer abates.  

I told her of all the praying I had done, and wearing the relic of St. Anthony Claret and how I prayed to God to kick this demon cancer right out of my body.  I visualized little chemo fighters attacking the cancer and nibbling away on it like a pac-man. A friend on a chat board looked up St. Anthony Claret and found out that he was beatified as a Saint on February 25th, and my test was done on 2/23 (a Friday) and the 25th was a Sunday.  Is this another coincidence?  But from the doctor's reaction, I know this is only because of God that in his mercy he did kick the cancer out of my body.  It was quite obvious to me that she had not expected that result at all, having only completed 1/2 of the chemo treatments.  As it was, she was late in her appointments again this afternoon, so I have to return tomorrow for my chemo.  

Of course when I got home, I called my two sisters right away when they were both at work.  They are totally stunned and joyful.  I have hardly cried since all this started with me and in talking with them an my other relatives today, I keep quietly crying with tears of joy and happiness.  My uncle the priest, says he is so shocked and asked if they will be having to repeat the test again.  I said I didn't think so, as this was the same test that said I had the cancer and that it had grown, last year.  He said he could hardly believe it.  I said yes, we just never expect miracles to happen to us just to other people you hear about, and I consider this a miracle happening to me.  I called and left a message on the recorder of the parish priest who had given me the Anointing for Healing, to tell him of this glorious news.  

I don't know what to say as to why this happened to me and not to others.  I tried  very hard NOT to bargain with God, saying if you will heal me, this is what I will do.  I just asked that if I was healed that he lead me into some good works or efforts that will reflect his goodness upon me for others to know and see.  Who knows, perhaps even this BLOG has been part of my doing "good works" and has been an inspiration for others or some hope held out for others in despair?  As I said earlier, I thought I was meant to be a witness for God in telling you of my Blessed Consolation.  All I am doing tonight is saying thank you God prayers, over and over.  

In the last two weeks I have been reading bits of St. Francis de Sales from his book On The Love of God.  Reading it brought to mind what St. Paul had to say about Love and how it should be patient, kind, etc.  And I started thinking of the Consolation again and it came to my mind that as impossible we might think it to be as loving as St. Paul tells us we should, God loves us even MORE than what St. Paul says love should be. How St. Paul describes love is only an infinitesimal amount of the love God showered on me during that Consolation and I truly believes he feels that way about all of us, his children.  Tell him of your worries and concerns and throw yourself upon his tender breast, and rejoice at his goodness and be thankful of his mercies, as I am this day and all the days of my continuing life!

March 9, 2007 - I just can't help it, I just keep walking around sort of shaking my head in the wonderment of my miracle.  I did get a little paranoid last night wondering if perchance a mistake had been made and that the report was some one elses' results (once in my medical file a blood workup sheet showing glowing reports on blood levels was found to have someone else's name on it!) but in re-reading the report (thankfully the doctor had given it to me) I found other information on it about the inside of my body which agreed with earlier reports so I know it is truly my report!  Of course I called everyone I knew who I had told of my cancer, wanting to reassure them about me and so many of them had been praying for me.  Today at chemo I purloined the other report on the upper GI which said there was no obstruction or blockage of the esophagus.  So I wonder why I was/am having problems swallowing - but if I hadn't had these problems then it is not usual to have done another CT scan until after the 6 months of chemo which would have meant 3 more months not knowing that the tumors have disappeared.  I did leave a note for my pulmonary doctor who had done the bronchospy last November and who was so upset for me, telling him of this miracle with a mild suggestion that he tell new patients just how neglible the bronchospy actually is compared to their fears. Today I got an email from someone on a chat board "Maureen, Your news is literally stunning! Your faith and attitude is inspirational. For reasons I won't go into here, you have renewed my faith. " so I have been of some help to someone out there in the world!

March 12, 2007 - I find myself emotionally numb at this time - sort of having been on such a high the last few days which has left me emotionally drained.  I have just checked out the cancer website the doctor recommended to me  in the past -- to find out about remission - and yes, when the tumors disappear it is called remission.  However for Lung cancer stage 3 it is stated  "A complete remission is when the tumor disappears so that it cannot be seen on X-rays. However, unfortunately even if a lung cancer goes into a complete remission, it usually eventually starts to grow again."  So how do I feel about this - well I feel grateful for every additional day God gives me to live.  I am continuing chemotherapy against this possibility.  And I would assume that there would be regular checkups to see if a tumor starts again.  And if it does, there is no reason that God and chemotherapy cannot do again, what it has done now.  So now I know why the doctor says I am not "cured" as doctor's experience in remission has shown it is not total.  But in my mind if this was an extraordinary remission, who's to say I will not have an extraordinary experience of no reocurrance?  I have been having trouble with nausea the last couple of days - having to pop those pills. I have also been having some pain underneath by right rib cage, which brought to mind a new diagnosis on the CT scan which at first I ignored which stated I have a "fatty liver".  It sounds benign, doesn't it?  But this is where non-alcoholic cirrhosis of the liver can start.  In researching where the liver is, it is where I am having pain.  In researching what can cause this, some of the inherited diseases of my family and from which my younger sister suffers can cause this - such as diabetes, high cholesterol and triglycerides, etc for which I have been tested for several times since my sister was diagnosed almost 2 years ago.  I was trying to figure out if this could be a side effect from chemotherapy and have not found a definitive answer.  Guess I am going to be a difficult patient again and start asking questions of the doctor regarding this and if she doesn't handle this kind of problem, make appointments with a doctor who does. So with all of the above, it doesn't look like I will close down my cancer blog just right now, but there may be long gaps between postings.

March 22, 2007 - Several have emailed me wanting (or missing) my updates so here it is.  

My twin (fraternal) sister asked me one night  "Do you find you have a new lease on life?".  And as usual, I disappointed her by saying NO.  And so I explained to her that basically nothing had changed in my life but that tumors I could not feel, that had not impacted upon my breathing or caused me any pain, had disappeared. (and what's really weird is that my asthma congestion in my lungs as gotten so much better!)  I still have the same physical impairments that I had before, lack of oxygen in my blood which causes fatigue, swelling in feet, ankles and legs which can sometimes be painful, and side effects of chemo. What has changed is that I am no longer thinking about a more immediate death, and how to prepare for it.  The will I wrote, papers I gathered, dispositions I thought of will not go to waste as all people should do this to help their loved ones when death comes unexpectedly.  

This last cycle of chemo, which was March 8 and March 16 has impacted more on me than those of before.  The March 8 chemo gave me some nausea, the March 16th has left me so very weak and dizzy.  On March 17th (St. Patrick's Day) I still had enough energy to go down to the Beadmaker's meeting and spend some time with some lovely people, and then come home and cook myself a Corned Beef and Cabbage dinner! (Anyone who lives alone knows what that means - three days of eating the same thing! LOL).  After that I went into a downward spiral of energy and for the first time experienced a lot of dizziness, even in just turning my head.  For four and half days I could not do practically anything but just make myself a sandwich for dinner.  Dishes are still in the sink and I hope to be able to do them tonight.  Some beads of mine sold last Sat, and I have not been able to go down to the post office to mail them until today.  Thank Goodness it was to one of my regular customers who I think will be forgivng of my delay.  During this time I finally had to call upon one of my neighbors to help me, I had garbage trash sack sitting in my kitchen for two days waiting for me to get up strength to take it down to the dumpster, so I called them and asked them to do this for me which they did. Yesterday I girded myself and walked down stairs to get my mail (and to get some grocery bags of non-perishables from the trunk of my car having to rest on the steps before going upstairs again), which the post man just kept jamming in the box so it was difficult to remove them.  My regular post man knows about my condition, and had said he would bring the mail up to me if he saw it piling up - so there must have been replacement people on duty this week.  So today I was able to go to mail box again, and then drive down to post office to mail off the box of beads and two bills.  Thankfully there was a open spot in front of the post office in which to park, and I put regular stamps on everything so I could just throw them into mailboxes without having to stand and wait.  So I am on the upward swing of the bell curve of energy of this chemo cycle. The curve is down for 10-15 days and then up for the next 10-15 days then chemo starts again.  I only have two more cycles to go through and thankfully when my sister comes in June I will be at the peak of strength with no chemo in June (at least I think none as 6 cycles will have finished in May). In the mean time I have started on my taxes and have all my papers gathered and sorted and so now I start the mathematics of totalling things and figuring out if I owe anything or not to the feds - I always owe the state because no withholding is done for them.  So rest assured that I am getting stronger and I hope to be able to do some housework this weekend.

I have to tell you about this lady I chatted with during this last chemo.  She was the lady who I first saw on December 4th chemo who I thought looked so much like the lady on my bead Teresa sent me.  I came to find out that she has been undergoing chemo treatments off and on for almost 10 years.  She first was diagnosed with breast cancer 10 years ago, a tumor she found herself despite yearly mammograms.  She refused to let them take the breast and insisted on a lump removal with chemo.  She has this fear that if she allows them to cut her open, that she will die from the surgery.  So they remove the lump, give her chemo, she goes into remission and then it comes back again, and so she goes through that over and over during the last 10 years.  That is one stubborn woman!  As for me, I would have said take the breast and good riddance!

March 26, 2007 - Well today I got a really good look at myself in the bathroom mirror and what a fright I saw.  I look like a zombie from the B movies!  I rarely really look at myself, since I don't wear any makeup - just wash my face, comb my wig if I am wearing it, do my teeth and that is that.  And my eyesight isn't what it used to be prior to age 50!  Well today my eyes were gummy and so I really looked at them and saw that ALL my eyelashes and my brows are Gone!  My eyelids without lashes look all puffy as if I had been crying (just not red).  I thought I was gonna keep them since they didn't go in Jan with the rest of my hair.  So today my face appears swollen and the eye lids swollen and I look like lumps of dough! (It occurred to me later that I look like Hermann Munster of the Addams Family!) Oh well, just as well I don't go out much anymore - trying to be saving money because of the expenses of getting my car fixed and having that new crown on my tooth and state income taxes to pay in a few weeks.  I did get out on Sat to the Friends of the Library bookstore where I found it difficult to stand for periods of time to look at the books for sale.  I had to drag over a chair and sit down several times.  I was able to pop into the library and get a few books that I knew I wanted, and get out without getting too tired.  So I find I am still weak and am wondering if I should push myself to get more exercise.  I wonder if I looked as terrible as I do today without having noticed it. I have been reading about Mrs. Edwards and her cancer having returned.  I noticed in today's AOL update, it was said that the bone scan showed cancer on her hip bone.  And I wonder if she has had a MRI to confirm that, because remember with me, the bone scan said I had all these cancer spots on my spine that ended up not being cancer?  I still think it weird that someone could hug you and break a rib bone in doing so - when she obviously did  not have osteoporosis?  Something is just strange about the information being give out about that woman.  

I am still working on income taxes - almost got all the figures done and should be able to compute the tax returns in a day or so.

April 6, 2007 - Well I have been asked to Update again, so here it is.  There hasn't been much to talk about because I having been doing almost NOTHING.  I have been very ashamed of myself, feeling I am incredibly lazy.  Seems I am able to get up, totter out to the kitchen table, have a couple of cups of hot tea and spend all day there reading a book or looking at chatboards on the computer.  I am able to make something to eat, but leave the dishes in the sink. Standing to wash dishes is too fatiguing and bending over to pick up something causes me to be breathless.  I have been laying down after being up for 5-7 hours, because of leg swelling and sometimes fall asleep.  My exercise seems to be my 15 trips to the bathroom, being an older lady with that particular problem caused by lack of exercise and and many years of celibacy.  Then back to the kitchen table and a book, and then later watch a couple of hours of TV.   This last month has not been like the others - I didn't get my two days of energy to get things done around here.  I have been so incredibly tired all the time and today we find out why.  I did get a couple of spurts this week - was able to go to the post office on Monday , take down garbage and mail off my tax returns and some bills.  On Wednesday I was able to go to the bank, fill up my car with gas at $3.29 a gal,  and then grocery shopping (hadn't been to store in 3 weeks - but don't worry - I have enough food to last well over a month at a time!) Half my groceries are still in the trunk of my car - the non-perishables. Carrying groceries from the car and up one flight of stairs leaves me panting as if I had run a mile and takes me almost 15 minutes to "catch" my breath.  Today I was feeling much better - breathing better (since I seem to be out of breath by doing the slightest thing) and was able to go to the doctor's office for chemo - and was told I have anemia and could not have chemo today! This was a real shock to me.  Anemia is a side effect of chemo, evidently, and now I have to give myself some shots of Procrit in the stomach to help build up my red blood cells and platlets.  When you don't have enough red blood cells then you are not getting enough oxygen, hence being breathless.  But I know some of this is mental, and just so bored with everything.  For those of you who think having the freedom being retired is wonderful - it isn't when you can't do much and have to spend a day wondering how to get through it (I hate most things on TV)- which is why older people get depressed and probably try to sleep away their time as I have been known to do. I worry about muscle loss in my legs because of inactivity but I just don't have the strength to get out and do daily exercising by walking.  So I found myself able to walk much better today getting in to the lab and then to the doctor's office which is why I was so surprised to be told of the anemia. (doctor was only running 1 hour 20 mins late for me today).

 I just about fermented a mini-revolution today at the doctor's office.  There were 4 people including myself just sitting there for the longest time and in talking to them I found out all four of us were waiting for the same doctor.  They were the doctor's 10:30, 11:00, 11:20 and me the 11:40 appointments.  We all were just antsy wanting our chemo - and if blood counts were good we didn't really need to see the doctor.  One man's chemo treatments took 5 hours and he was worried because if he waited much later the nurses wouldn't do his chemo today and they seem to knock off at 4:30.  So I marched in to the doctor's nurse and told her that we were having a revolution and we all just wanted to get our chemo started and the doctor could talk to us while we were getting the chemo (instead of before chemo which is the way it normally is done).  Well someone must have said something to the doctor as she came out and started talking to the patients and suddenly we were down to just me, which is when she told me I couldn't have chemo today.  She sent me down to pick up prescription and needles and then I had to come back up to have nurse go over how to give injections to myself - so after 3 hours of being there I could go home.  For those of you who don't know, I used to be a Union representative and president back when I was working and living in Minnesota - and I always was able to be proactive for other people! 

Today I wasn't charged a co-pay as the computer didn't tell the girl to collect one from me.  She told me to call member services when I got home and I found out that when I see doctor that if I am getting chemo that day I shouldn't have been paying co-pays!  So with my appointment next Friday I have to take my receipts in to claim refunds. But then we have today, I saw doctor, didn't get chemo, and didn't pay.  Then there is the time the doctor was so behind that even though I saw doctor and was taken to the nurses, the nurses refused to do it because I wouldn't finish before their quitting time.  So the whole issue is somewhat murky. Oh yes, something I had wanted to ask the doctor was about whether MRI would have shown the tumors still there or were they gone a month earlier than the CT scan - just a matter of curiosity as to when the tumors disappeared. Since we were talking in the hallway she didn't really have a chance to check my MRI results so maybe next time, but she said yes, the MRI should have shown the tumor as well as checking out the spine at that time.  

My sister and niece are coming to visit me Easter morning.  We had planned a Mexican meal for Saturday but my brother in law and niece have to work, so we postponed it for following weekend. So maybe I can get my niece to bring up the rest of my groceries, if I don't forget it.  Oh yes, anemia with low oxygen blood count causes memory losses too.

April 9, 2007 - Well that shot of Procrit must be helping as I feel a little more energetic and was able to do my dishes last night!  And today I am even feeling better and even thinking of making some beads!  I forgot to mention that the prescription which was for 8 little bottles (one shot in each bottle) of the drug retail cost is $1,323 !!!! Thankfully belonging to HMO I only had to pay the co-pay of $35.  I give myself another shot tomorrow, and so hopefully by Friday my blood counts will be up so I can get my chemo.  Well best laid plans and that went awry, in that my sister got terribly sick and was unable to come down to visit.  She has her own medical problems and actually she has a worst time than I do and has to push herself to go to work every day and keep house, etc.  She worries about me because she can't do anything for me and feels some guilt about that (but I don't feel bad, which is something she just doesn't seem to get!)  In mean time I worry about her because her conditions can be life threatening too, and her physical reactions are constant and ongoing as well as engendering depression.  My twin told me last night that for the first time my younger sister talked to her about God and that she is turning back to God again and this was an answer to my prayers for my sister!!!!  I had told her  (my younger sister) that perhaps God had me go through this ordeal with faith to perhaps inspire her and make her realize God's mercies, and for her to turn to him for help with her problems as well.  Both my uncle the priest and I have been both praying fervently for her to turn to God for his help and it seems that our prayers have been answered!  And If my sickness has helped create this then it has all been worthwhile!

I forgot to mention I am getting a federal tax refund which will be enough to pay the State taxes and completely pay off the cost of getting my car fixed plus a small amount on my crown.  So I am a happy camper about that!

I was reading a chat thread today when someone had mentioned that they thought they would stop trying to help people in the bead making community, indirectly indicating there was no "return" (my words) for them.  So I piped up and related my experience of the overwhelming support and encouragement and praise I have received in the last few months from the people in the bead making community, and that it had been astonishing to me that I had such an impact on other people!  It brought to my mind the story of Jesus taking the 7 loaves of bread and breaking them up and distributing them to the people gathered to hear him speak and how those loaves of bread multiplied so greatly as to feed all those people and still have baskets of loaves left.  And while this was not a parable but an actual happening, it can be looked at by me as a parable in that it can happen that what you give out can be multiplied and come back to you in greater quantities! And perhaps you just don't know you will have that kind of effect on other people, and you don't know that such a thing can happen until you have great need for it and that this is God's way of comforting you.  It's funny that many times you read the Bible and yet you don't really know how it can be applied to YOUR life experiences, until those experiences are upon you and then you "remember" what you have read.  The Bible was telling a real life story and yet that story was simply of Jesus giving away what he had and how he got back a lot more than he had given away.  Something to think about!

April 17, 2007 - Well I am doing OK in a passive sort of way.  Last Friday I had chemo again, and talked with the doctor.  I am not instantly cured of anemia, as I thought I might be with these shots (so I am still giving them to myself) - so I still have that problem which is a double whammy on the tired front.  This time my white counts were up but something else wrong was indicated so I had to have a B12 drip along with the chemo.  I had asked the doctor what happens after this 6 months of chemo treatments - like do I stop chemo and we just do checkups to keep looking if tumors come back.  Oh No, she indicated to me - we "give you a break in chemo" and then start back on chemo cycles.  If we stopped giving you chemo then the tumors would just pop up again.  So she sort of indicated that I would be on chemo for the rest of my life (even though the tumors disappeared) and for some reason that just doesn't seem right to me. Everybody I ever head of on chemo has an ending to it??? In checking the web, the only chemo patients that seem to have continuing ongoing chemo is leukemia patients - which I am not.  I had told her I was glad to be getting chemo that day because I didn't want to get too much out of cycle since my up time in June is when my sister is supposed to be visit.  June would be the 7th month since chemo started and she said "we'll make sure you have your break then".

I had a lovely day with my sister and BIL on Sunday.  We had our postponed Mexican Easter dinner, and my lovely niece was there as well.  I had brought my BIL an old 1964 book on softball, since he is a coach for girls softball as well as a umpire which my niece is also, having spent many years in the softball activities.  They laughed and giggled to themselves over all the different rules and hand signs of the 60's compared to what is done now. A good source of cheap books is the Friends of the Library of which many have a bookshop where you can purchase little gems like this.  She made spinach cheese enchiladas and chicken fajitas which were scrumptious.  Sis was disappointed that I left after 2.5 hours, but I was tired and I didn't want to get too tired to drive home.  So driving time was 2.5 hours, being together 2.5 hours (where I didn't do anything but sit and being served) and when I got home I was so tired I took a nap for 3 hours!  But I made it home safely and that was the point.

Then yesterday what a shock.  My sister ended up in the hospital after a harrowing drive to work in the wee hours of the morning when it was still dark. She has to drive over this mountainous road called Ortega Highway where there is no place to pull over and people are driving fast behind her.  She had an episode where she started to feel like she was going to faint, got sick and her vision of the road started revolving before her eyes.  She thought for sure she was going to pass out and drive off the cliff.  Finally she came to a spot where she could pull over and get herself back together and then eventually drive into work.  She told them there that she thought she had had a stroke and they called ambulance who hauled her to hospital.  Seems like she had a huge deficiency of magnesium, and while they were doing all sorts of tests on her they had bags of magnesium in IV drips.  Well they couldn't find anything definitively wrong with her in that she did not have a stroke nor a heart attack - they said perhaps she had a heart hiccup!  Well in researching magnesium on the web for her and talking to her later in the day when she was feeling better - as I read all the things to her about magnesium and the signs of real bad deficiency - my gosh it was text book of everything that has been making her feel bad for over a year.  It also said deficiency can cause heart spasms! With her heart problems, uncontrollable blood sugar levels, cholesterol and triglyceride problems all are impacted by the magnesium deficiency.  What's interesting is that both she and I have been told by our doctors NOT to take vitamin, and if we had done so, perhaps neither one of us would be where we are today? Daily vitamin pills have 100% of daily need of magnesium.  So anyhow she is released today and is already feeling good and will go back to work tomorrow.  This is why I say I have more concern for her than for myself, as her medical problems are more immediately life threatening.

Success at last for me on this day!  In Jan I purchased a new tracfone  (cell) (because they said they would not continue serving the earlier phone they sent me). I have had the devil's own time to get it to work.  After several months of trying, I finally discovered that Motorola's instructions on insertion of a Simms card was wrong, and so I got it finally to be able to charge.  Then I wanted my old phone number switched to the new phone as well as the carry over minutes and that's when things went south.  First they told me they couldn't do it, then they could do it but it would have to be done manually and would take then two weeks to process it.  After two weeks their online case number answer was in spanish which I could not read.  The last time on the phone with them lasted over 1.5 hours and I just didn't feel up to all that.  Today I checked and there was an english message on case number indicating perhaps they had switched thing.  So I called their technical services and only had to wait 10 minutes for a person - who finally took me through all the steps (after I told her I was an old crabby lady with poor eyesight and asked her to talk slowly! ) and finally I have a cell phone that works!  I feel it important to have one because of my health and in case of car troubles.  So I am happy camper!

April 20, 2007 - Well I had a "bad day" today - they called me yesterday to change me from 1 pm appointment to 10:30 appointment.  Well for most people this would be no problem, but different meds give me insomnia and so I cannot seem to get to sleep till 1 am or later.  I take an anti-depressant pill which makes me sleep 10 hours or more, and I can't go to sleep without taking it (except when totally fatigued).  So going in for 10:30 appointment means my day has to start at least 2 hours earlier (have to have blood drawn at least an hour before appointment).  So shocking myself awake with alarm clock to get up, I just generally felt bad all over (which Procrit can do to you) - so I called to try to get back to later appointment (no go) or appointment on Monday (only one available was 9AM!).  So they said try to get there as early as possible cause afternoon would be busy and I would wait longer.  So I managed to drag myself out of here and was only 1/2 hour late.  Boy when your mind tells you you are down, you are just down!  I did feel better walking with wheelchair since it was slightly rainy and dismal today  - meaning air was colder and easier to breathe.  The anti-nausea drugs they give you gives you a little lift off, so I was able to mail some bills and pick up some groceries afterwards so I have enough for the next 3 weeks.  

Someone on a chat board who has worked 25 years in oncology said , Yes, I would be on chemo for the rest of my life and it takes about a year to get rid of anemia.  How dismaying to think that I am going to have to spend the rest of my life looking like Herman Muenster without hair on my head, eyebrows or eyelids! Sure I can wear a wig, but it gets hot under that wig and in order to scratch you have to wiggle your wig around while it's on your head, which looks pretty funny.

A year to get over anemia when they only gave me 8 shots of procrit? By that time the dust in my apartment will be a foot high! Good thing my sister is coming to visit she thinks it's a vacation. I think I will graciously allow her to clean my whole apartment which in turn will make her feel good about having done something to help me. I thought I could continue as I have for 6 months of chemo, then it would be over and my strength would return, and I could get back to doing normal activities (which were still not a whole lot because of lymphedema in ankles and legs but a whole lot more than what I am doing (capable of doing) now. So instead of waiting for the "burst of energy" returning to me, I have decided to be a snail - doing just one tiny thing a day when I am feeling so fatigued. If I am too tired to stand up washing all the dishes at once, then I will only wash 2-3 and then sit down. Now if only the drain would cooperate, and not drain all the water if I let the rest of the dishes sit for an hour in hot water! Adaptability is one of the greatest achievements of the human race, and my adaptability has been to "let it go" till I am feeling better so I now will have to adapt to knowing that just ain't gonna happen - but I will prevail!

My thoughts on VT killer

I think he is evil incarnate. He wasn't some confused boy he was a methodical killer preparing far in advance of what he was going to do, buying the gun, making the videos and writing. The only redeeming factor which the news people never seem to stress- is that the senseless death of 32 innocent people help bring thousands if not millions of people closer together in love.

Is no one else disturbed that the picture of the two handed gunman is so familiar as those that are on the cartridge/video games the children play with where they disassociatively "kill/murder" people? I think those games should be banned and are more to blame for "children" murdering other children as the means to satisfy their vengeance. While watching a a recent movie called The Inside Man - it was brought home as the bank robber looked at the video game one child had that showed the playing killing people indiscrimantely while walking down the street and indirectly condemning the child for the parent even allowing the child to have such a game.

Look at the long term effect of the media continual coverage of the killer's motives and words - this man glorifies what the Columbine killers did - meaning he must have watched over and over all the media coverage of such a event which now several years later has blossomed into this tragedy. How long does it take for the "seeds of destruction" to come back and whack us in the face once again? There should be a public outcry of horror at the continual coverage of this man's words and video on TV.

April 30, 2007   Well it's time for another update since I don't want to be getting emails asking what is wrong.  It's funny, in that I started this blog so relatives and close friends could check in here and keep up with news about me, except from the phone calls I get no one seems to do so - cause of none of them that call me know what I have said here!  I waited to make this update till I had some good news to report - and that is that I am feeling much better and more strong than I was so I think the injections are working on that anemia problem that left me so very weak and breathless. The days after my past post were very weak days and just generally not feeling god and not doing much of anything.  But now  I went and got my mail today and received my tax refund (25 days since I mailed it!) so I am thinking if I feel as good tomorrow as I do today I shall be able to go to the bank and perhaps the grocery store.  And maybe on Wed. I can even do some laundry (remember those stairs I have to walk up and down multiple times).  In 11 days I start my 6th cycle of chemo and hopefully shall find out more from the doctor on what the future will bring me.

I have been debating with myself whether to send a email to someone for whom I did a very time consuming favor and upon whom I spent money getting something to them when I didn't have hardly any money.  Four months later I got a thanks (recent), but only in response to the email I sent them 4 months ago telling them I had sent the package.  At first I was upset thinking I had mailed it off too late (because of my first chemo sessions), and then I got mad at her thoughtlessness and lack of manners and then I just put it away and let it go.  The untimely thanks has stirred it all up again for me.  From what I saw, this person never did say thanks to anyone she had solicited from until they had sent her an email asking if she got the items.  So those that didn't ask, didn't get a thanks (and somewhere she "lost" an email address that people could write to).  Now I am mad, not for myself, but for the others that never heard from her.  And for myself, I don't feel good with the feelings it has left in me, that I probably shall never again go to such efforts for another person that I don't personally know except through a chat board.  My efforts all were during the time of cancer fears, cancer confirmation and cancer chemo starting which were almost the worse days of my life.  But the actual worse days of my life were when I suffered from deep dark black depression 11-12 years ago when all I wanted to do was die.  I thought that this might be the "reason"  as she had stated this problem in the past.  

So this started my thinking back about when I was deeply depressed and I now discovered something I never realized back then and never heard from any therapist (and there were a lot of them since HMO's kept changing) and that is that depression is ALL about ME.  I think back to way I was thinking then and all I could think about was I, I, I, in that I never once gave a thought to how my behavior impacted upon my fellow workers or people that knew me.  I never was ONCE asked by supervisors or therapist to try and work through my blackness by thinking of how what efforts I could do would help my co-workers who had to struggle with my untouched workload as well as their own. I was living alone far from family and had lost most of my friends because of divorce since most of them were other cop's wives and all I heard from therapists was how I needed to go out and find a support group of friends to talk to.  When I stopped working, I had a specific workload no one else was doing and the workload increased so much that by the time my disability came through they had to assign two people to my workload and those two people still could not keep up with it.  I had kept up trying to do it all by myself until it just broke me.  I was made to feel that I was a complete failure because I couldn't keep up with the workload, therefore it never occurred to me to think I had other value that could help others with whom I worked.  Now in thinking back on it, I am deeply ashamed of myself because I think that would have been the key to turn me around - people have a need to be wanted and valued even in doing menial jobs.   

Anyhow, this doesn't help my decision whether to send an email on another person's disappointing behavior, which I shall work hard at letting it go again as other people should speak up for themselves.

Happy May Day tomorrow!  

