Reflection...

Today my wheelchair was picked up by the company that rented it to me. It is very strange the way it makes me feel. I remember when it was delivered here. My mom and I broke it in by doing donuts in the front room! Now it is gone. I am glad, but it is a weird reminder of how far I have come and what I have been through. I am now one step closer to life going back to normal. Sometimes it is almost like it didn’t happen at all, then I look in the mirror or get rid of something I needed but don’t anymore.



Some of the crew on my first day back!

I also went to back to work on Tuesday. It was great to be back and I was so happy to see some of my favorite people there! Being at the front desk is easy for me physically, and I was able to pick right back up. There are some new things and some of the special order things that I didn’t see much of before that I need a refresher on, but I think it is a great place for me to start. My only concern about drawing blood is just being physically tired being on my feet for long periods of time. I don’t think anyone will care if I need to sit down for a few minutes though, not really.

I watched a documentary film yesterday called, The Education of Dee Dee Ricks. Dee Dee starts as a shallow, annoying personality, so much so I almost turned it off. I am glad I didn’t. As the story progressed, she changed and also changed the lives of people around her. She found an amazing purpose for herself. She found that many different things were important to her than before and decided to live a more simple life. It was inspirational. Part of this movie also followed a woman Dee Dee became close to, Cynthia Dodson. I found a reflection of myself in Cynthia, and I cried very hard when she passed away during the filming.

I have found myself more reflective this week. I have been contemplating what about me is different and where am I the same. My patients is not so good for things like waiting in line, which it never has been. I am, however, much more likely to be patient with other people and let things roll right off back. I also roll with the punches more. I am more accepting when things won’t go according to plan. Let’s face it, if I can handle having to quit nursing school, for who knew how long, after so many years of hard work I can handle plans needing to change or some things just not working out at all.

I have also noticed wanting to change things with my surroundings. I want to make my environment full of happiness and life. Alan and I are talking about adding more windows in our living room to let in some light. This room is like a den. We are picking out some new paint and finding pictures to hang. We are going to be hanging pictures of our trips and good times together. One thing I told Alan when we knew that this was most likely cancer was that I had no regrets. We have had a beautiful and fun life, and I wouldn’t change a moment of our life together. I want to reflect that in our home.

An awesome cancer update!!!

Well, things have been progressing well. I am working on my stamina every day. I find I need naps a little less, but am doing more in my day. I feel more like myself a little everyday!

I start back up at work on Tuesday. I am very excited to go back. It is one more step to normal life again. My boss is being very kind and understanding. She is allowing me to come back as an extra person, so if I find I am unable to stay at work I can leave. I am starting at the front desk so I can learn the differences in the computer stuff and get a refresher on the old stuff too. She is letting me pick what days I go in too. Over all they are being very supportive in me coming back!

In other great news…I saw my bone doctor yesterday. He gave me the best news ever. He gave me the ok to do whatever physical activity I want, with the caveat that I ease into the activity. He told me to listen to my body and if I start to feel pain to stop and come back and see him if necessary. I won’t be running a marathon tomorrow, but have decided to run a 5k run at the end of summer. Other than that I will not be going to see my bone doctor anymore! It is bittersweet for me as he was the first doctor to tell me anything and was the doctor who really took care of me until I started chemo. I will miss him in the future.

I will also be going back to school in September. There might be a chance I cannot get into the clinical side of the program though. There are already too many people in the class I am going into. There are not enough clinical slots for me right now. I might have to take winter quarter off of class and do the clinical portion. That would mean I could not progress to the next class until spring and would not graduate until December 2013. We shall see what happens. I have decided that whatever happens is ok, even if this does change other plans and hopes. I can only do what I can.

I am getting my survivor tattoo on Sept. 30. I am not sure exactly what I am getting yet. I have it narrowed down to a couple of ideas. I will see my artist after I get back from Jamaica to make the final decision. I am super stoked and cannot wait. I do think I may get a cherry blossom tree, but have her make it in such a way that I can add things to it later. I am thinking that I would like to add Alan, Loki and I sitting under it at some point and add something to it if we ever have kids.

Well that is all for today. There are lots of great things going on right now. I am going to go make breakfast so husband and I can go on our walk and get our day started!

