Let’s be bad

I’m not a pumpkin spice fanatic. I don’t ride that train from the first second the temps dip until the Peppermint Mocha comes out for Christmas. I’m not lighting the scented candles and baking the cookies and all the things…

But a PUMPKIN ROLL… well, that’s a different story altogether. Cheers!

 

Good news!

 Lots going on to fill you in on, hopefully this weekend, but one big thing is:

PET scan showed no sign of disease! Woohoo! All clear!

Thanks for all your prayers and support though everything these past 17ish months. I would like Bartles and James, “thanks for your support!”

😁

And my kids wonder why I'm weird

My Dad, the kids' PaPa, came out to visit for a few days. You may have already seen that he took us out for dinner in a previous post. 

Here, we were having breakfast and this goofball scoops jelly out of our jelly jar and lands half a mini powdered donut on top. He proclaims, "jelly donut!" I watch him consume that, lick his spoon clean and notice that he has 5 other donut halves on his plate.

"Wait just a second, you are NOT sticking that spoon back into our jelly jar!"

"I do it all the time!"

"Yeah, at YOUR house! You're not sticking a licked spoon back in OUR jelly! You are such a nut!"

"There's nothing wrong with what I'm doing!"

"Dad, you're so weird!"

 I get him a small mug of jelly for him to dip into at his heart's delight. Absolutely brought flashbacks of our hilarious breakfasts before school as a kid when the 4 of us were sharing a bathroom and had scheduled times of who would be in there when. Dad and I often would laugh ourselves silly as he's launching banana slices into my orange juice and my brother barricaded himself behind cereal boxes. 

In case you breakfast at my parents', you might want to bring your own jelly.

I just HEARD my mother roll her eyes.

 

Pepe got loaded

 This is me in the cab of a semi for the first time in my life. That's Pepe the Pilot getting loaded onto the trailer behind me. Let me tell you a story with a happy but to-be-continued ending:

Earlier this week, I think Tuesday but maybe Monday, who knows, I had an oncology check up appointment. I got an excellent report, blood work looked good, and no serious side effects from the first long term, new-to-me medicine that I started two weeks prior. I also got a prescrpition for the second I'll-probably-be-on-forever medication. So with a song in my heart and love from my medical team, I headed home. Until...

One by one my dashboard starts to light up in my 20 year old Pilot. The check engine light pops on, the exclamation point in the triangle pops on, other letters I don't know the meaning of lit up, as well as my TPMS which is often on and off so unless an actual tire lights up on my little car diagram that one gets ignored, but even more concerningly, my speed begins to decrease even though I'm not doing anything different with my right foot. *Side note: I'll be informed later on that this phenomenon is called, "Safe Mode" though how it is a safe mode when your heart is in your throat and you're praying you won't have to get out and push or something is beyond me. Maybe it's safe in the sense of the car is shutting down instead of blowing up?*

I am on the interstate.

Pepe, you can NOT die on the interstate. No, no, noooooo!

That would be not quite the Sound of Ultimate Suffering, for those of you who have seen "The Princess Bride". For those of you who haven't, what are you waiting for, Christmas!?

Poor Pepe gimps along to the next exit where there is a truck stop and a McDonald's, thankfully, and I'm not stuck on the side of the road in August in my new, cute shoes that I'm still breaking in!

Mind you, I've also only had a protein bar, water, and my morning meds. The plan was to do the appointment and go home to get Dad and then go out to breakfast. I haven't even had Elixir of Magic Beans yet.

First call is to the Elite of Husbands, who, naturally, IS OUT OF TOWN because things only go wrong when he is gone. Not because I expect him to help, just to keep him abreast of the situation and so that he can laugh at me. And then go bang his head against the wall, because.... vehicles. Nobody is going to let me drive alone to these appointments ever again between this and the Ori on the Rocks episode.

Second call is to AAA. 

Now, all due respect to the dispatch, he was incredibly kind and respectful and was trying his best. Any comparisons to Flash from "Zootopia" are probably unfair, but as anyone experiencing an adrenaline dump could tell you, please wait to tell me you're sending me new AAA cards AFTER you have sent help for the current situation. I am pretty sure my eyes were getting wider and wider as he tried to find me in the system from what apparently was an outdated membership number and had to hunt and peck in my name and so forth. 

Then we had another whole set of adventures as he tried to locate me because the link he sent my cell phone to ping for my location didn't work and he was in the same boat that I'd be in if someone called from somewhere unfamiliar in my state... it was a whole thing. He found me and sent a tow truck and it may have even arrived earlier than he predicted. So now I wait.