May 6, 2007 - I watched a very interesting program tonight - Ted Koppel's program on Cancer for the Discovery Channel. What I got foremost from it was the sense on how incredibly blessed I have been with what has happened to me since the diagnosis and treatment for cancer started.  What struck me most was how DIFFERENT I am about this whole thing, compared to the three people highlighted on the show.  As somewhat briefly mentioned, the three were not your normal everyday cancer patients being Lance Armstrong, Elizabeth  Edwards and Leroy Sievers (a friend of Ted Koppel).

First of all I was disappointed that not one person in this 3 hour program had one single thing to say about God or how their faith was helping them cope with Cancer.  They mentioned having hope, but that hope was never connected to anything.  The Second thing I noticed is that every single one of them thought that cancer would kill them (eventually) and this really impacted upon them so much more differently than it has for me (like who has a guarantee for a tomorrow?). We all know every single person is going to die someday.  I may have cancer today, or yesterday or tomorrow since I am remission, but I know I could just as easily die tomorrow with a brain aneurysm, go shopping in a mall targeted by some wacko and be shot dead, die in a car crash - I read the papers and TV everyday and people are dying from all sorts of things they never envisioned would happen to them and cancer is only one of many ways to die. Who says I am going to live long enough to die from cancer? I look at each day, even though I don't say it consciously to myself, as , Thank you God for giving me another Day! It's almost the flip side of nightly prayers that say And Give us this day our Daily Bread.! Being diagnosed with cancer has brought that fragility of life to the forefront of thought, but not to the exclusion of other possibilities that can cause my death much, much sooner.

It's hard for me to put into words how different I am that does not sound callous.  When being told I had inoperable cancer, besides initial fear, my thoughts were first about what I could do to help my sisters through this process.  I immediately wanted to lessen the impact of my illness on them, rather than myself.  I started looking for outside help, not so to as exclude them, but make it easier for them.  I called upon my own resources and strengths with the will that I could handle this alone the best way I could.  I have been blessed with a minimal effect of nausea which was not the norm for Sievers and Armstrong.  And I am taking the same Platinum that Armstrong took.  (Edwards barely related anything to audience)  I think I have been blessed by having to face this alone on my own, not having to see fear reflected in someone's else's eyes everyday and so great periods of time I can forget about the cancer.  

May 9, 2007 - I had waited a few days to more fully digest my thoughts about the program mentioned above.  In some respects I thought myself a freak in that my reactions to cancer were so different than those three.  Then it slowly came to me what the difference was.  Those three were in the midst of a full and varied life, so cancer came as a much more severe blow to them ruining the future they had planned out for themselves and family.  Whereas for me, cancer came during a retirement and many years of silence and solitude and the onset of other diseases that had impaired my physical well being.  I had COPD with trouble breathing, lymphedema which is swellings of ankles and legs making walking difficult at times, then blood clot in leg and now cancer with chemo and anemia.  My daily pleasures were small ones and my plans for the future almost non-existent.  So the diagnosis was so much less a shock, having followed the probable diagnosis for 8 months before it was actually stated.  And the impact on my life so much less than the impact on their lives.  Because a lot of what I heard on the program was discrete rage that this had happened to them, even though Siever's was third generation in his family to have cancer like I am as well.  All were still looking at all they would miss in life and love and none actually looking each day to what they actually had.  Armstrong is an aberration - being a 10 year survivor who is very much mistaken in his belief that "we can cure cancer now".  There is no cure for cancer, your body's cells have mutated and could start up the chain reaction again in another place in the body.  Perhaps with gene manipulation they could "turn off" the mutation, but I am not sure they can do that to living bodies like mine.  All we can hope for is remission.  As to Siever's wanting the oncology team to be "his family" - I don't want that at all.  My nurses are all foreign and barely speak good english.  I want competent people who know what they are doing and doing so professionally - sympathy, laughter, hugs, love is only wanted by my real family and real friends - not the hospital staff.  I guess my strength comes from inside of me and not outside of me as it does with others.  So this is why I was so shocked by the program and my reaction to it - although the middle part was excellent for friends and family to know what you are going through, when you are going through it alone.

I think I still have anemia.  I went out to dinner with my friend on Monday evening and the short walking almost did me in and left me huffing and puffing.  It has turned hot here in So. California which makes it even harder for me to breathe.  I think getting to the doctor this Friday is going to be even more of an effort than it has been and I am almost contemplating asking someone to take me so I don't have to walk from parked car in a ramp into the hospital and then the great deal of walking from there to doctor's office. I may actually use the wheel chair as it is normally used and wheel myself around in it.  The things I thought I could be doing this week, which is supposed to be my strongest in the cycle, I have not been able to do.  And I am worried that I might not be able to get chemo even after such a struggle for me to get there - which will set back any strength for when my twin comes - and even if I do get it, I am not sure that I will have strength for much of anything by the way I am feeling now at the end of this cycle.  I may have to forgo Disneyland - but that's no biggie.  For anything else, my family will push me in wheelchair.  I am supposed to go up to my younger's sister's house for a week after twin leaves, to watch house and dog while they are in New Orleans and it just hit me, duh!!! that their bedrooms are all upstairs! Just the thought of having to bring a suitcase and struggle with it upstairs is enough to weary me now.  I think I will ask her to load up on frozen dinner's so I don't have to cook cause here everything is just a short few steps and there it is a long way (big kitchen).  Oh well, time will tell!

Happy Mother's day to you all tomorrow!

May 12, 2007 - Well yesterday I managed to get to the doctor for my chemo session ( I started feeling better the day after the last post and much better on Friday when I went to doctor so I could make it there on my own) and found my blood count was the lowest it ever has been, so I couldn't get chemo. No wonder I didn't get any upsurge in energy during the end of this cycle. First she wanted me to get a blood transfusion and try for next Friday for chemo. I am leery of transfusion and asked if we couldn't do medications. So in looking things over, she decided since my tumors were gone, that we would take my "break" from chemo now rather than in June, and gave me prescription for Procrit ($1082 for 4 shots) and some prescription iron pills (My HMO cost including syringes $55). So now I don't have to go back for chemo till 6-19 which will be 8 weeks of no chemo so perhaps I can get those red blood cells built up. And that is going to work out so perfectly for my twin's visit the first week in June and my other sister's visit to New Orleans where I house sit house and dog in second week in June!

Catch this - she was only about 30 minutes behind today - she was telling me to take iron pill with Vitamin C and do not take milk or milk products. I started to say, Ok because I don't drink milk..... And then she says "Do not respond, that was a statement not a question"!

I talked to another woman in waiting room who has been on chemo for 7 years now.  She started with lung cancer and the tumors went away and she had to have bi-monthly chemo for 3-4 years then was able to switch to a daily pill of chemo for the last several years which she says is fabulous and had no side effects like the liquid chemo - so hopefully I shall have the same some day, she was 77 years old now!

Anyhow, I had something fantastic happen which for me, was a thrill of a lifetime! After doctor's office I swung by Carls Jr. to get burger for lunch/dinner and three semi trailers pulled into the local shopping mall that were the Budweiser Clydesdale Horses, and they drove to a cordoned area so I drove over there behind them and parked, and got out my wheelchair and burger and went to sit behind the string and for over an hour I watched happily 10 feet from the horses as they unloaded them, put them in harness, and then started them pulling the trailer while walking around the mall. There was absolutely NOTHING in the paper about this, and it happened just by happenstance because they were in the area to march in a parade today in another city and were asked at the last minute to come to this mall. I was in heaven - I have seen the Lippinazers and now I have seen the Clydesdales!!! These are magnificent horses, standing over 6 feet at shoulder and about 11 feet to top of head,  weigh about 2,000 pounds each.  During the middle ages they were war horses because of their ability to take the weight of men in armour.  Eight of them pull the draft bud trailer which weighs about 7,100 pounds.  And the old "retired" dalmatian and the new dalmatian were both with this team - (the dog in the commercials for Bud beers). There are six teams throughout the US.   This team's home is down in San Diego where they put on two shows a day down at Sea World.  Each horse when initially purchased can cost from $5,000 to $35,000 each and all of the teams have gelded males since the ladies gestate for 11 months then spend 6 months nursing babies so to be in team is too much stress for the ladies. Such a thrilling experience!

May 17, 2007 - Well I have begun to think I made a big mistake in not getting a blood transfusion last Friday.  After my visit with the doctor and seeing the horses, I have taken a downward spiral of energy as before where I can't do anything at all.  I had to ask a friend to pick up medications for me on Tuesday because I was so short of breath I could hardly walk from one end of my apartment to the other end.  I have taken my shots and started the iron pills but evidently that is going to take a long time to do any good.  I have started to run out of food in my freezer, which perhaps is a good thing as I am coming upon freezer burned items which need to be thrown away.  I get out of breath just getting into my bed and getting settled with all my pillows around me.  I quite exhausted myself yesterday in making 1/2 of a stew in just cutting up the meat, dredging it in flour, frying it and turning the meat and then letting it stew in water for a long time.  I ended up taking a nap for 1 1/2 hours after that.  Then today in getting the vegetables ready for it and in cooking them - so at least I had a more healthy dinner than usual for tonight, but now I have run out of bread. In fact everything is getting real low in the apartment in food area. But I still have plenty of canned soups which is what I have been basically eating lately.  I am beginning to wonder if I will have any energy when my twin sister arrives in two weeks and that I may not be able to house sit for my other sister.  

Last night I was looking on the web at the beautiful beads again, while not making any of my own.  And I came across regret of my own making.  Have you ever wanted to make ONE thing that is so beautiful that everyone just stopped and gasped and said to you how beautiful that is?  All my life this is the one thing I have always wanted to do, with all the various arts and crafts I have been involved in - and something I have never done.  Yes, I have made some nice things and people think they are pretty, but none has that splendor that I aspired to in creation.  Then I started thinking of my eulogy and thought "She tried her best" is the best description of me.  And then I thought of the 16 boxes of family papers that I have stored here because sister's were feuding on who should have them and I, who have the least amount of room, kept them to keep peace.  And I thought of the many paper things I have been tossing lately, greeting cards and letters from people during my life.  I got to thinking of what legacy my father left, and in those 16 boxes are letters from people to and about my father about all the kind deeds he did for other people throughout his lifetime.  My father never had a hobby and didn't even like to fix things around the house yet his legacy would also be "He did the best he could".  So I guess it's not so bad being thought of in that manner, after all.

May 18, 2007 - "What a difference a Day makes, just 24 little hours" and isn't that the truth! The difference from yesterday to today is like night and day.  I slept almost 12 hours last night, off and on when the cat wasn't meowing because I moved in bed!  And when I awoke today and had my cup of tea I realized I was breathing so much better and actually felt stronger than I had for a long time.  I actually was able to take down the trash, get my mail, wash dishes and make a meal!  So I hope I haven't over done it, but just wanted to report being somewhat better when I was so discouraged yesterday.

May 21, 2007 - There hasn't been much for me to talk about since this anemia has laid me low - just trying to get strength back. The other night/morning at 4:30 am (sometimes my insomnia is so bad I am up all night long) I went to front door and opened screen door to try and get newspaper, and the cat got out. Now I don't let the cat out after 5 pm. She's always been an indoor cat and the ferals prowl around in the dark. During the day the ferals don't seem to be around so my cat goes for a jaunt downstairs and then spend afternoon sunning herself about 5 feet from screen door.  So here I am trying to get the cat to go back into the apartment, having to follow her down one outside staircase, walk the length of the building, and up another staircase, and when I get close to her she mewow's (a whiney sound) and she skitters away again. Finally she gets in thru the screen door. Totally wiped me out and had such a adrenalin high from all that chasing I was no longer able to go to bed, as I was fixing to do so.

In two weeks my twin will be here and I am already mediating between sisters. I don't know why they can't get together and just "go with the flow". Twin and DH was going to leave Fri night and drive down to DH's mother's house and spend Sat, Sun visiting there and doing repairs she might need (she's in her 80's) and then leave there Mon morn and arrive here Mon night.Then stay here till following Sun morn and leave. Meantime other sister is leaving here second Sat morn at 5am for trip to New Orleans her MIL is paying for the entire family, and she wants me to babysit house and dog so she wants me to come up there Friday and spend night there to see how to use their TV setup and that. And in the meantime the "cousins" who we see about every 6 years  (only at funerals and weddings) wants to get together on the first Sunday to have a family get together and family portrait because they don't think my uncle will be around much longer and the last time they did "family" portrait, they couldn't wait 2 weeks till twin was down here to include them (course this feeling has been simmering for years and somehow twin seems to forget that I was in Minnesota and wasn't in the "family portrait" either!)

I'm not particularly close to these cousins (they are about a 10 years younger than me - more my younger sister's "set"), not one of them has called or written since mom died and certainly not since I got sick - so why should I accommodate them? Younger sister is taking the week off to "spend with us" BUT has now decided to fit in a couple of doctor appointments that week so now things have to be arranged between her doctor's appointments. Twin wants to go to Ronald Regean library and I absolutely detested the man and have no desire what so ever to go to the library (2 hour drive one way from here) and waste my energy on that - so I told twin to go themselves. At this point it's getting so complex and upsetting for me, trying to figure out how to arrange things for them - that I just want to skip most of it, the thought of which tires me out just thinking about it!

I thought I might be strong enough to go grocery shopping this evening because I am running out of a lot of things around here. I was able to dress, then rest, then walk to get mail and then to car, then rest, then drive to grocery store 1/2 bock away. Get cart and start putting groceries needed in it, cart is 1/2 full and I am tired and out of breath and just about hang on to it - then slowly walk around rest of store slowly throwing things into cart which is now almost full and too heavy for me to move. Get into line, half draped over cart getting my breath and let other people with fewer items go in front of me. Get up to cashier and she already recognized I needed someone to unload cart for me and sent a boy around to do that. Then girl loaded up groceries and took them out to the car for me. When I got home I knocked on downstair neighbors doors and the kids came out and brought up all my groceries for me into the kitchen. Sat and rested panting trying to get more oxygen into me, then put frozen away and cold stuff in frig and will let the rest (non-perishables) sit in the bag till I feel better perhaps till tomorrow. Think that should tide me over for several weeks to a month before I need to go shopping again. That's how tuckered out I am these days and it sure doesn't feel good.

May 31, 2007 - Boy I didn't realize it had been so long since I posted.  I have had a terrible time since my last posting - much worse than just being too tired to do anything, but the slightest thing would cause me to pant for breath.  I couldn't walk from my bed to kitchen table without panting, I couldn't snuggle into bed arranging all my pillows without panting, I couldn't bend over to pick up the cat's water bowl without panting.  It's a horrible feeling knowing you are breathing just fine, but you don't have enough blood cells to carry the oxygen you need to operate with in your system.  Last Friday I was so desperate I emailed doctor and asked for immediate transfusion - and of course, I haven't heard word one from her at all.  I sent a friend down to pick up the refill of the Procrit that the automated refill line said would be ready for me, and they wouldn't give her any drugs saying the way the doctor wrote up that order that only 4 shots is considered a month's supply and I would have to wait till June 1 to get the other 4 shots.  If I hadn't started to feel a little better by Mon while still waiting for a call from her/or nurse, I would have filed formal complaint with HMO about her.  Monday I was able to walk down and get my mail and take down the trash.  Tues I was able to sweep my kitchen floor, do dishes and pick up somethings around here.  Wed I was able to wash kitchen floor with a mop - just a little bit at a time with rest periods in between.  Today I was able to walk down to car and go and get another prescription refill and then go to library to pick up some books I had requested inter-library loan and at that point I realized I did all I could do today and had to skip the stop at the grocery store for a few items.  

A very nice and unexpected thing happened to me this week.  When I first rented this apartment in 2001, the owner told me then that he rarely raised rents and hadn't done so for years.  So upon my anniversary ever since he's raised my rent! (later he said it was because of rent control that he couldn't raise rents before me)  Usually it's about cost of living percentage, but with my retirement check going up with COL percentage, then taxes, health insurance and then finally the rent increase, I end up with less money than I started out the year with in my pocket for living expenses. Anyhow he sent me a letter this week that while normally this would be the time for rent increase, because of my illness he has decided to forgo any increase.  I called him to thank him and spoke to his wife since he was out of town and told her of my appreciation and that just medication costs have been high for me, and we had a pleasant talk.  It has really hit me hard not to have income from selling beads but since my health is so irregular I just can't seem to work it out.  

I think perhaps my sister's have worked things out.  Cousin just HAS to have family over to her house, because she is getting divorced and won't have that house much longer (what kind of sense is this?) when I suggested why didn't we meet at a restaurant for family gathering at a more central place and then on to the picture.  Now my BIL is getting sick probably with bronchitis - so who knows if Sunday is still on.  BIL couldn't go to Disneyland on Wed, can only go on Monday due to work conflict but now if he is sick what happens to Disneyland.  The Picture has to be taken at 12 noon on Sunday because niece has to get to work at Disneyland by 3 p.m. and cousin's daughter can only do it on her lunch break since she works in the mall where picture will be taken.  This whole thing has got me nervous and full of anxiety of so many people trying to accommodate people without people's feelings getting hurt - like a cat on a "hot tin roof", especially not knowing how I will be feeling.  Well, three more days and we will find out!

June 17, 2007 - Well the visit from the twin is over, and the little sister safely back from New Orleans and me back in my home surroundings.  I must say the first week didn't go at all like I thought it would, and the second week went exactly as I thought it would.  I amazed myself at the things I have accomplished in the last couple of weeks, and more will follow about what happened, at a another posting.  Family peace prevailed in the first week, and I came home to a very mad kitty after housesetting dog and home for younger sis.

A blessing occurred during this time.  

Remember how I said at the Anointing for healing that the priest had me say rosarys for two women in this apartment building that I did not like.  And I told you how one brought me soup after she learned of my cancer.  Well the second woman who I absolutely detest, met me coming up the stairs with a box on wheel contraption that I was using to bring my things up from the car after returning home from sis's house.  I had already expended great effort that day in packing and hauling everything out to the car in leaving sis's house, then had an hour and 20 minute drive back home, so I was sort of dragging at that point, and the box contrivance was right in the middle of the stairs.  I said "I'm sorry" to her and looked back at the box thing thinking how I could shove it to one side to let her pass, when out of the blue she asked me if she could lift it up the stairs for me.  I was dumbfounded!  The last time this woman spoke to me she was screaming at me that she was going to call the health authorities on me, and complain to the landlord and take me to small claims court, because I was feeding stray ally cats, because she said the strays sat on her car and put scratches in her paint (which they did not do as I am home all day long and looking out at the alley and only the car next to the trash cans do they climb on (which is MY car) and I have no scratches on my car).  And what is completely ludicrous is that she is hiding a cat in her apartment that the owner doesn't know about (I saw it again at their screen door during week twin was here) and I never have told him about, and which could get her evicted if I told.  Anyhow, I said that would be great, and she lifted it up the rest of the stairs for me so I could wheel it into my apartment.   Later upon reflection, I got to thinking how God works in his mysterious ways and at his own time frame - and now 6 months later some kindness from this woman towards me! As I have said, it has to be God's doing because I did nothing to contribute toward this happening.

Will write some more about last two weeks later.

June 20, 2007 -I went and got my chemo therapy today with my blood counts being very good!  They were better than normal and she was surprised at how good they really were. She'd asked me how I felt and I told her I felt fabulous and have lost 6 pounds from being able to exercise by walking and doing things I haven't been able to do for months. It's only in the last two weeks that my energy has returned and by pushing myself to do things when the twin was here and sis in NO, have I increased my endurance and walking ability.  It's been two months since my last chemo and my hair has started to grow back, and my eyebrows and eyelashes - which I shall probably lose again. Oh well! My head has a outer fringe of white that wasn't there when I started chemo 7 months ago! Anyhow she gave me some almost good news - we are going to do another CT scan this month to see if tumors have returned or if they have stayed gone. If they have stayed gone, then we are doing two more months of chemo with something special added, and then I may be able to go off chemo for a long time. So I am keeping my fingers crossed!

June 28, 2007 - Well time for an update I think! The chemo induced anemia got so bad that I was panting for air yet feeling like I was suffocating and almost went into emergency room to get a blood transfusion. I emailed my doctor about my symptoms and never heard a thing from her. Finally something kicked in and I started feeling a little better (just imagine reaching down for the cat's bowl and have to start panting from that exertion). I kept getting better a little each day, and was good enough for when my twin came to visit me, but still not tip top.

So the month started on Saturday June 2 with a phone call.  My ditzy friend from Minnesota was sitting outside in a car in front of my apartment building.  Completely unannounced she shows up on my door step a day before my twin is supposed to be here.  God I was in a panic, how could I manage a visit from her with everything else.  She said she didn't tell me she was coming because she knew I WOULD GET UPSET  and if she just showed up, I would have to deal with it!  She came for a flying visit to pick up some jewelry and papers she had me holding on for her after her divorce "because she was afraid that with how bad I was getting, if I died she wouldn't get her things back from my sisters" and Oh yeah, she really wanted to see me.  She stayed for 3 hours and then left and during that time all she did was talk about the sentimental things of papers, photos and jewelry.  She was hungry and I said all I had was to make her a BLT, so besides telling me how bad I looked and hearing how tired I was, she let me fry up bacon and then make her a sandwich.  She did "tear" up several times telling me about how I looked and sounded.  I just shake my head thinking of the visit. I haven't heard from her since the flying visit.

Then Sunday June 3, my younger sister picks me up and away we go down to cousin's house for the PICTURE!  We finally go to Penney's portraits and meet my twin and husband there.  Tears started in my eyes in seeing her and she murmured for me not to start or she would (cry) too.  So then we get the picture taken and then have to WAIT THREE HOURS more for them to make up pictures for the selection - it was a small store and stuffy and hot with no ventilation.  Both myself and uncle were visibly wilting on the vine.  I could barely get upstairs on the elevator and walk the length of the store, without holding on to racks ( I didn't think I would need wheelchair but I was wrong).  So then back to cousin's house for more visiting and then back home and I was totally exhausted.  Twin went on to their hotel for the night.

I found the visit somewhat disappointing - I expected to be "mothered" and coddled and fussed about and I wasn't. When I hired an acquaintance to help me caretake my mom many years ago, she was the kind that came into the house and became the MOM to everyone - she plumped pillows, made cups of tea, would do light housework while talking and cracking jokes and she just made you feel like the most important person in the world to her!  (I miss you June!)  WEll I didn't get any of that.  It was like there was a wall that "it" shouldn't be discussed and yet twin kept wanting to take digital pictures of me with no hair or hat on me.  (I thought what is this a documentary?)  The next day they came over and we went and got papers notarized and bank accounts set up, etc.  Then we went to visit folk's grave and bought some flowers for the grave. When we got there we couldn't find any flower container.  My BIL started digging with a screw driver and found it 4 inches under ground!  As much as he tried with the screw driver, he could not get the vase up so twin went off and found a grave digger who came and he couldn't get it up either.  He had to get a spade and dig it all the way up and then put in a new container and stamp it down.  So then we went to dinner at our favorite mexican restaurant and had a really good time, and then I asked to be let off and for them to go on by themselves as I was worn out.

Tuesday younger sister was coming down to go through family papers I had been storing for the last 6 years because the two of them fought over who would get what, the last time they were together.  Each of them have children that they want to have part of "their" heritage.  So I sort of thought perhaps twin would clean up my apartment after hearing me moan about how ashamed I was to have let it go because of my illness.  Instead of really helping me out around here, it was more about them being on vacation, than anything else. My twin vacumned just the small area in front of couch where she thought she and younger sister would sit to go through family photo albums and divy them up, when the whole place needed vacumning. So when other sis came to visit, it was the two of them in the kitchen going through the photo albums and laughing over old memories, with me in the bedroom scanning hundreds of photo's so the other one would have them available on a CD. The 3.5 hours spent scanning photo's on one day left me so stiff and sore and, that I grew cantankerous and decided I did not want to go to Disneyland after all because I hurt too bad. After sister left, twin kept going through other boxes seeing what she wanted and marking boxes she had reviewed.  At that point I was disgusted and said I was going to lie down, which I did.  Twin thought I was going to print out ALL of the pictures, and I said she was crazy, that it would cost hundreds of dollars for me to do so with the cost of ink cartridges and photo paper.  I said with the CD, she could review them on her computer and print out what she wanted (she seems to be so proud at how computer illiterate she is).  So that night we were going out to eat dinner and she said "Arn't you going to wear your wig?"  I said No, it's hot  and makes my head sweat.  She then says the most insensitive thing I have ever heard - "Don't you think you should because people are not used to be around people with no hair and it may make them uncomfortable seeing you in a hat".  I am sure my jaw dropped open - and I said tough, life is what it is!  I am very thankful for the chores my BIL did around here for me, he finally fixed the front door and screen that I have not been able to lock for 2 years, as well as other things.

So the next day when they were at Disneyland, I scanned another 3 hours and was able to make cd's for them (This "kept the peace" between them when they both wanted the same picture!) Thursday they wanted to take me on a "drive" to the beach and I said no, I wanted to go to grocery store cause I was low on everything. So we went shopping and when we got back twin did clean out the freezer and part of refrigerator in putting food away and then a couple of shelves with canned goods, but that afternoon they went to the show. When they returned we went for pizza as my treat since BIL had refused to let me pay for dinners, and ate the best pizza they had ever had (so he said).  And then Friday  they came to visit for a couple more hours then left for their ride down to the beach while I got my stuff ready and went up to my sister's to housesit and watch the dog for 8 days - which was like being in prison for me. They don't have a single piece of furniture that is comfortable, and the bed (niece's) was hard and sagged terribly. The dog got me up early every morning with her barking at anyone in the street.  I felt Paris Hilton should have stayed there on house arrest! The best part of staying there was this shinning memory that will stay with me forever which is of my younger sister waking me up Sat morning as they were going to be driving to the airport, and seeing her sunlit beaming face giving me a hug while I was in bed and telling me she loved me and saying goodbye.  (their windows don't have any drapes just louvers hence lots of sunlight). She's always told me she was a morning person and bright eyed and bushy tailed in the morning, and I could see that in her face.  It was just one of those instant memory pictures that so rarely happens in your life and it will stay with me.

But the good part is that my energy kept getting a little better each day and by the time I went to chemo again last week my blood counts were way up and I was feeling very good. I had chemo again yesterday and I feel terrific with still good blood counts. When my twin had asked me months before if I felt like I had a new lease on life hearing about the tumors, and I said no - well I feel today I do have a new lease on life!  Let's hope it stays with me! We are doing CT scan tomorrow, and if the tumors have not grown back with my month off chemo, then doctor says two more chemo treatments and then a long time off chemo. So let's hope for the best. My hair has started to grow back and is about 1/3 inch, with a white fringe all around it (I had hardly any gray before chemo) and my eyebrows look weird, dark fuzz, and my eyelashes are growing again. Probably will lose them again during this three month.

This week in talking with my sisters over the phone, I managed to tell them in a nice way the things I said above.  I said to twin that I had hoped she would have babied me more and done more, and she said something I can't quite remember, like she didn't want to intrude.  I also said how we never seemed to be alone to where we could have been like sisters again, like at a pajama party - but I know part of what caused this was my smoking - she was very very good about this not complaining about it and appreciative when I blew the fan on me to blow smoke away.  If people are going to be praying for me, please pray to help me quit this addiction in spite of being an extremely nervous person even when I have nothing I should be nervous about.  I have a home and a bed to sleep in, I have enough money to pay my bills and eat, I am retired and have no real stress yet I am so nervous my fingernails are bitten up to the half moons and I still smoke.  I smoked less when I was working and my mind was occupied.

So for now, I feel real good physically about the best I have felt in a year!

June 29, 2007 - Well  I should have known better than to crow about how good I was feeling.  I should have known the euphoric feeling was chemically induced by the anti-nausea stuff they give before the chemo, cause I simply could not get asleep last night, no matter how much I tossed and turned.  I finally got up and at about 4:30 am called the automated phone number and canceled the CT scan for today.  I shall re-schedule it, makes no difference as I would not hear the results until my next doctor's visit in 3 weeks.  So today I wake up feeling all stiff and sore and every year of my age, and my feet and ankles have really been bad (which I have noticed happens a lot after chemo - which does cause some to have swelling).  So I shall just hope that tomorrow is a better day!

July 5, 2007 - Hope everyone of you had a happy and safe Fourth of July!  I spent a quiet day at home (as usual).  

I could certainly tell that poor economy is affecting the hispanic neighborhood I live in as the fireworks were much decreased over previous years. Even last year there were so many fireworks shot off the neighborhood seemed foggy from the burned powder. This year there were hardly any fireworks shot off before 7/4 and the fireworks only lasted about 2 hours instead of all night. That points to me that people spent a lot less money for fireworks than they have in previous years.

I am doing good - not as chipper.  It's been very hot around here, in the 90's and high humidity for So Calif so I have had to run my air conditioner for several hours a day  otherwise I get by with just a fan.  My sleeping is all screwed up again - if I go to sleep I sleep for no longer than 2 hours and then am up for a few more hours before I can go back to bed.  I don't know what is causing this but it's a pain! Staying in bed hoping to go back to sleep doesn't help either! Tonight I am meeting my friend for dinner and delightful conversation and it should be fun.  Sat I am having the  CAT scan but I won't know the results till I see the doctor next.  I only hope it shows those tumors are still gone!