So...green juice!

Well folks, juicing is still new to me. I only have a few recipes and really I have only done my green juice. I don't drink fruit juice because it has too much sugar.

There are lots of opinions about juicing and if you should do it or not. Why not just eat the veggies? If you juice it, you lose most of the fiber. Well, the answer is easy, you do what you like and what you are comfortable with. I personally don't want to try to make food to fit the veggies I juice into a good tasting meal. I like the juice. It gives me energy, and I treat it like my coffee for the day. It fills me up for a good snack, and I can still have all the veggies I want in my meals. It is extra vitamins, minerals, and trace elements I wouldn't get with any other snack.

The green juice I make, I lovingly call my Warrior Juice because it is just that. I got the recipe out of Crazy Sexy Diet. It is jam packed full of vitamins, minerals. and antioxidants. It promotes a more alkaline climate in the body and is a cancer fighting ninja drink! It does taste...interesting at first. It was hard to drink the first time, but now I drink it with no problems. In fact, my body craves it.

As I always say, do your own research and decide what works best for you. I personally believe in the juice, and  I feel better when I drink it.

Green Warrior Juice
Makes 20-24 oz
2-3 Romaine lettuce leaves
2-3 Kale leaves
2 celery sticks
1 medium cucumber - peel if not organic
1 broccoli stem - include the stem and top
1 medium to large apple or pear
1 in piece of ginger - I don't do this because I hate ginger but many people say it helps with the flavor

A nutrition novel...

Cancer has done a great many things to and for me. Not one thing more important than re-emphasizing the importance of health. Ironically, I was already starting this path when I first started feeling the pain of cancer in my bone. With the pain came a downward spiral of inactivity and eventual failure of diet. It was hard to go to the grocery store to shop, cook, or even care about what I was eating when I was living with pain. It was debilitating. It would take five months of ever increasing pain before I would know why I was in such pain, and I am now well on my way to recovery.

I am not cured of cancer yet. I have no detectable cancer at this moment, but that does not equal cured. In fact, I will not be considered in remission until I hit the five year mark! My cancer was tested for biomarkers on the cell wall, and I have a biomarker that makes my cancer a more aggressive (though not most aggressive) than the average lymphoma and increases my risk of the cancer coming back. On top of that, the lymphoma went into the bone, which also increased the risk of the cancer coming back. What’s worse is that the doctors were unable to determine where my cancer started. If the cancer started in my bone, that is even higher risk of the return of the caner. My doctor’s will not say that the cancer will come back, but they have made sure that I know that it is most likely it will sometime in 2-3 years. In short, I am at high risk for this crap to come back.

This leads me to wonder, what can I do? How do I stack the cards in my favor so that I don’t have to go through this again? The truth is, not much. I cannot fight genetics or predict what my body will do. There is only one thing I can do to and that is to live a healthy lifestyle. It is the only thing I do have control over.

So let’s look at the risk factors for cancer. The most common risk factors are: aging, tobacco, sunlight, ionizing radiation, exposure to certain chemicals and other substances, some viruses and bacteria, certain hormones (especially sex hormones), family history of cancer, alcohol, poor diet, lack of physical activity, and/or being overweight. There are also environmental risk factors as well, but I will save that for another day. I am already becoming a wind bag!

Everyone knows that using tobacco products or regular exposure to second hand smoke increases your risk of cancer. You always hear about lung cancer and smoking, but did you also know that there are several other cancers you put yourself at risk for? People who smoke are also at higher risk for developing cancer in the larynx (voice box), mouth, esophagus, bladder, kidney, throat, stomach, pancreas,  cervix, and getting acute myeloid leukemia (cancer that starts in blood cells)!

Many people have asked me why I have mostly quit drinking alcohol. Granted I have a drink here or there on special occasions, but there are several reasons why I don’t really drink anymore. For the purposes of today I will keep the reasons cancer and me related.

First and foremost, my cancer ate away at the bones in my right hip and left shoulder.  Alcohol actually leaches calcium from your bones and decreases your bones density! This is not very helpful to a person trying to rebuild her bone!!!!