McDonald's it is! Except now I've missed the breakfast menu. I'm second in line when the Elite of Husbands calls me back, so I exit the line to update him and then make my way to the counter to order. The kid taking my order is a young cutie. Pretty sure I heard him tell his manager that he was 14. Is that even legal? Who knows. He asked me what I wanted and I told him a frappe and he asked if there was anything else and I said on an exhale, "I don't even know." I ended up with a box of McNuggets because I figured that'd be less mess than a Big Mac if the tow showed up in the middle of my whatever meal this is.

Back outside, devoured my nuggets, got a brain freeze on my first big sip of frappe, and the tow shows up. Hey, new bestie! Yaaaaay for the rescue! 

He gets Pepe loaded, we start chatting as we head up to our Honda place that's taken care of us for years, and he unloads Pepe and drops me off. Thank you, Matt!

I head in and the guys at the service desk all chuckle and say, "you got to ride in the truck!" I beamed at them and concurred, "I DID get to ride in the truck- my first time!" So then we go over what all is happening and they promise to squish Pepe in whenever they have time to work on him and they get me a shuttle ride home. 

So. He's a 2005. Not getting any younger. Has a lot of rust damage on his back left side so we OFTEN joke about, "hold onto your butt, Pepe" anytime we go over awful potholes, railroad tracks, the high curbs in the town north of us, etc. The tow truck guy thought maybe alternator issue since I had a ton of lights on the dash and my interior lights were dim. 

I picked Pepe back up a few days later. I love that my service guy talks to me like I know thing one about cars. Bless his sweet heart. I'm also thankful he types stuff out for me so I can hand it to anyone who actually DOES know things about vehicles and parts and whatnot. They cleaned out a ground throttle body (?) and cleared the code and one of the guys test drove it to the next town and back and nothing lit up on the dash. Not alternator as my battery light was one thing that did NOT light up. *Side note, my kids call those "achievements" like in a video game when you level up* 

They said to see how it goes from here, reminded me about the terrible rust damage, and to call them if we need them because they didn't want to sell me a bunch of stuff on a vehicle that is that old. So not Last Rites, but pretty close to a Good Luck and God Bless Until We Meet Again. 

Hopefully not next week. 

 

Good times, food times

I have two lengthy posts to edit tomorrow, but in the meantime, here's a fun photo from dinner last night. PaPa came out to visit for a few days, so I've put him to work, and he took us out to eat!

 

A question for the internet

Anybody know what this is? I found it (them?) on a front porch post. Anyone know if it (they?) need to be removed, posthaste?

 

Semantics

 Full disclosure: Thing Two is a direct relation of Slow Poke Rodriguez, the cousin of Speedy Gonzalez on the old "Looney Tunes" cartoons. They used to crack me up, those two, because to have family members that different struck me as being hilarious.

Then I met more people.

Anyway, Thing Two has been... nontraditional... in his milestones in the late teen years, not unlike, from what I hear, a lot of his peers. Kids seem to be delaying getting drivers' licenses, dating, and so forth. He's dabbling in the driving, but as yet hasn't had the First Job, etc. It's become quite the topic at our house. In fact, Dada asked:

What're you waiting for? Divine intervention? I'll be your divine intervention.

Thing Two: Divine intervention is "divine." You are not.

Dada: I'll help you MEET the divine intervention!

Thing Two: That's not intervention. That's.....................shipping.

Two of everything, including skin pictures (viewer discretion advised even though things look amazing)

Two weeks post-hysterectomy, here's how things look. Still chigger bites hanging in there, figures, but my glue-covered incisions are healing well. I saw my doc for the first follow up appointment and she said everything looked great and to keep doing what I've been doing, with one exception:

 I overdid it a little bit last Saturday with walking 3 miles on the treadmill and then twisting side to side to crack my back. Then I had some spotting, which is always alarming, at least to me. So I quit it and haven't done it again and things have been fine. Just keepin' it real, or honest, or something.

She showed me the photos of my lady parts that she took during surgery and can I just say that I think it's so cool to be able to see one's own insides? So neat!

Also getting plenty of wear out of the abdominal wrap they gave me. Definitely nice to have the support when I'm walking. And wonderful to take it off. My doc and I mused about how that's like a bra, but those ALWAYS feel good to take off, haha!

And it's been two months since my last radiation session. My skin looks fantastic and it only a bit more than than the rest of me. It looks much less burned and the lotion is still going on once a day for the most part. I've forgotten sometimes and other days I've slathered it on twice, so it all evens out. 

