Showing posts with label Cancer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cancer. Show all posts

Friday, May 29, 2015

My Survivor and 1st T-Shirt Quilt

I am 2 years out of my chemo treatment now and my tests continue
to be good.  I am so grateful for all the prayers that have been sent up
on my behalf and I am thankful that God has given me the time here on 
earth to be with my family.  And grateful that he has used this to teach me.

He has taught me that I should put more trust in him.  And I need to trust
more in his word.

Matthew 6:26-34New King James Version (NKJV)

26 Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?
28 “So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; 29 and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
31 “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

So I just wanted to share this.

Christmas before last I went through my closet and cleaned out all of my t-shirts and decided to do my first t-shirt quilt.  A couple of them were gathered from CARTI and from relay for life that my sister-n-law was involved with in our area.  
 I had the purple and neon green material that I had bought some time ago just
because the colors popped and I just loved the green and purple together.  I used
a decorative stitch with purple thread.  And
when I went to putting it all together I think the colors just went so well with the tees that I had for my quilt and I just love how it turned out.
 So this is my survivor quilt and I have been sleeping
under it for several months now.

Monday, November 24, 2014

Great News and Staying Busy

 Had some great news come in from my doctor regarding my last colonoscopy.  I have a really small ulcer possibly around the site where my colon was nicked during my kidney surgery but all of my biopsies came back clean.  How great is that! 

Early detection is key folks.  So please go have your test ran.

And I have been staying busy at my denim quilting.  I have been processing the old jeans and now I have a nice big box of denim material to work up.  I am so excited.  It does not take much to make me happy.

Saturday, June 28, 2014

Wonderful News!!!

Well I feel like I have just left everything hanging here...but really think I had a good reason.  I went for my kidney surgery but when they did it my colon was nicked and they had to call someone in to repair it.  So instead of just the robotic removal of half the kidney, which they did, I had to be opened up for that repair.  I got home and still was feeling terrible and about a week later woke to a pool of blood in my bed and had to go back to the emergency room to be opened up again and all the flood cleaned out and was sent back home with a wound vac.  I am finally off the vac but still have an open wound that has to be dressed every other day.

But the wonderful news is that when the pathology results came back on the kidney it was denign...woot woot!

Thursday, April 10, 2014

Sometimes Things just do not Workout as we Planned

I've just recently found out that my kidney cancer has returned.  I have struggled with this since I found out almost two weeks ago and then finding out about a week ago that they are wanting to remove 1/2 my kidney.  But I have finally decide to go ahead with this surgery and have 1/2 half of the kidney removed on the 23rd.  Please pray for me.

Thursday, February 6, 2014

Well hopefully this is a good excuse

I have gotten no better at blogging and no better at starting my weight lose journey.  But I have been heavy into my quilting.  I actually have just started this so I am not very good at it....but really hope that I can improve.


This is the first one I did for my grandson from his, his mom's and my old jeans...I am thinking that I really don't like the sashing done like this so I am planning to do something different and I've found a different tutorial that shows a different way.

Next I started my survivor quilt...from old tees that my sister n law had given me because she works with our local race for the cure and my tee from CARTI plus just some old tees that had gotten some stains on them...she is also a survivor.



I had not even finished my survivor quilt when my sister wanted me to work on a jean quilt for her.  So she and I worked together on this one.




And finally, this quilt, I had to have started from old scraps well over 5 years ago and I am just glad to have it done...sadly it just looks like black hearts to me.  I am not as pleased with this one, as some of the material has probably at least 50 percent polyester and I think I would be happier trying to stick with cotton when I can...you live you learn.  I love the jean quilts they are a bit hard to work with in places but I love the weight of them when they are done.  I don't think I will do another tee quilt again unless it is something special like maybe some of my granddaughter's tees from her dance and school functions.

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

I started the 2nd of 8 treatments today.  Today was a really tough day.  Not because of any pain or getting sick.  But because going for these treatments are kind of like being pushed through like cattle to slaughter.  Not that the nurses and doctors are unkind because they are really great and all have a positive upbeat outlook.  But with the nature of how this is done all of these people with cancer diagnosis are all there in rooms together.  Everyone in the waiting area or who are in the treatment area has either a diagnosis of cancer or a family member with one.  And their stories can be very heart wrenching.

One of the ladies I spoke with in the waiting area is two years into her breast care treatments.  She lost her mother to breast cancer and one of her daughters is also in treatment.  In addition they found a skin cancer on her husband and they did surgery which involved removing and replacing his ear and taking out a saliva gland, and later they found lung cancer, and later another cancer but I can't remember now which organ she was saying but that later spread to his lung and was of different origin to his other lung cancer.  On top of all that he also has Alzheimer's.  She said it has just become a lifelong battle.  She had a wonderful personality and outlook but my heart just went out to her.

While in the treatment area there was a 76 year old man and he had a friend there visiting with him during his treatment.  Sounded like one of his old running buddies or maybe a brother.  They were talking about when they were younger.  Things they got into together.  Talking about girls they had met or dated.  Made me smile.  But at one point he looked up like he was looking far away and said "I never thought my life would come to this."  Just broke my heart.

So, yes, today was a very tough day.  The treatments keep me up all night the first night.  Not sure why but it has happened to me for the both the first and second treatment and it was one of the side effects they advised me about.  Then I get sick with lose stools about the third or fourth day.  Otherwise physically I am holding up pretty good right now.

Spiritually I have been holding up pretty good too.  I had a wonderful report and had my surgery canceled back in August/September because I did so well with my first rounds of chemo and radiation.

I've kept a very positive attitude about this from the very beginning.  I know that I have not been promised to live on this earth for eternity.  We know as soon as we are faced with our first death on this earth that we are all headed to the same.  And my thoughts have been that if this is my time then it is my time and I have been blessed to know that it could be sooner than any of us had thought.  And I have faith in a promise from Jesus and faith that he will not fail me.  But when I go for these treatments and I hear these stories it is just really hard on me.  I've believed from the beginning this would be cured.  That the doctor's would follow me for 5 years and that would be the end of it.  But talking with these other individuals and their battles it makes me wonder if this won't be a lifelong battle for me.  Always having to look over my shoulder to see if this evil villain will be lurking somewhere behind me ready to attack again.  I know I have to take one day at a time and keep my faith.  I pray, not just myself but others, for healing and strength. 

My whole role in life always involved helping others.  I've always been the one that runs around trying to prepare for the storm and been the calm in the eye of the storm when it hits.  I can remember taking care of things even as a small child.  I moved in with an elderly lady for a summer when I was 12 to help care for her and stayed with my grandmother and helped care for her when I was 15.  We watch TV and so many of us have modeled our lives after shows.  Houses are nicer than they were when I was growing up.  Things are cleaner.  I am thinking of shows like Mary Tyler Moore, squeaky clean shows but they rarely show the messy side of life.  But I learned early there was no shame in the messy side but someone has to deal with that and clean it up.  Whether it is cleaning up after someone being sick or cleaning a bed pan I've done that and it never bothered me.  So it has always been a part of who I am.  That role has begun to change for me.  So I am learning to have to accept that.

My grandmother is the one that taught me there is no shame in being a caregiver.  The one the cleans up messes.  I'm missing her terribly tonight.  She was a my rock.  She is the one that taught me about the love of Jesus through her actions.