NYE

Kate woke up this morning wanting to stand. She climbed on me as often as she could and used me to push herself onto her feet. She wants to stand. I'm so proud of my baby.


Not the best camera angle and if you notice Dylan mumbles "What the [expletive]!" He thinks that language is hilarious. I don't find it funny. He says he heard it at Jake's Wayback Burger and he knows better than to say it in my presence. However, if I call him on it he makes up fake words. Smart little spitfire.

The kids were in bed by seven and Sean is extremely sick and hasn't seen the ball drop in years anyway so I'll probably end up watching it alone if at all. I'm pretty beat myself.

So. Resolutions. I don't usually make them but this year I have one big one. I am going to feel healthy. My body hasn't worked at all this year but I'm slowly starting to feel better. And I'm going to keep feeling better. I should be going for my whole body scan in May to see how much cancer is left, if any, and I might have to go through the radiation again but I'm very hopeful that we got it all. I have my calcium levels under control now, which means my remaining parathyroid glands are recovering, and I'm taking so much vitamin D that I don't even mind winter. By this point I'm usually craving spring. My legs are not perfect but they're working. Things are seriously looking up. And I plan to stay on the up train.

2013. I gave birth to the most beautiful baby girl. I went through radiation and separation from my babies for a week. I lost a good friend to cancer. I welcomed two beautiful little nieces and one handsome little nephew. My baby boy started, excelled, and fell in love with preschool. And on the last day of the year our baby started standing.

Cheers to 2014!

Hooray, Today!

Last night left much to be desired in the sleeping department. I crept into Dylan's bed at ten when he started to whimper from a bad dream, woke up to Kate crying for her bottle at 10:30, snuck back into Dylan's bed when he had yet another bad dream, woke up alone in Dylan's bed to the sound of Kate crying for her morning bottle at the ungodly hour of half-past-five, and since both Sean and Dylan were in our bed which is next to Kate's crib all four of us were wide awake at 5:30AM. I'm pretty sure I was fumbling around trying to find the reset button for today.

But...

Today is turning out to be lovely. I'm exhausted, absolutely, but today is the first day in over a month that I don't feel sick (yet) to my stomach! I bought some lovely fiber mix that you stir into your drinks and I have not puked or crapped myself today. Hooray for small victories. I also have been abstaining from taking my thyroid drugs because my suspicion is that I am overly medicated which is causing these debilitating side effects. I am supposed to have very low TSH numbers for a few years so that my cancer cells don't grow back, but this low is too low. So a few days off of my meds, still taking all supplements, adding fiber, has given me this one very relaxing day in which to relax my stomach.

And since we barely slept at all last night both kids are doing this...



...I was even able to sneak in a short nap.

*

Yesterday was the father/son breakfast at Dylan's school. He was so excited for his daddy to come to school with him and was all like later, Ma! as they were heading out the door.



The kids sang songs for the dads and did crafts with them. Dylan absolutely froze on stage for all of the songs and seemed to have an extreme case of stage fright until the Chicken Dance came on and he let loose.



(He's the one in orange)

He obviously has inherited my dancing talents. Here's to dancing boys and good health!

The shell of a woman

Friday was the one year anniversary of my thyroidectomy and as much as I felt accomplished and glad that I no longer have a giant tumor in my neck, I was defeated. I've been feeling so sick lately that I broke down in tears this morning when someone asked me how I'm doing. I feel as if I'm inhabiting a lifeless body and I cannot find the right balance of medications to make it better.



It sucks. Cancer sucks. Living without a thyroid is hard. But I'm so tired of hearing myself talk about not feeling well that I don't even want to write about it. Most likely the recent cause for my lack of blogging.

Sean is going to a father/son breakfast with Dylan at school tomorrow morning and I am so glad that I'll have two hours with Kate in our pajamas where we can just eat oatmeal in front of the boob tube and not have to leave the house.

Sickly or not, I'm always thankful that I've got these little ones to remind me to lighten up when life gets a little tough.



Sometimes it's impossible not to smile.

Luckily Dylan knows where we live.

Last night, in my dream, I was a student. I was sitting at my desk--those tiny brown metal desks with the chairs attached--staring blankly at my teachers. I raised my hand and whispered to one, "I can't remember what is happening. I don't understand what is going on. I don't remember." I explained that I have thyroid cancer and the brain fog is getting worse. The teachers continued on with the lesson trying to repeat themselves as much as possible so that I would remember, but I was lost.

The irony of remembering the dream about forgetting made me chuckle a bit upon waking. I remembered even the smallest detail down to what I was wearing.

Removing cancer was the easy part. Now I've got to figure out how the hell to live without a thyroid. So far I'm not doing so great. The two things bothering me the most are my legs and my memory. I can't remember what I did three minutes ago sometimes. I had to ask Sean what our daughter's birthday was the other day. That's pathetic. I do, oddly enough, remember wacky things like our network key to our internet which is ten random digits, Sean's social security number, the name of a man he worked with back in 2007 that I never met. But I don't remember the drive to the store or what I was talking about a few minutes earlier. Sometimes I forget the beginning of a sentence by the time I make it to the end.

This is all frustrating more than anything. How am I supposed to be able to hold down a career when I'm ready to go back to work? How am I supposed to hold a conversation with anyone? Oh what a journey this will be.

*

Today was the first day that Dylan showed signs of being a bit weary of preschool. He calmly asked me if I could go with him into the building as we drove to school. I told him that I would be waiting for him when he was done and he nodded and told me that he likes school.