I have been making beads again, working with a new Big Buck glass called Terra ($100 a pound).  Even though I am now beginning to get some color out of it, with some advice from other beadmakers, I stilll don't like it very much and shall use what I have till it's gone.  I don't know why I have such apathy about cleaning my beads and photographing them and putting up auctions on ebay.  Somewhere the fun has gone out of it, even though I would like some additional money from them.  Some hwere along my life I never learned how (or had the desire) to discipline myself (I guess cause there were too many other people who always had to tell me what I was doing wrong!).  But I certainly need to start applying that to myself and get off this lazy butt of mine!  I will say, though, my living room is all dusted and clean!

That's about all I have to say - never have much to say when things are going so-so.

July 11, 2007 - Well the chemo has caught up with me, once again.  I can tell I am getting anemic again, because I have started getting breathless and panting a bit after exertion.  So despite doctor saying I didn't need to take the iron supplement, I have started taking it again anyway!  But thankfully, I was able to clean my bathroom and dust and vacumn my bedroom (having previously done the living room) , and brushed all the walls and ceilings for cobwebs - so I feel good about that!  I have had a couple of days now where I am coughing up blood in my sputum.  This was a sign to my general doctor that I may have cancer ( over a year ago) so I am wondering about it.  I haven't done anything about it yet, because just before it started I inhaled some bread crumbs and had severe coughing from expelling them - which may have broken capillaries and with me on Coumidin thinning my blood it could cause the blood.  Today the amount of blood has gone down significantly in my coughs, so I will watch it carefully. I know I should go somewhere about it, but I am just plain too tired physically to go anywhere.

My younger sis and I decided tonight that I will not babysit the house and dog (and niece's puppy) when they go to Las Vegas next week for my niece's 21st birthday.  I feel bad that I will not be able to go (have chemo again the day before they leave).  I had especially wanted to see the puppy - a Golden Retriever (do you remember that commercial with all the baby gold retriever puppies knocking over a toddler?).  My niece got the puppy as a birthday present from her boyfriend, and decided to name the GIRL puppy - Bailey!  Yeah, I know - we all feel the same way except her.  We feel puppy had been mistreated by the breeder because of some fears it had, but puppy has been spending a lot of time with "grandma" who has been training her very well.  No one but niece wants to call her Bailey - her first nickname with Grandma was Boo-Boo, I voted for Molly Maguire (being a red head you know) but that is going to be one confused puppy.  Niece got puppy before moving into her new apartment closer to school which allow dogs BUT failed to find out that only dogs 25 pounds or less are allowed.  So Puppy (Grandma's current name for pup since name is such an issue) will be shifted among many homes once it gets to be 25 pounds.  Grandma has an AUNT for puppy (not me) by the name of Millie (for millennium) a sort of English retriever who has adopted Puppy (after a few days of avoiding this rambunctious ball of energy) and now plays sock with Puppy (tug o war) has trained Puppy to walk to door and stand there, and go potty outside, and generally runs around playing with Puppy and gets her tired out so she will sleep instead of exploring at night.  Millie gets very depressed when Puppy goes home to niece's apartment and begins to mope around and generally gets very quiet.  The problem is that niece works so many hours waitressing at Disneyland, and then when school starts, plus having a boyfriend, that Puppy will be left alone a lot. My sis and I are feeling very sorry for Puppy, and the plans niece has of shuffling Puppy off to various other people's home because of the weight limitation in her new apartment.  We think this is going to be one very confused Puppy, and we dont only mean because of the name! My sis and BIL are very attached to Puppy by now having "babysat" Puppy off and on for several weeks.

My twin is off to Camp this week - every year for gosh, maybe 15 years, she has taken a week of vacation to go to the Church's camp for children and works as a cook there as a volunteer. She started doing this as a way to get her kids into camp, and it just continued.  As it turned out, my other niece ended up being camp director for about 5 years, and has recently got a new job as a "scout" for Cal State Humboldt up there near Eureka.  Days slaving over a hot stove up there isn't nearly as bad as it sounds in that Eureka area of California is generally much cooler than it is like down here in So. Calif.  Twin enjoys being around kids so much, and many of her volunteer hours through the years have involved kids - like taking exchange students every year and many church activities.  I am very proud of her! Good news from my Sis, the doctor has put her on a new statin cholesterol drug - and she has NO side effects from it, like the other ones that ended her up in the hospital.  This new one is Crestor (for those of you who may have had reactions to the other statin drugs)

So with my cleaning having been accomplished and groceries stocked up, there is not much more to do than laundry which I shall probably start to do a couple of loads a day till it gets finished, depending upon how hard it is to walk up and down those stairs.  So while this portion of cycle is when I am supposed to be getting stronger, I know I am getting weaker.  We won't find out about the CAT scan results till next week when I see the doctor, let's pray for the best!

July 16, 2007 - After a couple of days of thinking about blood in sputnam, I decided it was stupid not to call someone about it - so I called the coumidin clinic.  The doctor there agreed with me, since there was no fever, no real trouble breathing and that, that I should just skip a pill - which I did.  Now the blood has stopped.  It sort of feels like when I had the bronchospy, that I have a hole in my lung - and I wouldn't be surprised if I was nicked during that procedure which is what ruptured open with my severe coughing from my aspiration.  Anyhow I am feeling pretty good - no real panting.  One thing that has happened which is good, with all the exercise even in doing daily things the last few weeks has strengthened my lower back muscles as my back does not ache as much, and it is much easier to turn over in bed without pain.  It's amazing how good muscle tone, even from as little as I do as standing and walking, has improved me.  I don't walk around hunched over as much anymore (only if I have a lot of walking to do like at the store).  My uncle, the priest called me yesterday to enquire about my health, he prays for me daily and says masses for me.  He has finally received 100 copies of his book, but the Claretian publishers pulled a fast one on him.  Even though they printed it and that, they decided NOT to carry it in the Los Angeles order's book store, so my uncle had to BUY 100 copies and sell them on his own.  At least they gave him a better deal on price and shipping than they did me, but he says they are selling like hotcakes to people he knows so he is very happy and says he will have to order another 100 copies soon.  I told him the one thing I did not like in his book was the "co-redemptionist" of Blessed Mary and I explained my feelings about it.  He agreed that "co" indicates equal but in reality the Church means subordinate but that her sacrifices were in the spirit of redeeming mankind.  I still have to think more about this as there is NO official statement about this matter from the church.  We talked about the Pope's decision on allowing Latin mass again, and he has volunteered himself to teach newer priest how to speak and read Latin since so many of them became priests after Latin was changed to the vernacular of the congregation.  Keep in mind that he is 88 now!  I went to the Vatican's website and read the actual letter of the Pope, and in essence he says this desire for Latin mass will integrate those splinter groups who broke from the church over this matter and eventually us old farts who knew the Latin mass will die out and then no one will want it anymore (not his exact words! LOL)  Two days until I find out about my latest CAT scan!

Update on Puppy - my niece had a meltdown this last week - she's been working double shifts and trying to finagle puppy and boyfriend and new roommate squabbles and it all became too much for her.  So boyfriend has been put on hold saying she needs some space, and puppy has come to live with Grandma for good, and she made up with her roommates.  Aunt Millie is ecstatic with happiness that puppy has come to stay for good! Grandma says Millie is acting like a pup again herself with new found energy.  Unfortunately Puppy has gotten used to Bailey as a name and trying to get her at 3 months to learn a different name is not working, so Grandma has shortened it to Bay. Grandma has suffered a few accidents, since she didn't know she was going to get Puppy for good and had no supplies on hand for Bay.  She has trained Bay to do a few things giving her treats of cheese - if it was me, I would be stuffing the pup with cheese getting her to come with a new name!

July 18, 2007 - Some really excellent news for today!  I went for chemo today and didn't have to have any!  The CAT scan shows NO tumors, so doctor says let's give you a two month break in chemo and then in Sept and Oct we will do chemo with a special addition that is suppose to get cancer cells at a single cell level.  We will do an Xray in Sept and if still no tumors I will be off chemo indefinitely with only 3 months checkups for two years!  She says less than 10% of lung cancer patients have this type of reaction to chemo.  So I am still in remission and it looks like she thinks I will remain in remission (God willing!).  I told her about the blood issue and she thinks it was probably aspiration as well.  I got an email that my blood workup from today was available to view online tonight, and I see that my red blood cell counts were all low again today, almost to the point of anemia again - which is probably why she decided on no chemo today.  But now I know that each day I will be getting stronger with this two months off chemo.  

Wouldn't you know it though, I started losing hair again last night from last month's chemo.  It had grown 1/4-1/2 inch in areas, but now falling out!  As I was leaving patient room today I told her my healing was due to God as I certainly had nothing to do with it (being that I still smoked).  

July 20, 2007 - I have been thinking about the "fatty liver" diagnosis on the CAT scan and think perhaps I should now take this time in the next two months to see my regular doctor.  My recent cholesterol levels were confusing, when I viewed them online and the cancer doctor didn't have much to say - but yesterday she made a quip about fatty liver being foies gras and being a delicacy!  Sorry doc, I have seen what cholesterol has done to my sister and I want to avoid stents in my heart and operations if I can do so!  And I still never got an answer whether chemo affects those levels, as everything had been perfect through last summer.  Interestingly enough, the coumidin clinic called me yesterday to say my blood was too thick and I was to pop two pill that night instead of one.  I advised them of the changes in chemo treatment (cause chemo affects how thick your blood might be).

My latest housework project has been getting rid of cockroaches!!!!! God, nothing gives me the screaming meamies than cockroaches.  Only once have I ever had them, in my house in Minnesota and we figured they came in on a dolly my husband had borrowed from BIL who worked for the housing authority.  I fought those with sprayed insecticide, and had to put every piece of food in cabinets in plastic bags.  I don't know if it is the extremely dry weather we have had for months, or where they are coming from.  Several years ago some tenants had problems and owner hired spraying company to spray around building, which was to continue monthly.  Then I only had to kill 2 roaches.  NOW I have killed 8 adults and about 5 babies!  Way too many for my comfort.  I asked and found out my caretaker (and her hobby is cleaning! LOL) at the other end of the building on ground level has had them, as well as the fellow downstairs below me. Now the guy downstairs has MS and is very dirty in his housekeeping.  And even though he has a caretaker to come in and do it for him, he got a lazy one who was not washing things and put back in cabinets dirty pots and pans unwashed. (so his mother told me recently).   So I am relieved that it was not my not washing dishes every night when I was sick, that may have caused this.  So I had to get down on my hands and knees and take thing out of all the lower cabinets and puff powder of boric acid around pipes and back of cabinets and mouldings.  I haven't seen any roaches last night or today - so I am hoping the couple of days since puffing has perhaps killed them?  I had even found one in the toilet bowl!  (flushed it away).  Ugh and Euwwww!

July 21, 2007 - Well the day has arrived for Harry Potter fans - the book is out!  I never did understand the hoopla about it, having started one of the books and after a couple of pages I put it aside.  Same with one of the movies.  It's written very simplistic (after all it is a Kid's book) and I was never one for witches and magic.  I think there is a real problem with magic (remember the dungeons and dragon and magic circles of a few years ago) in that people (kids grow up you know) look for exterior means of solving their problems - wave a wand and the problem is over.  The use of magic also seems to involve violence, killing their opponents (yeah, I know, It's the American way that the good guy wins).  So the absolutely good thing to come out of this is that (besides Rollings becoming a multi-millionaire from this) is that it is making kids read books.  Saying all that, having never read the books or seen the movies, the only way to kill off a series is to kill off the primary character - which means I guess Harry gets the ax! LOL

So far, good news on the cockroach front - none seen in day 3!!

As far as myself, I seem to be losing steam - begun to pant a bit in leaning over to pick up something - which means to me that my blood count is going lower still.  I can still wash dishes and cook meals - just means I will have to put aside my plans of shifting boxes in the second bedroom for awhile.  Now my niece from Eureka is coming down to So Calif around Aug 4 for business and is supposed to stop by.  Her mom (twin) volunteered her services for heavy lifting! LOL

July 27, 2007 - Well today was a real scorcher! 91 degrees.  I haven't been doing too much because when it gets really hot, I have trouble breathing.  I have had to break down and run the air conditioner for a few hours each night.  It's weird to run it from about 7 pm to 10pm, but the heat from the apartment below begins to rise at that time and that is when it is the hotest in my apartment.  So it's been too hot to make beads as well.  The guy below me has left for a month's vacation, so his apartment is all closed up and makes it even hotter.  The guy below me has MS and his mother came down to pick him up and take him on this vacation.  He lives on SSI disability and section 8.  I was talking to his mother about how food costs have been rising and how I have had to cut back on some of the things I used to buy at the grocery store.  So his mom and he came up with this plan - that I take his card to the food bank where he gets food and I use it to get food for MYSELF while he is gone.  They attached a note to his card that he "was too sick to come and get it himself" and that I was picking it up for him.  She brought up to me some of the stuff he received that he didn't want - frozen waffles, yogurt that is a month past due date, frozen okra, some hotdog and hamburger buns.  I feel bad, but except for the buns I wouldn't be eating any of that stuff anyway.  My using the card continues to make him eligible without having to recertify himself when he gets back.  But I didn't use it this week (I couldn't get myself up early enough to get there on their limited open hours).  But I am not sure I want to use it because it would be taking food away from people who really need it.  Then again, I could save the canned goods and that for him when he gets back.  So it puts me into a quandary .

The cockroach wars is still continuing!  After emptying shelves and spreading the boric acid powder, a couple of days later I found a couple more of the beasties!  So then I started spraying roach/bug killer around  in the kitchen- then a few more days of nothing, and then last night another one!  The apartment building got sprayed this week on the outside.  This is really frustrating - I can't walk into the kitchen or bathroom without my eyes darting around frenetically to see if I can spot one so I can kill it right away!  I know what I have to do.  I have this large pantry cabinet that I purchased because there is not enough room in my kitchen, and I use it to hold my food and some cooking equipment.  I shudder to think that I should just take everything out of it, and spray it really good too.  It will be so much work and I am not sure I have the strength to do it all at once - and where to put everything if I do it over a couple of days.  And I am not even sure that may be where the problem is - it could just be every couple of days a new bug comes up the pipes from outside or something.  But it is something I have wanted to clean out for some time, and my sister did do two shelves of it for me.  Twin seems to think if it is packaged and unopened (like cake mix) that it should be good forever - she even wanted me to keep cans of expensive canned fish that had rust on the cans!  But I read in the paper an article how dry goods can give you salmonella if they have been around for a long time, and my experience in opening one of those fish cans which had no bulging and that the fish was bad - so she agreed to throw it away. I remember when I returned to my apartment in Minnesota after being gone for 5 years and trying to decide what food to get rid of before I moved back to CA.  I called the peanut butter company asking about a jar that was never opened - they said toss it.  Unopened coffee and spices I kept and almost everything else I tossed.  Well I have some stuff here from mom's house, that I have never used, and just need to get rid of as well.  Basically the only cooking I do any more is quick things - broiled chicken and steak, nuked fish, frozen vegetables and tomato slices and sandwiches. Instant oatmeal or yogurt is generally all that is for breakfast for the rare times I eat breakfast.So why keep the things I don't use - I just need to get rid of them (do you know what unopened Nestle chocolate chips that are several years old taste like? Yuck)  

Northern Niece called me - looks like we will be getting together next weekend.  And Harry Potter did die, but is alive again - or so I hear! LOL Anyway, that is all for now.

August 3, 2007 - Another Hot, humid day here in So. Calif.  Experienced some weird things this morning - two times I got out of bed to visit the bathroom, I practically fell over.  I didn't even have a chance to feel dizzy - it was like one half of my body was gone and the other side of my body was falling toward the missing half.  I got up and swung my legs out from the bed and went to stand up - and bong - was gone.  Thankfully my arms worked and I managed to catch part of the small drawer night stand to stabilize my fall, and fell back into the bed.  Next time I tried getting out of bed, I sat up, swung legs over side of bed and waited a minute or two, and still the same thing happened.  When Mom was falling a lot, they said she had a decrease in blood pressure upon arising, so I am thinking perhaps it is the same thing happening to me.  But then the rest of the day I was OK, sitting and then standing with no problem.  So tonight I am moving my quad cane into the bedroom next to the bed so I have something to hold on to.  My sleeping has been so erratic the last few days so perhaps I took one to many blood pressure pills.  The last time it was read when I had chemo, the bottom part was 62 which my sister says is too low?  

I was really horrified by the collapse of Interstate 35W Bridge in Minneapolis St. Paul.  This was the freeway I used twice a day for many years to get to and from work. It is something everyone fears in going over a bridge (or under one too).  My off ramp for work was right where the Metrodome is.  It's really a shame that people who survive have "survivor guilt" and the only thing I can suggest is reading Thornton Wilder's book The Bridge over San Luis Rey - which is a story of people crossing a bridge in So America and how it's collapse impacted on those that survived and those that were related to those that died.  In a poignant way it brings to mind that God works in mysterious ways in that such a calamity brought reconciliation and love which would not otherwise be the case without the tragedy.  I worry about the poor workers who are going to be suffering because of trying to find other ways to work.  I was constantly late to work towards the end of my career - usually a minute or two late, because of traffic or accidents.  Even in bad weather when I would leave a hour or so earlier, I was still late.  I estimate this is going to increase travel time at least 2 hours a day for people living on the opposite side of the river trying to get to work (and I thank God, I don't have to be traveling that any more!).

Well the cockroach war May be succeeding - 6 days and no more in kitchen, but found two tiny little babies in bathroom.  I have not sprayed or laid down boric acid in there - waiting to see what happens there.

I went out to a lovely dinner with sis, BIL, niece from No. Calif and birthday niece.  WE all enjoy watching the cooking reality shows and had great time talking about them.  Hell's kitchen finale is on tomorrow night.  One of the new shows I enjoyed very much is Damages with Glen Close.  Initially it's on cable on the FX channel, but I see they re-ran pilot and first hour on channel 13 (regular programming).  All I could think of was Martha Stewart and Enron while watching it.  It may be difficult to just start watching having missed the first two hours - in that some of the story line is dependent upon knowing what happened previously.  Miss a show and you get too lost - which is what happened when I stopped watching Traveler which has disappeared from TV now.  I get really tired of the programming that shows you 4 shows then disappears for two months and then restarts with show 5, etc.  I have given up on more shows because of screwy programming.

Well not much else to say, so be careful !!

August 8, 2007 - Well today I finally felt better!  Saturday's dining out  tuckered me out - the humidity was high and I had trouble breathing and walking enough so my BIL gave me his arm and helped me walk to my car some distance in the crowded lot.  Still had vertigo, so I called and left message for doctor on Monday hoping to get an appointment.  The doctor called me back - this is my regular internist doctor and the sweetest guy!  He says 62 is perfect for BP.  He says inner ear can get confused causing the vertigo and for me to keep track of it and call him back next week if I am still having it.  He checked my blood test results on the computer and says I have nothing to worry about as far as cholesterol AND he also said chemo can skew those results (one relief!).  Anyhow thinking about the vertigo my sister had with the giant deficiency of magnesium in her diet prompted me to start taking one a day vitamins again.  Each pill has your daily ration of magnesium in it.  Even though cancer doctor told me to stop taking vitamins when we started chemo as it supposedly helped grow tumors, I have decided I cannot remain off them indefinitely since I don't eat well and don't get enough vitamins from what I eat. The last two days, with it being so hot, all I had to eat was a bowl of soup and cheese quesedeas.   And after two days I am feeling better, enough so I was able to take the car to the mechanic and get smog test done, then run up to auto club to get my stickers renewed, and then on to local lab to get blood drawn for coumidin testing.  And I did all this walking around without the problems I had just had on Saturday! It was hot today, but not as humid, so that helped.  I am hoping I can get to laundry tomorrow.

Still no new cockroaches in kitchen, and found another baby one in bathroom last night.  I guess I should spray in there and shut the door and hope that takes care of the rest of the babies?  You wonder what I do all day long?  I read, and read - must be on my 45th book since twin visited here!

August 12, 2007 - Well I continue to have vertigo, but it's changed from a downright falling vertigo to a drunken sailor when walking vertigo.  In the meantime, I have had 2 days of a lot of dizziness and nausea, which didn't seem to be consistent with the vertigo and may have been a flu?  The vertigo only happens when I get up from my bed - so it's livable.  Doing some research, I do see that chemo therapy can cause vertigo - especially the type of med I have used - but it seems to be a more all day type vertigo than what I have.  I only have it the first few minutes upon arising, and then it's gone for the day.  Otherwise, everything is going OK.  Still warm weather and no rain here!  Not much else to say for now!

August 18, 2007 - The older I get the more I think people are weird!  My next door neighbors moved out yesterday, having done so in two days.  Can you believe after 3 years living next door, they didn't even say goodbye to me?  I think of all the times I have received packages for them, how obliging I have been (to the detriment of my own car) to park as close to the garbage cans so my neighbor (big and fat) can park on the line so he has enough room to get out of his car.  I say to my detriment as I have scrapped my car, hit the mirror, etc on those darn trash cans getting over or otherwise I cannot get out of my car because of the way they parked!  All day long, in and out of their apartment, my door was open with just the screen door so they knew I was up and not one knock saying so long, it's been nice to know you!  The lady who I don't like who recently lifted up my carryall also has moved out a week ago.  So we now have 2 empty apartments on the upstairs.  

Today I was up and about and down to the library to pick up some books I ordered held for me via the internet.  It sure is convenient to check the library catalog while you are at home using the computer - you can also renew your books through the computer!  Getting out of the car and turning to the back door I stumbled with vertigo and caught my self by holding the car.  I have started to notice I am a bit rocky on my feet the last couple of days and I am beginning to think this is not just "positional vertigo" as the doctor stated.  I will keep track of it and just hope I don't take a fall.  I did check, and some chemo does give you side effects of vertigo.  So I may go through cancer doctor.

 One nice thing today, I noticed my car had been washed again. The caretaker's daughter hoses down the parking lot.  Through the years I have "loaned" her money for tight spots, and never been paid back.  Then I started noticing since my chemo, that my car would be washed down.  My car sits right under the only wires coming into the building, and the lovely little birds just love to sit on it and poop on my car and window.  With not going out much (maybe 3-4 times a month) my car gets real dirty from the particulate in the air, as well as these little bird droppings.  So I noticed the car being washed occasionally and had thanked her.  Well about two weeks ago I approached her and told her that I really appreciated all she had done in washing my car the times that she had, and that I "forgave" her debt to me and that I thought her generosity to me deserved that as a reward for her kindness.  She protested that she hadn't done it for a reward, and I said I know it.  So again today I see she has washed my car again!

August 23, 2007 - Well God sure gave me a comeuppance yesterday -- a lesson in judge not that you be judged!  Remember how I was saying how weird it was that the next door neighbor didn't even bother to say goodbye?  Well yesterday in talking to the owner and caretaker about the cockroach problem, I found out from caretaker that the big burly man who lived next door and had moved out,  has cancer and will be starting chemotherapy next week!! Even the owner didn't know this.  Evidently the neighbor had had cancer a few years ago and gone through chemo and had been in remission and now it has started back up again  in his lymph glands under his arm through his upper breast area and it has progressed up neck (just now discovered with large swelling in his breast area)  and now they were worried that it was going to his brain.  My God, not a peep out of him about previous cancer, even when we had discussed my cancer back in December.  

The cockroach wars continue.  I finally was able to take all the foodstuff out of my large pantry cabinet and clean shelves and wiggle the cabinet out so I could spray and power well behind it and to the side - and re stocked my shelves looking at the dates on the cans and that.  One can my sister evidently was loathe to throw away was a can of clam chowder soup with a second can of clams affixed to it.  Date on that can was Oct 92 - must have come from mom's house.  I threw away all the cake mixes too that I know I have had for years.  I think I had read somewhere that old cake mixes could give you salmonella because of the powder eggs in them - don't know - just threw them.  Just that effort took me almost a whole day to do.  Then I had been finding single cockroaches, who must come up to my tile countertop to squirt out some little babies cause when I flip on a light all the pencil sized babies run everywhere and I squish them dead and then get the mom.  Some babies were on my bread board, so I took out both drawers and bread board and sprayed the wood underneath the countertop.  Then I go a couple of days without seeing anything, then another one pops up!  Then I respray the area under the sink and then found one in the plastic cabinets of tupperware.  Then I haul things out of there and spray some more - almost done with a whole bottle of roach spray.  So now I am waiting to find another one somewhere?

God I hate cockroaches.!!!  The caretaker told the owner that one day she watched a trail of bugs climbing up the outside of the building going into a hole somewhere under my outside window!  Anyhow he mumbled something about having a professional come in to spray for them.  I am not sure I have the physical strength to remove everything from all the kitchen cabinets at once and where would I put it?  It only takes one roach to stay in some container if everything is put on living room floor - to come back and haunt you with reinfestation.  Where would Kellie and I go for a whole day for professional bug spray to permeate my apartment, and would I be able to breath it coming back to the apartment with how bad my asthma could be.  

My sleeping pattern is so screwed up now, I can hardly think of how I can correct it.  Sometimes my body just runs on high octane and I will stay awake 18-20 hours before I can go to sleep.  So then I am going to bed at 9 am - 10 am and sleeping to 5 pm.  I try going to bed earlier taking my anti-depressants which is suppose to make me sleep - and I still am awake.  I try going to sleep at 11 pm - wake up after an hour and get up and read a while, then try sleep again, and again and again.  And while I valiantly try to get more regulated again - then I will get another weird all nighter and be thrown off track again.  It's to the point when I start chemo again I guess I will have to stay up all night and day to get the chemo and then go to sleep.  I told my sister this sleep problem has been getting worse since I stopped taking female hormones in Jan. Somehow with my remission I just don't have the courage to start taking the hormones again - since we know that they encourage cancer growth.   I just seem to be out of step with the whole world!

The last couple of days have been nice - our heat wave has broken.  I just wish we could get some of the rain they are having in the midwest.  While I have been doing more physically - I still seem to be real tired and having to do things in spurts, but at least somethings are getting done.  I seem to be recovering quicker - like I took down my garbage and threw it away and walked to get my mail and had to rest catching my breath for a few minutes, then collect the mail and walk back upstairs.  Then rest and get up and make dinner, then rest, then do the dishes and back on the computer here again.  My life is lived in tiny increments of activities and while it would not constitute "living" according to my little sister, it's a living I will take!

August 30, 2007 - It's been very hot here again - in the 90s and 100s with humidity in teens and 20's.  I am able to tough it out with just a fan until about 7 pm at night when the accumulated heat from the apartment below rises to suffocate me.  I had another all nighter of no sleep, so I am completely whacked out of schedule again.  I don't know why but I find myself very weak again so I can only conclude that I still have anemia.  Someone said it takes about a year to get over anemia, but who knows.  I am still having vertigo when I get up from bed, and it's lasting a few steps beyond that.  The cockroach wars continue and I am beginning to find some sympathy for them, even as I am killing them.  They are desperate for water - they are now trying to get to the cat's water bowl and the cat's water cup in the bathroom.  Tonight I am playing a game on the kitchen table and one skitters by on the table!!!!!  It was about one half grown one, so out comes the spray and the table, chairs, wall and floor are sprayed good.  And for good measure all the cabinets are sprayed and doors shut.  Pretty soon I will be poisoning myself with all this spraying.  

And interesting sight the last time I was out that I meant to mention - I saw a palm tree with dates on it!  In all the years of California living I have never seen dates on a palm tree. It was a small palm about 4-5' high and had a ring of what looked to be peculiar growth around where the palm leaves come out and upon squinting and look real good as I drove by with my car, I could see individual dates.  It just astounded me. Have you ever wondered what manna from heaven was?  Have you wondered about the Tree of Life that is supposed to have 12 different kinds of fruits on it.  Have you ever stopped to think of all the fruit that does grow on trees and how if they were all in one garden, no one would ever go hungry? In growing up we had an orange and peach tree as well as a fig tree in our backyard.  I was in "hog heaven" when the peaches and oranges were ripe to eat and to this day I still cannot abide store bought ones that never fully ripen.  

In about two weeks I am supposed to go for chemo again.  My hair has grown almost an inch in some areas and I suppose I will lose it all again with two months of chemo.  Then we will find out from blood tests about anemia or not.  Well that's it for this month!

September  3, 2007 - Hope you all had a fun Labor Day Weekend.  Today we hit 107 degrees in Whittier, CA.  I can't remember it ever being this high before.  Yesterday sis in Lake Elsinore had a 4.7 earthquake and two microbursts of torrential rain of an hour's duration each and high gusting winds.  So all I have been doing is trying to stay cool and use as little air conditioning as possible - though today I just gave up and ran AC all day.  I have to call tomorrow to get my chemo appointment since this is the month I start chemo again for two months.  This chemo cocktail is supposed to have something additional in it so I hope I can still do it by myself.  I still have the vertigo upon arising, and I still find myself somewhat weak and I still find my sleeping all screwed up.  So not much has changed there.  I still also have the bug problem.  Been real bored with reading and playing computer games and started working on a website for my friend as another way to entertain myself.  I also am thinking of getting down some watercolor stuff and maybe try some painting - not that I was any good at that.  My twin is doing real good and when she came to visit she brought a painting for my niece's 21st birthday and it just knocked my socks off!! Both me and my sis (mother of the niece) were jealous cause we would have wanted it.  We both have pics of a lighthouse from her earlier work - but this latest stuff was fantastic.  Twin has really improved so dramatically and it really shows in her work.  Me, I am just a kindergarten pupil splashing in bright colors - but that's alright for me to have fun with.  To be a really good watercolor artist you have to have patience - waiting for the water to dry, and I was never any good at that kind of patience.  When I did this before, it was when mom was alive so I could do it on the patio, leave it while doing other chores, and return to it and it would be dry.

