Finally, I am halfway through my last treatment. Hopefully it will be last one for life! Last week, I felt strong positive energy and momentum building up for Monday's day 1 treatment! I had an opportunity to DRIVE for the first time in over 4 months! Boy it felt good however, it didn't take too long for me to be tired and exhausted from just a 15 minutes drive. Definitely took a lot of energy out of me and of course, I kept reminding myself to pace myself. I had to let my mom take over on the return trip back home. Another good news is that I managed to drop by to visit my boss at work last Friday. I had mini-errand to run and figure I can see one person. Only the courage to see one person. I wanted to see her for a long time and we had some good catching up! She also bought me a lovely anti-evil bracelet from Capri! I got quite a few compliments from people at the hospital who saw me wearing it. Speaking about gifts and blessings, I received a huge basket of goodies from a group of cousins on my mother side. They know it is my last treatment and gather a lovely basket together to help sooth and make me more comfortable. My niece, very talented in the areas of art, has put together a wonderful scrapbook with photos taken by his father. So nice to flip through and see all of my cousins' children and mine growing up together and having a good time in the past few months. In terms of blessings, two friends that I have hung out with in University and haven't seen for a long time have reached out to me. Feels great to be loved and that my story has touched many. I hope my story is touching people in a positive way vs. pity and/or feel sad for me. Last but not the least, my client from out west and also many of Phil's friends sent me their well wished and how they are cheering for me. I have been feeling quite emotional for the past few days since my treatment started. However, I constantly remind myself how much I have received from everyone so far that I cannot let these emotions take over. I shed a few tears at the hospital when I had a quiet moment but they were happy tears. I cannot believe that I am finally going through my last treatment!! I waited for this day to come for so long and finally I am going through it!
This past Monday, I checked into the hospital hoping for 3 things:
1 - The nurse who will take my bloodwork for testing doesn't poke me like crazy and that the results shows that I will be able to proceed with the treatment (aka no delays)
2 - I want this chemo to be done on my left arm cause the last 3 times it was done on my right and I was literally paralyzed since I am a right-handed.
3- Really want the certified IV nurse to find the vein, poke me in one shot and thread the damn 8 inch tube inside my arm without any problems!!!! It took 3 trials last round! I don't need the same experience!!
Well guess what, with so much praying beforehand and also during procedure of all of the above, I literally got all 3 wishes come true! First of all, I normally don't look at the nurse who pokes me to take blood but this time, I did and for some reason, I didn't FEEL the needle at all!!! I wish all needle poking was like this!! After spending 1.5 hrs waiting for the results and speak to the doctor, my blood test came back hitting the minimum level required to proceed for chemo treatment. It was lower than last treatment but still meet the minimum required!!! So hurray, no delays!!! Last treatment it is! Around the middle of the afternoon, finally the IV nurse came by to get everything set-up to do the IV on me. I was praying so hard asking God and my beautiful guardian angel Charlotte to help this nurse get the big needle into the right vein so that she can thread the tube inside! I prayed so hard, thought so hard, and asked so much.....repeatedly until she was done. And then I felt the pain... the huge poke and the threading and before I know.... within a minute she said out loud: it is in!!! HURRAY!!!!! Totally blessed and happy that everything went pretty smooth so far. I must also thank everyone who has prayed for me during all of this time. I will certainly need more prayers to help me get over this recovery hump.
Lately, I have been making a lot of prayers for a lot of people whom I know. Over the last 2 -4 weeks, I found out two more people who has just discovered that they have cancer. One of them is the lady that I rent my work parking spot from. She called to see how I was doing but also shared a sad news about her daughter has been diagnosed with lymphoma cancer. The other one is Jake's close daycare buddy mom's mother-in-law just diagnosed with lung cancer. I sometimes wonder why good people needs to pay the price. I don't understand but I truly hope god is giving these people some good miracle and help them along the way to find cure just like how he has helped me. Other prayers I have been making is for all people who has been hurt and killed in all these airplane, train, bus and mud slide disasters around the world including the one that happened in Quebec. I really hope God is helping these poor family who has been hurt from this. Last but not the least, I'm praying for many close friends who are trying for a baby. Some of them has been trying for over 2-3 years and they are my age. These are great people and will be good parents, I just hope god can bless each of these couple a good bundle of joy soon! I like to ask those who are reading my blog and continuously praying for me to help me pray for all these people too. I know they are strangers to you but God listens to everyone's prayer and will answer them :) Thank you for your help.
Lots is happening in August once this treatment is over. I have 4 medical appointments scheduled: hearing test (because radiation and chemo can damage my hearing over time given where the cancer is located), GI Tube removal (HURRAY - haven't used it for 2 months and can't wait to be tube free!), dental Check-up (again radiation can damage gum tissues and lack of saliva doesn't help to kill germs in the mouth), and finally, seeing my oncologist to review my last chemo treatment and making sure my bloodwork is back to normal. The big testing won't be happening until middle of September. I cannot wait and hope to find out that every single cancer cells have vanished so that I can finally focus mainly on the recovery only.
The title in this blog is called Jumping off the cliff soon. Many blogs ago, I talked about how hard this entire process has been for me.... it is like climbing up a huge mountain or volcano. Finally, I feel like comes Saturday, I can finally jump off this mountain because I will reach the cliff! I can free myself! However, I have been on and off with my emotions and now that I am almost there, I start to wonder what kind of ending I will have. A few days ago, I read the news and saw some skydiver landed in someone's backyard and died. I bet you he didn't think he was going to die when he jumped off until he almost reached the ground. Here I am wondering, for so many months, I couldn't wait for this day to come but now, I can't believe that I start to feel uncertain about what is ahead of me.... I keep saying, wow once the treatment is done, I can focus on the recovery only. But I am feeling a bit skeptical about the future because I don't know what the future looks like. Doctors cannot tell me what my prognosis will be but as long I am clear for the next 5 years, I have a high chance to survive and live a longer life. So, the feeling to finally jump off this cliff sounds so good but what kind of ending will I have? A happy one and a new life beginning? Or will it be a bad landing and there goes my life? I am training my brain to think more positive and think less of the negative outcome. It is not easy but I am trying. I had the opportunity to meet Barry Spilchuk on Monday who gave me some hope. He is the first Canadian to co-author the A Cup of Chicken Soup for the Soul. He is a motivational speaker and a life coach! He has survived a stage 4 deadly cancer and been cancer free for the past 4 years. I met him at the hospital while waiting for my turn to do the blood test. It is a small world.... my dad actually knows him pretty well because they went to the school together during their childhood years and grew up in my hometown North Bay. He told me to believe that miracle does happen as long you believe it. Just stay positive. You are so young, you can definitely do it! :) So, tell me that I have been blessed!! To meet great people and constantly brings me back into the right track the minute I start trail off. So I must believe it. No one can help me get there if I don't want to believe and try to get there. I must trust and believe that this is all going to be over and yes, I will have both a happy ending and has hit a new stage in life!
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