Life without the Scarf

On April 17, 2008, my life changed drastically. I went from being a healthy happy 29 year old to a 29 year old with Stage 4 Lymphoma. When my "lymphoma life" started, it was very different. Over 9 months time, I spent more time in the hospital than I did at my own home. I took more medication in one day than I had probably the year before. From spending hours washing, drying and straightening my massive amounts of hair to lotioning my bald head. These things soon became not my "lymphoma life", but my life. My life was being in the hospital, taking medication, being weak, having my mom and mother-in-law cooking, cleaning and taking care of my children (which I appreciate so much!), and wearing a scarf when I went out in public. I never really cared that I was bald, but I could tell that other people were uncomfortable in public when I didn't have my scarf on. Well, my hair is now growing back and as of last week, I started going without a scarf. When I was first diagnosed, I knew my life was going to change drastically, but it never occurred to me that when I was done with treatment, it would change drastically again. Yesterday, in my process to clean (which I'm having to learn how to do again), I started putting all of my bandanas and scarves in a plastic box to put away. For those of you who saw me out know that I have a ton of bandanas. I have one in every color. They were my accessory. Anyway, it was very emotional. I realized that my life was changing...AGAIN. I was packing up that part of me. I don't miss being at the hospital...but I do miss my nurses. They became my friends. I saw them more than I saw my family and friends. I was forced into this life and then after 9 months, it was gone. As I thought about this concept, I thought back to when my nephew Walker was born. After sitting in the waiting room all day with my family and my sister-in-law's family, working on a crossword puzzle (it was a group effort), he was finally here. We were all very excited. He was precious and we were so glad that he had come to join our family and brighten our lives. When talking to Kay (my sister-in-law) after he was born, she told me that it was so weird because she couldn't feel him moving inside her anymore. Of course she didn't, he was there in my arms, not her belly anymore. But, for 9 months, he was growing inside of her. He moved, he kicked, and she felt it. Then he was born, and she no longer felt it. Her life was different. The same was for me. Please don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to compare child birth with cancer, but for 9 months, my life was one way, and then all of a sudden, it's different...I no longer felt it (in a manner of speaking). As I continued to pack away the scarves, and contemplate this revelation of life changes, I thanked God that He healed me and allowed me to have this change.

Here are a few pics of me with hair from last weekend's Mardi Gras parade in Shreveport...

Me & my friend Tracy. Yes, my hair is purplish-red. They spray painted it while waiting for the parade!

Me and Rob- he's wearing my silly hat so I could show off my hair!

Whistle While You Work

Well, I am now in my second week of work and it is going great. Again, I have great employers as they are letting my get my strength back by working part time and of course holding my job for me through my crazy 9 months. Right now, I am working on small projects- stuff that doesn't have to be done "today." That way, if I am feeling bad one day and can't work as long, then it won't harm any deadlines. For those of you that don't know, I work at a law firm. Before I left, I was the receptionist, but they ended up hiring the temp they had so now I am an assistant (not a legal assistant or paralegal). I am still doing some of the same things, but sharing the other stuff with Tiffany (the new receptionist). She's great and I'm so glad she joined our little family. I really love everyone I work with. It's a great group.

Before I left, they sold the office we were in and were in the process of leasing a new office building. While I was gone, they moved offices so when I came back to work, it was to a new office and a new desk. It's very different than what we were in- a historic home, but I like it. I though you might like to see a little bit of my life...

This is the row of cubicles...there are 4 of us in this area. There are 6 offices around us for the 4 partners and then 2 extra for other uses.

This is the outside of the building (only half of it). We are in the far left building.

My desk. Normally, it would be covered with papers, files and notebooks, but since I just came back, it is still pretty clean. It won't stay that way for long I'm sure!

And for a little bit of other news, I was accepted to LeTourneau University's Bachelor in Psychology program. I'm very excited. I already have my Associates Degree, but I really wanted to go on and get my Bachelor's and Masters. I am hoping to one day do cancer counseling. I always loved when my counselors would come to see me in the hospital. It was someone who I could talk to about what was going on with me and they would just sit and listen to me as long as I needed to talk. I also think since I have been there, that I might be able to make others feel like there is hope. I know when I talked to other survivors, it always made me feel so much better and made me feel like I would get through it. I hope to give others that hope too. I also hope to be working with the Leukemia and Lymphoma society for the rest of my life! I'm also excited because LeTourneau is a Christian University so I will be taking the rest of my Bible courses. I start on March 6th, so keep me in your prayers as it has been a few years since I've been in school. All my classes are online, so that will help me out and I should be able to have my bachelor's degree in about 2 years! I'm so very excited!!!