Here are a couple of my past feeble attempts at watercolor.

September 8, 2007 - We have been blessed with much cooler weather the last couple of days.  What a relief!  The temps have supposedly been in mid 80s but feel like balmy 70s to me, having a nice breeze that runs through my living room and kitchen.  It's almost been too cool at night, making me wear slippers and robe.  Cool enough so I have made a few beads experimenting with some suggestions from my beadmaker's chat boards.  My friend Joan in Minnesota celebrated her birthday this month, and though I remembered the night before, I forgot to call the day of, and then that happened two more times!  And when I did remember it was too late at night to call her with the time difference.  She sure is having a difficult time with her husband deteriorating and in a nursing home, and having a disabled son.  When Medicare stops paying his nursing home bill, it's going to cost her over $8000 a month for his care.  She is being worn to the nubbins in caring for both the men in her life, so please say a few prayers for her continued health and well being.  Everything is fine with my family.  I called to get chemo appointment, the doctor had said in July how about Sept 12?  So I said OK but was never contacted for an appointment.  Found out she's gone on vacation that day and for 2 1/2 weeks so I can't get in till Sept 28.  Not much going on here - seems I am down to just baby cockroaches which is all I have seen (and killed) lately.  I am getting somewhat concerned with the Raid spray, reading the back of the can is quite scary and it says if you get the spray on your skin you are to flush your skin for 20 minutes!!!!  So I am trying not to poison myself with the stuff.  I have moved Kellie's food and water to an area where I don't spray, as it is harmful to animals as well. For funsies I have been working on a website for Susan, who was my beadmaking student and friend.  She sells beads on Ebay that she imports from China, and some of the beads are quite lovely but they do not anneal them nor clean out the bead release.  But many people are willing to buy them despite those facts, so they can sell cheap bracelets and other jewelry made with them. As Susan says, there is a market for both types of beads - those that want higher quality, fresher colors and techniques in beads versus those wanting a cheaper alternative.  And I have no beef with that.  If I can make her a nice website and people go there, it will save her a ton of money in ebay fees. My sleeping is still screwed up - thinking of contacting my shrink and asking for sleeping pills even though I did not like the woozies they gave me when I tried them5 years ago.  I used one of them a couple of weeks ago and they did nothing for me.  In relating this to my sister she was aghast that I used them because meds degrade and have different effects and inter-reactions when they are old.  I don't know how to get rid of them though.  I was reading an article in the paper that said our daily water supply is getting so filled with medications ,that people just dump down the toilet,  that they cannot be filtered out through normal water treatment processing.  Guess it's something else I will have to save for a twice a year hazardous waste disposal day?  That's all for now! 

September 11, 2007 -  Not much happening here - still no new tenants for the two vacant apartments.  Weather has been decent, but can't say I have seen much of it going to bed at 7-9 am and getting up at 4-5pm.  Through information on one of the chat boards I have come to find out about IP addresses, which is the company you call with your internet connection.  With IP addresses you can sometimes tell where someone has come from that was looking over your webpages and that.  My hosting company for these cancer pages and a couple of tutorials I have on beadmaking keep a log of everyone who has clicked on my pages.  It has been interesting to see that people far away as Finland and Germany have clicked on the beadmaking tutorials and people from all over the US have clicked on the cancer pages.  Beadmaking is truly an international community and people I don't even know are interested in my well being and my information on techniques of beadmaking.  Just think what the world was like 50 years ago - television was just starting and news was broadcast via "newsreels" at the movie theater and primary source of info was the newspaper.  Yet 6 years ago we knew within minutes, here in the US and the whole world, of the attack on the twin towers in New York and we had pictures showing us the devastation.  It truly is becoming a small world, with connections to people all over the world so that not just US citizens were killed on 9/11, but citizens from all over the world were killed that day as well.  For my parent's, the "Day of Infamy" was Pearl Harbor, and for my generation it was the World Trade Center on 9/11/2001. More people were killed in the 9/11/2001 attack than the day at Pearl Harbor (I checked on this, military and civilians) yet Pearl Harbor left us with a clear cut enemy and 9/11 has left us with will o'wisps of just terrorists. Most of us cannot understand why these terrorists hate us so.  I still don't understand it to this day.  

September 17, 2007 - It's been nice and cool here lately and I am enjoying it.  I woke up to find my front door wide open today and it sort of has me scared.  I called the caretaker to see if she had come up to check on me, or had given the key to a tenant prospect without accompanying them and she said no to both.  So how did my front door get open?  Nothing was missing.  My routine is to go to the door, lock it, turn off the light, then the fan, then the kitchen light and then walk to bathroom in the dark.  I have a special door brace which I can use, but it scares me to do so in case of an emergency they couldn't get into the apartment through the door.  So is this just an incidence where I blame myself for negligence or is it something else.  If the door is open part way, it will swing open because of the cracks from earthquake causing that area to be not level anymore.  I find I am having more vertigo incidents (whirling) while walking or standing now involving turning my head.  I am trying to keep track of it.  My lymphedema has gotten worse and pain in foot and the rushing tingling sensation of water leaving the foot has kept me awake.  Tylenol Extra strength doesn't do a thing for me, and so I have been taking the forbidden ibuproferen pills and cutting back on my coumidin to do so.  I am so tired and weary of the roaches, for the most part I am killing lots of babies that look the size of ants.  I started making some beads for Beads of Courage, which is an organization that works with kids who have serious illnesses.  For each procedure the kids get a lampwork glass bead, with purple hearts for the really scary stuff.  So I started making some purple hearts to send to them, knowing kids would enjoy any bead I made and I would not have to worry about how perfect it was.  I don't mean I would send lousy ones.  It's just so hard for me to be happy with anything I make anymore, that this would provide a nice relief for me and perhaps get my ass in gear to making beads again.  Beads of Courage - http://www.beadsofcourage.net/howtohelp.htm

There has been discussion on one chat board about the new biography of Mother Theresa and how she felt God had abandoned her for 50 years in not talking to her. I have read all the female doctor's (saints)of the faith in Catholicism and it always has bothered me how they feel that God should be conversing with them on a regular basis. They didn't look to the GIFT God gave them, instead looked at it as deprivation for not having further contact. Why should one feel abandoned by God when he doesn't talk to them, instead of feeling so full of his love for when he did talk to them? That alone should be enough for steadfastness in knowing of God's love for one and all mankind. My one experience is sufficient unto itself to last me a lifetime and to know one is never abandoned by God.

September 21, 2007 - As I am writing here, we are having a good drenching rain.  It sounds wonderful!  We had a earlier rain a couple of nights ago which only lasted a short time.  This rain seems to be a good soaking rain which we have not had in many, many months.  I like rain, it cleans the air and everything seems to spring alive after it is over.  Course, that is the life giving rain here, and not the monsoons that destroy crops, make rivers leave their boundaries and flood homes and businesses.  Earlier this week I had my one great day this month, meaning I was feeling strong, able to walk and breathe and get some things done.  It had been 17 days since I had left my apartment because I just generally felt bad.  And after that one day of good, another 18 hour days of not being able to sleep and now a bad day when I am feeling pain and generally not good.  But I have been making some beads again, making purple hearts.  Not a lot, just enough to keep me going.  I continue to work on my friend's website - it is going to be a lot of work since she has so many beads to sell.  It entails changing all the names of the pictures so they will work with my program, and resizing some of them, then an individual page for each bead.  She has 522 auctions running on ebay, and some are duplicates, but about 400 are individual beads.  Fewer roaches are being found, mostly baby ant sized ones in the kitchen.  Went a week without one in the bathroom.  I got to thinking about the guy downstairs - I bet he isn't doing any spraying or anything to kill the roaches in his apartment which ends up meaning his apartment is breeding them and then they wander upstairs to me.  I am going to have to talk to him about it.  Remember, this is the guy who was gone for the month - and no one home to kill roaches during that time.  I found on my door handle a bag of food he didn't want from the food shelf that he had received, another bag of rice and some bread and muffins.  I immediately put bread and muffins in frig and two days later the bread had mold started on it so I threw it away.  Makes me wonder at some of the food that shelter is giving away, expired dates on yogurt and now almost moldy bread.  

Twin is on vacation to the coast of Croatia - I know, where on earth is that??? It is on the main land of Europe to the side and up from England.  Who on earth wants to go there?  Well they do.  She has been practicing biking for about 9 months (when she came here in June I expected her to have been trim and fit with all these 10 mile bike rides) on this 20 speed bike - which means not a whole lot of muscle power pushing that bike.  Evidently they are going to bike ride through a lot of the countryside which looks a lot like where she lives right now.  Then they are taking a "tramp steamer" up the coast and may see some ruined castle or two.  Anyhow the whole family went.  

I got a new book at the library and started reading it today and finished it in under 4 hours.  I couldn't put it down.  It was a real humorous chick book that I recommend for some laughs - The Sleeping Beauty Proposal by Sarah Strohmeyer.  I am going to get the rest of her books to read as well.

If you have DSL, there is a video on ABC news of a college professor's last class that is real inspiring and heart warming to listen to.  He has pancreatic cancer, but really doesn't talk about that, instead he talks about life's dreams and challenges and how to get on with living life.  You may want to watch it at here.

September 28, 2007 - What a unusual day that did not end up at all like I thought it would!  This is the day I was supposed to start chemotherapy again, but it got too late in the day for that.  It started with me being awake all night again!  I thought I would perhaps get sleepy at 2-3 am for at least a couple of hours sleep seeing as I had arisen at 3 pm on Thursday.  Nope, nothing worked to get me to sleep so I was still awake at 7 am when I did start feeling tired, but had to stay awake cause doctor appointment was at 10 am.  First thing, go to car and it won't start.  What the heck is this?  I last drove it Wed and returned in the darkness but the lights were turned off - but still no turn over on the car.  Had to call Auto Club and wait for them to arrive and give me a jump.  So I was a little bit worried about getting home, and arrived for my blood taking late (supposed to be there 1 hour early and was only 20 minutes early).  Then I sat and waited for doctor, wishing by then that I could go home and go to bed.  When I saw doctor, I told her about how rotten I have been feeling since I last saw her and about the onset of the vertigo and progression of such, and how my sleeping habits have been so whacked out.  Then she says --- "This could indicate a brain tumor!  I am sure my mouth dropped open with that one.  I said some web research indicated anemia and or chemo can cause vertigo - and she replied looking at the blood tests today, that I do not have anemia.  She indicated it was imperative that I have an immediate brain CT scan, because if I did have brain tumor that we needed to start radiation this weekend.  So she called chief doctor of CT imaging, and sent me down there for a brain scan.  So again I was doing a lot of waiting, cause they were slipping me in, in between regular appointments.  After almost an hour of waiting, the receptionist gets a call asking why I was there for CT scan, and I could hear my name being mentioned, but they never said anything to me.  So I finally went up and said, would you do me the courtesy of telling me what that phone call was about - well they were stammering a bit, but turns out my initial receptionist put me on the list for chest CT scan (different department) and they were wondering why I was waiting for them when it was brain scan that was needed.  So 15 minutes after that call the brain scanners called my name and took me in.  Back upstairs to doctor to wait, saw her again and she says no brain tumors (thank goodness) so it must be inner ear problem for which she will give me medication, shaking her head at GP doctor not doing anything about it.  Then she brightly says, well we might as well get your chest XRay - so again sends me down to the same department again, to sit and wait and get the chest xray which I am to bring back upstairs to her again.  Now why we couldn't do both the first time I was there, I don't know - unless it would have been overkill to get chest xray of possible lung tumors when one has brain tumors?  Anyhow, more waiting and back upstairs again and find out NO new tumor growth.  So I am clean in both "heart and mind", LOL!  So now we discuss ongoing treatment (cause she couldn't remember why she wanted to see me in Sept since July was so long ago).  She wants me to have Avastin therapy which is extremely, extremely expensive - for two months (as I envision her seeing my head of 1 inch hair acting as if I am going to protest it).  I replied that is why I was there, to start the chemo again based upon whatever she wanted me to do.  She says this is a milder chemo than I have had, so I should be able to tolerate it with no problem.  So again, by this time it was 3 pm, it was too late to start the chemo today so I have to come back next Tuesday. She gave me a prescription to help sleeping which is simply the anti-nausea pill, which makes most people sleepy but never had that effect on me, so I am to take 2 at bedtime and we will see.  So walking back to the car, using my handy dandy wheelchair, I once again marvel how I have had the resilance to do so much walking today - I guess my gumption to getting something done when I really have to get it done out weighs my regular doldrums sitting here in my apartment.  Thankfully the car did start and off home with me. I still had some nausea pills and decided to skip getting prescriptions today because I was so tired by then.

BTW I was wrong about Croatia - it's to the right of Italy across the sea next door to Bosnia! I got an email from twin at a internet cafe saying they were having a good time.   I talked to caretaker last night telling her I still had roaches and mentioned I didn't think the apartment below me was doing anything about roach control and she is going to find out for me what's what.  Just finished another Sarah Strohmeyer book, The Cinderella Pact, and again another good book with lots of laughs for us girls! I also did a coumidin blood test today and they called me - my blood was too thick - and then I confessing my sins and how I was self adjusting coumidin thinking Ibuproferen was making my blood thinner - which it generally does NOT.  (so I wonder why I was told not to take it?) 

Well that's all from the trenches!

October 3,2007 - Well I finally got my chemo today after two days of my car not starting - last Friday and Tuesday.  Tuesday Auto Club checked the battery and said it was good, so I cancelled chemo and rescheduled it for Wed. and drove down to the auto garage.  They spent about a half hour on it and said battery was good and charging but something was draining 1 amp an hour from it and it would take more time to try and find the short.  So I am to bring it back Thursday.  So last night at midnight I went down and started my car and let it run a bit, and so it did start up this morning so I got to chemo OK.  Chemo was boring as usual and for some reason I was edgy and really hating the time it took to do this.  Then when I left, I felt somewhat sick even though they give you a mild nausea pill.  On the way home I swung by Taco Bell and picked up a few thinking maybe getting some food on my stomach was needed.  Really felt sick when I got into my apartment and went and immediately took another anti-nausea pill.  Then I ate my tacos and I felt better but tired so I went in for nap for 2 hours.  I didn't sleep well the night before - down for an hour, up for three hours, and then down again waking to the alarm clock.  I met an interesting old little black woman in the blood testing room named Lila.  She was really emeciated at 105 pounds.  She spoke with a slur saying she had a stroke last year.  Sometime during her life she had fallen into a fire and lifted up her blouse to show me her skin and breast - what a horrendous ordeal that woman has been through.  She liked my current 1 1/2 inch hairdo and said I should keep it like this!  

Found three more roaches last night in kitchen sink after several days of not sightings - course I found them after my one hour of sleep which is when they feel confident to come out, whereas the previous two nights I had been able to sleep straight through.

Interesting thing - I get my yearly calender from my uncle's order and flipping the page to October, there was this quote that seem to have summed up my last year since most of this started with me.  "I sought the Lord, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears."  Psalm 34:4

Sister called me from San Francisco airport yesterday - they made it back from Croatia OK and in spite of being up since 3:30 that morning they were going to drive the 5 hours back up to Eureka since their daughters had to go to work today.  I was ansty about them getting back safely - checking the internet airline arrivals and that.  

Well I am off to start the car again tonight, so I shall see you all later!

October 7, 2007 - What a thrill tonight!  Course we know it doesn't take much to thrill me, but tonight I saw a HumVee Limousine parked in the alley behind my apartment (I'd never seen one before) and as I went down to take out the trash I was talking to the driver and he let me inside to see it.  He brought it to show his brother and sister in law who lived in the building behind me.  He had come by earlier, and I had seen him maneuver it down the alley backwards, because the length of it would not allow him to make the turn down at the end of the alley.  The Limo was the length of 3 pickup trucks and the inside was really neat with contouring seats and psychedelic type lighting and all the amenities - and by golly if it was me that had tons of money I would have one of these babies hauling me around!  So if you are in the LA area, be sure to call Aba Unique Limousine if you want a Hummer! LOL  Oh yes, it turns out the SIL is also a cat feeder and has been feeding the alley cats - I told them how I had to stop feeding them in March when I knew I would be too tired out from my chemo to continue doing so.

The last couple of days have been different from earlier chemos - I have had some nausea and basically feeling achy as if I had the flu, you know with joint and bone pains.  I was going to take my car into the mechanics on Thursday and so Wed I night I went down to start the car and it wouldn't start.  I only have one more free start thru auto club, so since I didn't feel good I just skipped Thursday.  So Friday after I got up and was feeling somewhat better, I sat down to call auto club.  Something inside me said to me to go down and try to start the car once again, and instead I shook off that feeling cause I didn't really want to go up and down the stairs twice, so I called auto club.  The guy came, and this time wanted to see my auto club card, so I got back into the car to get my purse and just tried to start the car and low and behold the darn thing started right up!  The guy didn't even get the hood open! So I blew my last free start and am shaking my head thinking I NEVER pay attention to my intuition!  Anyhow I made a quick stop at the grocery store and then went on down to the mechanics and then they drove me home and helped me up with my groceries.  So now they have the car for as long as they need to find out where that short or whatever is causing these problems.  I never had any problems like this before and this only happened after they did that electrical work on my column.  So we shall see!

Twin is back from Croatia and had a wonderful trip.  Evidently the cruise they were on was a biking cruise, the ship would put into a port, people would take off on bikes and meet up with ship at next port.  Twin was only able to do 2 bike trips because none of them was easy and most were up mountainous roads which were just too much for her.  The Romans built a lot of stuff on that coast line and they got to see something like the Parthenon which was much more preserved than the one in Rome.  They also got to hear the music of the sea which is something where steps of concrete and spaced holes that receive the air currents that drive the sea onto the promontory of the concrete steps and those wind current blow into the holes creating music.  I could even listen to it on the internet and while discordant it is also soothing. http://www.oddmusic.com/gallery/om24550.html   Twin was bowled over by the sense of history - the sheer age of the place compared to our unique 200 year history here in USA.  

October 18, 2007 - I was a bad mommy last night - I set fire to the cat's tail! I sit at the kitchen table using my laptop. When the cat figures out when she's done sleeping where she wants, she jumps up on the table and sashays back and forth in front of me and the keyboard. Her back is so high that it forceably brushes my throat and her tail is waving around under my nose - so I usually push her away again and again and again. I take her feet out from underneath her to sit down, but she pops up again. Anyhow I went to light a cigarette when the tail brushed over the lighter and poof her hair caught on fire! I quickly dropped the lighter and put both hands on the tail fur to put out the fire and she was fine and didn't even know anything had happened to her!

I've been reading some delightful books on a site Internet Archive. The most interesting book is one on how people lived in colonial times and the author well researched everything and dug up old photos to illustrate implements used.(Use the Djvu setting to read the actual book that has the pictures) http://www.archive.org/details/homelifecolonial00earlrich

I got chemo yesterday - it went ok but still have nausea a bit. Went to vacumn bedroom today and only got half way done (with attending bending over to move things) cause it made me too sick to do all at one time. My car is finally fixed, seems it was the anti-theft device (where you pass a key fob across it before the engine will start) that was shorting out, so they had to remove it. Thankfully that was only $75.   Since the car is 11 years old and dinged I doubt if anyone want to steal it now! LOL  My friend Susan took me down to pick up the car and found out that her daughter has moved back in with them, with her family, in the small "mother-in-law" type house they have in the back yard.  Which is why I probably have not seen or heard much from her since March.  We have had several days of rain off and on - usually rains at night.  The cockroach problem seems to be abating, only seeing one maybe one a week now so maybe the rain has caused them to go back to their usually habitat - outside my apartment!

I find myself in a real depression full of apathy.  I have lost interest in most things - I tape TV shows I don't watch.  All I do is read books - even making something to eat is a trial like it's too much bother .  I've stopped loving and petting and grooming Kellie like I used to do - which is why she is so cantankerous. I wear the same clothes over and over again,except when I go out.  And I rarely go out but once or twice a month and for chemo or doctor visits.  I think it's time to call the shrink for an appointment- perhaps new medication is needed.  I've gotten a lot worse since I stopped taking hormones and I am thinking this is chemical imbalance because of that.   

October 24, 2007 - Not much change has happened to me lately except I have lost 2/3rds of my hair and now have to start wearing caps when I go out.  I still have nausea and some vertigo.  I have been trying to do things in weeding out things and have gone through my paper back books and filled 5 boxes of books to get rid of which has only given me 2 free shelves in one bookcase!  My 4 bookcases have hardback books stacked on top of them reaching the ceiling, and I am bound to go through them and reshelve on open area and try to get rid of more books.  At the same time I am going through kitchen cabinets and getting rid of things I have not used in years and probably never will again (nobody ever visits here much less eats here - everyone want to eat out when we get together!)  So why do I need so many tupperware containers, two sets of cookware (my own and mom's) egg poachers, rolling pins and pie equipment, canning supplies, and on it goes.  The downstair neighbors said they could use the kitchen stuff to sell, but not the books which I shall somehow get down to my car to take to the friends of the library.  So at present I just fill up boxes and stack them - also been going through clothes to get rid of as well.  Keep in mind this is done in a very slow pace due to fatigue and dizziness, but it is getting done. I had ordered some books through the library and went down to pick them up tonight.  They were all cooking books of the great chefs seen on the TV reality cooking shows.  Looking through them I couldn't find a single reciepe I would want to make - either they were so complex and time consuming, or their ingredients so prohibitively expensive.  I was disappointed in Chef Gordon Ramsay's book I got as someone stole the CD from the book - and the recipes were so thoroughly british.  In the meantime in talking to my sister last night I find she has turned herself into a Vegan in the last month and now the taste of beef, chicken or fish makes her sick.  I was checking out the Ramsay books because she enjoys his program so much I was thinking of getting one of his books for Christmas for her.  So much for that thought!  Christmas dinner which she usually prepares should be interesting since she makes oyster dressing, a family recipe, and turkey.  She says she has lost 12 pounds since doing this.  But she also has had an onset of severe pain in one side of her face with no known reason and serious dizziness where the doctor says she can't drive right now, and has seen dentist and specialist who ran an MRI on her and can't find anything wrong.  I just don't think you can change your body's chemistry so fast without it having an effect - like if I was suddenly to start eating spinach a lot I would thin my blood way too thin to be taking the same amount of coumidin that I do.  In fact, in just starting this new chemo has caused my blood to thin way down to twice of what it was.  

BTW I am far from the fires and only had a little smoke in the air yesterday. What an ecological disaster for all the wildlife of the area.  Houses can be rebuilt but it takes tens of years for the growth to comeback and the wildlife.  Can't think much else to say - Despite what people have said about Homeland Security, the evacuation plans put into effect in the various counties has been superb!

October 31, 2007  BOO! Happy Halloween to you all!  (always disappointing to me as no kids trick or treat here) Today was the third treatment of this new drug called Avastin. Another long boring day.  Doctor's appointment at 10 am, saw her about 12:15.  She was real pleased with herself today, smiling like a Cheshire cat.  She told me that I am her FIRST ever patient that had a CT scan show cancer tumors and then a later CT scan saying no tumors and latest tests showing no reocurrance 8 months later.  She was tickled pink!  I told her to write it up and make medical history! LOL By this time all my hair is gone again.  I told her I have been tired and having mild nausea and depression and that I am trying hypnosis to quit smoking.  This hypnosis is thru community ed and it isn't a Quit right now thing, it's quit at your own pace.  I'd been to this lady 6.5 years ago and paid for 3 visits but went to only one - and then had to  finish packing up mom's house since it had been sold, go back to MN and pack up my apartment there then come back here and find an apartment that would take a cat - all within a month.  I don't seem to get hypnotized by her but I shall go again this week and she tells me the other two visits are still good for individual sessions , so I will be doing them too.  I have been to about 10 hypnotists thru the years and it only has worked once - I got into a fight back then with sis and started smoking again.  By the time I looked them back up they were out of business.  Doctor thinks perhaps I have PST, having spent all my time and thought on preparing for dying, and now the realities have hit me.  Nope, I think it's chemical in nature (remember lack of hormones) and just taking this chemo has thinned my blood to where my coumidin level were good again today.  My next chemo is Nov 14, and two weeks later I should have lost the effects of that chemo and think I will get shrink appointment which also will run blood test on serontonin levels as well.  Doctor said she would be happy if I just quit down to even 3-4 cigarettes a day.  She indicated that continuing to smoke could cause "field" tumors where the path of the smoke goes to the lungs, meaning mouth, esophagus, etc. - not a regrowth of the original tumors.  So that's where I am today.  I now have 8 boxes of books to give to the friends of the library and I got a notice this week that they are stuffed to the gills with books and have no room for storage so they hope a lot of people will buy books during this upcoming bi-annual book sale!  I do to - so I can give them these books! (almost all Scifi books)

November 4, 2007- Hello Everyone, time for an update.  I have been really getting sick from nausea and been popping those pills.  While my scale doesn't show any weight loss, I know I have been eating less (like soups) and my clothes are a little bit easier to wear.  Two interesting things this week - I went to the second hypnosis session (didn't work) and low and behold the woman came and gave me the worry stone I had left in her office 6 1/2 years ago!  I almost didn't go because I was feeling poorly.  My mom used to collect rocks where ever she went (sshh, don't tell anyone, she even took some from national parks!) and sort of had a small rock garden with succulents that my grandfather had raised and gave her.  When I had to leave her house after selling it, this was the one small rock I chose to take with me, as it is shaped real different and was like a worry stone with a grove large enough for a thumb print on it. She said it was April 9, 2001 that I had left it there - she looked it up.  Then I dragged myself down to the library this week to pick up some books I had ordered, and the woman said they were so heavy and she wanted to carry them out to the car for me - which she did.  That astounded me, never has happened before, so I must have really been looking dragged out!  Later thinking about it, I got to say to myself - good things don't happen to you when you stay stuck up in your apartment all the time!  

Sometimes I think I am a real weird person - I have been ordering from the library and reading cookbooks - with no intentions of cooking anything in them!  I can still remember days during my high school years when I would clip recipes from the newspaper and save them thinking to myself that when I got married I was going to be a gourmet cook and really astound my husband with good cooking.  Well the man I married was a meat and potatoes man who was also allergic to all seafood - so that sort of put the kabosh on that.  A lot of people thought I was a good cook - but I only did normal cooking, nothing spectacular.  (Although I do remember having a couple over to dinner who got into a big fight over why did I have time to make a pie from scratch and she didn't!).  Course they didn't know the time I was learning and trying to figure out how to roll piecrust pieces and had a nasty comment from my husband in which I was sorely tempted to throw the pie dough in his face.  But instead I was "Nice" and just ignored his comments.  Maybe we would have had a better marriage if I had acted on my impulses then who knows?  I guess I have been jazzed up watching the TV reality cooking shows, and yet when I see the cookbooks it would cost an arm and a leg to cook the things they do - when was the last time you priced a leg of lamb, or even halibut fish.  I told my twin who lives up in Eureka on the coast, that halibut cost $17 a pound here - more expensive than filet mignon!  And herbs - my goodness the cost of those is out of sight too to have a stocked kitchen.  I once belong to the cookbook club and had tons of books when I was married - got rid of a lot of them after the divorce.  Not too long ago I got rid of even more of them.  One of the books I just finished was the autobiography of Julia Child and how she wrote her cookbooks (Her first two) and those I still have in my kitchen.  So it was interesting reading where she had difficulties in certain areas in making those books and then looking at those spots in the cookbooks themselves.  

Well I was thinking to myself this week, that I have beat the odds that I was reading about a year ago - that only 5-12% of lung cancer patient survive a year after diagnosis.  On Nov 10 when I will be 60 I was at the hospital taking a PET scan to see if cancer had spread elsewhere in my body.  Well my last chemo should be 11/14/2007 and then it will be only checkups in the future!