I'm staying out of the sun and still wearing my sleeve on my right arm. I have another PT check in two weeks. Here's hoping I'll be done with the sleeve for real unless I'm doing heavy household chores or gardening, and I need to remember to ask if they recommend using it for any flights in case I get inspired to go anywhere. 

Thanks again for all the prayers! The healing is going really well on all fronts. 

Enjoy the cooler weather this weekend!

 

Just goes to show

 I wonder if brain cells are the first thing to go once you hit middle age. All day I've been wondering, "hmm, it's July 24th. Whose birthday is it? Who have I forgotten?"

I checked my phone to see a text from my mother about, "happy half birthday!" Then I see an email from my dad, "happy half birthday!" 

Oh yeah. It's me. Happy 49.5 and be glad we are partying NEXT year for 50.5 because it is 93 degrees out there! 😅

"And DON'T underestimate the importance of BODY LANGUAGE, ha!"

 The title is from Ursula in Disney's "The Little Mermaid"- the old animated one I grew up with- and it doesn't quite fit this post but it's close enough for government work. It's too hot and I'm too sleepy to fight with it for a better one. "GETMO; Good Enough To Move On," as Craig Groeschel says at the Global Leadership Conference.

I got a good look at myself in the mirror the other day and had to just laugh ruefully. This is not how I pictured my middle aged body would look. I do remember telling Dada decades ago that I wanted to be "pleasantly plump" and I guess what I had in mind was Mrs. Weasley from the Harry Potter series, though it was way before there was a Harry Potter. I think I desired that because nobody in my entire family was ever plump and I thought it was cute. We are a family of beans. String ones, generally. 

At any rate, since I don't have boobs, the first thing I see when I look down is my stomach. For someone who wanted to be plump, it's still a bit disconcerting. Not the lack of boobs- I'm fine with that- but the amount of belly. Welcome to middle age. 

Added to that, my right arm has been in a compression sleeve for almost two months and therefore looks like a fish belly. While I KNOW tan is actually sun damage, I have always felt healthier with a tan and I am *insert your favorite synonym for "mad" here* that cancer has ruined yet another summer for me and I'm feeling a bit sorry for myself. My sweet radiation doc begged me to not burn because of the radiation I underwent, and that all looks... nontraditional... because half of my chest is "tan" from the radiation and that's the half I'm supposed to keep protected, under a rash guard, with SPF 50 on the parts that might be exposed. The other half is meh tan for mid-July in a normal year, but I have to keep telling myself that it's not been a normal year. And then my white right arm and hand with tan fingers. Gah. Ridiculous.

My hair is coming back pretty well and it looks like even my eyelashes and eyebrows have decided to show up this time. However, I have started one new med and will be starting a second, and hair thinning/loss is a possible side effect. If this goes to Round Three, I don't plan on ever growing hair back out again. I like it short and fuzzy. Makes me happy and boy, does it streamline your morning routine and your Walmart receipt!

*I forgot to mention all my small incisions still glue covered and healing from last week's hysterectomy. Added to all my other scars, you could draw some funky constellations on my body!

To add insult to injury, every time I go outside I swear I get another bug bite. Mosquitoes I can handle. It's the chiggers! My heavens. It's not just me- the New York Times has an article on them and the comments section is full of misery loves company as well as tips for relief. For those of you who live where there aren't chiggers, and those areas seem to be shrinking due to climate change, count your blessings. I think the only reason poison ivy is worse is because you can spread that around whereas the bites stay put. Chiggers like to get you in the worst possible spots- along bra and underwear lines, armpits, in the folds of back fat, along your groin, not gonna lie- I even have two in my buttcrack. Talk about hitting below the belt! My poor mother did some weeding when she visited and ended up with 24 bites herself. I'm so sorry. They itch for about three weeks and the jury seems to think that it's best to not scratch them open due to histamines and less chance of secondary infection.

So there's no red, white and blue here, just fading black and blue bruises from my IVs, pink from the insect bites, and a depressing lack of tan! In the meant to be comforting words of my radiation doc, "not for forever, just for this summer." *sigh* Whatever you say, Doc.

Sir Squire

Band camp is this week so naturally it's back in the 90s and this crazy child decides to wear a knight costume for one of the theme days. Dude, it's black and long sleeves and I'm going to get a call saying you're in the hospital for heat stroke...

 

Wherein I play the role of Mrs. Potato Head. Again.

 In the post about the Chaos Party I mention being (mostly) done with cancer treatment. The mostly part was because while surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation are all behind me, (again), I still have some Stuff To Do. 