 On the cancer side, you increase the chance of developing cancers of the mouth, throat, esophagus, larynx, liver, and breast if you consume more than two drinks a day, on average, for long periods of time (a couple of years or more). Many of these cancers are increased risk with tobacco use too, so if you drink and smoke you are just asking for trouble. According the National Cancer Institute, a woman should drink no more than one drink per day and a male should drink no more than two drinks per day. That doesn’t mean you can drink a long island iced tea everyday either. One serving of alcohol is ½ oz of ethyl alcohol. Here is a great link to information about portion sizes and the different types of alcohol. http://www.wwu.edu/chw/preventionandwellness/AODWebPDFs/WhatisOneDrink.pdf

Ok…I will get off my soap box! Just keeps this in mind moving forward. These are two very controllable risk factors that are often ignored. More than 180,000 people die of cancer related to tobacco use each year. That is 180,000 people who essentially killed themselves this year alone!

So I can’t control the fact I have a family history or that I have hormones, but in the areas I do have control…I have a leg up. I don’t and never have smoked. I have never been a heavy drinker and rarely do drink. I have completely eliminated caffeine out of my diet already. I live in the Pacific Northwest, land of the hippie and hippie food. The most important thing I have is attitude. I want to change. I have a desire to eat well and to be physically fit.

I have to admit, I was really intimidated at first. I had no idea what quinoa was or how to cook it. I was venturing into the world of green juice, which isn’t the most wonderful tasting stuff but I crave it now. I was learning about all of these so called “super foods”, some of which I would still rather eat my shirt than the food itself! There are all these things you hear about like cleansing and detox diets, vitamin rituals, colonics, raw food diets, vegan diets, and on and on and on. Where do I start? How do I decipher what works for me and what is healthy for me?

I started with TV and the internet. I would watch some of the shows on TV that were about health. When I heard something I thought sounded good, I would go to the internet. This is how I found Kris Carr! She was on The Revolution. She had rare kind of cancer. There is no treatment for it and the prognosis isn’t good. She ventured out into the world of healthy eating and found a diet she thinks keeps her cancer from growing…she has been doing her diet or variations of it since 2003 and has had no significant tumor growth! I fully endorse her book, Crazy Sexy Diet. This book is not preachy and is very fun. It is a raw food diet, but has a lot of information and tips. You don’t have to want to do the raw food diet for this to be worth the cost of the book. I also saw Kelly Freston on the Ellen Show. I also have enjoyed her book, The Lean. It has lots of information. It is a book that helps you ease into a vegan diet over 30 days. I do not prescribe 100% to either book, but there is tons of great information backed by medical research in both. I have found food practices that I have encoporated from both books too. I have learned a lot and also found some other things to research from them.

So how exactly am I approaching food right now? Well, I eat mostly organic. I say mostly because sometimes there isn’t an organic alternative so I buy non organic. If there is organic I buy it though. When I have to buy packaged food, I read the label. I have to know what every ingredient is. No preservatives, refined sugar, refined or bleach flour, high fructose corn syrup, artificial sweeteners, and many other things. I buy meats that are not treated with hormones or antibiotics, contain no nitrates, and free range poultry. I don’t eat bread or pasta. If I do eat something made with flour, it must be whole GRAIN, not whole wheat. I have a smoothie with chia seeds, organic fruit, greek yogurt, and agave syrup everyday. I do have my green juice most days, but it is hard to juice everyday especially when traveling. I also keep my sugar and refined carbs down as they are the fuel that feed cancer!

I love Whole Foods, but it is so far from my house. I have also been going to Marlene’s in Federal Way. It is hard cooking with so many new things, but I am getting the hang of it. I have found many recipes I like thanks to my books and Pinterest, actually.

This is a lot for one blog, so I guess I will stop here for now. I will post my recipe for my green warrior juice in a different post in the next day or two. I have been asked about it, so I will post it.

I look forward to sharing all the things I have learned and am learning. I am already working up a post for coconut oil, chia seeds, and of course my green juice. I hope you all find it informative and entertaining at times.

