Thank You Martha!

I was sad today picking Owen up from Martha’s. It was so bittersweet to me. I was sad for Owen, for the fact that he doesn’t even realize that he won’t get to see Martha or any of his friends for 2 months, since we are going on summer break soon!  He’ll be sad. I  bet he’ll ask for Martha or Paul, or Shaun or Luke or Estephen or Lilia or Cameron or Eden or Maxx…his friends that he loves so dearly with every ounce of his 2 year old little heart! Yes he’ll have other friends to play with…and see most if not all of them again in August, but still.

Gosh, I remember this time last year, we were finishing out the school year and Hannah was babysitting our lil Owen, with the company of Brenda Goller and lil Addison Gerke. Taryn’s mom was having hip pain and unable to fit Addi up and down…Brenda and Addi would come over so Hannah could help Brenda with Addi.  Hannah was just amazing with my baby, she would lay down with him to get him to take naps, and just spoil him rotten. Owen loved his Hannah, she got to watch him grow those few months while I was back to work.  It was nice and easy, and convenient. But I knew that the following school year Owen was going to have to go to a “real” daycare. Mom started searching for me…and my anxiety about leaving him with a STRANGER was really getting to me. I’d sit and cry all the time with the thought of bringing him to a complete stranger. Like HOW on EARTH could I ever trust my CHILD with someone that I did not even know?!? I had major mixed feelings about whether I wanted him to go to a big daycare facility or an in-home one.  Do I want a bunch of eyes on my child, and possibly let him get lost in the mix of children OR one set of eyes on him…only one that could potentially  harm him?!?!? Oh gosh, what to do what to do.  My heart-rate is increasing just THINKING about back then.

Then one day…Mom was getting her hair done at her lady’s house. (This hair woman does hair outta her garage in the Ridge on Tuesdays and has a huge client base).  Anyway, Martha’s name came up. Mom got the number for me…but I just wasn’t sure about an in—home sitter, especially one in Southridge (which is totally outta my way from my house and work). BUT I wasn’t having luck really finding (or even looking) for other options. I called and spoke with Martha, and in the mean time Mother was contacting tons of people/teachers that used Martha at some stage with their own kids…ALL totally loved her!  So I went to the house to check Martha out, hell she could have been some crazed lady for all I knew…and a LONG story short, Mom adjusted her work schedule…Owen started going to Martha’s August 9th, 2010. 

The first week of school I cried driving from Mom’s to work w/ the thought of Owen being w/ someone he didn’t know.  Mom had the luxury of dropping my SCREAMING child off…the first 2 weeks were very rough on Owen AND Bernie. Owen would be crying, not wanting to stay…Bernie would be crying on her way to work…all while I had no clue…they hid that from me until later!  It took Owen 2 weeks…and he was adjusted. After 2 weeks Owen LOVED “MarthaPaul” (Owen used to call Martha, “MarthaPaul”…and he called her husband, who’s name is Paul, “Hunnie” which I thought was just so so cute) and would talk about her on the weekends.  And the best part of that was that Martha AND her family all TOTALLY LOVED my son back. Not often you find people that truly love and care for your child like you would.

Week after week, I noticed my baby turn into a real boy. Martha was teaching him things I never knew he was capable of learning. When he counted ALL our stairs in the house at 18 months I knew Martha was working wonders w/ him.  The manners, boundaries, limits she teaches them all is amazing.  We were suffering w/ his sleeping habits at that time (b/c he was in our bed) but Martha got him taking naps in his Pack-N-Play and now sleeps like a champ in his own room!! I really don’t know what we would have done w/o her…actually I do know…I’d be ONE GRUMPY lady never getting enough sleep!

  So now its summertime…I’m teaching summer school for the month of June. Bernie is going to get to be the Babysitter….I warned Martha that my child will be absolutely RUINED when he returns to her in August. Oops…poor Martha will have some re-training to do!  I was on facebook uploading the pic of Owen and Martha to put on Martha’s page and I noticed another Mom already posted a pic of her son and their friend Luke w/ Martha. Those boys are starting kindergarten in August and Owen is truly going to miss them dearly. He talks about Shaun and Luke on a daily basis! Got me sad…like my Owen isn’t the “baby” at Martha’s anymore…he’s in the “intermediate” group…she’ll be prepping for kinder soon enough. Next thing I know I’ll be that Mom taking THAT picture w/ Martha    Ok I’m getting a little ahead of myself…haha

Thank you Martha for loving my son!! And see you in August…fingers crossed Owen will be using the big boy potty by then!!!