Because my cancer has been hormone-driven, my oncologist strongly recommended having my ovaries and tubes out, and felt that my surgeon could decide about the uterus and cervix. Let's face it; I'm almost 50, I don't need any of that stuff anymore, and like Dada said, "clearly your departments aren't communicating with each other because you haven't been able to physically feed a child since 2018 so why do they keep trying to make one?" I couldn't agree more. Enough is enough already. 

My surgeon felt the same. "Why in the world would we leave anything in there to cause trouble later on down the line? No! Let's do it all at once."

"I agree. No uterus left behind. Everybody out of the pool."

So, my belly (and bug bites) Before:

My surgeon also said that she prescribes a bowel cleanse before the surgery. Should anything, God forbid, go wrong, there's less mess to deal with if you're squeaky clean inside. Good times ahead for me and my stack of library books...

The pre-op nurse who called to go over everything told me that they'd be able to use my port. I was thrilled. That doesn't happen for every procedure like you'd think it would. And while they did indeed get my port, which was being stubborn and not wanting to draw blood (it does that sometimes. It'll let you put stuff in but gets selfish and won't let stuff come out. She had to re-poke it, then it gave up and cooperated), they informed me regretfully that because the surgery was being done robotically, that meant I'd need another line started to push meds in case anything unforeseen should happen. 

I told the nurse, "good luck! I have tiny, uncooperative veins and haven't been drinking because of the bowel prep." Bless her heart, she got me on the first try in that lower pink circle, and then AFTER it was all over they do a blood draw to check your hemoglobin status so that is the elbow stick in the top pink circle! Six days later, I'm less blue and purple and more green and yellow.

They applied a scopolamine patch behind my left ear to prevent nausea. You leave that baby on for 24 hours and then peel it off, throw it in the trash wrapped up, and wash your hands. If you touch your eyes the medication can dilate your eyes and cause blurry vision- the opposite of anti-nausea, haha, so follow directions. 

I had other stuff in my IVs and fentanyl for the surgery, which I've had before, apparently, because I asked and they checked. The anesthesiologist had already gone over her checklist with me about myself or any family members who have had trouble with anesthesia. 

My bugger of a port, looking all innocent:

I don't even remember seeing the docs in the OR. Dada smooched me and they rolled me down the hall. I remember going into OR #3, seeing the lights, hearing someone say that Tiffany was already in there, and then looking down my right side as they lined up the bed I was in with the OR bed, then nothing until the recovery room. My surgeon showed Dada the pictures of everything that was removed, and she may have showed them to me but I ALSO don't remember seeing her afterwards, so I'll have to ask at my follow up appointment. Gotta check on my Mrs. Potato Head pieces!

So it's four small incisions for a robotically laparoscopic complete hysterectomy and then everything gets pulled out down below. A camera is inserted into your bladder during the surgery to make sure nothing is accidentally nicked in that area as well, so you do have some burning upon urination immediately after surgery, but by the second day that had already faded for me. 

They sent me home the same afternoon with ibuprofen to take every 8 hours with food, a stool softener to take twice a day because straining during constipation can tear open your stitches and then you have a right mess, and Percoset which I haven't taken any of because for me the ibuprofen/tylenol routine works great. I'm thankful. I thought there would be both more pain and more bleeding, but I have only had twinges and some spotting, no cramps, no gushing, nothing awful! Did I mention I'm thankful? 

Bye bye, lady parts. Well done, good and faithful servants.

Thank you all for your prayers and the well checks. I have the best tribe, as always!

Please pray that I continue to heal well- my follow ups are at the 2 weeks and 8 weeks marks, and I'm not anticipating difficulties there, but I AM beginning a new medicine that I'll be on for the next three years if I tolerate it well. 

It's called a cyclin-dependent kinase 4 and 6 inhibitor (CDK4/6 for short). CDK4/6 proteins regulate cell division and cell growth, so by inhibiting/blocking those proteins, the drug slows or stops cancer cell growth. We are using this because my cancer has been hormone receptor (HR)-positive (meaning estrogen and progesterone driven) and HER2 negative this time around. 

It's a lot of big words, so just picture Gandalf with his staff in front of my regular cells, and bellowing to any stray cancer cells, "YOU SHALL NOT PASS!"

It's a 21 day on, 7 day off cycle, like a lot of birth control pills. Blood counts will be monitored while I'm on it, so my goofy port had better get it together and start drawing blood correctly. There's potential side effects, as with any drug, and these ones could affect heart and liver. I already had my EKG before beginning it so we have a baseline, and my oncologist does blood draws at each visit. 