Thanks for all the prayers and please remember all my friends I mentioned below. Love you all!

Update to the Power of Prayer Blog

Oops, apparently I received some wrong information on Claudia, my aunt's friend. As I know God knows what she needs and has heard your prayers, I also strongly believe in specific prayer, so knowing what is really going on is important. Here is an email I received tonight from my aunt:

Claudia has finished her second round of chemo. She was here this weekend for my valentine party, and ended up in the emergency room with a 7 mm kidney stone. So she went ahead and took her second round of chemo and reported to the hospital this morning for surgery to get rid of the kidney stone.
They have not told her that she has to have chemo the rest of her life. She is stage 2 and trying really hard to stay positive. Thank you for praying for her...God is giving her the victory everyday and she is holding on to that.

Thanks Aunt Flora for keeping us posted. We will definitely be praying for her as I know With God, She can beat it!!!

I HATE CANCER!!!

I SERIOUSLY HATE CANCER!!! Why is there cancer in the world? Why does God allow it? These are questions I have had for a long time, even before I was diagnosed. They just intensified since I was diagnosed. Today, Rob got an email that a friend of his from Chicago, growing up, lost her fight with breast cancer. I really and truly hate it. Why is it that some people live to have a great life and others lose their battle? Why does God choose to take some home and not others? Why do children get cancer? Why isn't there a cure yet? If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we cure cancer? This is the reason we are so involved with the Leukemia and Lymphoma society (LLS). They are trying desperately to find a cure. I don't understand it and I'm sure I never will. I know God has his plans for all of our lives and I know He is going to use me and my experience and I am so thankful that He chose me to do this.

Next week, we will be meeting with Tara from the Leukemia and Lymphoma society to try and make the East Texas Light the Night walk bigger and better and help get the word out. I will be able to sign up our team in a couple of weeks, so I am asking that you start praying about joining our team and helping raise funds for this great organization. The walk itself will be October 17th here in Tyler. Our team last year raised almost $7000. I was so excited and grateful that so many of you joined us and helped raise this money. I want this year to be better so we will be that much closer to finding a cure. If you don't want to get involved with LLS, then I am asking you to get involved in ANY foundation that fights for a cure for cancer, but selfishly, I hope you join our team. Keep checking in and I will let you know when you can sign up on the team.

The Power of Prayer

Hey everyone!! Can you say that God is AWESOME? WONDERFUL? ALL POWERFUL? INCREDIBLE?, etc.? I know I can!!! I am so thankful that I serve an AWESOME God and that He loves me unconditionally and He listens when we pray. I truly believe in the power of prayer, and I know as my prayer warriors, you do too. It is ONLY through God and prayer that I am here today to write this blog.

Update on me: I had a doctor's appointment last week for bloodwork. All of my bloodwork came back in normal range...WOOHOO!!! -an answer to prayer :-). I also started back to work this week. Yep, starting to get my "normal" schedule again. My employers have been so great and are letting me work part-time for a little while to regain my strength, not to mention the fact that they kept my job available over the past nine months. I am working half days right now and I am hoping to go to 3/4 days by mid next week and then full time in March. Today was my third day and I LOVE being back at work, but I am worn out and very sore. I feel like I have been working out like crazy. My back and legs are killing me! My doctor said it will eventually work itself out so I am just trying to deal with it and only take pain meds when I can't stand it anymore. All in all, it has been a GREAT week so far!

Now, more on the power of prayer. Over this experience, I have asked you to pray for others who needed it. Some of these came through the blog and others through email. I would like to update you on them, so here it goes:

John Jerome:

I met Johnnie and his wife Karen when I was in the hospital hallway reading (I got bored with my room sometimes). Johnnie has myelodysplasia (MDS) which is a group of disorders in which the bone marrow does not function normally and produces insufficient number of normal blood cells (www.stjude.org). On October 30, 2008 Johnnie came in to the hospital for a blood transfusion. He developed some infections and was facing surgery. They had to redo his PICC line because of infection and was in ICU. He ended up not having surgery which was an answer to prayer and was finally released the day before Thanksgiving. I spoke to Karen tonight and Johnnie has been receiving blood transfusions every two weeks the past two months. They have exhausted the options at ETMC so now they will be heading down to MD Anderson for some experimental treatments. Please pray that one of these treatments will work. Through all of this, Johnnie continues to teach Sunday School at their church.

