Day 7 - A failure that you have had - And Day 8 - A Success

Well, obviously a failure I had was keeping up on this every day now wasn't it?

Oh goodness, who likes to talk about failures that they have had, even though they are usually where we learn our biggest lessons? I wish I would have had one of those grand failures that turn brilliant successes - like flubber or something. But alas, I have not - I think I am mostly composed of everyday failures that everyone beats themselves up about - the failures of a mother, a wife, a friend, a daughter...a human. Actually, one failure that I have had - I wish I would have allowed myself to fail more. When I was little, on top of being an extremely shy introvert...I was also terribly afraid of failing. Some things came so easy to me, primarily school and grades, etc., that if I wasn't completely certain that I could win something, or knew the answer, or could master it, I wouldn't try it. I truly believe that I missed out on many opportunities, or at least growth, from that, and that in itself is the biggest failure. As I've gotten older, I have had to force myself to try things when I am unsure of the outcome, and I still struggle with it, but I'm thankful that I recognize it and am trying to change.


A success I have had - I think one of the big successes I had in the past year was moving past my own comfort zone to put my personal story out there. If I could get one woman to avoid going through what I did by knowing the different signs of what to look for, then that is a success. If I got one mom to donate her excess milk instead of throwing it away, that was a great success to me. If I helped one of the pregnant moms with cancer that I have come across in the past year to navigate this cesspool of crap, then that was a great success. 

Day 6 - My Children

Raising children is some serious shit. It's hard, difficult work that tests your patience in ways you never knew, like working muscles you never knew you had during that first Pilates class. I am still amazed that a tiny little person (in Jack's case, not so tiny, he's already more than half as tall as I am) can create ways to push your buttons in ways even your husband hasn't figured out yet...boggles my mind. Adding a serious, life-threatening illness to the pot is like adding some sriracha to a bowl of cayenne pepper soup - it just adds fuel to an already heated situation, and I am in no way proud to say that I have taken my emotions out on them at times over this past year - I've snapped and yelled at times much louder and more often than I should have. I pray and pray that some of those memories get lost in the ether.

 

 

But beyond the frustrations and madness of raising children is truly an awe-inspiring space, a place where time both stops and careens forward. I know other parents see their children growing up and want desperately to push the pause button...but I, warranted or not, feel like I'm sprinting, holding their hands and dragging them along, because I want to see everything that they do, I want to see all of the years and the events and growing and the stumbling and the successes and the failures. I want to see and touch and breath it all and I feel like I have to do IT RIGHT NOW. But I can't, so I take every day, and though I may lose it sometimes and I will most definitely never be the perfect mama, I dole out copious amounts of hugs and kisses, and breathe in these beings who for whatever reason were crazy enough to choose me to pass through.

 



Day 5 - Friends

I don't have many close friends - I never have. I think it's just part of my introverted personality - I never liked to go out and socialize in addition to various and sundry other reasons, so I never developed the mass amount of friends that some people have.

When this all came down, I was fully prepared to go through it like I have almost everything else in my life - primarily by myself. I don't expect much from most people because I find when I do I'm most often disappointed, so I certainly didn't expect anything just because I was sick. Some people certainly held up the "don't expect anything and you won't be disappointed when it happens" credo, but some people, who had absolutely no obligation at all to help me out, did more than most. My husband's co-workers (who were my co-workers too almost 13 years ago) went above and beyond - they provided us with meals, they sent cards and flowers, gifts - for me and for the baby. They dealt with my husband all day when I'm sure he wasn't exactly a peach dealing with all of this. They are the ones who put together the Komen walk for me. They truly did this out of the goodness of their hearts, and they will always embody the true meaning of friendship to me. 

Day 4 - Family

Family

 

This has me thinking of a post that I would like to ruminate on, so I will post something succint here. I have a pretty large family - a small immediate one but cousins, aunts, uncles, distant cousins galore. This, as I'm sure many of you have experienced, can cause both great joy and fun, as well as strong dislike, decades-long arguments and fisticuffs in the old days. I would not have chosen to grow up any other way.