November 10, 2007 - Well Happy Birthday to me! (the BIG 60) Yesterday and today have been days where I have actually felt good which is so unusual as to be remarkable.  This week I got some terrible news that has upset me greatly, and that is of a good friend who has had cancer surgery and now having to undergo chemotherapy.  The good news is that they think they have got it all, but that this is "preventative" chemo just like mine is at this time.  I asked my sister to put Kathy on her church's prayer group and ask you all for prayers for her as well.  (letter in the mail to you dear one!)  My other good friend in Minnesota is having an easier time having been able to get her blind, deaf  (because he won't wear his hearing aid) dementia alzheimer husband moved to a nursing home in their city - so she doesn't have to travel so far to feed him.  The nursing home is cost $8,900 a month and while he is getting better care, they don't feed him - just leave the food on the plate in front of him.  He really isn't sick in the body - no heart condition, no diabetes, no cancer - just losing his sight after an operation just finally sent him around into dementia from which there is no coming back, so the doctors say.  Today is just a quiet normal day for me - sis wanted to get together but everyone's schedule didn't work out so we are going to do it next weekend.  They wanted to take me somewhere special next weekend, with a drive somewhere, and I had to regretfully tell them I wasn't sure how I would be feeling since my last chemo is next Wed.  So we shall see.  Yesterday, when I was feeling good, I was finally able to go and pickup some meds and stop by the flu clinic and get my shot.  So that is taken care of for another year. Several people sent me money with my birthday cards to "take myself out to dinner" which I shall be planning.  I have been reading a new mystery writer who's books are really great - Thomas Perry.  I just finished 2 and have 4 more that I got from the library.  I have been reading books on line at this wonderful service called Internet Archive - where they are copying books and making them available to read through your computer.  I have been reading books from the 1700, 1800's and 1900's some on colonial american days (I have always had a thing about the American Revolution and George Washington) as well as early craft books on handmade lace, illuminated manuscripts and how to make them, journals of settlers in America,  as well as some various books on religion or about ministers, etc.  Lots of fascinating stuff at this web site but the search function and ability to find things by title or author name is poor.  I have been just doing hit or miss, coming up with these treasures.  Some of the copies have actual color pictures, while others are in black and white. This site also has old movies like Charlie Chaplin and others to watch.   Did you know that if you missed one of your favorite shows, some time you can watch it on your computer?  For some reason my cable TV didn't have House on for 2 weeks, and I was able to watch both shows from the Fox channel website (with only 15 second commercials!)  Fox also has Kitchen Nightmares you can watch and I finally caught Are you smarter than a 5th Grader? The kids on it are real ham's probably hoping for a movie contract if they are cute enough!  I thought it was a cute show and mean while thinking to myself about all the garbage they teach us that was good for nothing in real life.  While I was at the pharmacy yesterday I also picked up a new set of various vitamins, since I have no tumors growing in me to stunt, I thought taking vitamins may help me get some zip back into my life with the end of chemo in sight! So that's it for today!

Yes, I talked to twin and sis today - told twin her card was in the mail but not until yesterday cause I just didn't feel up to a drive to the post office till then.  Both are doing well.

November 11, 2007 - Boy did I have a wild ride last night!  As you know I have been experiencing vertigo upon arising since the first of August.  Well the doctor "prescribed" a medication for me for vertigo which turned out to be an over the counter medication but behind the counter at the local Kaiser pharmacy.  Anyhow I remember NOW looking up vertigo medications on the internet - and they are the types that people also take for seasickness and other dizzy things.  Anyhow I also have had problems in sleeping and the doctor prescribed an anti-nausea pill which has helped me become sleepy but I have run out of them.  So last night  (forgetting what I had read in the internet searches) I took one of the vertigo pills which is supposed to make you sleepy, and I fell asleep OK, but I had the worst night of my life with terrible nightmares.  Now I don't remember (many many hours later) most of the nightmares but I remember the worst of them dealing with my having put my mother into a nursing home and the various things happening there to her.  NOW I remember what I had read on the internet, that this type of medication for dizziness causes vivid nightmares in some people, and after yesterday's conversation with my friend about her husband in the nursing home and her declaring that my parents were sure lucky to have me to care for them instead of going into a nursing home, caused me to have these dreams.  But the worst nightmare of all was where I told my mother in my dream that I was taking her home with me and she didn't want to come with me!  As it turned out, I was able to get out of bed without vertigo this morning but it is not worth the suffering I experienced in last nights dreams, to take that medication again! (because I kept waking up after these individual little nightmares because they upset me so)

I was reading the antique roadshow website tonight, and it has personal stories of big "finds" people have written to them.  The more I read them, the more sad I got.  I got sad because of the ones where people bought something from someone that they knew was valuable, and never shared what they got for the item with the parties they bought it from. (Only one person went back to the party in all the stories I read and in another one one person told the person right away that what they had was valuable and did not take advantage of their ignorance and financial need and helped them sell it for big money).  I think part of what brought this on was someone telling on a chat board I visit, about this auction site that today was selling old items of clothing that Tasha Tudor had collected, and one of the people who appraise for this auction house had their own website of clothing and textiles.  In looking through her website I came across a Battenburg lace outer skirt (meant to be worn over silk skirt) and it was being sold for $1,125.  Now I sold a Battenburg lace dress, with bustle insert, that was much, much ornate lace and much prettier design and with less condition areas for my friend who was going blind, who's son had just died, who was needing money and selling almost everything she owned to go live in a room in her sister's trailer in Florida.  I sold the dress on Ebay with gorgeous pictures of it and started it off at $100.  A lady emailed me and asked me to stop the auction and she would pay  $200 right away for it.  Since it wasn't mine, I called the friend in Florida and asked her what she wanted to do, and she accepted that deal.  I got some nasty email from people who said they were going to bid on the auction (no one had bid on the auction when I stopped it except the lady who offered the deal) and was mad at me for ending it and I explained that it wasn't mine and my decision would have been to let the auction continue.  The lady who bought it said she wore historical clothing to special events and that's what she was going to do with it, but you never know if someone is telling you the truth.  I know I researched the dress as best I could and even emailed a couple of museums to see if they wanted it because it was really in exceptional condition.  So now I am sad I did not encourage my friend to wait it out, as a full dress overlay would probably have been worth over $2,000.  

My "BIG" find of my life was a mink coat.  I went to the local church annual garage sale on my birthday and since it was in fall and cold in Minnesota I decided I needed a warmer coat than what I had for winter.  I saw this coat and thought it was "fake" fur as did the church people, and bought it for $10.  I put it in the closet and forgot about it for a couple of weeks and brought the coat out of the closet and looked more closely and saw that the lining had the tag of one of the better stores and that it had embroidered initials on it which were also the initials of Mrs. McKnight  (the McKnights of Minnesota Mining and Mfg - otherwise known as 3M) who had lived in White Bear Lake until her then recent death, where I also lived.  I opened a small part of the lining at the bottom and peeked inside and found that it was skins of mink sewn together.  I quickly called the church and asked them if someone had reported that they had donated the coat in error and they had not received any calls, as I gladly would have returned it to the owner. And of course you don't find the McKnight's phone number in the phone book!  But the church told me to keep it . I then called my mom and asked her if she wanted a mink coat and she said no - so it was mine.  I took it to a furrier to see about having the sleeves slightly lengthened and they told me it was worth about $2500 in spite of being an "old"fashion style of cut to the coat.  So after that I called it God's birthday present to me!  I wore it several times and could see the attraction for having fur as compared to man made materials for the same warmth, fur was so light weight and warm that you hardly knew you had it on you.  I still have it - when I die I suppose my sisters will give it to the Salvation Army and someone else will have a pleasant surprise in the future (course you can't tell about Salvation Army anymore as they have their "boutiques" now where they price things they feel are valuable at a ridiculous price!)

And I have no idea why I am rambling on tonight?

November 14, 2007 - A year ago today I was having a bronchospy done on tumor in my lung which revealed I had inoperable lung cancer.  Now today, I have had my last chemotherapy, hopefully , for the rest of my life! Today was a bit trying, the 5 level patient hospital parking lot was almost completely full, I got the LAST parking space on 5th floor at extreme end of the lot.  But at least I didn't have to circle around like the 10 cars behind me.  I have no idea what caused so many people to be there today at 10 am.  So it was more walking than I was used to, but I made it up on the other end with hardly anyone in line for lab and blood work.  They were really packed for chemo today so another wait of 1 hour beyond appointment just waiting for a chair to open up in the chemo room, and today I didn't even have to see the doctor.

Last night's sleep pattern went to bed at 11p.m. took about 1/2 hour to fall asleep - then awake at 1 am.  Back to bed at 5:30 and I know it took just about an hour to fall asleep and then had the alarm wake me at 8:30 am to get ready for chemo trip.   So a total of 3 1/2 hours of sleep.  After chemo - left at 3:30 - got take out hamburger and came home and ate it and checked on the computer and went to sleep at 5:30 p.m. and awoke at 8 p.m.  God knows how long it will be before I got to sleep again.  And I don't have the slightest idea why some days are this bad.

So I have followup appointment with doctor in 3 weeks and then checkups every 3 months for the next two years.  Not much else to report today except it was supposed to have been 92 degrees with 15% humidity and riding down to chemo I felt like the sun shining through my window was burning my skin, even though it didn't feel that hot.

December 4, 2007 A year ago today I started my first chemo treatment, scared as to what was going to be happening to me in the coming months.  I see the doctor in 2 days presumably to set me up on quarterly checkup visits.  And in spite of everything, I am still smoking.  I was thinking to myself, even though I am praying to God for help in quitting smoking, why am I still doing it (besides being addicted to it).  And I got to thinking that by my continuing to smoke, God is showing that my remission is only through his mercy, because in my weakness I haven't done anything to help the situation.

A good thing it's been three weeks since chemo.  The owner of my apartment building decided to have the building painted.  It's been a real pain all week listening to the clanging of the metal ladders as they hit the building which sounds like a sledge hammer hitting the walls. So today I had to take out the window air conditioners by myself, so they could paint the windows that had been swung back into the building.  Each air conditioner weighs 70 pounds!  They teeter perilously out the window, with just screwed in steel supports and wood 2x4's.  I was able to get them both out,  having a dresser and a bookcase to partially rest them on right underneath them, and was able to put back the bedroom air conditioner OK, but I am having trouble with the living room one because it does not have a extending flat board support to sit on because it is over the stairway to upstairs.  The 2x4's ripped out of the plaster sills in taking the air conditioner out because of the weight of the machine.  I can't seem to put things back the way they were cause the air conditioner weighs too much for me to lift it up,without gravity and weight pulling it out of my hands to drop out the window. So I had to give up and just put plastic trash bag covering the opening, while I think about it some more on how I can do this.

Someone I don't know emailed me thru one of the bead maker boards saying to me that I was meant to do great things and she wanted to send me a bead.  I figured she must have read one of my cancer posts.  Well, so I said OK.  I got it yesterday and it is the most beautiful bead I have ever seen with teeny tiny purple flowers.  Even in my best days I could never make a bead as beautiful as this one.  It has dichroic in the middle of it and it just shimmers with silver green highlights like an opal fire inside the bead.  Actually just amazing over this bead has got me curious as to what I could do if I tried working smaller and it may get me back into making some florals again.  Here's her website - Starleen Studios - with gorgeous floral beads. http://www.starleensstudio.com/Gallery_Images/GalleryMenu.html    The pic below is something like my bead but you can't see the shimmer of the dichroic in the pic. The bead is about 5/8ths of an inch tall.

December 6, 2007 - Well today has been a great day but something weird happened which I shall relate below.  I finally got the living room air conditioner in last night and secured it and was able to put back in the window glass that surrounds it.  I had let it sit for two days, praying that there would be no earthquake to unseat it and drop it down onto the staircase!  It went in slick as could be, and I wonder why it was fighting me so hard a couple of days earlier? Anyhow today I drove down to the doctor's office at the hospital, and said to myself, if there is handicapped parking on first level I would try walking to doctor's office on my own, without using a wheelchair.  And so low and behold, a parking space and I was able to walk to the doctor's office without having to stop and pant, and walk back!  That's a first for me for many, many months.  And then I arrived at my appointment on the dot (since no chemo, no blood tests) and by golly she saw me within 15 minutes!  Another first!.  She couldn 't remember why she had made me get this appointment, and I said I thought it was a wrap up visit.  She decided that I needed another Xray and CT scan, since last scan was in July so she arranged that on the computer.  She is of the opinion that I will be starting chemo again in 2008, because cancer of lungs always comes back.  I reminded her that I have been in remission for 10 months and that she never expected that.  She replied Yes, that my case "had broken all the rules" of what cancer is supposed to do - so I told her that I just have expectations that it will continue that way.  She also said I could start taking vitamins and estrogen again, and couldn't remember why she asked me to stop estrogen other than it's possible effects on blood clots.  She says there is NO evidence that it fuels lung cancers, only breast cancer.  Anyhow as we were walking out of the room, I sort of put my arm around her shoulders and hugged slightly and said I wished her a Merry Christmas.  She got this sad, wan look on her face and said it was going to be a quiet one.  And then something happened that I have never experienced before - it was almost like someone took me over and made me say things to her - most of which I don't remember.  I remember saying that I usually spent Christmas  time by myself, and that she needed to find peace and serenity in her heart and all would be good, and she replied like "oh yeah, mind games" and I said something more to her about peace and contentment and said for her to count on it as a "certainty". Most of what I said to her, I don't remember.  But this was a weird disassociative experience - like it wasn't me talking!  I have to say here again that this doctor is 2 years older than me and looks 30 years younger than me, and is a slim elf of a little lady - so I talk to her as if she IS a young person and I am the oldster!   So I was out of her office in under 30 minutes!  Then on to another Kaiser facility to pick up medications, and again I managed to do the walking without using a wheelchair.  This is just an indication on how much stronger  and better I am feeling. 

Two days ago I stopped into the cable company to pay my bill since the last payment has been lost in the mail.  I asked them about putting a stop payment on the missing check and their policy (the bill says if check returned to NSF, a charge would be made) is if the check is returned for any reason, they would charge me $25 extra, even if I was paid up when that check comes floating in perhaps in a month or two.  So I am faced with putting a stop payment on it, costing me $25 by my bank for the SP, and then if they receive and cash the check and it bounces back from the stop payment, pay the cable company another $25.  The total bill was $64.  So do I take the chance someone else finds the bill and check and "washes it" and forges a different amount on it, or let it ride.  Still deciding on that one. While I was there the girl talked me into a change in service which would lower my bill, and then a different service that would cost the same amount I was saving, for more channels.  So I said OK, and she said she'd done everything right then with the computer and everything should show the new channels when I got home.  When I got home I had NO SERVICE at all, and subsequent calls to cable company technicians to send signals to my box have failed.  So I have had no TV the last several days and tomorrow a repair man is supposed to come by.  Sigh!

For you bead makers out there - I have been working for the last three weeks reviewing all 557 technical pages on Wet Canvas for the best information on techniques and tutorials and have finally finished compiling the list - it really will be a benefit for you all to bookmark this for your own use!  http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=462409

December 16, 2007 - Well it's time for an update again.  I have had to reschedule my CT scan twice, once because I was not feeling good, and the second time because I had a raging gout attack. So it is supposed to be this Tuesday again.   It seems the pills the doctor gave me to help me sleep will give me gout if I take them three days in a row.  I had the most glorious sleep, slept straight through the night without waking up and awoke feeling so refreshed.  Then the gout started.  I haven't had a gout attack in almost 11 years because I take a pill every day to prevent it.  Taking anti-depressants give me gout, and of course the shrinks never believed it was a side effect I had from those meds.  So the daily pill I took was enough to prevent gout with the daily antidepressant pills,but the "sleeping" pills the doc gave me also seem to be anti-depressants and taking three days in a row put me over the edge.  The agony of gout cannot be adequately expressed nor does pain medication help.  So thankfully I always have on hand the medication to take for when you have a gout attack, and after three days of taking those pills the gout disappeared, but those pills also have a side effect which means you cannot be far from a bathroom.  So if it hasn't been one thing, it's been another.  Just before this happened I manage to get out and have a lovely dinner with my friend Sue.  She wants me to do a website for her, with software her SO has, but I am not sure I am smart enough to figure out all this java stuff and shopping carts stuff - so we will see.  Her SO does software programming for businesses including Jet Propulsion Lab (Think of Voyager, Missions to Mars place) but he doesn't have time to do a website for her. This last week was my uncle's, the priest, birthday - his 90th and I called him.  Seems he spent his birthday with some other priests down at a Catholic High School of some 600 kids taking confessions all day!  He is still sharp as a tack and has just finished his second book, but is having trouble finding a publisher to take it. He wants to make money from the book to give to his order of priests.  My other uncle had his 88th' birthday yesterday, and I called him as well.  He is doing well, very thin and somewhat forgetful but still living independently with his son checking up on him in day or two. I am the only one in our family that keeps in touch with everyone and keeps everyone informed on how the others are doing.   I got some bills this week and found another utility bill got "lost" in the mail and I was over due on it.  This makes me mad as I have to drive down to the post office and use their drive through box to post my mail as this is not a good neighborhood where I live.  So now I have $120 of bills that I have to pay a second time because the first check is lost and yet those companies will cash them if they ever turn up, so I can't add that money back into my balance.  Tomorrow I have to mail my sister's gift to her and go and "stand"  (with my wheelchair cause I really can't stand for long anymore) in line at the post office and I am going to register a complaint.  Both bills were mailed two weeks apart on days I had chemo so I know I mailed them at the PO cause I get myself hamburgers at the mall when I had chemo.  I saw my friend Gloria (who is 80) for a few minutes on Sat when she brought her dog down to the vet locally.  Every month the dog has to have a shot that costs $200 for a rare disease.  So I was able to meet her at the vet's and visit with her for a short time since she lives on the other side of LA now.  Couldn't stay too long because of the gout and her long drive home.  It's been terribly cold here - in the 60's during the day and very cold at night.  I don't have any heat, because I am afraid to light the gas wall heater having to get down on my hands and knees and hope I catch the gas pilot light with the flame.  I have visions of missing it and the place filling up with gas.  So instead I have a little electric heater under the kitchen table, and some good blankets on my bed and get by without having any heat.  You never know with California weather - some Christmas's here have been in the 90's!  Car is running well and starts up right away since the mechanic removed that anti-theft device, so I am thankful that is OK.  This week we have the Christmas computer party with my friends on the Ebay bookboard.  I got my gift from my secret buddy this week.  I got a lovely card and gift from my good friend in Minnesota and hope she is doing well with her chemo.  I talked with my sister's this week and all is fine with them Except - my sis decided several months ago that she was going to be a vegetarian and figured that would help her lose weight and get her cholesterol and triglycerides in shape - well the blood tests came back and showed her chemistry all screwed up and the doctor demanded she quit being a vegetarian right away!  Yes, she lost 12 pounds and yes her cholesterol was down, but all her other blood work and sugar were off the wall.  You would think someone who has heart troubles and diabetes would check with a doctor before she did something so drastic but she didn't.  Now she says she can't stand the taste of meat or chicken - it tastes like cardboard she says.  So for Christmas I will be driving up to her house and shuddering about the drive home, which in holiday traffic has often taken 2.5-3 hours to drive home stop and go all the way!  Well that's about all for now.  Nothing more to say! LOL

December 17, 2007 -Hello everyone - I am asking for immediate prayers for my BIL who has this day been diagnosed with lung cancer the size of a golf ball, and has been told he doesn't have long to live. (Course I was told the same in a round about way- so a year ago I thought I would be dying in a couple of months.My words to my doctor then were - I guess I am a gonner then!) He was taken by ambulance to the hospital last night because he couldn't breathe because of pneumonia he has had off and on this last month when they did NO xray of him! They are doing the bronchospy on him in a few minutes to find out what kind of cancer it is. It sounds like it has metastatized into the esophagus. He is the rock of this family and held us all together through past illness and tragedies. I am so upset about this - it was easy for me to find strength in God for myself, and now trying to find it for him is so much harder. My dad died in 1996 with golf ball cancer tumor, BIL's father died in 1997 from stomach cancer - a hideous death. I've turned to the Bible as I did with myself and have had somewhat an encouraging reading. I pray for the best and hope you will add Bruce Atherton to your prayer lines, also my sister Eileen Atherton who is ready to fall to pieces (this is the sis with the heart condition and diabetes). Thank you

Philippians 2:21-25 ..... "I long to be freed from this life and to be with Christ; for that is the far better thing; yet it is more urgent that I remain alive for your sakes.  This fills me with confidence that I will stay with you and persevere with you all, for your joy and your progress in the faith."

December 19, 2007 - It's so hard to talk about what is happening to my family.  My BIL is still in the hospital.  Tests reveal a golf ball tumor in his left lung, and some mass, probably tumor, growing in his laryrynx which is what caused the infection that gave him pneumonia.  Their bronchospy did not, evidently, reveal what type of cancer he has so they will be doing a needle biopsy through the chest into the lung tomorrow.  At present he is feeling great, the pneumonia is gone, he is breathing better, they have him on medication as well as a nicotine patch (yes he smoked, much, much less than me) and they have him on insulin saying his blood sugar is too high..  He's been sleeping and had tons of visitors and now he is in a happy, happy mood and chomping to start chemo and radiation.  Meanwhile my sister is losing her mind.  She is there when these tons of people have come to visit (Bruce is a people person and has coached girl softball teams for years in his small town) and everybody is glossing over what is wrong with Bruce and everybody is optimistic Bruce is going to survive.  My sis says she can't sleep at night, she feels like throwing up with all this happy talk,  the doctors are coming in to tell him things at 4 am and then later at night after family has left, so she doesn't know what is going on.  She has no idea what the lab results were on the bronchospy.  And when she does talk to a doctor, they are all foreigners and don't speak very good English and she can't understand most of what they say - although they are very good doctors and have great reputations.  My sister has almost gone into diabetic coma twice since Sun night, because she just has plain forgotten about herself with all this worry and stress.  Remember my sis is the one with the heart problems as well.  Bruce's mom came up Tuesday to visit and she makes everyone revolve around her and what she needs and drove sis totally bonkers (making comments on how messy the house was, how she needed to eat right then, etc) making her miss information from the doctors.  Thankfully she has gone home.  I called cousin Monday and left harsh message (yes, I admit it, I am NOT a saint!) and said in essence for her to get her butt in gear and send us the pictures that were taken JUNE 4 th as they may be the last family portraits we ever have.  Sure she's been going through a divorce (for 4 years now) but she needs to do this for sis.  So niece knew I had left message and talked to her nicely about the same thing, and the next thing you know she is talking about coming up to sis's house for Christmas and bringing them with her along with her brothers. They have not bothered to come for Christmas for the last 10 years since Daddy died!  That is additional stress my sis did not need, and I suggested to her today that she "cancel" Christmas - I mean we would all be there (just immediate family) but no biggy on housecleaning and cooking.  But Bruce said he wanted her to do this Christmas for him.  So she decided to do a ham, which her MIL is not happy with for Christmas dinner!  That's assuming he's out of the hospital by then.  The only real news is that they want to start chemo and radiation on him, and are thinking of sending him to Loma Linda for laser surgery on the masses.  Thankfully my sister did talk frankly to me and I was able to tell her some of the reasons why Bruce is acting like he is - remember my happy, happy feelings that lasted about 6 weeks - I think it is a chemical reaction - a release of more serontonin in the blood as I was chipper, full of energy and just happy all the time.  I told her that we knew our body was out of control, so the only control we could take is to get immediate treatment started.  I told her visitors usually do not know what to say so either they are overly optimistic or like Bruce' boss who will not talk to Bruce anymore - some people can't handle it.  I can imagine Christmas is going to be a zoo - with my sister having to go back to work the next day.  Bruce is assuming he can jaunt into the doctors office and have his 15 minutes radiation daily for 6 weeks while on his lunch break, and his chemo on Sat's for 6 weeks.  Little does he realize that those schedules are not what reality is as far as times to get these appointments which everyone probably wants.  So everybody and his brother have visited Bruce except for me, and my sister doesn't want me to come up till this weekend.  So we have been on the phone a lot to each other.  

Meantime, I went and got my CT scan - was in an out in under 20 minutes!  I was able to walk to and from without wheelchair and generally feeling pretty good.  Did I tell you I woke up this week and realized my vertigo is gone?  I just started getting out of bed and being able to walk without staggering, etc.  Four months of vertigo and then poof, it's gone as easily as it came.  But right now thing are schizophrenic and so surreal with what's happening in the family and with fears as to what the future is going to bring that we are all whirling around. I mean, what are the odds of two people in the same family with lung cancer within 12 months of each other?  Pray for us!

December 24, 2007 - Well tonight I want to share with you a story that happened some Christmas Eve night a while back.  I had decided to bring some Christmas cookies up to my sister's house for Christmas Day, and so I stopped at the local Italian store that had home made cookies as well as some italian food my sister had wanted.  They had this huge display of cookies in a glass case, and I was standing there picking so many of this kind, and so many of that kind.  You stood in line for the cash register when in front of this display.  A mother and her child were waiting there and the child's eager face was shining looking at all the cookies, and she asked her mother to buy some cookies.  The mother hushed her, and said, we can't afford any of those, and then moved up in the line to purchase the few items she had.  I quickly whispered to the girl helping me, to quickly fill up the bag and weigh them and slip the bag into the purchases of that small family and that I would pay for them.  So she did so, and then we set about making up a new selection of cookies for me again.  The young mother walked out of the store and suddenly stopped in the doorway realizing her bag was heavier than she thought, and looked down into it and saw the cookie bag, and mouthed Thank you to Me.  So I finished selecting my new bag of cookies and paid for them and other items and walked out of the store.  She was there waiting for me because she wanted to thank me in person and know my name so she could pray for me.  I remember wondering about their situation because they were driving a much newer and nicer car than I was, but then thought of how people can unexpectedly be laid off even if they had nice cars.  So I then went on to Target where I had to get a couple of things, when all of a sudden it hit me, that the girl had not charged me enough money in the store - that I had not been charged for my new bag of cookies.  I returned to the Italian store and went to the girl and said some mistake had been made and I had not been charged enough money.  She replied no mistake had been made, that she decided she was not going to charge me for the cookies because of the ones I gave away.  I worriedly asked if she would get in trouble for doing so, and she replied No.  (She may have been a family member - but I don't know).  Anyhow the reason for relating this tonight is just to tell you that occasionally what goes around comes around sometimes sooner than we think!  She gave me a kindness for a kindness I had done another.  It's the first time I can recall of anything like that ever happening to me.

This week has been one of ups and downs.  I discovered over the weekend that someone had stolen $500 from my checking account and I was now overdrawn and incurring fees of $27 a day in overdraft.  Why they stopped at $500 is unknown because I had more money in the account because my rent checked hadn't been processed yet.  The only thing I could think is that someone found one of two checks that are missing in the mail that had been sent to utility companies in November.  I had been checking my checking account in Minnesota to see if those checks had been sent for payment yet, when I discovered this loss.  OMG, I was a nervous wreck, worrying so badly about how I could stop those charges, get my money back, be able to pay my upcoming month's rent when my pension is direct deposited into the account that may have to be closed.  I was so upset that I didn't get any sleep last night and was up bright and early to call Minnesota as soon as they had opened, although I sent them two emails and two voice mails.  I had called the police Sat night and they came out and took a stolen identity report from me at 1:30 am!  Well thanks to a sweet angel of mercy at the bank, and the aid of the internet and telephone, we were able to talk, she sending me forms to complete thru emails, my completing forms and scanning them, and emailing them back to her - she was able to reverse the electronic fund transfer which was a payment on a Walmart credit card (never had one and don't shop there) and get the charges reversed, closed the account, start a new account, and have my direct deposit and car insurance sent to the new account when they occur in Jan.  I was sad to see that account go - I had been a customer with that account for 33 years!  I was with them when they were a mobile home on a corner lot, and now they are a 20 building bank in Minnesota.  Now I have to check with agencies to see if someone has compromised my identity in setting up new credit cards - but if all they had was my missing check they wouldn't have my SSN, driver's license or date of birth with which to do so.  So right now, I am restored to what I had been before this started.

My brother in law was released from the hospital on Friday and they still do not have any confirmation of cancer for the growths in his lung and air passage.  After both biopsys they were told they got good tissue mass for testing, but when the testing was done it could not say it was cancer.  They feel very strongly that it is cancer, but they can't start any chemo or radiation without a test confirming it is cancer.  My sister is wondering if it is some kind of fungus growth that he may have picked up when they were in New Orleans in June?  So my BIL is having a semi-rough time at home, trying valiantly not to have to go back to the hospital, coughing up a great deal of fluid from his lungs and throat. (He quit smoking that Sunday which can also cause large amount of coughing)   My sis say he cannot lie down to sleep without choking with no breath.  My BIL wants so badly to be home for a regular Christmas, so my sis is still cooking a Christmas dinner. My niece who was supposed to work Christmas Day at Disneyland, got a doctors slip to take emergency family leave to be able to spend it with her folks.   My cousin, the one who hasn't sent us the pics, says she and her brother and my Uncle are coming up for Christmas dinner with us which I believe is the first time in 11 years since my Dad died that they are doing so.  And of course I will be driving up there - which I dread, for two reasons.  One is that the holiday traffic coming home means a 3 hour drive instead of 1 hour 15 minutes it takes to drive up there.  And two, because people have been calling sis all day to find out if they can come and visit Bruce Christmas Day - which means an interruption of family with all these strangers that no body knows except my sis and BIL.  So Wednesday he and radiologist will go to Loma Linda Hospital which specializes in these things and will have some special testing done to see if they can reach a diagnosis.  