Fatigue is also a potential side effect, and there's a laundry list of others that I suppose I should read so I know what to watch out for. It's a fine line between knowing what could happen versus scaring myself to death. My radiation doctor is actually the one who put the bug in my oncologist's ear about this type of drug, lucky me; they're conspiring, haha! He had a different brand in mind and my oncologist declared this one to be much less time in the bathroom than the other, so thank heavens for that.

Please pray that my system tolerates it well, so we can do the 3 year stint and be done with it. The reason it is three years is that it's been proven to prevent recurrence when patients have taken it for three years, and there aren't apparent benefits to continuing past then. I'll also be switching from Tamoxifen to Arimidex no that I no longer have ovaries. "Better living though chemistry," is the quote I keep hearing in my head, but I don't know that I believe it, haha! Hair loss is on the list of potential side effects, so it'll be interesting to see if I end up bald for a third time and how long that will last. As usual, plenty of the side effects are "I can deal with" ones like fatigue, bathroom issues for which one can use Imodium or stool softeners, and so forth. There are some more serious ones, as well, such as your heart rhythm being affected (long QT syndrome) so that's a bit worrisome. I guess there's no such thing as a risk-free life, and the meds are to help prevent recurrence. Since I do NOT want to endure a Round Three, here we go!

Great idea. Throw a party then leave for the beach!

We threw a Chaos Party Father's Day weekend. Thing Three had turned 15, Dada had turned 50, and I was (mostly) done with cancer treatment, so we figured it was a good time to celebrate!. 

That would be a skeleton on the stairs under the streamers.

There was pie.

And people everywhere!

It rained until about noon on Saturday, but cleared out and dried out so we even managed to use the deck! We'd been a little worried because we weren't sure how many to expect and if they'd all fit in the house if everyone came at once...

Cadaver was in charge of making sure everyone got a name tag and signed the guest book. You show up at one of our parties and we will put you to work!

Thing One and I were upstairs and stopped what we were doing to listen for a minute. 

"Are they playing Twister?!"

"Right foot green."

"They ARE playing Twister!!"

 Thank you to everyone who squished a visit to our house in admist all the weddings, showers, grad parties, and Father's Day bashes that weekend! We loved having you!

Next year there will be a Christmas in July/50.5 party so save the weekend of July 24/25, 2026!

And more sand

Sand is not Dada's element, so I'm always grateful when he wants to join us at the beach or in the dunes. Above was an early morning excursion and we hopped up onto a lifeguard chair for this photo. I was indeed in my compression sleeve though you can't tell. I'm not in my rash guard because it was early morning sun, but I had it with me in my beach bag, fret not.

This year we made it to Jockey's Ridge. We don't always, but this year we convinced Dada to join us and we huffed our way up and down the dunes that always seem like they'll end just over the horizon... or maybe now... or in another minute... or...

Gladys turned over 30,000 miles on our trip. You go, girl!

I think these photos were the night we got to the beach. Thing One and I had to go say hi to the ocean immediately- there's no waiting around for the next morning!

 

Random beach snippet snaps

Can you guess whose sandy feet are whose?

I wonder if the crab is mad that his sun was blocked or if he was glad for a second of shade.

Fairly early morning sun on a glass ocean.

Proof of a busy beach! Check out how many different species used the same space.

The solo Thing Two beach sighting. We beach very differently!

Thing Three, with waves that were just warming up. He did get some fun ones before we left!

And Duck Donuts, because we can't beach without them. Blueberry lemon, lemon coconut, chocolate peanut butter, maple bacon, glazed, sprinkles, and cookies & cream. Of all summers to not be running, haha...

 

Sunrise

Shhhhh, be very quiet. Here we see a Hinrew in the wild, focusing on how best to take photographs of the sunrise. Don't spook him!

 They're out of order and I have a bajillion more but you get the idea. We went to a few sunrises that week and enjoyed the mostly empty beach before the sun got high.

More beach pix

Our beach week featured a lot of calm, glassy ocean days and few clouds. Definitely my preference of ocean. Thing Three was a little grumpy that there weren't huge waves to smash into, but this was a good year for me to be calm and serene and slow. I kept my promises to my radiation doctor and have the ridiculous tan lines to prove it, but enjoyed the beach nevertheless. How could I not?!

I always forget how BRIGHT it is at the beach!

Small child sized footprint beside Thing One's. I like investigating the sand and thinking about how many critters have left their marks.

If anybody needs a road trippin' partner, I highly recommend Thing One. There's lots of singing, laughing, good talks, snacks, and carrying on whilst being an excellent, cautious driver. So proud of this kid!