Su Su:

I also met SuSu while in the hospital. Our housekeeping lady introduced us. She had been recently diagnosed with Leukemia and had no insurance to pay her medical bills. She was released from the hospital in time to make it to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society's Light the Night walk. At the walk, survivors carry white balloons. Well, unfortunately, I was still in the hospital, so I asked my mom to carry my balloon for me. SuSu went up to her and told her that she was very happy to see a survivor there. My mom told her that she was carrying the balloon for her daughter and SuSu said "you're Vanessa's mom." Mom was totally shocked because I had just told her about SuSu the day before. Soon after, I went back into the hospital and one of my nurse's broke the news to me that SuSu came in with neutropenic fever, ended up in ICU and lost her battle with cancer. She left behind a very sweet daughter and a precious granddaughter.

PapaDuck:

A few months ago, I told you about my friend's dad. He had some spots on his kidney that turned out to be a tumor. They went in and removed the kidney. During a checkup, they found some cancer spots on his other kidney. They are going to try and remove them by needle aspiration. Well, he had a biopsy and it turned out to not be cancer...YEAH!!! Please keep him and his family in your prayers as he will continue to have to have checkups and he is living with just one kidney.

Darlene:

This is an email from my friend Crystal so it's in her words: My aunt's name is Darlene. She just turned 50 and was diagnosed with breast cancer. She didn't even know she had cancer until she couldn't walk anymore due to the cancer 'eating' up two vertebrae in her lower back. The doctor and chiropractor thought it was sciatica because she has only been in pain for about two months and only from the lower back problems. No other symptoms -none! She has probably had the cancer for a while since it has spread. I don't have any details on prognosis but the doctors are very optimistic. She will start chemo after Thanksgiving. I think hers will only be one 4-hr treatment every three weeks with some shots and other stuff in between. One BIG additional prayer request- she has NO insurance. So please have everyone pray that the doctors will continue to have mercy and compassion and give her excellent treatment. So far it has been miraculous to see how her treatment team has been so wonderful and supportive and treated her like it's not even an issue. Also, last Monday she had back surgery to stabilize her spine. They put in some screws and pins and cleaned out a lot of the cancer from there. she is still recovering from that and has been a little down the last few days. she can't walk hardly at all because from not moving AT ALL for about the last 6 weeks there are NO muscles. (This was in Nov. 2008). I spoke to Crystal on Monday and asked how Darlene was doing. She said that it has been a complete miracle. They did a scan on Darlene and the cancer is almost gone. The doctor's say they can't explain it, but we all know what is happening. Please continue to pray for her.

Claudia Steen:

This is one of my aunt's best friends and one of my faithful prayer warriors. She was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. I'm not sure which one, but they're all cancer. From what I understand, her treatment is going to be in the clinic every few weeks, but for the rest of her life. I don't think they have found a cure for the type of lymphoma she has, but with treatment she can live a long full life. She is so sweet and truly prayed for me through my struggle. Please keep her in your prayers and I will try to get a better update on her.

And for a new one...

Stuart Smartt:

Stuart and I have actually never met, but I feel like I know him and I keep him and his wife in my prayers every night. Stuart has also been diagnosed lymphoma. He is undergoing the same treatment that I did and he has the greatest attitude and love for the Lord. He just started his third round of chemo and has had a few complications already. Remember all the lovely lumbar punctures that I had to endure? I didn't realize how good I had it. Stuart had some issues and after numerous times of trying to get the needle in, they decided that he would have to get a port put into his brain for that particular chemo. I told him that he gave a new meaning to the term "chemo brain." If you would like to follow his blog, please go to http://stuartsmartt.blogspot.com/ and his wife Candace's blog http://candacesmartt.blogspot.com/. He was also told on Tuesday that he is in remission. I'm so excited for him. He still has a long battle ahead of him so please remember him.

Well, I think that is it for the prayer requests. Again, thank you so much for all your prayers for me and my friends. You guys are awesome!

With God, WE BEAT IT!!!