My elderly friend in Minnesota called me this weekend to tell me that her husband had died Sat and she was there holding him when he went.  I told her of my prayers for them both and how difficult it was praying to God for a solution to her problems without praying for his death.  Thankfully she had only had to spend one half of their savings in nursing home costs, so she still has money left for herself for the future.  His kids are returning to her house from CA and Saudi Arabia for the funeral, and will be spending Christmas with her .

So Merry Christmas to you all and may God's blessing shine down upon you all!  

December 25, 2007 -Hello everyone - am home from visiting sis and BIL. BIL was not kept in ER last night.(after I posted on the 24th he was taken to ER again by ambulance)  But he stills continue having trouble breathing from coughing up so much. I gave them the hints that has helped my asthma, drink hot drinks and put a pot of water on to boil and lean over the steam to help loosen congestion. Those two seemed to help a bit. I left after 4.5 hours as people started coming over to visit him, when he was in no condition to really see anyone with sis and us hanging over him worrying about his condition. He kept saying he was sorry, to me as I left. My Xmas dinner was hotdog wrapped horduerves and chips since sis didn't put ham in till late and was too wrapped up with "visiting" people to try and keep them away from BIL. I told her she should just put a large note on door - no visitors. So I don't know when they will eat,and they will probably have what I am going to have which is a ham sandwich, since I cooked a ham last night for myself. A very poignant Christmas but pleasant with his family.

December 26, 2007 -  I talked to my sis today about how things went after I left there last night. It was a good thing I did not stay - or there would have been a family fight of epic proportions! Not between me and her, but between me and her BIL who started screaming and yelling at my sister who told company that she was sorry, but that they had to leave cause hubby was feeling so poorly. He started yelling at sis saying that no one had to apologize for his brother because he was sick - meanwhile just sitting staring at his brother as if it was the last time he was going to see him. (But to be fair to this man - I am thinking 10 years ago when their father died of stomach cancer he physically carried his 89 lb father into doctor's office because the HMO was doing nothing to help him with the pain) Meantime my BIL (the hubby) was so bad sis said either 911 or they take a drive to ER, which they did. Meanwhile she told her daughter, my niece, and MIL to get dinner out for the brother and his family. Thankfully that bro and family was gone by the time sis and her hubby got home. They tried to sleep and MIL's dog was wandering around all night with bells on his collar keeping them awake, and finally my BIL (the hubby) threw his mother out this morning. It is darn hard trying to be "sociable" when you are so terribly sick and can barely breathe. Being exhausted makes you ugly and blitchy and you just want to be alone. Meanwhile everyone is taking it out on my sis (who has been popping nitro pills all week). Finally today everyone is gone and they are together just as a family unit and Fri he goes into specialist for another special biopsy test. I suggested to my sister that I come up and give them my wheelchair, and she said he would never use it. Then I thought that some hospitals have wheelchairs available for patients and for her to call in advance to get one for him. I told her to tell him that he had to conserve his energy for the things that were important, like getting through that test, and uselessly wasting energy in trying to be macho by walking when he can barely breathe is not the way to go. It's otherwise known as knowing your own limitations and she acknowledged that they are both to that point now, knowing Christmas was a disaster that neither of them forsaw. (It wasn't a disaster for me because I never really have any expectations and (didn't buy any gifts  as I couldn't afford it) therefore I was not disappointed in anything). Like I could have taken over getting dinner out for everyone, but I knew the minute I would suggest that my sis would go into hostess mode and kill herself trying to get that done. Learning to accept help from others is a hard thing and one I learned well this last year. They are finally learning it too - which is really sad.  My sis says "the family" is changing right before her eyes - and I replied that it could just be temporary.  My BIL is to the point where he just "hates everyone right now" and wants to be alone.  I told sis that was one thing I was thankful about, that I didn't have anyone here so when I was crabby I didn't say things I really didn't mean, and that it's so hard to be cheerful for others when being scared to death themselves.   The hospital is sending a neubulizer to them tomorrow which should help break up some of that congestion and make it easier for him to breath.

 December 30, 2007 - I continue to ask for prayers for my BIL.  Things have just gotten so terrible.  Friday they were supposed to take him to specialist and needed reports from local hospital to take with them.  Sis had to go to work on Wed,  but couldn't concentrate and just told them she couldn't work so she went home.  Then on Thurs niece and BIL went to hospital to get reports then BIL went into work to do some emails and make management decisions and then home with niece driving him.  Then Thursday night he stopped breathing altogether and turned gray and the paramedics were able to shove this tube down his throat and start him breathing again and rushed him to hospital.  They didn't even put him in ICU. He was conscious on Friday so they knew no brain damage had occurred.   Friday they tried transferring him to Loma Linda hospital but they were full up, so after some finagling they were able to transport him to UC Irvine hospital who immediately placed him in ICU and decided he was their  most critical of all patients in the hospital.  They have confirmed that it is cancer in his lymph gland that has closed the air passage almost shut.  They thought they could put a stent in there to prevent passage from closing, but they couldn't do that because of bleeding and the large size of the mass.  This area is below the area where a tracheotomy would work.  So they decided to put him on ventilator and induce a coma so that the ventilator does not move.  They did not hold out much hope at that point.  They did another bronchospy and got tissue mass and ran their tests so on Sat they did confirm that it is cancer. They were having some trouble with the tube moving, so they induced an even deeper coma.  They decided to wait until this coming Wed to do some surgery and said he had 50% chance of making it till then.  The doctor said there is staff on hand to do this surgery now, but they are not top of the field and that this case is so unusual (there were 15 doctors in conference with sis talking about Bruce's case) that he would prefer to wait till the top people in those fields were there on Wed.  After the deeper coma, he seems to be breathing better and has good color.  And then today my sis calls to report the most amazing thing that has the doctor absolutely confounded.  They had visited him and no one is allowed to touch him or talk in front of him, and were on the way home when they got a call from the nurse (he is on 24 hour watch with a nurse) that Bruce had regained consciousness and was responding to questions.  So sis and niece hot footed it back, and the doctor took them in to show him this - he called Bruce and  and his eyes opened and then asked him some questions which Bruce answered yes and no with a shake of his head.  He was in no pain and knew where he was and what was being done and that he was not supposed to move. He heard sis's voice and raised his hand toward her and the doctor told him again not to move and to go back to sleep which he did.  The doctor is considering having to make him paralysed if there is more movement of the tube.   So this evening we have a glimmer of hope.

I have been praying so hard - I have been praying to St. Anthony Marie Claret (and wearing his relic) who is a patron saint of cancer cures (to whom I prayed for myself) asking for his prayers to the Virgin Mary and Lord Jesus Christ asking for a miraculous cure as what was given to me.  I opened the bible last night to read some more pages and opened it to the exact spot where it said to me  -have no fear, but it is so hard to be so positive for someone else.  And last night for the first time in my life I had a dream about my father who I was talking to on the telephone but I couldn't hear what he said as his voice was slurred and far off.  I remember thinking that I had thought he was dead but from the phone call I found out he was alive and just living in a far away state.  Bruce and Daddy were as close as father and son.  All I know is that there was joy in my heart as I was talking to him in the dream. Maybe that happened because I was watching John Edwards Crossroads last night and he was telling people to pay attention to things and dreams that the spirits do try to reach us and I remember thinking OH yeah, that I can't even dream of them and then this happened.

God provides us with comfort in mysterious way, is what I am trying to tell myself.

As for myself, I still have not heard from my doctor as to the results from the CT scan.  I have now left 3 messages and according to clerk she has not been on vacation.  Not hearing from her has been worrisome.  And today I wake up with a slight gout attack.

December 31, 2007 - this will be my final posting for this year.  Today the doctor called me and gave me the results of my CAT scan, saying that it does not show any new tumors or any cancer.  I had said to her that I hoped her Christmas was better than she thought it was going to be , and then I went on to tell her about my BIL.  I made some statement, like, why did God give miraculous healing to someone like me and this to happen to such a good person.  She replied "I know" (as if saying she knew the answer to that) "Payback" she said.  She shocked me so much with that answer and I was speechless!  All I could do was say I did not believe that, and ended the conversation as quickly as possible with my next appointment to see her in three months. Now I am left to wonder what she meant, did she mean that God saved my life and is taking another's life in exchange? or is she implying that BIL is paying for his sins?  I hope some of you can come to a more charitable interpretation that I have.  All I can say is that this thinking is twisted and while as a doctor she must see patients that die while others live with no reason why the differences between them, nevertheless I am certainly going to pray for her soul to be delivered of the blackness of spirit I have heard from her in the last month.  

My sister says they intubated BIL several times today to remove liquids from his lungs and BIL was conscious and gave the doctor thumbs up when it was done.  He just won't stay in a coma.  My sister is agonizing over his suffering and I tried reminding her of his "saying with headshake" that he was in no pain.  She feels he is mentally suffering a lot.  The doctor is still saying 50/50 so we are still praying fervently for the best.  This doctor is just a saint, always there to do every procedure.   I looked him up on the website, Dr. Davoudi who trained in Terhan among other places and I prayed to Allah tonight to thank him for the wonderful man that is so devoted to my BIL.  In my book (opinion), when Jesus said there were many rooms in his father's house, I take it to mean there are many path's to God and God's saying that people who are not christians who lead a good and loving life can also be saved - I believe he means others that seek God through different religions.   The caretaker of my building just called to wish me a happy new year and told me that the neighbor that moved out next door from me on 9/01 died 12/05 from cancer.  That big burly man gone so fast.  I shall certainly pray for him as well.  Well that's all for this year!

January 3, 2008 - Some fabulous news to report!  My brother in law Bruce, had stopped breathing a week ago because the tumor had cut off his air passage, but the paramedics were able to revive him by shoving a hose down his throat.  The next day they transferred him to UC Irvine hospital where the doctor put him into an induced coma.  The doctors only gave him 50% chance of surviving till yesterday morning when they wanted to do surgery when all the top specialists were back from vacation.  They had him on a ventilator all this time.  Sometimes he would become conscious and respond to doctor's questions  by shaking his head when he was supposed to be in a coma!  So yesterday there was a 3 hour surgery where they cut out a lot of the tumor that was shutting down his breathing, and inserted a shunt to keep his air way open.  The cancer had eaten away his cartiledge holding thorax from collapsing.  Big pockets of pneumonia were under the cancer tumor.  Today he is conscious and they took him off the ventilator and he was able to breath on his own right away!  He was able to start talking and making jokes and they have him sitting up.  The doctor considers Bruce a miracle case that he has recovered so well and so quick.  My sister was agonizing so much since she felt if he was conscious to answer questions, that he could feel and be in pain from being strapped down unable to move and that the tube was in his throat.  So today she asked him if he could remember things from being in the coma.  He said he had strange dreams but did not remember being conscious.  She said he felt several times he was near death but he could FEEL prayers surrounding him! This is the first time I have ever heard that someone felt prayers!  So we are all so thankful to all you people who have prayed for him, and thankful God has given him back to us once again.  He still is a sick man with tumor in his lung and probably some they were not able to cut away - but at least we have him back and can begin to address other treatments like chemo and radiation.

I just can't get over him feeling the prayers.  I felt I had to tell you all this to KNOW that the power of prayers is awesome and that it does work!  So rarely do we get "feedback" on our prayers. I called and told both uncles so they can share in the good news.    

In meantime, people from the city of Lake Elsinore got together and delivered to my sis this morning gasoline gift cards and restaurant gift cards to help defray the expenses of the driving and eating out.  

The police called me today for more information, the case has been assigned to a detective who is proceeding with the investigation.  I asked him if it would matter that I had been financially restored, and he said only if I was not going to press charges.  I assured him I definitely would press charges. So we shall see what happens but he says it does take some time to get warrants etc.  The hardest part of case is figuring out who did the input into the computer.

January 4, 2007 - Oh, I am just steaming here. Everyone has felt so blessed at what has happened to BIL and feeling optimistic - and a new doctor comes in today and tell him that he has had two miracles already and they were to give him time to go home, write his will, check out finances for paying for chemo since he is not in hmo and get ready to die. He had my BIL crying! I told my sis that no matter what doctor says it does not take into consideration what God wants!

Oh yeah - this too - He may be discharged this weekend. Sis has to go back to work Monday. She was talking to his mother about him being home and she wants to come take care of him but NOT on Monday cause she has dentist appointment to clean her teeth, and NOT on Tuesday because it may be raining. You get the idea? MIL has only been to the hospital on the first day to see her son, and has not returned since.  Reminds me of my ex-MIL - when my husband did something and hurt his back and could not straighten up, he called his mom to take him to ER and mother could not do that cause she was in the middle of doing her laundry. He had to call me, and since I was ride sharing, had to have another person take time from work to drive me home to take him to ER. Right now my sister HATEs her MIL. I of course, told her I can come up and look after him whenever she wanted me there.  

The cousin finally mailed those pictures up to my sis who said they turned out very well.  Interesting mail this week.  I got a notice that my pension check was going up 2.3% increase, and that taxes, medical insurance and everything else went up AND my life insurance increased in cost 115% !!! because I turned age 60, so the net result is that my "take home" payment is less than what I received in 2005!  That was a great help isn't it in learning to live with inflation. 

January 9, 2008 - Bruce stopped breathing again night of Jan 4 and was started by paramedics who rushed him to local hospital again.  His blood pressure was down to 60/40.  He was mad that sis insisted he stay in hospital but said he would do it for her. Sis was so distraught she called me at midnight and then again at 5 am - just lost as what to do.  She had called his mother who was no help.  She was ready to drop and had left him at hospital saying she would be back in an hour  - so I told her he would be mad whether she was there or not, so to go home and get a nap before going back.  She found he had not been eating for days while at UC Irvine, because everything tasted like cardboard to him.  She wanted to get some food or ensure into him, and the hospital wouldn't let him eat incase surgery was needed.  The hospital found his magnesium and potassium was non-existent and put him on mega doses of drips (remember when sis ended up in ER from magnesium deficiency?) So he was released again yesterday, and they have been cramming him with food.  He is so terribly weak that he is having to use a walker.  He's lost so much weight that when he was at doctor today his bottom clothes all fell off him.  He insisted on going in to work today to talk to his boss, and it took him 2 hours to get showered and dressed.  On the way to his work, he told daughter he didn't feel good and she ran into Walmart and bought a second BP kit and his BP was down a lot and she filled him up with Gatoraide which seemed to bring up his BP.  I didn't dare ask my sister how that went.  In the meantime sis gets call from work (higher up than her boss) who said - she was supposed to be on intermittent leave and instead she will be off 4 whole weeks at the end of this week so they were going to have to cut her pay!  Who on God's earth would ever have expected what has happened in the last 4 weeks?  In the meantime she went to her heart doctor today and he said she can't go on this way- her blood sugar is up and down and doing her heart damage.  Meantime MIL and daughter are there, and they are sleeping the night away while Eileen is up 10 times a night helping Bruce to bathroom - and then during day MIL and daughter are taking naps while Eileen runs errands?  She says MIL is no help at all, starting to give orders again, and whenever Bruce calls his mom she calls Eileen.  When I suggest that I come up, she feels I am too weak recovering from cancer myself.  In meantime everyone is scared to death that Bruce will stop breathing again, and the tension has things pretty grim up there.

What a shock today - I went to pick up some medications and my cost has gone up 200% !!!! The policeman called me yesterday to call bank for some info today that he needed for a search warrant, which I did and called him back.  There's a lot more to that story that I won't say anything about on here, for now.  

January 17, 2008 -  My BIL has had no further episodes, but is living in fear that with every breath could be his last one.  What a horrendous way to live life - every second is one of fear.  I "evangelised" to both him and my sister by phone, telling them to turn it over to God because the fear is eating them alive.  While my sister said what I said helped, from what I hear it hasn't done any good and the family has been having some big fights.  (as my niece whispered to me today, the fighting will decrease when MIL is gone)  Sis told me that one night his brother came over to visit and both he and Bruce told their mother to shut up and not say a word.  That's how bad it is getting there.  One night I called sis, and she said she couldn't talk to me as she had to get dinner ready - and I thought to myself - what the heck!  doesn't the MIL prepare the dinner for them all???? Sis has been working long hours all this week, and she has to come home from work and goes grocery shopping and prepares the dinner???  Bruce evidently is being a pigheaded stubborn "man", and is really incredibly tired of everyone fussing over him and wanting to do things for him.  He is tired of sis hovering over him, asking him if he alright (let us not forget she saved his life twice by quick action with 911)  Friends of Bruce are organizing a charity tournament in his honor, and evidently this bothers him a lot too.  They both got worried when Bruce stopped coughing up, and Monday another bronchospy was done at UC Irvine who said the lungs were looking good.  This helped reassure them a bit. Then the solution needed for the neublizer couldn't be found.  After calling a lot of drug stores locally, I finally emailed the company and found out that they stopped manufacturing it a year ago because they couldn't get proper components for dispersal from their aerosol bottle.  .  The pulmonary doctor told them to get saline solution without preservatives and to use Bausch & Laums Sensitive eyes solution - which has preservatives!  I recall a scandal about people using B&L without preservatives and it caused fungal growth in contact lenses which is probably why none of their solutions now have no preservatives.   So I emailed company back about another product they have called wound solution which ends up being the same exact solution as the discontinued solution, just in a different dispersal container and company said they would send out free bottle to sis.  In meantime niece found 3 bottles in a couple of stores which will hold them over for a few weeks.  Bruce has to do nebulizer treatments 3 times a day in order to keep stent moist or else it will slip and cut off his breathing! Yesterday he had his first  chemo and his first radiation treatment.  I have no idea how that went.  He continues with radiation today and tomorrow, as well as all week days for 15 days. In meantime stuffing him with food has helped as he is a bit stronger and walking around house without walker.   Tomorrow both niece and MIL are leaving and sis will be on her own.  Nobody has talked to me as to whether they want me to come up or not.  Of course my smoking is a real concern as I could not smoke in the house, but I did spend 6 months smoking every cigarette outside my folks home when I came to Calif..  Another is my sleeping patterns (the medications make me sleep 10-12 hours - and then again what need do I have to get up early now?)- but heck, I figure I am better than no one!  And when the going gets tough, I either set alarm clock or just go without sleep in order to be where I need to be by a certain time.  I also have one of those personal alerts my sister used to sell, you pull the plug and this horrendous wailing starts which would wake up the dead - and I figure Bruce could keep it by him if he needed me and I was some where out of reach.  So perhaps I will hear more tonight.

Addendum - heard from sis tonight and evidently things are so much worse than what I related above, she won't even tell me what has been happening there - except she came home last night from work and found the place a pig pen and no one doing anything.  She has given up on getting help from MIL or niece and is just slaving away - so much so, that she does not want me to come up when they leave - she just wants to be alone with Bruce.  Monday Bruce is supposed to go back to work, but they don't even know if he can drive yet.  At present he is handling all his bodily needs by himself with no help, evidently his breathing is so much better and they are feeling good about that (amazing in that he got out of hospital just a week ago!).  So far he tolerated chemo but started getting sick after a big meal tonight - as I recall I could not eat all my dinner meal, but could only eat 1/2 of it and 2-3 hours later go back and eat the rest of it. They started him on cisplatin and etoposide.   He does have anti-nausea pills though to help him.  Sis says I won't even recognize him as he has lost 60 lbs and looks so old.  So we shall see what we shall see. Below is pic of 2006 of Eileen and Bruce Atherton

Here is a touching tribute to Bruce from Girls Softball I found on the web tonight         http://eteamz.active.com/legsa/index.cfm

As for myself, I am doing OK.  I still don't do much, but everyday I do something.  I had to take the living room air conditioner out again yesterday and re do it as the hose directing the water back into the house had come off.  The wires had rusted away.  I am required to do this as owner did not want water dripping down on steps as people could fall.  It was a lot easier taking it out and putting it back this time.  I did have to do some thinking and finagling wire to get the hose to stay on machine but it worked.

I am really getting concerned about money these days.  With the increase in medication costs and the decrease in my check I am down about $120 a month, and come June my rent will probably really jump because he did not increase it last year.  All I can think about is perhaps dropping part B of medicare which costs $100 a month, which I never use belonging to HMO which does not require me to have it till I am 65.  Another is to think about reducing my life insurance coverage and thereby reduce the cost being deducted from my check.  Once you reduce it, you can never increase it again.  Worrisome too is the fact that Ebay sales are so slow and low priced - but something I just have to force myself into doing again.

I got notification from all three credit reporting agencies that the fraud alert has been placed on my record. Hopefully nothing has happened on that front.  I decided to password protect my computer with a password I have never used before, so everytime someone tries to use my computer they cannot get into my records.  I also put a notice on the cover of my laptop that computer is password protected.  This will only stop the unknowledgeable thief as real computer hackers know to pull the hard drive and put it in another machine and get the info that way - but most thieves are in it for the quick buck.  I tried to drivelock the hard drive too, but for some reason the bios will not do that even though it has a mechanism to do so.  What that means is that the hard drive would be locked too, so switching it to another machine would not enable them to get info from the hard drive. So I am still researching Drivelock mechanism.

January 19, 2008 - Talked to my sis today for short time, last night was a hard one for them - BIL had breathing problems again and sister in lot of pain evidently from sinus infection.  They went today for him to have a PET scan, and it could not be done because his blood sugar was so high.  Evidently chemo can cause this they were told, but none of the oncology sites mention this as a side effect of those two chemo meds? One time while in hospital before chemo, the same thing happened to him, so maybe he is borderline diabetic?  We shall have to wait and see. I also found out that it is not my smoking per see that may bother BIL, it's the fact that he is still craving cigarette smoking even 5 weeks since his last one and even with nicotine patch!  What an insidious evil it is - I am so glad of all the education for the children to eliminate this filthy habit

My little old lady gallery owner called me so upset.  She had received email from AOL telling her her account was going to be suspended if she did not update her financial information.  Well it just so happened that we have been in the process of doing this for sometime and having difficulty in doing so, because she has new credit card number and expiration date.  And she had called AOL directly to do this and the woman said her account had been updated over a week ago.  So thankfully she called me before clicking on any link!  So from my home I got into AOL under her account and looked the email over and it was a phony fraudulent email that would have directed her to somewhere else for to input her credit card information.  So I deleted email for her and called her back and told her it was phony and she dodged a bullet on that one.  So evidently she does listen to me some of the time.  Yesterday morning she called me because she could not get onto the internet.  I had had about 2 hours of sleep when she called ((another one of those bad nights) so I told her various things to do and then last resort I told her to call cable company for them to fix it.  So cable company was able to reboot her connection and get that fixed for her.

January 21, 2008 - Good news to report, my BIL was able to go to work for half a day today!  Yesterday was the tribute softball tournament and he drove himself and sis up and visited with the girls and coaches for about an hour, coming home feeling very good.  So today he was able to give himself his nebulizer treatment, dress and go to work driving himself to and from work.  Then he took nap, and friend came over and took him to radiation.  He is finding himself very tired, but he is getting double whammy with both chemo and radiation.  The radiation is giving him a metallic taste in his mouth, so he is experiencing a little bit of nausea because of that, that I have no experience to relate to them.  My sis sounded so relaxed and wonderful tonight and I am profoundly happy about that as well.  They have everything all charted out and feel like they are able to cope without in-house help - and I realize what a morale booster this is for BIL!  

AS for myself, I slept 15 hours last night!  I have no idea why - except there is hardly anything for me to get up for.  I am finding myself more and more morose, and forced myself into cleaning some beads today.  I am just going to have to find some gumption in myself and do good for myself - like selling some beads on Ebay.  I managed to make a couple of beads last night and will keep chipping away at this wall I have built.  My doctor had said in December when I mentioned this that she thought I had "survivor guilt" - that I was planning on dying and now since I didn't die I didn't know what to do with myself.  I shall just have to prove her wrong.

January 30, 2007 - Some more continuing good news on my BIL.  He was able to stick to their schedule and go to work for half days and then radiation in the afternoon.  He has become very tired, and it takes him longer to do things.  Walking from the car to the house makes him short of breath and he has to sit down and recover.  Walking up stairs to go to bed, the same.  But we remember how it was the same for me.  He has lost another 7 pounds.  Finally my sis tried a couple of my tips on him and he was ecstatic that they worked so well.  For the metallic taste in mouth, I said suck on a pickle or pickle slices and it completely overwhelms the taste buds and clears the mouth (which makes it easier for him to eat something).  For nausea and mouth taste, suck on salty sunflower seeds (but she got larger pumpkin seeds) and that helped immensely.  Another one they haven't used yet, it suck on small square of Hersey chocolate bar (plain)the chocolate just oozes over all those taste buds and changes their chemical reactions. No one told me those tips - just something I picked up in my life from having queezy stomach from excessive gastritis.   He wasn't home last night when I called sis (I have been cutting back on calling to give them a break in "daily reporting" to me which can create anxiety).  Sis said he wanted to know why I wouldn't talk to him direct - which confounded me!  (because he wanted to thank me)  I said I wasn't avoiding talking to him, I just thought he was unable to talk to me when I called which is why she didn't just hand the phone over to him.Sometimes I have heard him coughing in the background while doing his bronchial thing.  His voice came back today which has made him very happy and given them some optimism.  With all the bronchospies and surgery his vocal cords were injured and so he had been talking croaky but is now back to normal (it took me a month after my bronchospy to talk normal again).  So he is on chemo break of two weeks while continuing daily radiation on the trachea tumor.  

As for me, I am sinking into depression and I don't know why.  I am going to make an appointment to see shrink and try and get new meds.  I am still behaving like when I was doing chemo - and yet I am somewhat stronger.  I have only left my apartment once this month, to run bills to post office and pick up groceries and that is all.  I did sit down and force myself to clean up about 100 beads, and I will force myself to make up some sets and try and get them on ebay.  I am having kiln problems, I turn on kiln thinking I will do some beads, then kiln gets too hot, then turn it down and then too cold, I just can't get it set at right temperature and by the time it is, I don't have the desire to make beads then.  

I was reading Leroy Sievers cancer blog and see he has had a hard road since that TV special last May.  Actually I expected him to be dead by now.  He started out with brain tumor, then went to lung cancer, then to tumors on his spine and now back to lung cancer again.  I wrote a response on his website, which they chose not to post, because (I think) I talked about God and praying to God for a miracle as what happened to me.  I guess God is not allowed to be mentioned on public blog - but other people can say they will pray for him, or that miracles do occurr, but the combination of saying God in connection with both of those is not allowed and that is a crying shame!  Who answers prayers, who creates miracles ?

I still see no gratitude in anyone dealing with this disease.  I don't see "Thank you God for giving me this additional day to look into the eyes of my loved ones or talk to them.  Thanks you for not taking me quickly through a heart attack and leaving my family bewildered and lost. Thank you God for a few more treasured memories for myself and family." And so in even just saying that, I realize how I am letting God down by not trying hard enough to get myself out of this depression and start to do something!  I did try and get down some of my watercolor things, but have lost the pallete with all the paints on it and don't know where I put it.  My twin keeps telling me some notecards I made the girls many years ago were so beautiful and she thinks I should take it up again.  Will still keep looking for them.  Haven't heard anything further from police. 

January 31, 2007 - Well I have perked up a bit.  Not a whole lot, but a bit.  Was able to go out today to get my blood work done for coumidin check (was supposed to do that 2 weeks ago).  Stop at post office and mailed bill, and pick up a hamburger and picked up my mail.  Came home and did a little vacumning and did the dishes.  I did get an appointment with the shrink in three weeks, too.  I talked to my sis tonight, and she was relating how they had watched last night the taped show of House.  The patient had stopped breathing and had to be intubated, and then the next shot was of them putting some liquid in her breathing apparatus telling her to breathe deeply so it coat the full lungs.  It suddenly hit her and Bruce, that he had only been doing shallow breaths with the nebulizer so last night he started taking really deep breaths and low and behold he was able to sleep a fully 6 hours straight without waking up.  He was coughing when I called, and so he called me back later and he sounded like his old self, perky and happy.  He says he hasn't lost any more weight and how happy he was to feel hunger and eat that night.  So that made me very happy as well!

February 6, 2008 - I have come down with a bronchial cough last night and quickly dosed myself with mega doses of vitamin C.  Since I left the apartment only twice this last month, I had to have picked it up from the girl putting change in my hand from the hamburger stand.  So it was a good thing I did not go up to visit sis and BIL this last weekend - and it wasn't a great weekend for him either.  We had talked last Thursday and he sounded great and perky and then his hair started falling out and in two days it was almost all gone (which is quicker than mine went).  His hair had been his pride, sis said, so it put him in the dumps that the stigmata of cancer is now evident to anyone who sees him.  I know exactly how he feels, like I did, that there is more to us than cancer, but cancer is the first thing anyone thinks about us when they see us.  He's also lost some more weight.  He was 5'11" and weighed 265 pounds and is now about 200 pounds.  Sis says he is still having trouble eating things, especially meats and chicken, eggs, dairy etc.  I told her he was drinking too much water which is why he was not hungry (which is the secret of the weight watchers diet and those people who are starving).  So he's lost some more weight and I guess the doctor did an intervention with him today saying he would be dead soon if he continued to loose weight and got a nutritionist there with them to try and overcome this weight loss.   It's been confirmed that he is diabetic but that is a superfluous condition at this point, they want him to put weight on how ever he can.  So far he has been able to continue working part time and getting treatment radiation later in the day.

