Cleaning for a Reason

Passing along this info:

If you know any woman currently undergoing Chemo, please pass the word to her that there is a cleaning service that provides FREE housecleaning - 1 time per month for 4 months while she is in treatment. All she has to do is sign up and have her doctor fax a note confirming the treatment. Cleaning for a Reason will have a participating maid service in her zip code area arrange for the service.

http://www.cleaningforareason.org/

Please pass this information on to bless a woman going through Breast Cancer treatment. This organization serves the entire USA and currently has 547 partners to help these women. It's our job to pass the word and let them know that there are people out there that care. Be a blessing to someone and pass this information along.

Overwhelming-Too-Much-To-Deal-With-Day

Actually, that should be "too much with which to deal"...in case Mary reads this...haha.

I can't find the papers I need, the ones I can find are a mess, I need the one from the SSDI so I can send it to the Hartford, to prove that SSDI is not paying me SSI for my child, who is NOT a minor...I know I should be working on stuff today, and I tried, but I just feel like crying today. I may go take a shower, then work on my jewelry-making and watch Eddie Izzard DVD's. I'm sliding back to my "why can't I just die" attitude. I'm going to have to drag all my buckets and of paper work over to my sister's house so she can help me get organized. She doesn't like to come over here, because it smells of cats.

My son tells me, as I'm driving him to school this morning, "oh by the way, I'm going out of town with dad this weekend"...!!! I wanted his dad to help him get his bike tires pumped, or replaced, or whatever to get it in working order. I talked to my counselor about this and decided that for starters, I'd drive him TO school, with the bike on the rack on the back of the car like I did in H.S., and make him ride it home. Weaning him in to riding both ways....which he doesn't want to do, since it is ever so slightly uphill on the way there. I'll have to get someone who can lift things to help me, and hope they just need air. I can't afford to replace tires right now; that's why I wanted dad to help him do it!!!

Some people in my situation (physically/health-wise) are so happy and chipper and thrilled to still be here. Some are going through crap I hope to never have to go near. Some are just starting out, are terrified, and sick....I'm not happy and chipper. Yesterday my counselor thought I was looking and sounding so much better...he doesn't know about days like today when I just sit here and cry and can't do a thing.

Another thing about my Support Group...I think everyone there has a husband or partner! Maybe not the one lady who also has METS who is so chipper, just retired....I don't know how she does it. Maybe she's that way at group, and cries at home. Who knows.

I have so much to do, and I am short money this month because of the SSDI / SSI mix-up, on top of the fact that my SSDI started in Jan, but not PAID until Feb, so Hardford DI only paid me $50 this month, until I can show what SSDI is actually paying me...so basically; no money in January.

I am really happy that I've been able to get back to church. That is really helping me. The first week I went, I wore myself out carrying all my stuff around using just my cane. A set of scriptures AND my backpack/purse is heavy!! So this week I swallowed my yellow-tennis-ball pride and took my walker. Hanging the books in a bag from one side and my purse on the other side made it MUCH easier, and I wasn't so exhausted after.

Maybe a shower and a methyphenedate will make me feel better. A bit better. Maybe.

Support Group Tuesday Night - computer not working

Had my Cancer Support Group tonight. I felt good about going and the meeting felt good. There were like 5 people there with METS, which was like half the attendance, and one woman who has just finished chemo and is starting radiation. I wanted to give her a bracelet that I brought, but she ran out quickly, and I was talking to another woman who has been taken OFF Femara, and she gave me three unopened bottles. Very sweet. People liked my "surviving" quest. I felt good at first , but then as it went on I kept feeling like I said the wrong thing.

What is this let-down I am feeling now though? My bad attitude is surging up and I'm not feeling positive and warm or fuzzy. Well, fuzzy in a few places, but not in that good way. I want to say/write negative things, go back to yelling "I could be dying soon!", and go out and sing karaoke in a real bar with a real sound system.

I'm feeling tired, but I was hungry; that's what got me up out of bed. Ooops, sometimes I forget that three meal a day thing. Wouldn't know it by looking at me.

I am feeling cranky about one thing that was said...and anyone who knows me, knows how I let that get me all obsessive. I want to go again next month, but I don't want to talk, or share.

Latest trip to the Lovely Oncologist

I only cried a little. I told him I am really trying to be more positive. I told him that when I get all this financial crap under control, I think I can live with the cancer. He gave me more Femara samples, which saves me a ton of money. He thanked me for a card I had sent him a while back, checking up on him. He said he ran across it the other day, and it gave him a lift. I guess a few of his patients are as intuitive as I am, and know well he cares for others, and forgets to care for him.

I wrote all over the paper on the table. I wait a long time in the exam rooms every time. I started writing {stuff} SUCKS, and drawing faces...and ended up writing scripture and song lyrics.

I meant to ask more about these illusive cancer marker numbers...but he just showed me his laptop where my numbers are...two of them are within normal range, and the one that isn't is going down slightly each time I have blood work done. That is a good sign and made him very happy. I asked him which bones have cancer. Basically probably all of them. I'll get more sore, and more tired as we go.

Was supposed to have another PET/CT scan in January, but EVDI and the insurance are still trying to work out the mistake on the code that screwed payment up for the scan in October!

I saw my counselor this week, and he was very positive about my desire to make jewelry, etc, and my ideas to promote support for metastatic cancer. A lot is still in the planning stages, i.e. how to finance it without showing income.