Most of my family has been great over the past year, either helping out, making food, or just sending thoughts and cards. Some have not and that's okay too - I know now whom I can depend on. My in-laws have gone above and beyond - something I can never repay them for. Like I said on day 1 - I was truly given insight into people's true character, a gift by itself.



Day 3 - A person who lifts you up...

I am going to take slight liberty with this and talk about people who did something to lift me up when I really needed it and did not know it...

 

 

Last year before baby girl was born some friends offered to throw me a baby shower which I absolutely did not want...it's hard to explain but I'm not one for parties anyway where I am the center of attention. Couple that with the fact that I had been receiving help from people for a few months - something with was a struggle enough to do - and I was 9 months pregnant and bald and still angry. But I finally relented, because I knew even if I didn't want this, the baby deserved it. So my wonderful friends Laurie and Wendy threw together an awesome fall shower (I left them with not much notice, poor things) and my cousin Nicole picked for me the most awesome shower cake ever made. For all of that, for knowing what I needed when I absolutely did not want it, I was truly thankful. 

Day 2 - A time when you were strong

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm going for the not blatantly obvious here and looking back at some of my past experiences to appreciate where I have been also...

 

One of the things that I have done, that I needed to be physically and mentally strong for, was Marine Corp boot camp... it was a lifetime (or almost 15 years) ago but I would not trade that experience for anything and some things will stay strongly seared in my chemo-battered memory...

 

Boot camp itself was probably the longest 13 weeks of my life and cost me one good knee and a severely rolled ankle but after you get through the initial weeks of screaming in your face, you find a rhythm and figure out they really do want to see you succeed. After boot camp comes a three week course called MCT - Marine Combat Training - for those who are not going into an infantry unit. This was at Camp Lejeune - which has many swamps. One side note - I am TERRIFIED of water where I can't see the bottom. One night was a night hump...through parts of the swamp...this was probably the closest I have come to a full-blown panic attack in my life (I vividly remember what an alligator sounds like - TV static) but with the help of others I pulled some semblance of mental strength out and made it through. Never ever ever again, but I'm thankful I have that memory in my bank.

 

 



A month of thankfulness...

I don't usually participate in this sort of thing, but I saw this on a blogging site yesterday and it caught my eye because it's not your typical "What am I thankful for today" for however many days there are until Thanksgiving - by giving a different prompt every day it challenged me to really start thinking. So I will take this as my challenge (much in the blogshpere right now about different writing challenges so this is my way of participating) and post my answer everyday.

A Blessing

I have been blessed with many many things...some obvious, some not so obvious. An interesting thing that I have been blessed with over the past year - I have been allowed to see the true character of many people in my life. I was honestly shown who my true friends and family were, in great, wonderful, unexpected ways, and also in hurtful unkind ways. That is not something that everyone gets to experience and I believe I am richer for it.

 

Now here are some fun photos from the rest of October (and from last night!) that I just can't help but

share...

Very serious for a little girl in a pumpkin patch...

 

My little ham...

 

 

A sea of orange beauties...

 

Daddy and a not so happy at the moment pumpkin...

 

 

I love this picture (which is not easy to say for me!)

 

A fall birthday...

This is a long time coming due to a missing, then non-working camera cable...but here we go finally!

 

Baby girl's first birthday party - obviously having a baby to celebrate in the month of October is going to be wonderful...for me at least, maybe not for her eventually. So I had to have a fall themed party - what else? And it was actually pretty stress free - I mean, the house is already decorated for fall/halloween, so I just had to add some things here and there...

 

Easy decoration - tissue paper pom poms

A book for guests to sign

The welcome wagon...

 

Caramel apple party favors - easy and delicious

More easy tissue paper pom poms...I think they are a little classier than balloons right?

 

Crafts to keep Jack and his friends occupied for a bit

The birthday girl...still deciding that she could crawl faster than walk at that point...although that has started to change this past week.

 

 

Marshmellow fondant leaves - this recipe is soooo easy and doesn't taste that bad!

