Ups and Downs Today ....

I realize it is only 8:38 am; however, I have already had an up and down today. I am accomplished! I can take the rest of the day off!

My down today was keeping Elvis out of the food and water this morning... he had to be on a 12 hour fast from 8:00 pm last night for a bile acid test ... liver issues! You try keeping a 180 pound dog who is bigger than you out of water and food. He was superbly grumpy this morning.

My up today was visiting Starbucks for a well-deserved just plain ol'cup of coffee. I entered to find a line. You know a couple of people ahead of me. No biggie. I can wait. They are fast. I ordered my coffee and the barista told me to wait a few minutes while it was brewing. No problem. When she slid my plain ol'cup of coffee at me and I started to pull out my wallet, she said ... no it's free, you had to wait.

Since when did waiting become such an imposition on our lives. Are we really so important that a two minute wait is putting us out? I remember waiting in lines with my mother at the grocery store. They never opened additional lanes, you just waited. You never got free coffee because you had to wait a minute. When did this happen?

Anyway, I am warmly tucked in at my desk with my free cup of coffee and Elvis is hopefully having his blood drawn so he can eat the baked chicken breakfast I packed for him. It's all good.

I fell off the wagon this weekend but I am ok with that

I really fell off ... but just before I fell ... I did manage to do 35 minutes on the elliptical machine with only one mishap of the ipod getting snatched off by my frantic arms to keep the pace! I burned 300 calories on that bastard! But Friday night ... loads of margaritas but veggie fajitas instead of the meaty ones.

Saturday ... a chic-fil-a sandwich complete with real mayo, a diet coke AND waffle fries ... but we were at the mall and I avoided the yummy hot pretzels from Annie's Pretzel Hut.

Saturday night ... wine :0 but I ate veggie patties and steamed sugar snap peas from dinner.

Sunday ... Garlic and Parmesan cheese fried wings with one draft beer and french fries ... side of steamed broccoli too :) but my workout was kind of pitiful ... a little turbo jam and some WII fitness coach cardio ... oh and Sunday night ... more wine

So the lesson here is ... I will trip and fall but at least it isn't creamy fattening egg nog and chocolate candy every day. At least I am back on and keeping in tune with plans this week to stay away from meat, alcohol and sodas. At least I packed my gym bag and actually look forward to the time alone and focusing on burning calories!

So this week I will work towards pushing my incline on the treadmill up a notch and kicking my speed up to 3.4 :)

Working out and detox ...

I started this year with a detox program. My own personal version of mixing it up for better health. The first week my goal was to have no alcohol, no processed sugar (as in doughnuts, cookies, cake, baked goods, etc and no carbonated sodas.

The first couple of work evenings when I refused to drink wine, I suffered. I just found it hard not to focus some where else. As the week progressed, I felt better and it was easier to not have a drink in the evening. I even managed Friday night at home without a glass of vino. I might also add that Friday night at home was excruciatingly tragic ... we lost one of our kittens to the backyard rumpus. She died trying to get out of the way but because she had just had surgery earlier in the week, she was extra vulnerable. It was a difficult night at the house and for the whole family.

The second week is off to a good start for me... I am also trying to limit my meat intake. I am finding it less appealing the further away I get from it. My lunches have all been vegetarian so far and my dinners are including an increase in fresh veges and salads. So far so good.

This week's goal is to ramp up my speed on the treadmill. I have steadily climbed to a clip at 3.0 pace. Now I am going to move up to 4.0. Yesterday I worked about 60% of my treadmill at 3.2 and my legs really felt the burn!

This morning I got up at 5:15 while the rest of the house was still tucked in bed and I tried to do some yoga stretching. I did okay but find myself painfully stiff first thing in the morning. Maybe I can work up to more time in the early hours. We will see how I fair by the end of the day.

Home and dizzy ...

I woke up last Saturday and the room was spinning! I thought I was just coming off of the Mad Hatter's Tea Cup ride after a wild spin. It hasn't let up and since then I have seen two doctors about it, suffered through a brain MRI and been taking a prescription medicine that makes me sleepy when I am not dizzy. So it's either dizzy or sleepy.... I guess I pick sleepy. One of the doctor's wrote me a work excuse for all week. She doesn't want me driving and dizzy. I guess I can't blame her.

So lucky you (whoever you are reading this) a catch up in pictures since my last post ...


Finger painting taken to an extreme


Halloween Cookie Baking with Wills in charge :)



Halloween Pumpkin Carving Adventures!




Bat Girl and her Bat Boy! And finally ... the absolute best halloween treat ... a surprise visit from BFF Molly!

You are too old for Facebook...

That's what my friend said to me. "You are too old for facebook." It gave me pause to wonder, "am I really too old? am I trying to go backwards and not admit to being an adult?" I was almost bought into this idea and then one night ... I was on facebook and at the bottom of my screen there was a little box telling me three friends were online. I clicked on the list to see who was out there and my nephew popped up. I had a wonderful opportunity to chat with him. We talked about nothing special but what made it special was that he happened to be miles away, in a hospital bed and getting chemo.