A quick note about caffeine…there are tons of studies by various corporations and institutes about the healthy benefits of caffeine and coffee. I would suggest you do your own research and determine for yourself what you think is healthy. In my research I have learned that coffee, regular or decaf, is acidic and promotes inflammation and an environment hospitable to cancer. Caffeine also puts you at risk for hundreds of other diseases with seriousness ranging from who cares to life threatening. I will do a whole blog dedicated to caffeine in the future.

6 weeks post final chemo...

Wednesday will mark my 6^th week post chemo. So much has happened I really don’t know where to start or what to say. I guess I will start with chemo 6…

That last chemo was horrible. I felt worse and for longer.  My hair started to fall out again too. It had been growing back and I had no new hair loss…that is until this chemo. I am so glad that is over and even more glad there were no more after that.

My mom and I had some very good times when I started to feel better. We went to the tulip festival for a day. It reminded us so much of being in Holland. We spent that next weekend at a spa resort in Leavenworth, thanks to my dear husband.  We got a wrap treatment, which was nice. I also had my first alcoholic drink, a margarita! We walked around and just really enjoyed each other’s company. Alan came the second day. It was a lot of fun.

The hardest thing I have done was say goodbye to my mother. Alan had training, so I had to take her myself. It was so difficult, and I cried a lot. It took me a long time to get used to her not be in the house anymore. I even shamefully went into her room and cried on her bed one day. I still miss her terribly.

I am more myself every day, and I am doing everything for myself now. There is a lot of house work and organizing to do. This got a little crazy when I was in school, and my mom had set things up the way she liked it. I have had to redo a lot of things to put it back to where I like it.

School is coming up. I had an appointment with my teacher today. I have three options. One…if there is a spot open, take it. Two…if the class is full, take theory in fall and do clinicals in winter. Three…if the class is full, I can take both theory and clinicals in winter. I think I will opt for two if the class is full. I don’t want to be out of school for a whole year.

What else??? Oh yeah, I am now up to walking 2 miles every day. I walk 5 miles at least once a week. I am still working on my stamina and need a nap most days. If I do too much one day, I am usually tired the next day, but I think that is getting better. I do have a doctor’s appointment with my bone doctor on June 1^st. I am hoping that he will approve me to do more physical things like going up the stairs and jumping. I have been going up stairs, but he doesn’t know that. I want to do my Zumba! I should be going back to work in June as well. Life is getting back to normal.

I will still be giving updates about my status, and I will also post some of the pictures my friend, Amy, took of us before my last chemo; however, I will mostly be transitioning this blog into updates on big things that happen to me and things I am doing for my healthy life style changes. I will post my first blog about this in the next couple of days. I hope that it is informative to someone.

Thank you all for all you have done for me. I feel very blessed for so many different reasons.

For Mother

Here is a video I made for my mother. I will post an update soon.

YAY!!! The worst is over!

Now it is wait and see time. I will have to see my oncologist every 3 months for various scans and exams for the next two years. I am high risk for it to come back. The most common time for it to show up is around year 2-3. All I can do now is reduce my stress and live a healthy life. I will have to get an echocardiogram because I was having some chest pain after a short easy cardio workout. Hopefully my heart will be ok.

At the end of my infusion, my nurses came in singing a song. They had a certificate of completion that they all signed and a bottle of Martinelli’s Apple Cider. It was very sweet. Here is the picture we took!


Just wrapping up the song!



The ladies pose after singing!

I love my nurses!

Alan, my mom, and I got our pictures taken at Discovery Park in Seattle by one, Amy Kiel! It was very cool. I can’t wait to see how they came out! She is a busy woman though, so it will be a little while. I promise to post some pics as soon as I get them. It was so much fun. We laughed a lot. Amy is one of my all time favorite people.

We have spent a lot of time outside this last week. We took extra walks and did whatever we could to soak up the sun! It is so nice to have such sunny warm weather. We actually got into the 70s this week. It helps my soul and body so much.

So I did a dance dare. For those of you who don’t watch the Ellen Show which I do every day, she has asked people to send her videos of them dancing behind people who don’t know that is going on. I did this on my last day of chemo! I don’t have very good dance moves as I still have such limitation with my hip, but I did what I could! Yes this is embarrassing, but who cares? When have I even bothered to not put it all out there! I am a silly girl! Also, I had no music to listen too...