 

Birthday girl could not understand why everyone was singing to and staring at her at that point

Hmmm, this feels interesting...

But I don't think I will actually taste it for a while...

  

The boys are over celebrating a one year old girl....

Family shot...Happy first birthday to my baby girl - I eagerly look forward to many more with you.

 

One year ago...

 

A year ago, a large team of NICU doctors stood in a delivery room with nothing to do, amazed that this month-early girl needed not one iota of help and was in fact healthier and bigger then many term babies. To my little chemo-sabe, my little buggy boodles, you gave me more strength than you will ever ever know and I look forward to many many more birthdays with you. Happy happy first birthday my girl.

 

 

 

 

I wish for you so many things I cannot even articulate them. I wish for you the world. I wish for you joy and pain and laughter and tears. I want to see you dance and sing and grow and learn. I want to hug you and kiss you a billion more times. I wish to see you follow your big brother to school. I wish to see you do wonderful things and get into trouble. I long to see those amazing blue eyes ingest everything they can. My big girl, I wish to see you grow up.

Thank you for this year.

What I think about the Pink...

Since I am "lucky" enough to have to share my most favorite month with breast cancer awareness month, well, here are my thoughts. As most of you are aware the world has been splashed with a heaping tablespoon of pepto bismol pink - which makes some of us feel about the same as the people in the pepto commercial. Not everyone...much of our cancer tribe has differing views on the subject...some loathe it, some embrace it, and some like me are conflicted about it.

I can honestly say pre-bc I didn't give pink-tober a whole lot of thought. Even though my mom and my grandmother have both had breast cancer, it still didn't really impact me...my mom had what I term (and please save your speeches, I know people who would stab me for saying this) "cancer-lite", she had stage 0, which just resulted in lumpectomy, no chemo, no rads, nothing else. My grandmother had a mastectomy - no chemo, no rads-  but that was over 30 years ago. We still have no idea what stage, what kind, nothing other then it never returned...people just didn't really talk about things like that back then. So honestly, other than seeing my football teams with their pink accoutrement's and seeing pink ribbons everywhere, the whole pink-washing didn't really effect my awareness all that much - likely my undoing. Because I always expected that I would get cancer, I was prepared to be vigilant...in my 40s. I expected it when my grandmother and mom got it, in my late '50s. Certainly not at 37 and most definitely not while pregnant. Surprise - joke was on me!

So here I am (I don't count last year because during pink-tober I was hip deep in trying to make sure this baby came out ok, prepare for upcoming mastectomy, continued chemo, and not quite concerned about much else) looking at the pink-washing as...an observer? a participant? an unwilling consort? I don't know. What I do know is that most of the products that slap a pink ribbon on their label are things I wouldn't eat/drink/ingest in any way, shape or form. You think I'm eating/drinking any of that processed crap after I've had CANCER?? No.

Do I appreciate that people walk for and with me at the Komen walk? Of course I do. Would I mind if people thought of me when seeing a ribbon or wore pink in honor of me or showed support that way? of course not!

What I do know is that not wearing a bra on Oct. 13th is in no way showing any sort of awareness, support or camaraderie with those who have breast cancer - it's just making you look, ummm, well, not good likely. (Should we all be going commando in support of prostate cancer awareness? Have all the young starlets flashing their hoohas at the cameras really been supporting cervical cancer awareness all along?) What I do know is playing some dumb game about the color of your bra on facebook is not doing anything other than...playing some stupid game on facebook. If you want to sport a pink ribbon, especially in honor or memory of someone, be my guest. If you want to donate money, please do your research and find the charities whose money does the most good. If you want to make me happy- learn about the signs, check yourself, learn about density and mammograms, advocate for yourself and please go to the doctor if anything is ever amiss - remember what I've been through this year. Know that behind the pretty pink ribbon, there are bald heads and scars and drains and IVs, there is pain and tears and not always happy endings. Cancer is not pretty, it's not pink, it's not sexy, it's awful. I will have my beautiful October tainted pink forever...you don't have to.