We captured two minutes online to exchange instant messages and I went to bed happy to have connected with him. I will never be too old for those impromptu chats with him or any of my nephews and nieces.

I would like a healing weekend with a side of comfort food, please.

Our family is so lucky to all live close enough to easily gather for Friday night happy hour. Even luckier that we all want to gather together every weekend. This weekend was only slightly different. We still had the kids filtering through the house ranging in age from 3 years to 17 years old, we still had plenty of wine and libations on tap and without notification, we still all showed up at the bewitching hour. Even Papa rented a car and came back to town for the weekend so he joined us too. The wise matriarch of the clan spent the day preparing the necessary comfort food ... pot roast! It was so delicious and much needy for this weary bunch. The difference this weekend was the weight of the mood and the heaviness in our hearts. But we created this safe place for each of us to share our fears and frustrations. We could expose our anger and tears ... how lucky for us to have happy hour.

Put your head to the ground ...

One of my coworkers talks about her bible study sisters and their prayer antics. She told us one day that they put their heads to the ground in prayer and how powerful that prayer feels. One day she prayed so hard that she had grains of dirt imprinted on her forehead! She will tell that story and just giggle.

She saw me in the hall yesterday and said, "wait a minute ... what's wrong? that not our crazy lady!" I just looked at her and said, "Put your head to the ground!" And of course, she said she would. Later in the day I told her about the latest developments with my nephew's relapse. She promised me she would put her head to the ground. I know she will and I appreciate that from her.

We got details ... they are scheduled today to insert a port-a-cath in his chest for chemo infusions. He had one before so he knows all about it. At the same time, they will biopsy the new tumor in his "good" knee. They want to know the exact make-up of the tissue growth to determine the chemo regimen. They are likely going to do a total knee replacement in the next week or so.

He is completely and totally in the game. He is confident. He is courageous. He is dictating to the doctors and his parents how he wants things to happen for him. This child is in control of his disease. He has learned so much since he was 12. I am so proud of him. Beyond his attitude and his courageousness, the good news is ... joint replacement is doable, the body scans show no other tumor growth in other bones, he is young and lung tissue regenerates faster in youth, he responded well to chemo last time so chances are he will again this time. He is purposeful and he respects the power of prayer so you can bet he has put his head to the ground too.

Tell the Truth

Those are three words Randy Pausch deemed some of the most important words to teach your children. I agree with him so that's what I am trying to practice with mine. To tell the truth. For the most part it is not a huge challenge. It is easy to tell your ten year old that her best line of defense is to tell the truth. Lies beget lies and are so much more difficult to keep track of when most times, the truth really serves the situation better. It is easy to tell your three year old that she must be truthful about her behaviors at school when you have been battling hitting and biting in the classroom. Tonight we didn't have those kinds of easy truths. Tonight for one split second I didn't want to tell my 10 year old daughter the truth. I didn't want to answer her questions with truth that is too painful for me to articulate without dissolving into tears. Our truth tonight is the cancer is back. Our truth tonight is we face another battle at best. Our truth tonight is knowledge is sometimes terrifying. My nephew is back at Shands tonight. There are new tumors and new lesions. We will know more tomorrow. But tonight the truth was hard tonight. I hope and pray our truth is easier tomorrow.

No Smoking Zone ... seriously!

As a former cigarette smoker, who really enjoyed smoking cigarettes and who missed having a cigarette for about 8 years after I quit cold turkey ... I don't understand smokers.

Maybe it is what I see everyday in the way of tobacco related disease but it will always amaze and surprise me that patients who are undergoing horrible treatments for cancer will still step right outside the door of a Cancer Clinic and smoke. Or worse, come in to my office begging for pain medication from the effects of chemo and radiation just reeking of cigarette smoke.

The other day one of my coworkers picked up a cigarette butt off the carpeted floor of our waiting room right there at the front desk. Someone had come in with a cigarette and dropped at the front desk as they were signing in for their chemo treatments.

Now that's crazytalk!

My six year old niece doesn't like me.

I offered to keep my six year old niece at my house tonight while her mom went to a school open house parent program. My niece doesn't like me. Her older sister recently told me, "She doesn't want to come to your house because you have too many rules." It didn't take long before she and I came head to head tonight over a lie. She has a bad habit of lying to the adults in her life so she doesn't get the "blame" or accountability for whatever she is being asked about and nine times out of ten she has been the perpetrator. She doesn't like me because I stop her in the act and ask her to look me in the eyes and tell me the truth. I wish she could see how much better her life is truth in it. I know there are lots of things beyond her control and she is still just six but the truth really is the much safer, easier and far more humbling way to approach life.

Randy Pausch said it best in his book and famous last lecture: If there were only three words I could tell my child, they would be ... Tell the Truth.