My good friend in Minnesota called because she was so lonely and I found out that her only biological child died Jan 10, just about 3 weeks after her husband died.  This son was mentally disabled and been quite a trial to her throughout his life.  Last mother's day he od'd on drugs and almost died.  In Sept he had pneumonia with asthma so bad he was in hospital 27 days and thought he was going to die and told his mother that he only came back from the peace and quiet and love of heaven because he knew his step father was going to die and he wanted to be with her.  And now he died of what appeared to be of a massive heart attack, just got up out of bed and collapsed and she found him in his apartment that way.  His biological father had died the same way when he was 40, and her son was 44.  She feels so lost, because she has spent most of her life taking care of one person or another and now there is nothing to do in her life.  I told her I knew exactly how she felt, that I felt that way after taking care of mom 24/7 that when she died I had no purpose in my life anymore (still feel that way).  I had prayed to God for some solution to her problems that was wearing her down so hardly, but never expected this to happen to her.  

February 12, 2008 - Not much going on these days.  I was sick for a week with a bad cold, nose dripping like a faucet, deep bronchial cough coughing up some blood, and 102 temperature one day.  Good thing I was not still on chemo or it would have been hospital time for me.  Did what they told me a year ago, stopped coumidin for two days, and took tylenol to bring down temperature and then things went on to a normal cold conclusion.  Brother in law's appetite has returned somewhat, the farther away from chemo he gets.  So it must be chemo rather than radiation that affects that for him.  He had bronchospy on Friday and they said they found some staph bacteria in his lungs - we don't quite know what that means and Bruce didn't question the doctor further about it.  

I've been thinking a lot of religious thoughts recently, which I won't bore you with.  I've been downloading and reading old religious texts from Internet Archive website.  I was talking to twin the other night about my thoughts on "gratitude for having cancer" and she said something to the effect that my spirituality impressed her - she didn't think I had it in me.  Well as I said, you just don't talk about God in your everyday conversation!  I think I always had it in me, it just didn't become coherent and expressed until the need arose for it.  And then too, unlike most people who have a varied and hectic life with jobs, family and children, I have had plenty of time to read and ponder and become contemplative.  Sometimes I think of myself as an anchorite - which used to be a person who wanted to be holy and think only thoughts of God who made a cell outside but connected to the church, who spent all their time alone and thinking of God and praying.  Now being holy is not one of my aspirations in life and I don't spend every minute think of God. but I do seem to spend more time than most in thought.  But I have been making some beads in the last couple of nights.  What's hard is the way the kiln is acting up - either it's too cold or it's too hot, so it's taking hours to get it to the right temperature and by then it's either too late or I have lost interested for the night.  Sleep screwed up again, slept 12 hours, was awake 20 hours, slept 8 hours and now we shall see how long I go again before sleep. I can certainly see how Keith Ledger got screwed up on his medications - I just wish I could pop a pill at 10 p.m and go to sleep right away and wake up at 6-8 am., and do this every day!

February 21, 2008 - I recovered from my cold, and thankfully it does not appear to be the "flu" which other people have that hangs on for weeks.  I was to the shrink this week and he is such a nice guy.  It's funny to call a shrink a "sane" man, but he has common sense, humor and is just easy to talk to.  He rewrote my prescriptions so hopefully I won't have to pay as much for them, and upped one of my medications.  I can feel it already helping in two days feeling more alert.  He told me the meds the cancer doctor gave me to help with sleep was a relation to valium and was a tranquilizer and could be addictive - so we decided I would not use it except for when my inability to sleep is greatly impaired.  So all in all I am doing pretty well.

I can't say the same thing for my brother in law.  Last week he had THREE days of chemo as well as daily radiation treatments.  It has turned him inside out with all the violent nausea and sickness even to regurgitating.  Nothing is working and today the doc says he has lost 10 more pounds and he WILL die unless he starts eating.  He was so sick he has been off of work for a week now.  The staph infection is MERSA which is highly contagious and is in his lungs.  The pills for it cost $100 a piece and the local pharmacy did not have it and so sis had to go to another town to get them.  The insurance company (Blue Cross Blue Shield) would not pay for them and sis could only afford 8 of them.  He is supposed to take one every 12 hours.  Up until this time he had been hacking terrible coughing and still coughing congestion up from his lungs, and it is because of this bacterial infection.  Thirty percent of population walk around with this bacteria, but it is inactive until the immune system is compromised, like with chemo.  We are beginning to think perhaps he picked it up in their trip last June to New Orleans.  Anyhow, 24 hours after taking this pill the great majority of his coughing stopped as well as expectorations from his lungs.  Sis says it was amazing.  I called the drug company since they have web page about financial assistance as well as assistance in getting insurance companies to pay for the drug - and they explained that what the pharmacy got was a routine denial and not a formal denial and how the process is for the doctor to call insurance company and submit medical information showing that this was the only drug that could help BIL in a life and death situation.  Anyhow doctor did that today and insurance company is now going to pay for them and pharmacy refunded some of their money since (surprise, surprise) they found out they have a drug co-pay starting this year of $500.  What's interesting is that the UCI doctor called Iran to find out what the pill costs there and it was $7 a pill there, cause he was going to import some of the pills from there (by same manufacturer) for BIL and pay for them himself! .  It's no wonder insurance companies are finding it difficult to want to pay such an incredibly increased price here in USA.  So for a day and a half he felt good but then the side effects of the pills is nausea, headaches and dizziness  and so his nausea is even worse.  They canceled his last chemo this week and his radiation because the MERSA is so contagious, for the safety of the other immune compromised patients at the clinic.  He had another bronchospy today which showed the tumor affecting the windpipe has gone down and a chunk of the tumor in the lungs  broke free and was sucked up today.  But sis is going nuts cause he just won't eat!  He only threw up for one day - he's not even trying to eat.  He "thinks" he would like a certain thing to eat and then when he gets it he won't eat it or only a couple of bites then saying he is full.  Sis sometimes is making him 3 different meals for dinner, none of which he will eat.  Sis has said for the first time she doesn't think he is going to make it through this. He has gone from 265 pounds down to 190 now.  He's not taking responsibility for his illness, he's not taking his pills when he should, he doesn't want to go for an Xray, he's just not trying to eat.  He's mad at her a lot because of her nagging for him to do the things he should be doing.  He just wants things the way they were and is so terribly tired of the way things are.  In my mind, it's like getting old - we don't like the way we have become and unable to do what we did but you have to adjust and realize you can't go back to the way you were.  He is still fighting "having" the disease and not fighting for himself in living with the disease.  I talked with sis and suggested some things that might help.  I can only pray for both of them . Sis won't let me come up to visit this weekend either - two weekends ago it was because I was sick, last weekend it was because he was so terribly sick, this weekend it's because he is still contagious.  They are resuming chemo and radiation Monday with him wearing a mask for other patient's safety.  Theoretically he only has one more chemo to do and then a long break.

Some months ago when people would say to me how courageous I was, I said let's see how much grace I have if I really got sick, like Bruce has.  First of all I realized that if I had been sick as Bruce, I would have been dead from the start because I have no one living with me that could have called 911 for me FIVE times in a month.  Twin calls me every 2-3 days and if she got no answer I know she would call sis or niece - or neighbors would notice the paper accumulating in front of my door and contact caretaker.  But then again, there were many times I didn't feel like eating (it's weird in that it was not nausea it was just a lack of hunger feeling) and many times it was too much of an effort to even make something to eat, but I forced myself into doing it. I may not have done the dishes, but I did what I needed to do.  We have to make Bruce feel this way too without sis losing her mind or having a breakdown or dying herself.

Kellie has been driving me absolutely nuts!  She keeps crying all the time, even when she has had her fresh food, fresh water, her time outside (which, thank you very much, sometimes involves going downstairs so she can eat some delectable grass from various spots in the lawn which then promptly causes her to throw up when she comes back into the apartment) and even when I have groomed her.  She keeps running to the door, acting like she wants me to let her out when she knows I won't do it, when it is dark - and so I open the door and leave the screen door shut (thanks to my other BIL who fixed it in June so Kellie can't jump on it and pop it open) and she sits there and stares out at the dark night.  Sometimes I turn on the light so she can see nothing is there.  I think she is waiting to see if that Lasa Apso from two doors down is going to be coming by or ocassionally feral cats would stop at the door and spray it or meow wanting food (which they haven't done since I stopped feeding them a year ago).  But she even jumps up on the table between me and the laptop and I pet her and she still cries (Whines).  So I finally had enough and got out my BIG GUNS - the flyswatter!!  I have NEVER hit her with the flyswatter, but I have slammed it down on the table (no where near her) which has frightened her and so now just the sight of it will shut her up and make her run away.  It used to be the water pistol, but somehow that lost a spring so it stopped shooting water, and so it stopped being a big gun as she grew impervious to it.  If I didn't know better I would swear she is in heat by the way she has been acting..  

February 22, 2008 - With all the bad things I had to say about my BIL, I forgot to tell you the good things - which is the bronchospy done yesterday shows the tumor affecting the airway has gone down considerably and the possibility is that they can remove some of the stents in a month.  They also believe the tumor in the lung has decreased in size.  Yesterday afternoon sis was relating that Bruce had trouble swallowing which is why he isn't eating.  I questioned that more intensely and found out it was the SAME problem I had, like that knot of pain and hardness in the airway/eating passage that felt like a huge vitamin was stuck there.  So I told her my personal trick about it .  If you put your hand on your larynx you can feel your airway stretching by slowly leaning your head backwards.  I decided that feeling, which I still get now and then either with food or water or even saliva, is a spasm in the airway lining and stretching it draws the kinks out of it - sort of stretching a cramp in your leg.  I do that a couple of times and take deep breaths while doing it and it helps it go away right away. Sis also said Bruce was better mentally and he was cleaning his drawers out.  I thought what? but let it go.  Sis called me back an hour later exclaiming how terribly helpful that was, Bruce did it and first a chunk of congestion came up.  And then he immediately felt better and didn't have that "stuck" feeling anymore. And then she told me he was upstairs laying down and had his St. Anthony Marie Claret relic laying on the site of his tumor cancer.  And then I "got it".  Three and half years ago Bruce had bad melanoma cancer on his back and had cancer operation.  At that time I gave him one of the two relic's I had, and he wore it religiously for some time and then probably threw it in a drawer (although I told him it was a temporary loan!)  They felt they got it all and he didn't have to do chemo or anything else.  And he got on with his life, which come to think about it, is probably why he is still "fighting" having this disease in it's current form.  So cleaning out his drawers was him looking for the relic.  I had asked both of them several times in the last two months if they had got it out for him, and told him last week that I wore the more feminine looking relic for him in praying for his remission and miracle.  This seems to indicate a sea change for him in my mind, that perhaps he is now more accepting and really turning to God for help.  

Tonight twin called me late just to tell me that sis had been talking to her tonight so lovingly about me and all my helpful suggestions, some of which she has passed on to other people. So twin wanted me to know that they both thought my purpose in life has been to help sis (and BIL) get through this.  I had told twin of my talk with shrink, that most people would think that I had NO life, cause I don't do much of anything, and that I felt like I had no purpose to life.  Shrink thought God did have a purpose in life for me, even if I didn't know it had already come or was coming.   So twin just called to tell me as sort of a comfort (but I didn't really need any comforting, if you know what I mean? 

February 27, 2008 - I was able to get out Monday and do some massive shopping, as I had been buying just bare minimums in Jan and most of Feb.  But even in buying a lot more than usual (I was sooooo tired of eating just chicken which is about the cheapest meat you can buy) I still had to practice economies in that the bread I like is now up to $4 a loaf, so I put that aside for a cheaper plain white one for $2.50.  Eggs at now $2.89.  I put back name brands and bought store brands to save ten cents or more on each item.  My one big splurge was to buy a few porterhouse steaks that were on sale  and saved over $2.00 a pound on them.  So I come home and my trunk is just full of grocery bags, and as my normal process I start sorting which bags had to come upstairs immediately having frozen or refrigerator items, and the other being canned goods and paper goods.  So I bring up one load, and sit and rest.  Then eventually I go down for another load.  Then I quickly put away all refrigerator and freezer items, and then the canned goods.  The next night, Tuesday, it hits me that I couldn't find the 4 pounds of hamburger (which I planned on dividing into portions) I had bought and sure enough, I had left it in the car trunk where the bag was off to the side.  I was so mad at myself that I had to throw away $10 worth of food!!!!  My ploy with my medications and the doctor paid off.  I picked up my medications on Monday, and the three that said "take as directed" for 100 pills each, were only charged the one month rate of $10 rather than 3 months rate of $30.  The other non-generic pill, prescribed exactly the same as the others for 100 pills, I was charged $60 which is a two month supply instead of $30 for one month of non-generic drugs.  So altogether by using Kaiser's own rules and asking doctor to change manner in writing prescriptions - I saved $20 on three and $45 on the other for a total of $105.  I don't know if I am going to file complaint on the one I paid $60.  The accompanying literature said the cost to Kaiser for those pills is $763 (but I am not sure I can believe that because of the large quantity Kaiser buys of pills).  The only difference between the 4 prescriptions was simply the overall Kaiser costs.  But then again the doctor thought of something I did not, and on the most expensive pill he made the prescription for the highest dosage of 200 mg, when he wanted me to take 100 mg, so I could cut them in half (as I had been doing all this time with that drug since I was taking only 50 mg and had to cut those pills in half).  So actually paying $60 for those pills give me 6 months of medication!  So I tell myself not to be greedy!

I was wrong about my BIL pain in his airway - the doctor they saw on Monday said it's the site of where the radiation has been treating, but some of the pain had gone away and my BIL is eating much more now.  Most of his nausea disappeared so we are thankful it isn't that expensive antibiotic for MERSA side effect after all.  So he was able to go to work Mon thru today when tonight extreme fatigue and some nausea happened again.  But the antibiotics Zvox has helped clear his chest congestion so much that he is sleeping the night through and has been able to decrease his nebulizer treatments in half!  All this is making him feel so much better both physically and mentally and sis says he's been going around apologizing to her over the way he had been behaving.  His blood tests on Monday show good but he is just on the tinge of maybe becoming anemic.  So no chemo or radiation this week either.  They also found out, when this last chemo is done, he will be then starting another course of chemo only once a week and it is much lighter chemo and less side effects.  

I was excited to read in the news paper a contest where Auntie Anne's Pretzel company was looking for the most volunteer family to give them a "grant" of $20,000.  I immediately thought of my BIL, sis and niece who have given thousands of hours of volunteer time to the girls softball league of Lake Elsinore, and several years sponsoring a travel ball team and spending thousands of their own money to get the kids to these events around the US. There was a time Lake Elsinore was going to cut costs by closing down the playgrounds and turning off the electricity (night lights) and my BIL Bruce Atherton went before the city council and persuaded them not to close the parks giving the reasons why girls softball was so important to the development of young children in Lake Elsinore, and they listened and did as he asked.  Even now with his chemo, he and my niece Erin are still going out to coach and umpire.  Just Monday night Erin went with her father to the high school and while he sat and coached, she was there to relay his commands and do the walking and running for him.  This is a committed and dedicated man to girls softball.  So then I went to the website with visions of perhaps my being able to do something good for them, and found out what a total sham it is - in that the money is paid to the individual BUT the money has to be spent on the charitable organization and that an accounting of how the funds has to be made or else....

" Upon dispersal, all grant funds must be used by the winning families to direct and/or perform those tasks essential to carry-out the families’ proposed charitable works. Failure to use the awarded grants to further entrants’ community service work may result in Sponsor’s action to recover such prizes."  

So I sent off a nastygram to the company to the effect that they were paying the money to an individual who would have to claim those monies on their income tax return, and even if they directly donated the entire money to the charitable organization, the individual would only get a 15% write off on their tax return and end up paying tax on 85% of the money they didn't even get to keep!  So I told them they should stuff their contest and just give the money directly to a charitable organization of their own choosing!

March 1, 2008 - It's been overcast and gloomy here the last couple of days.  I thought my fight with the cockroaches was just about over, when instead I found some more at the opposite side of the kitchen - where the stove and frig are!  In the ceiling there is a space where a vent was once, that has a open barred metal cover covering the hole.  Since I have never washed the ceiling, the cover has had dust accumulate which was a solid cover.  Now there are holes in the dust as if something has dropped through it, which I am thinking perhaps roaches have come from the attic of this building.  So yesterday I get up on my 3 foot ladder and I am teetering there (imagine a plump humpty dumpty shape figure!) , and finally managed to step on top of the stove and then put the other foot on top of the stove and stand there and unscrew the plate!  Teetering all the while I get back down to ground level and then wash the cover clean and put some grease soap on a large sponge and go back up there and clean ceiling around hole.  Back down again, waiting for ceiling to dry. Then back up again and I start cutting up strips of clear duct tape and covering the entire hole, with overlaps sealed to each other.  There isn't going to be a single roach coming in that way again! So in my fourth time up the little ladder standing on the stove I go to punch a slight hole in it to re-screw the cover back and you guessed it, I dropped both screws behind the stove.  Thankfully I did not fall at all.  I have killed 5-6 medium sized roaches around the frig.  I have cleaned everything away from it's sides and top and sprayed real well.  I know the frig rolls, as I have done it when at mom's house, but the floors are uneven here and I could not budge it.  I think I need to get the frig and stove and microwave cart moved out of their area in order to clean and spray better, but I am afraid I am not strong enough to do it.  By doing this work, I managed to clean out some shelves of things I didn't want, so I could put into shelves things I did want to keep so that the top of the frig is now clean.  So I was going downstairs to my flea seller friends, and stopped to talk to neighbor next door.  They are newly setting up an apartment so I offered them any of the household goods I had there, and some she took.  He said he was available to help me any time (I guess cause I look like what I am - a little old lady with no hair ,chemo patient).  Then went downstairs and had them come up for the rest, a trunk and 3 boxs of goods.  I got rid of most of my serving platters, glass and silver - a meat grinder and accessories.  I am planning on getting rid of my canning equipment and pressure cooker as well.  I will just never use those things again - sets of stemware - things I know my family won't want and that have no sentimental value to them.   So while I am not terribly active, I have been doing something.  

March 2, 2008 - Well today I finally was able to drive up and see sis and BIL!  It was a beautiful sunny day, but a bit windy as I got closer to their home.  In fact the main drag into their city had a tree blown over the road and highway patrol was there directing traffic while the tree was being cut up.  Sis was right, Bruce looks 80 years old.  You can't lose 70 pounds and not look all dragged out and so thin.  His hair was white before, and it has started growing again.  But people who are old or sick have a certain way, a fragile way about them.  No more hugging and kissing, he put out his hand to me as I approached and I shook it and patted it and commended him on a good way to keep people away from him and giving him germs.  He likes the short amount of hair that has grown on my head in the last 3 1/2 months. They are amazed that my hair is so dark (but did not mention the white fringe around the dark. LOL) We sat and watched the NASC car races.  Boy there are more camera's in a race car than in the shuttles when they lift off!  Both of us were disappointed that Dale didn't win.  Sis fluttered around doing things and then made us home made tacos.  He had a couple of slight coughing spells and was able to eat several tacos.  It was just a pleasant and relaxing time, and sis kept remarking how amazed she was that I wasn't smoking!  I told her when I was relaxed and feeling good, I didn't have the need to smoke.  I asked his permission to do a religious thing, and he assented.  I told him about how I read in the Bible that he needed a laying on of hands, and since he was not a Catholic, I wanted to do a layman's version of Anointing of the Sick.  Please keep in mind though, there is NO such thing in the Catholic religion - there is only a sacrament done by priests.  So I had brought the holy water from St. Anthony Marie Claret Church (where uncle is) and did a prayer and blessing  with the sign of the cross in water on his forehead, lips and chest, and asking for the Virgin Mary's intercession (she came to him in a dream vision many, many years ago and helped him quit drinking cold turkey!) and Christ's  intercession for a miraculous healing for Bruce.  Now I want you to realize that I do NOT think that I have any special powers or that; it's just that heartfelt prayers in groups of more than two is when Christ said he would be there with us - and that is who I was praying to and so were they.  He appreciated the thought and sis said he wears the St. Anthony relic every night.  So we had a wonderful two hours and I left so they could get on with their going to bed routine.  He was relaxed and peaceful and in good spirits!  Sis read off to me a report from doctor that said that in 4 weeks they are going to do possible stent removal and/or laser cut out remaining part of tumor.  Now that's exciting news!

Sis gave me the family pictures taken last June, and I will be mailing twin's copies to her.  It was sad that niece insisted on her boyfriend being in the pictures and they have recently broken up.  They had been going together for 2-3 years and she did something he didn't like and broke up with her.  I don't know the whole story there and probably never will but it's sad that he will not be among us any more. I took it nice and easy driving home in the dark - I stay in the slow lane and drive 65-70 mph (that's slow in California in spite of the posted speed limits!)

March 10, 2008 - I am doing OK, still having trouble sleeping.  I try not to take that addictive pill, but find then that I stay awake till 5-9 am and sleep till 4-6 pm.  And that is with me frequently waking up and tossing and turning so I feel very tired even when I do get up.  Taking the pill give me more sold, less waking up sleep which leaves me with more energy - so which is the better to use?  I've been having nothing but computer problems the last 4 days and pulling out my hair trying to figure it out and fix it - primarily I could not open internet explorer nor do any search for files on computer.  I could get online with AOL, but that is crazy because they use internet explorer in their program.  I've had HP do a computer check and computer is working alright.  I had Microsoft do a software check and everything checks out there.  But offsite search indicates it's some virus or worm or something, so I had to pay $60 to download some software that has partially fixed the problem.  I also downloaded another internet browser called Firefox.  So after I did that I went back and check and internet explorer would work ONLY if I did not do a search through it - then it reverted back to not working anymore.  I've done all the restores and configurations and just about everything and will just have to leave it the way it is now.

My BIL had a bad week.  He went for chemo on Monday and told him his veins were collapsing and wanted to install a shunt in him and he refused.  Good, I had told sis of June's son dying from the infection caused by a shunt when he was getting chemo.  Funny thing, they have been giving him chemo in his arm, whereas I always got my chemo on the top of my hand.  Anyhow blood tests came back that he was terribly low on white blood cells and the had to start him on injections used for leukemia patients to start making more white blood cells from his bone marrow.  Then his red blood cells were low and they decided he had to have a transfusion of 2 pints.  The combination of which all made him sick and nausea again  Seems he just gets to the point of no nausea when they do something else to him.  I believe this last week was the end of his radiation and that he can possibly be having the stents out in a few weeks.  

March 15, 2008 - Last night I went out and had a delightful dinner with my friend Susan at a new restaurant in uptown Whittier.  We were talking about medical insurance because of my BIL's problems and the increase in drug co-pay.  I knew she had Kaiser HMO, like myself, but I did not know she was in an individual plan (not affiliated with large group) and she has to pay $1,400 a MONTH for family coverage for herself and husband, in addition to all the co-pays and medication costs I have been blitchin about here.  I nearly dropped over when she told me this.  She says it's to the point where she may have to drop it altogether, and just pray nothing happens to them (yes she has had medical problems and takes medications) until they turn 65 in a couple of years and qualify for Medicare (which doesn't pay everything).  I told her I paid about $100 (checked tonight and its $103 for Kaiser and $96 for Medicare) for self only high coverage. But then again, it was for the BENEFITS that I worked for the federal government for 30 years.  One time she got behind in paying premiums and they were going to drop her, and she had to pay a penalty of $5,000 to be allowed to be continue with Kaiser.  I have never heard of anyone paying that much in monthly premiums.  I know that if I did not have Kaiser, I would be dead by now.  Say what you may about HMO's, Kaiser has done good by me.  

BIL has taken another turn for the worse.  He started coughing up horrible stuff and vomiting horrendous stuff.  A bronchospy done this week reflects that the horrible stuff has been dead necrotic tissue off the tumor in his air passage BUT that the tumor has grown through the wall and thru the stent into his air passage.  So they will be doing surgery on him this coming week.  They just can't cut out the entire tumor because it has veins and arteries and he might just hemmorage and die from blood in his lungs. (I thought Lasers could burn off those veins?)  SIS asked me if I ever was vomiting from coughing, and I told her YES, you can cough so hard that the acid will come up from the stomach and cause regurgitation.  But that never happened while I was on chemo, but did happen with gastritis - excess gastric juices in the stomach.  Heck, if I just bent over slightly I would upchuck.  So I take a pill everyday which limits the amount of acid produced in my stomach which took care of that problem.  He's lost more weight again.  I just have the feeling because he is not eating, that he has excessive gastric juices too and should be taking a pill to help control that.  Nevertheless he is plugging away at still going into work - that man has TRUE GRIT with what he has endured and still he struggles to work because he is afraid they will fire him and they can't do without his salary.  

I received a St. Patrick Day card from my good friend in Mn, and was so happy to read that her blood tests show her cancer markers have practically disappeared.  She is sad though as she has lost her eyebrows and eyelashes.  She had stopped chemo though, and they are the first to grow back really fast.  It took me a while to realize they had grown back, as they really do "define" the face.  

March 20, 2008 - This last week has been particularly hard on me physically.  I HURT still, from the physical efforts which required me to physically box and bag up everything in my kitchen and bathroom and move it out of there for exterminator to come in and spray for Roaches.  The caretaker called and told me last Sat that I had to have it done before Tuesday morning at 7 a.m.  So I started doing some of it Sunday.  By Monday, after 1 hour of sleep I was looking at everything in despair.  There was just too much of everything and it was very heavy and wore me out quickly. I could only do a box or a few bags at a time and had to sit down and rest.  And that's how it got done.  I had no one to help me and in 48 hours I had only 5 1/12 hours sleep in that this happened to be the time my body went haywire and just would not relax and allow me to go to sleep.  Do you realize how much you have in your kitchen?  The pots and pans (who knew I had 10 frying pans?), the baking pans and sheets, all the glassware and tupperware, the iron, ironing board, mops, dishes and corning ware, and all the food and canned goods, all the cleaning supplies, silverware, and everything else just slung in bags or boxes in my living room making it impossible to even get to my TV.  And my poor body which has been taking a "rest" the last year and a half had to toil all through the night Monday night and I was finally ready 10 minutes before 7 a.m.  But guess what, they didn't come at 7 am - it turns out they were to be here 7 am TO 9 am, arriving at 9:15AM.  So there I was twiddling my fingers with my kitchen table full of drawers and things with computer disconnected and hidden in my apartment, waiting two hours till they showed up.  I told the caretaker I wanted to be the first apartment, cause after they start spraying you have to be absent for 2 hours before coming back.  

Here I was envisioning spraying like out of the Raid bottles I have been using since last August, with the fumes making living here unlivable.  It wasn't anything like that - it was a handheld sprayer with a dribble of a stream coming out of it with less pressure than what I used to use spraying my roses in Minnesota for bugs.

 Being absent also meant Kellie had to go, so I boxed her up in a cardboard box cat carrier and got her down to the car at 7 a.m. and let her loose in the car while I went back up to wait.  After calling caretaker to find out they would NOT be here at 7 a.m., I released Kellie from prison and brought her upstairs, she was one unhappy cat.  Little did she know what was to come! So when the guy was here, with the caretaker right with him to see how dirty (gosh seeing things in the daylight versus at night really shows you how dirty your apartment has become in the last 2 years) .  I just could not physically mop floors and clean walls to present a better "image" of my apartment to someone else!  So I get myself and Kellie down into the car, where I thought we would sit for two hours.  I release her from the box so she could roam the car and she would NOT stop crying! I am petting her and talking to her and she is still crying LOUDLY.  So then I thought I could drive away and get my car cleaned, and I started the car.  That was the "ON" button to a ferocious kitty I didn't know - who started  clawing her way across the dashboard, along the window and my driving arm, across my back with her back claws digging in, caterwauling to high heaven and just about making it impossible to drive.  So I quickly turned into a grocery store and parked the car and spent another half hour trying to calm her down.  It didn't work - so I finally drove to the car washing place and leave her then on the backseat shelf area, and put the coins in to start the wash.  The first spray of the car wash wand, and she was gone in a flash from the back window- when I was done with car wash I found her huddled up in the area by the gas pedal unwilling to leave there - still crying.  So while driving home, I decided to stop for a few groceries, and then back to my apartment.  So for 1 hour, 40 minutes I got to listen to her!