My sister went with me today for a consult with a lawyer. I'm going to pursue Chapter 7 bankruptcy...so I have a whole pack of papers and stuff to do. He also referred me to another colleague for help with the accident in Nov. 08 that caused the sciatic nerve issue.

I couldn't find my son when I went to pick him up from school and realized my phone was dead. I looked around for at least 40 minutes, then had to give up and go home to meet my sister who was picking me up for my consult appt. She was able to contact him from her phone and all was well. We charged my phone in her car, but his texts about his schedule changing didn't pop up until we already had him in the van. I know, he's 18, but when I can't find him, or contact him, I get frantic.

After all that I was exhausted. I lay down around 5:00pm and slept until 10:30pm. oops. Tried to go back to bed but kept getting up. 2:41 am now...that's closer to the time I can sleep.

This driving my son back and forth to school is exhausting me. The city bus doesn't run up as far as the college, which is only about 3 miles from our house. When this rain stops, we're going to talk more about him riding his bike!!

From a song...touched me...

"And I know it aches and your heart it breaks, you can only take so much...Walk on..." by U2. A friend posted it on his FB site. Maybe they already use it in conjunction with breast cancer walks and stuff, but I'd never heard it before, and I really relate...and try to take it to heart...Walk On...It's on my play list now...give it a listen.

Our high school's motto was " Carry On", spoken years ago by a student/football player who passed away in HS. It's what he told everyone before he died and it became the school motto. I'm probably telling the story wrong, but it applies today more than it did back then for "school spirit" and football.

The struggle between faith and failure...

Most days I feel like I just can't make it...I can't do it...it's too much and I cry at the drop of a hat...

But right now I'm listening to my song list...#2 ...Lyrics say "With you all things are possible..."

I need to strengthen my faith. I can overcome all my financial MESS right now, with the help of my friends and family and church I will get it worked out. OK, yeah, I am going to die...5-15 years...that's the current joke amongst my friends and family. But I have to battle this depression, which is nothing new, but worse since the cancer (METS) diagnosis, trying to do for others, look for opportunities to serve...and now Carrie Underwood is singing "Jesus Take the Wheel"...

Maybe that is the "thing" that I need to learn from this. To have more faith and put it all in the Lord's hands as he has promised we can do. It has to all work out. I didn't die in the hospital for a reason. OK, I was dead for a few minutes, though we don't know how long. Perhaps that nurse was prompted to check on me when she did, or I would have been dead...easy way out as far as paperwork goes, but I pray that the Lord will help me see what I need to do and help me find the means by which to do it.

So grateful for friends who have been so generous to me over the past 5 months. I know some of them are as depressed as I am, but they are still there with kind words and smiles, and help and trips, and fun, and ideas, and more and more help. Now it feels like Testimony Meeting...haha.

But is a battle between who I was born to be, what I was beaten down to, and now what I am struggling to regain and be the person I was born to be. There's a picture I need to find and scan.

Now "Barracuda" by Heart is playing....yeah, it's inspiring, because when I sing it at the top of my lungs I always feel better!!!!

Seriously Sick of This....

I don't want to have cancer anymore, I don't want to hear all the "survivor" crap that's out there, I just want to disappear.

Every commercial on TV is about something that depresses me either because of my current financial situation, my illness, my fears of worse illness, the knowledge that I will never be able to fix up my house, buy a new car, on and on...

My sister helped me today call one of those counseling help lines to help you apply for lower interest rates on your mortgage. Sounds like it's going to work out, but it was so depressing. They even asked if I had a room I could rent out...sure, I said, if I kick my son out! Don't they think I'd have already thought of that if I had extra space?? Don't eat out so often...dollar menu at McDonald's? Groceries for a meal cost more than that! You can't eat healthy when you're poor, you can't eat what you should to help your body fight cancer when you're poor.

I just want to know why I have to still be here!! Scan coming up...I hope it has spread wildly. Someone tell me what I had to stay here to do, and let me do it already! I really feel like I'm on the verge of losing my mind.

The New Year...2010

Who ever thought we'd get to the year 2010!! Now do we just say "in the year '10"?

I know I still owe my blog a story and update on my wonderful Disneyland trip, and possibly the last doctor appt, oh yeah, and then there's Christmas...uneventful. Christmas for me is about singing in the choir, and I'm thankful to have been able to do that. Also Disneyland at Christmastime was Magical. More on my special experiences there later.

New Year's Eve...went to a party tonight at some friends' house. Sang karaoke for hours with my Great Cousin Jim (his mother is my great Aunt, so that makes him Great Cousin, right?), who IS great, and had fun doing that. Kept my mind off other things. I was getting very down before I went over there. I'm stressing over mortgage, bills, looming need to file bankruptcy, trying to modify the mortgage through the "making home affordable" plan...it had better work. It all just brings up so much to think about. Seriously made me start thinking about dying again. 2010 might be a good year to die, but of course, since I look forward to it, and know they have less paperwork on the other side than we have here, I'm sure I'll hang around for 12 more years or so...or go insane first. It's really too much to handle, and my Disneyland Magic space of denial has just about worn off. I don't suppose wearing mouse ears and tiara every day is very socially "cool". Not that I care, but there is a point at which people start considering commitment. And I'm not talking about a relationship...haha. I really have no feelings of looking forward, fresh start, or any of that yadda yadda...I may sleep very late tomorrow.

Promise the Disneyland stories soon.


(Me at Disneyland; tiara and Bug's Life awesome 3-D glasses. I totally wanted to keep them.)