Cancer Treatment Centers of America and Family (More Randomness)

  I was pretty sick yesterday so I didn't get a chance to blog. I went to the Emergency Room because I had been running a pretty high fever all day. I found out that I have bacterial Pneumonia. So, more bed rest for me. I don't go anywhere so I am assuming I got sick from all the doctor's offices I have been in. 

  Today, I talked to almost my whole family, which was wonderful! My Uncle Dean called and we talked for a while. I miss him tons! Then, I texted my Aunt Margie...who agrees we all need to get together soon. Finally, I spoke to my brother and sister-in-law. They suggested that I contact the Cancer Treatment Centers of America and see what they can do to help me. 

  So, I contacted CTCA and they will schedule me an appointment soon. I am so excited! There is a much higher rate of survival through the Cancer Treatment Centers of America. I want to live. I NEED to live. I have to be here for all three of my children and if that means I have to go to Tulsa, OK to beat this...then that is exactly what I am going to do.

  I have seen cancer through the eyes of a mother with three children. I used to be a busy mom, working, going to college, and raising our three children. I was tired all of the time, but who wouldn't be? And I had a string of chest colds, strep throat, and pneumonia that I just couldn't shake. I stopped going to tuck my kids into bed...that became KB's job because I would simply get too winded walking from one room to another. 

  Learning I had Stage IV Non-Small Cell Adenocarcinoma became some sort of sick joke. I have three beautiful faces looking up at me, counting on me to be around to wipe their noses, kiss their scraped knees, hold their hands during their first heartbreak, and applaud as they receive their diplomas. Each dream was being wiped away with each new tumor on the scan.

   Both lungs...your pleural lining....

  Right now, they are testing my tumor and finding out the specific mutation that is driving my cancer (if there is one). If I am one of the lucky ones, there is a pill to target that mutation. If not...its chemo and radiation.

  I have learned that 'cure' is not the only goal in cancer care. I have learned that it is possible for some people to live with metastatic lung cancer as chronic disease for months and sometimes years.

  Cancer research is moving fast. Will it move fast enough to stay ahead of my cancer? I desperately hope so. There are three little people who are counting on it

  Having Stage IV cancer has made me acutely aware of my death in a way that I never expected at age 35. 

  I walk in the land of the living with the oppressive knowledge of how very close we all are to the land of the dead.

  Learning to cope has been a gradual, ongoing process. First was the shock, a frozen inability to process this new reality. Then there was the grief, the acknowledgment of my lost future, all the things I had assumed that I would get to do and see. The plans that I had laid crumbled beneath my feet. But, I realized that I couldn't stay in that mental space. I felt like I was wasting the time I had left here focusing on my lost path.

  So, I stopped looking down that road. I started doing what all the self-help gurus tell you to do. I grabbed onto the old cliche' and focused on "living in the moment." It is quite liberating and bizarre. And I get strange jolts when I remember that most people don't live like this.

  "I will look back on this when I am 80 and laugh about this!"

  "This will be make a great story to tell my grandkids!"

  I avoid thinking about my own future in any concrete terms. I can think in a general sense about the future of the world, how things might be one day. But to think about my family five years from now, sends a pang through my heart.

  Isn't part of growing up focusing on the future? Be an adult. Plan for tomorrow. Think ahead. Prepare for any rainy day. How are you supposed to do that when YOU know that your future holds a typhoon? If you focus on the storm, your today will be washed away. In my case, I most likely know what is going to be the cause of my death. Does that make it different?

  So I avoid thinking about the future. At least, most of the time.

  It is a tricky balance. I am a mom, a wife, a daughter, so a big part of my job is preparing my kids for the future. How do I prepare them for a future that may not include me?
.John 8:12
When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, "I am the light in the world.  Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.

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