We were second in line at the drop off and the kid in front of Dylan totally freaked out. Tears, screaming, petrified to go into school. Dylan just stood there watching him with the biggest WTF kid look on his face. All of these little guys are a bit unsure of what to think of preschool. One of the teachers scooped up the crying boy and carried him inside and yelled back to his parents, "He stops crying as soon as we start, trust me!".

Dylan had a good note waiting in his folder when he came home. The teacher had written, "Dylan knew his address when I asked him! :)" Yay, Dylan! I'm so proud. He and I worked on memorizing our phone number over lunch and he was awarded one apple Teddy Graham each time he recited our number.

Ah, parenting.

Running on empty...running on...

Okay, I give up. We're down to the last half hour before Sean is home for the weekend on a week where the sickie two-almost three-year-old was awake pretty much every hour every night since last Friday. He's feeling much better now and I'm feeling absolute exhaustion.



Kids are like Energizer bunnies.



I put on a movie and the two of them are creating a very loud, very chaotic environment in the living room. I'm fine with it as long as no one smashes their head into a wall by mistake, and there have been a few near misses as Dylan is being Tarzan in Katie's doorway bouncer. You're on your own to fend for yourselves, kids, Mama is tuning out until Daddy gets home.



Not only did Dylan sleep terribly all week and burn up a ton of energy at school this morning, but he also helped Grandpa install new stairs out back.



Seriously, he's not tired? I'll have what he's having. I'm looking forward to early bedtime tonight and having my love home to help out so I can get some shut eye, too.

My endocrinologist's office called and said that my bloodwork came back with an even lower TSH result than two weeks ago and so they are putting me on a lower dose of thyroid hormone to raise my levels. Technically I am extremely hyperthyroid but my body is strangely acting hyPOthyroid instead--I'm starving for energy. Thank God for my father-in-law who is always here to help me when I have health issues. He's here taking the kids faster than I can get off the phone with him. He says, "Put your feet up, take a nap, relax." I'm so so so lucky to have him. We all are. My mother is the same way. I know that if I don't feel well I can bring the kids over to her and she'll watch them for me so I can rest.

At this point I am just tired of being tired. I'm tired of saying, "I'm tired", writing "I'm tired". I'm optimistic that when my TSH levels are raised I might start to feel better. I'm tired of thinking about cancer and the side effects. I'm tired of taking giant horse pills. I'm tired of feeling eighty. I'm tired of falling over because I can't make my legs work. I'm tired of losing my hair.

So I'm going to forget about being tired. I'm looking forward to spending the weekend with all of my loves, including this weenie:



No matter how hard of a week I've had, when the weekend comes everything is right with the world. I always tell Sean that my love tank is filled over the weekend and starts draining every Monday when Sean goes back to work. By Friday I am craving our family to be together again and my metaphorical gas light is flashing. As soon as Sean walks in that door on Friday night life gets a million times easier.

And would you lookie here...guess who just walked in the door!

Joy and Sorrow

Katie learned how to clap! As impressing as clapping is for a baby, I'm more excited that she is starting to understand us. She recognizes the word "clap" and sometimes says "Aaaaaaaaaay" after I gleefully exclaim, "Yay, Katie!"



Dylan didn't get to go to school again today because of this damn flu bug he's still fighting. His fever is down to a 99.5 but now he's got a ridiculous cough. He needed another rest day to fully shake this thing. Kate is still hanging on with no fever and a clear runny nose.

In good news, I saw my endocrinologist yesterday to figure out why my legs have stopped working this month and we determined that since my thyroglobulin are still at < 0.2 my cancer is most likely not spreading.  I like to hear that.

As far as my month of weakness, the doc isn't sure.  He tested my levels again and said that some people do great on a 0.03, some don't.  My levels should be 0.1 to 2 as a cancer patient because the higher my TSH the more likely the cancer cells will grow, so low is good.  However, 0.03 might be too low for my body.

Whatever the case I still very much like my doctor and I feel confident that he will take good care of me.  I like that he is thorough.  Two thyroid panels in two weeks.  My kind of doctor.  In the meantime I'm staying on my 150mcg of synthroid and taking it easy.  I feel better this week than I did the last two and I think maybe I'm on the up and up.  Let's see what my levels are in a few days and maybe we can find a happy thyroid balance.

*

Today is the twelfth anniversary of September 11. Those of us who are old enough to remember will never forget where we were that day as we watched those planes fly into the towers. I was working in the music library in college when another student came in and told us about the first plane. All of my classes were cancelled, except for choir. It was our first day of concert choir rehearsal and our esteemed conductor walked into that practice room with a cell phone in hand. He was waiting to hear from his daughter who worked in the trade centers. He handed us an 80-paged copy of Mozart's Requiem and told us that we were going to perform this that weekend.




That whole week is a blur to me now. The concerts we performed around the state to show our support and respect are a vague memory. But whenever I hear Mozart's Requiem I am brought back to that place, watching those towers fall and feeling in my soul the aftermath of so much suffering.

Recording my symptoms

I just read back to June to find out what my levels were at when I felt my worst. My TSH was a 3. To keep cancer from spreading TSH is ideally kept at a .1 for the first few years after treatment.   But having a TSH of 3 felt horrible and I had just dropped from a severe hypothyroid state in preparation for RAI treatment in which my TSH measured 112. To put that into perspective, anything over a 5 is hypothyroid.