After returning home and opening windows and putting fans on - there didn't seem to be much in the way of fumes.  I couldn't even get to tea bags and coffee cups to make myself some tea.  A few hours later I was able to finally go to sleep and sleep 7 hours.  When I woke up I hurt so bad I could barely walk.  I had already started coughing up blood from the ibuphofren I had taken to get the job done (my blood was thinner using it and the dust caused coughing), so I felt I couldn't take anymore. About all I could do was watch pre-recorded TV for many hours. When I finally went back to bed again I had legs so swollen they were alarming and red.  Then I slept most of 16 hours!!!!!!!!! I didn't really sleep well because Kellie had to be almost on top of me while I was sleeping and every time I rolled over I got indignant meows.  So upon waking I found my swollen legs had gone down in size (thankfully) but I still hurt like the dickens.  I still couldn't do much, except put the bathroom back in shape (Oh yeah, caretaker had to wake me up Wed morning cause plumber was here to fix my drains in bathroom and toilet).  And tonight I am starting to feel a bit better and have been able to start putting some things away.  Putting some things away though means you just can't them back without wiping off the shelves!  Twin called last night and gave me some good hints like spraying shelves with windex and using toweling to wipe them off - rather than hauling a heavy bucket and sponge around.  So the bathroom is back in shape (had shelving on top of kitchen toilet so had to remove all that too) and about 1/5th of the kitchen back together.  At least I could make myself a cup of tea - ate frozen dinner one night, and ordered delivery the next night, ate left over delivery the following night and maybe tomorrow night can cook a meal again (with dishes to eat on).  Let's see how much I will hurt tomorrow after lifting stuff again.

In the meantime my physical pains are minuscule in comparison to my BIL.  He had to have a bronchospy a week ago and they determined that the growth had to have surgery today.  Because stent moved, he found he couldn't talk sometime this week.  Anyhow this morning they did throat surgery again, to cut away some more of the tumor and re-position stent.  Sis called at 5:40 a.m. to tell me it went OK, and I didn't bother her to call tonight to find out how she was, figuring she was exhausted.

I was supposed to have my three month checkup today which I had to cancel primarily because they had not authorized me to have a Xray done before doctor appointment today.  So I call Wed again about Xray (I had called on Monday) and a second girl says she will have doctor authorize the xray and then call me back - I am still waiting for the call!  

March 21, 2008 - Still No call from my doctor's nurse about authorizing an Xray!  I slept 11 hours last night, but woke up feeling much better as half way thru the night I locked Kellie out of the bedroom.  Still had some aches and pains but still feel tired.  I woke at 11 p.m. (after 11 hours of sleep) and now at 3 am I am feeling like going back to bed.  I am obviously fighting a cold cause cold sores have appeared.  By the time I woke up, of course, it was too late to call sis about BIL.

Today was Good Friday, the day memorialized of Jesus's sacrifice for all mankind.  Something I read not too long ago really blew away my mind, Jesus died to save ALL sinners - which means not only you and me but the ones we would consider really big sinners like Hitler!  Like how many people would stand up and say kill me instead of Hitler?  Many good men will and have died to save other good men (all of whom were sinners).  I have asked God to take me rather than my BIL, but that is me asking to save a good man and even if it were to happen it is no significance in comparison to Jesus's act of redemption.  

March 22, 2008 - Well Guess What!  I had to kill a medium sized cockroach tonight that was on my countertop in the kitchen!  I don't even have half the stuff back into the cabinet yet.  So out came my spray and sprayed the general area where I thought he may have come from.  That makes 4 days since the exterminators were here.

Really great news about Bruce, my BIL.  He had the surgery on Thurs and they let him come home that day.  It was successful and now he has bronchitis and is taking antibiotics for that, and he can talk again!  They think with this next batch of chemo that the tumor may disappear all together!  He and sis are driving up to his Mom's for Easter tomorrow.  As for me, I cooked a ham tonight and will munch on it tomorrow.  One of my friends on the bookboard chat board told me of a different ham and bean soup to make (cause I really don't like split pea soup).  I've made it before and it was quite tasty, so I am looking forward to making more when I am down to scraps.  And I figured out my excessive sleeping is me fighting a cold, having broken out in cold sores again.

Have  a Happy Easter Everyone!

March 26, 2008 - Last night I was watching TV and found tears just streaming down my face.  I had just switched programs and was watching the last 1/2 hour of the Janis Joplin movie on VH1.  It was episodes of her life and I was watching one of her concerts and she was singing the two most important songs of my life back when I was 21-22.  Ball and Chain, and Take Another Piece of my Heart.  That girl was full of energy and rocking even when she was stoned, as she appeared to be so during that concert.  I was sitting on the couch rocking back and forth and singing the lyrics with her when the tears started.  I was unhappy in love then which is why those songs were significant.  I found I was so sorry that she died so young and so much promise was lost.  Then I wondered if I was crying for my own pain and sorrow of all those years ago making me realize that when we experience any kind of grief, we learn to live with it, shut it away and turn our thoughts from it - but something can trigger it and it will well up deep from within again.  Meaning that we never really lose it.  

BIL did pretty good Easter but found himself exhausted from it - it's two hours driving each way to go to his mothers home.  Mother and his brother were all shocked by his appearance, since they have not seen him since the massive weight loss.  

Three more cockroaches died last night - so I am still spraying cupboards that I have not restocked with kitchen goods.  I still have not heard anything about the Xray and they are getting another call today with threat to make a formal complaint about lack of follow through by doctor.  Last night was another go to bed, wake up 1 1/2 hours later - try to go back to sleep and just plain get up 1 hour later.  I got an email from my general doctor that he is re-writing my prescriptions, which should help save me (hopefully) $60.  

I was stunned last night to read some comments a prominent bead maker made about me on chat board and I don't know what I have done to win such admiration from her.  "There are people who have inspired me, though, in later years, for their honesty, their integrity, and their ability to make beautiful beads. One of those people has just posted here, Maureen Kennedy. However, I won't tell her story, or at least the part I know, because I don't know that she would like that very much - ok, probably not (sorry, Maureen), but she has been an inspiration to me since I met her, quite a few years ago. Thank you, Maureen "  I took a class from Pam Dugger in 2002 (I think) and haven't really had any contact with her after that, otherwise she only knows me through chatboards.  

March 28, 2008 - Well my emails to the doctor didn't seem to do any good.  Or perhaps he forgot what I had asked, because he was in consultation with the Coumidin clinic as he had emailed me back that unfortunately I would be on Coumidin for life.  In those two days I guess he forgot about my asking him to change the manner of prescription, because when I went to pick them up the two said take 1 a day, etc - So I had to pay $32 more than I had thought I would because of that wording on two bottles of pills.  But I was also tickled with myself . I had called cancer doctor's office for the 4th time, and found she had authorized my xray the previous Wed and nobody had called to tell me.  So when I called Xray department at the hospital to schedule an appointment, they said no appointment was necessary and I could just walk in.  So on my way to pick up pills I remembered that this was the "end" of the month and I could get my coumidin blood check at the local Kaiser in Whittier, and since it was the lab and also handled Xrays, I enquired if I could walk in for chest xray and would the doctor have the results on the computer so I wouldn't have to go all the way down to Bellflower for xray which always has a large waiting time frame.  So I was able to pick up pills, do blood work and get Xray done which saved me a trip to the hospital.  

I was talking to neighbor downstairs asking about his cockroaches when caretaker went by and related to her that he said his apartment "was crawling with cockroaches" and how he was telling me that insecticide for roaches was so expensive and that 409 sprayed on them would kill them.  Yeah I thought to myself - but does it kill all the ones that are in hiding?  No wonder I still have cockroaches coming upstairs to visit me!  So caretaker called the Terminex man, who has some sort of guarantee on their work, and again next Tuesday they are coming between 7am to 9 am to spray my apartment and neighbor down below for a second time.  Oh joy, another 2 hours with Kellie in the car!  I have not yet replaced all the kitchen goods in the bottom cabinets since I was spraying raid into them still.  

Great news - Battlestar Galectica is starting again next Friday night!  I have been waiting 8 months for this TV show to start which is the last season of the show, and next week they are running all the shows in sequence leading up to the 4th last season.  I have all those shows already on tapes, but they are not consecutive.  So I shall have to set recorder for 8 shows at a time and retape them.

April 1, 2008 - Hello everyone - today is April Fool's Day - and I hope none of you had an unpleasant practical joke played on you!  I hate practical jokes, for the most part, because they are funny only at the expense of another person's  feelings.  I always was too serious for my own good.

The last few days I have been cleaning, down on my hands and knees scrubbing kitchen floor with green scrubbie!  The cheapest materials were used in this apartment and after 7 years of wear it just will not get clean with just a mop, and so now my knees ache.  I "dust" with a wet sponge as the dust is that thick in some areas.  What a relief to finally have the bath tub drain quickly so I can keep that clean now too.

Today Terminex was here again - and again I spent last night moving out some of the kitchen stuff I had put back into my cabinets.  So again, I am achy and sore and popping pain pills inorder to move about.  The guy is so blase about it, he just waves his wand around a little bit in each section and spends no effort in getting down on his knees to ensure he is spraying into cracks and crevices. He "sprays" the baseboards with a general waving action about 4 inches above floor - like how is that suppose to get them?  He said I didn't need to be gone 2 hours, and 30 minutes vacancy would be fine.  So Kellie and I (Kellie in her box) sat on the steps and waited.  One good thing, he joked about "if I was getting rid of some books" and he was a reader - so I offered him 2 boxes of Science Fiction books I was getting rid of, and he loaded them up and took them away.  That saves me from hauling them down to goodwill.  And then after an hour was up, I got down on my hands and knees and sprayed the dickens out of all the crevices and cracks with Raid!  And after going to sleep and waking up I STILL found an ant sized cockroach on my countertop!  

Thursday I go to the doctor and find out the results of the Xray.  Let's hope it is still good news.

 I have been reading early books on the history of Minnesota and some of her early founding "fathers" on internet archive.  Organized "hunts" like we think of as occurring in India were also done in Minnesota where a long line of hunters progressed through the land killing everything in sight and running ahead of them, thereby decimating eventually most of the animals that constituted the trade of the fur companies. Most of the Minnesota leaders  were involved with the Indian fur trade and these good people made their money off the backs of the Indians with 300-400% increase in prices to the Indians.  The fur companies extended "credit" to the Indians who had become dependent upon the trade goods having given up most of their independent ways of hunting and farming in order to survive.  This credit kept them indebted and in virtual control of the Indians so when treaties were proposed the financial value of land have been ceded was then taken by the fur companies in payment of their "credit" balances.  It's no wonder the massacre of 1862 started out at a fur trading store.

I talked to sis this morning and BIL is doing great.  They have him started on some steroids and he is eating, gaining weight AND sleeping and having very little coughing!  She sounded good too, despite being busy at work she sounded relaxed and in good spirits.  .

April 3, 2008 - I had an extraordinary visit with the oncology doctor this afternoon.  She reviewed the Xray report while in the room with me and it shows I am still in remission from my lung cancer (meaning no spots on my lungs).  She was in a upbeat, bubbly, happy type mood and spent 40 minutes talking to me about various things and I kept asking her if I was keeping her from other "customers" - clients she called them.  To spend 40 minutes with me to tell me everything was Ok with me just astounded me - remember the time she told me not to talk to her and just listen?  We talked about my sleeping problems and she explained her reasoning about the pills she had prescribed to me and that they were not really addicting in an addiction sort of way, and that the important thing was for me to get a good nights sleep so that I can start doing things with my life that I wanted to do.  She said that sometimes cancer came back in other areas so just to be sure she was scheduling me with a bone scan to make sure there was no cancer in my bone marrow.  Then in June she wants a CT scan again and another checkup with her.  She says she normally does not review the reports until the patient is in for the visit, because telling someone that they have cancer again is just not the thing to be doing over the telephone.  Finally I reached over and patted her on the knee and asked her what had happened to her, that she was so changed from December.  Remember when I said she was so black in her thinking that I was going to pray for her?  I reminded her how depressed she was last year at Christmas, and I asked her if she was in love, accounting for the change.  She said no, but then her face brightened up and she said she had recently got herself a rescue dog, and we talked about dogs and how much they love their owners - and she was bright with love for her little dog.  Isn't it amazing how animals can change us with their unconditional love (unless you have a cat called Kellie! LOL)  And anyhow the change in her was so profound that I think God answered my prayers for her.

I called both my sisters tonight and told them the good news, as both were worrying about it.  My BIL called me back later just to tell me how happy he was at the good news too.

April 4, 2008 - Well last night I did what doctor suggested and took the anti-nausea/anxiety pill on top of my anti-depressants and slept for 16 HOURS!  It wasn't all sleep, with some tossing and turning over waking up but nevertheless at bed at 2 am with waking at 8:20 pm.  I felt alert and not drugged, but in the last couple of weeks twin is feeling that I have been "drugged/confused"  when talking to her on phone.  One good thing, if I get confused over whether I have taken medication or not, I just skip it.  Doc gave me a pill container to keep track of meds.  Sis is worried because I have been sleeping 10-12 hours - she will have a fit over this! Now today I wake up with feeling like a cold again, last night had sniffles and starting a cold sore again today (I guess it's really tonight!)  I think I will try it again but with the reduced seroquel of 50 mg instead of the 100 mg he recently prescribed for me and see what happens with that or maybe I will try to cut the tiny anti-nausea/anxiety pill in half?.  

Well tonight I did something I probably shouldn't have done and been resisting for almost a year in doing - I ordered online with Amazon the last two DVDs of the program Battlestar Galactica!  (and I confess to a few books mostly in paperbacks I have been wanting).  Season 4 and the last season started tonight and I am taping it on VHS so if I don't screw that up then I won't have to have a dvd of it.  I really HATE dvd's.  Sis loaned me the 3 dvd set of House and darn if the 3rd one will not operate on my player - it seems to have a scratch and player will NOT skip over an area and start in the middle of the DVD as it can't even open it enough to get to a menu.  This is why I hate the suckers, as well as the reduced size of window in watching the program.  But we are stuck with this format with big business not giving us an option.  Just like this switching of all tv channels from analog next year meaning every TV in us will either have to have cable or BUY a converter for digital to analog.  Why does congress get behind these big businesses and force us consumers to purchase something we don't want?   That is really working for the public, isn't it?

April 6, 2008 -I am so confused this morning, waking up an hour ago. I couldn't remember which day it was, since the paper is not here yet, till I clicked on my computer clock. Seems I have slept Saturday away going to sleep at 8 am and waking 19 hours later at 3:30 am Sunday. The "night" before this I slept 16 hours. Before it was bad enough to sleep 10-12 hours at a time, this is too unreal now. I took the pill the oncology doctor told me was equivilant to two cocktails Friday, and then yesterday I cut pill in half and even slept longer. Not sure what I am gonna do about this, probably skip the pill altogether. But this sure is a heck of a way to live life.

April 9, 2008 - Well good news on the Cockroach wars - they seem to have ended!  It's been over a week since Terminex was here and I haven't seen hide nor hair of a single one.  I left everything still strewn in my living room just in case....... I did go around on hands and knees using caulking and filled in 5 big holes in the kitchen area from when they installed new water pipes so perhaps that impaired their egress from downstairs.   Well I stopped taking that pill and have only been sleeping 9-10 hours, but I wake feeling tired and muscles aching.  I have been working on income tax papers and am so terribly relieved that I will be having a modest refund of federal taxes.    Hopefully they don't audit me and declare me a hobby just because self employment income was so low last year.  I continued making beads but just didn't sell them because of my inability to get to the post office to mail them.  Now I know I could have had said all beads were to have postage for priority mail, which means you can arrange for post man to pick them up - but then again my sleeping was so erratice that would not have worked either. I always have to pay state tax but think I can handle it from this month's income. Luckily this is a catch up month on electric even pay - meaning I don't have to pay the $100 this month for electricity.  I have been reading books from the internet archive about ghosts and clairvoyance, etc and I find them very amusing.  Some of the books sounds very good and worthwhile and then up pops something like the mediums talking about people and races on other planets and it makes you wonder why people even believed them in the first place!  But then again, when my life was in jeopardy my uncle (the priest) told me to pray to mom and dad for their help in beating cancer.  Makes me think of us praying to saints for their help and intercession which means even the church believes "spirits" of those departed can help us so who's to say they don't talk to certain mediums.  Nevertheless, these mediums of the 1890s-1920's always manage to screw it up with something so outrageous or proven today in scientific facts as being impossible which is why they are amusing.

April 14, 2008 - Well tomorrow is the BIG Day!  Hope you all have your tax returns done; I mailed mine last Friday.  The last two days we have had unseasonably and record breaking hot days of 96 degrees.  Even though humidity was low, I still had to run the air conditioner for several hours each day.  Since I have not seen any cockroaches for two weeks now, I started putting back things in the cabinets sorting out things to get rid of - sets of glasses, mixing bowels, pots and pans, etc.  And wouldn't you know it, a marble rolling pin managed to drop on top of one of my feet - ouch!  Thankfully the foot hasn't swelled up!  (I know that is grammatically wrong, but can't think of how to say it grammatically right!)  I got my order from Amazon with the DVD's and some books and happily reading my way through them.  I will wait on the Battlestar Galactica DVD's until after the final season is over and taped on my VHS machine.  Then I can watch everything in order again.  Right now I am enjoying a DVD set my sis loaned me, called the Young Indiana Jones chronicles , which is a 10 DVD set.  This is set 1, and there are 3 sets, but they do run one program a week on the History channel at 7 am on Saturday mornings.  What is particularly good about these, besides the fact that George Lucas is the creator, is that after the 1-2 hour show of young Indy, there is programs about the sites and events that he experiences during that show.  Such as when he was traveling through Egypt, there is several programs on Howard Carter, the Pyramids, etc.  I highly recommend these shows.  

My BIL seems to be going through the stages of grief and is stuck on anger right now.  I had a disturbing call from twin last night about her conversation with him & Sis and it made me so sick to my stomach I had to take a pill for it.  He is fighting with sis and canceling appointments and generally taking things out and lashing out at sis.   Sis's doctor is so worried about her heart and what is happening to her that he is ordering tests.  Sis told twin that his personality is changing and she is helpless at what is happening.  This sort of reminds me of when I came out to take care of the folks, and Dad had lung cancer and he was so mad about it and took it out on me, who was trying to help them.  My mom would apologize saying she didn't know why he was doing what he did in that he wasn't "that way", but it reminded me of when I lived at home till age 19 when he was drinking a lot.  Several times I threatened to leave them and go back to Minnesota during that year before he died, and as it turned out it wasn't the cancer that killed him, it was his heart condition.  I do get PTS (Post Traumatic Stress) which is probably what made me so sick last night.  I remember once at work they showed a film on the alcoholic family and it so accurately depicted the fighting and problems that it made me so sick that I had to get up and walk out of the showing.  I had lived through it and couldn't bring myself to listen to it again.  I am "wringing my hands" with worry over them, trying to figure out how I can help them but as I said to Twin, all we can do is pray harder.

April 17, 2008 - Today finds us in a sunny, warm Southern California!  One of the wonders of the internet is being able to watch video's of the Pope's visit and speeches directly on my computer monitor, and then being able to go to the Vatican's website to read the actual speeches he gives (sometimes he is hard to understand because of his German accent).

 http://www.uspapalvisit.org/    

http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2008/april/index_en.htm

  In some of my cruising around the internet today I came across Saint Faustina and the Chaplet of Devine Mercy  

http://www.ewtn.com/Devotionals/mercy/dmmap.htm  

This Polish nun had visions and spoke with Jesus on his mercy with absolution from sins and punishments from sin, in the saying of this chaplet.  So I got out my rosary and started saying the chaplet of Mercy for my BIL Bruce, and next thing I knew I was crying for Jesus's suffering on the cross.  I was crying as I was saying it - and I felt cleansed with my tears, which I cannot ever recall happening in just saying the rosary.  This brings to mind something I read of Gospels NOT considered valid and therefore never made it into the Bible, but one section purports Jesus saying that even Judas could have been saved if he had BELIEVED that God would show him mercy in spite of what he had done.  But instead of believing in God and his mercy, he turned himself away from God and killed himself instead.  

I talked with Sis last night, and she said Twin just happened to call at a bad time and that BIL has good days and then bad days - so it was not all bad.  I told her how concerned I was about these "tests" for her and it seems some blood levels are high and they will be running a lot of tests next week.  He has started getting weak again (having to rest a lot while walking) and is almost to anemia again and has to have shots to promote red blood cells (for a while it was shots to promote white blood cells), but so far he doesn't need a transfusion.  He had an appointment to see oncologist about the results of the CT scan, but was sick and canceled it and has not rescheduled it.  Sis thinks he is afraid of what it may show, and I reminded her that it could show something good and positive.  After all, it was a unexpected CT scan that showed my tumors were gone! 

Tonight one of my most favorite TV shows has it's finale - Eli Stone.  It should be a good one and seems to have some religious overtones.  I spent part of the day sorting through more kitchen goods and replacing them in cabinets - I just have a stack of boxes of kitchen goods lined up ready to be given away!

April 19, 2008 - Some Glorious News!  My BIL had another bronchospy done yesterday and the doctors report that there is NO sign of the trachea tumor - that it appears to have disappeared completely!  They said it is faintly possible that the tumor is hiding behind stent and only the CT scan will show that.  He does have thrush (a yeast infection of the mouth and airways) for which they gave him medication, and he has irritation of lining with gastritis (acid reflux) which is what has caused him to cough up some blood recently.  They now have him on Prilosec everyday for the gastritis.  My sis said BIL is ecstatic and walking on air with this good news.  Now perhaps he will be more willing to go to doctor to find out the results of the CT scan! Sis said every night they would place the relic of St. Anthony Marie Claret on the trachea tumor and pray for healing.  Now she said they are going to move the relic to where they think the lung tumor is and start praying for that tumor.  God has answered our prayers as I have been praying for miraculous remission of his cancer!

April 24, 2008 - I have still been sorting through kitchen stuff.  I have every lid on every piece of tupperware and somehow have left over lids that don't fit anything or extra bottoms without lid.  You wonder how could that happen?  In our evolving lifestyle we have given up the need for tupperware using plastic bags instead - so one way of "Going Green" (the new buzz word. LOL) is to start using reusable tupperware rather than plastics!  Even so, I have way too much of it so half of it is to be given away.  I went through all my drawers and got rid of all the extra's like boiled egg cutters, serrated grapefruit knives, extra steak knives, bread knives, strainers, etc,, etc. (remember I had duplicates of my mom's since I had to live in this apartment before my things came from Minnesota. ) Now my drawers open and close nicely without having to stuff things down to get it to shut! (except for the junk drawer!)  I have three electrical appliances I want to give away but darn if I can find their electrical cords.  I went through the junk closet and into the bag where I put all cords, and no cord for the coffee maker, belgian waffle maker or the electric frying pan.  I hate to throw those things away JUST because I can't find the cord but I can't imagine where they are.  Just by chance I checked for the cord for my electric mixer and found that in the bag.  I know I wouldn't have thrown those out so they are somewhere around here! I had 3 visitors a couple of days ago, one night a cockroach walking along the wall, and another night one on the countertop and one on floor.  The thing was, these were big fat plump well fed roaches, so I think they meandered in here from outside.  So I sprayed all my window areas again.  So that's all I have seen in 3 weeks.  I am still weak and have started taking vitamins regularly now.  I don't know if I will ever again regain my strength like I used to be - maybe some of that is growing old too.  I tried to sit on the kitchen floor the other day with one leg bent under me and I just could not do it, so I could not get close to the cabinet when trying to lay down new contact paper.  I used to be able to raise one leg up and bend it and lay it down on other leg so I could rub lotion on it like I am supposed to do for my lymphedema, and can't do that anymore.  I wonder if that has something to do with what that MRI found that the bottom of my spine has 3 discs fused together - or if it just means in not doing something I have lost the mobility to do it?  Anyhow getting down on my hands and knees is the key to the next project I want to start and that is cleaning the kitchen.  I especially want to start with the stove as well as the cabinets so hopefully I can get close to the floor to do them well.  That's about it from here!  Hope you all are having a good spring.

April 26, 2008 - Well I feel pretty pleased with myself.  Yesterday I was able to walk up and down the stairs and wash 4 loads of laundry - something I have not done for months.  And today I was able to get down on the floor and clean my stove and microwave.  I even found out that the Greaser stuff works well on the walls for the oil spatters and was able to wash a small part of the wall which has been real disturbing to me for sometime.  So I really feel good that my kitchen drawers and cabinets are in excellent shape and I am now being able to really clean the kitchen.  Hope this isn't just the 2 days a month of energy like I used to have.  It may not seem a lot to you all reading this, but it is a big thing for me to be able to do this.  I think those vitamins are helping, despite having had a terrible night sleeping being hot all the time.  For months I have been cold, bundled up in bathrobe and afghan, and now suddenly I am hot.  Course it was 94 degrees yesterday, but I run the air conditioner and fan at night so I should not have been hot (so now I am worrying that maybe the air conditioner is going bad).  So I got no restful sleep lasting night, being in and out of the covers first hot then cold then hot.  Today was another hot day so I ran the living room air conditioner for a few hours too.  

Last night I called Sis 3 times and got no answer.  Today I called 2 times and got no answer.  Then I called her work number and found her message that she had taken Friday off.  Then I called Twin who vaguely had said last week that I guess Sis mentioned that some friends wanted to take them to Las Vegas sometime for a weekend.  And then I found myself very mad.  I had to talk to myself trying to find out why I was so mad and after cogitating about it all day it comes down to the fact that she didn't tell me about it - and as I have said to her in the past, that I am an "after thought" in her life.   I am upset that she wouldn't want to share good news with me, as she had with the bad.  And to tell you the truth, if I didn't call her I wouldn't know what in the world was going on with them either.  I makes me feel useless and like a pest.  I don't like feeling this way, and so tonight I am going to be praying for myself for something that seems to be missing inside of me.  

Something I have to mention here.  Last night I watched the tail end of a Cops type show where this man was holed up in a standoff with the police for over 3 days, even when they had shot him in the shoulder.  For some reason they had TV coverage of him.  The negotiator said he felt like the guy wanted to commit Cop Suicide by having them kill him.  Several times it seemed as the guy was going to turn the gun on him and the negotiator kept talking to him about living life and don't give up.  Finally the guy asked for some water and they threw him down a bottle of water.  That was the turning point in the guy, that someone felt he was worth the decency of having water and he threw out his gun and gave up.  It made such an impression on me about the little things we can do, that end up having big impact on someone else.  And it reminded me of Jesus saying whosoever you do for someone else, you have done for me, by hearing the compassion of the negotiator trying to save the life of this man, as well. Needless to say the guy will be living his life in prison, but who knows what small acts of kindness he could be doing there that helps someone else?

April 30, 2008 - Have you ever felt like drop kicking your cat?  Like picking her up and just kicking her out the door?  I woke up with that feeling today and really had to control myself in delivering corporal punishment.  As it was, I ignored her whining and got up and did my necessary things all the while she was whining.  She should know by now that whining does not get her way any time sooner!  I woke up feeling terrible, didn't sleep well and achy and tired and sick to my stomach.  I kept feeling more and more sick and finally took some stomach pills for it.  In the meantime, about 1 1/2 hours before I got up I started having the cat visiting me in the bedroom whining to me to get up and let her go outside.  Back and forth she went, always staying far enough a way that I can't throw a pillow or something at her, whining enough so I couldn't get back to sleep.  And when she does go outside she stays for only 10-15 minutes to poke around and then back inside into the bedroom to sleep for several hours!  I was going to go out and eat with Susan and just had to cancel that as I felt too sick - then most of the night I kept smelling a burning oil smell  (you know the kind where you put oil in a frying pan and heat it up while you coat your chicken - that burning oil smell when it gets really hot?) which made me nauseous as well.  I just couldn't figure out where that smell was coming from.  I was worried that downstair neighbor had fallen asleep while cooking something (this had happened in an apartment in Minnesota and caused smoke and the fire alarms to go off- which was dangerous cause we had a lot of old people in that building).  Finally I got up and went down stairs to see if I could find the smell, thinking maybe it was the taco shack a half a block away - nope, not them.  I was smelling my clothes, the trashbasket all over and could never find the source.  

Well I had not heard anything from Sis about my 5 phone messages left on her machine, the last saying I was getting worried about them, so I broke down and called her Tuesday.  They had a horrible time in Vegas.  One thing I was worried about happened and the smoking in Vegas turned Bruce into a coughing machine despite his nebulizer treatments.  And then when they went to see Phantom of the Opera, Eileen started having heart attack symptoms with terrible perspiring and pain running from heart down left arm, and she had forgotten her nitroglycerin in the hotel room because she only took a tiny purse with her to the show.  All I can do is shake my head - when she was diagnosed with this problem the first thing I did was buy her a medi-alert bracelet and a chain with a teeny skinny twist top bottle to store nitro pills in so she would always have them available where ever she was.  At that time she said it was a nice gesture but she always had her purse with her so didn't really see the need for it.! Well they were able to get her back to the hotel room OK and the nitro did it's work, but ruined their night.  Their friends felt so bad because they thought they were doing something nice for them, paying for everything, and yet it still turned out bad.  If Bruce was smart he would have worn a mask which would have helped with the smoke - (this is what I would have done) but no, that's too common sense.  

This week I was also able to get down on the floor and scrub most of my bottom cabinets - they look so clean now!  I almost wiggle with pleasure looking at my kitchen now, with it's clean stove, microwave, refrigerator and half the cabinets clean!  Really, it's amazing how much pleasure it gives me to be looking clean. So I am just doing it a few cabinets at a time and in a couple of days the whole thing will be done - then time to tackle the walls bit by bit. The Lady next door has not come by to look at the kitchen things, think I will remind her one more time and then call the downstairs neighbors to come up and get them - I want them out of living room so I can vacumn and dust in there as well..

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