15 months and counting…

Do you see that…..you see those words “IN REMISSION”….how freakin’ awesome is that!  It’s the first time they added that to my “After-Visit Summary”

Today was my 15 month routine check with my oncologist. Always pleasant to see him and talk cancer w/o feeling weird.  Someone that understands and listens to every concern w/o even batting an eye. No sympathy, no worried looks, just medical answers that I need to hear!  I went into this appointment this afternoon secretly EXTREMELY worried. I have been feeling VERY tired lately, have some unusual back pain, stiff neck pain at least once a week for the past 2 months, I found little eczema blisters on one of my fingers (which, let me show you all what happened to my hands last time I noticed blisters on my hands…

Yes those are my nails FALLING OFF due to excessive dry skin back in 2009…it was horrible!! After many many appointments with the dermatologist, she came to the conclusion that I have severe eczema (which is excessive dry skin) and its triggered when my immune system is threatened! This eczema started when I was pregnant with Owen…got worse and worse and that’s actually what brought me to the doctors office when I had cancer, not the lump in my neck! haha Go figure!  And for your info…the CHEMO cleared my hands up..Thank God b/c THAT was more miserable than losing my hair…seriously!

So when I saw the little blisters on my finger a few weeks ago, I kind of started to panic BUT the weather has been changing so much so thought it MUST be that.  I didn’t contact Dr. Chan since I knew I had my 3 month check-up coming up. Tuesday this week  I went to get my routine labs done…brought Owen along, since I was already going there, to get his 2 year check up labs done as well…my poor little dude was NOT happy about getting blood tests done. But I felt good…2 birds with 1 stone!

He screamed and cried, but helped me count to 10 until the technician was finished. After she was all done Owen said “All done” and I told him yes your ALL done. Then he said sooo excitedly “I DID IT!” heehee. Such a cutie!

My lab work is always done STAT, meaning no line or waiting and I get the results sent to my email via kp.org within an hour. When I got home I thought I’d take a glimpse at the lab results since I was feeling nervous. I’m not sure if I thought I’d be able to see something that would suggest that my cancer is back or even worse, I have a new type of cancer some where  else…like the email would say “YOU HAVE CANCER”…I’m not sure what I was looking for!! haha So I looked at the tests, and compared these test results with the tests from the past 20 months…the electrolyte panel, normal.  Creatinine and Creatinine Clearance, normal. Blood urea nitrogen, normal. LIVER FUNCTION PANEL, normal. But when I got to the Lactic Acid Dehydrogenase I noticed my levels were very high (for me). In August 2009, when I was diagnosed, my level was 133. Since then it has steadily dropped, and 3 months ago at my 1 year check-up it was 110. THIS time my LDH level was 147. So I was naturally worried. BUT Dr. Chan, my oncologist didn’t seem bothered by it today when I brought it up to him. He reassured me that that test can pick up anything, a cold, infection, anything. SO I don’t know…maybe I have a cold and think its just my allergies?!?  I mentioned the tiredness and he wants to get a thyroid screening done for my next appointment, which he pushed to 4 rather than 3 months away!  Which is a good thing…spreading out the time between appointments means my life is getting healthier and healthier!

I left the appointment happy, we discussed some research about chemo patients and weight issues and it made me feel good that I’m busting my a** working out lately and am not losing any weight or inches like I would have pre-chemo! Just ANOTHER thing that cancer has made a little bit more difficult for me…difficult, but definitely not impossible!!

BLAST from the Past…what Grad Nite stirred up!

A few friends from work (Erin Gonzales & Taryn Gerke) approached me about chaperoning Grad Nite MONTHS ago. We put our names in to volunteer since it was during finals week and wouldn’t have to “teach teach” the day after anyway. Between then and now…they changed the date of Grad Nite from the last week of school to two weeks BEFORE graduation and we were STUCK chaperoning. But I’m so happy we did…it was a lot of fun!!! 10 buses FULL of seniors left our school at 8:45pm…and didn’t return until the next morning at 6:45am….JUUUUUUST in time for school! As all the seniors left for breakfast or home…I was stuck at school. You know when your SUPER tired…and its like torture to stay awake…oh man. But all in all I had fun!

Why did it take me 11 years to finally get to experience a Grad Nite at Disneyland?? Man it was so much fun!!! The random student that we asked to take our picture as we entered the park thought we were so weird…old ladies excited about grad-nite. haha  We skipped the clubs (I know…not typically what I would do) and just stuck to riding the rides…it was fun!!!

Seeing all these kids so excited to graduate got my brain thinking about my senior year. Was such an amazing year…had some major emotional highs and also the lowest of lows when I lost my brother.  I start searching for the scrapbook I made of my senior year in high school…and I found it. Its so funny to look at….amazing with the emotions it brought back. Oh to be a kid again….right? haha Since I don’t know how to work our scanner…I took pictures of my scrapbook pages…

June 2000…Graduation!

 

  With all my friends having graduation parties, I knew I just couldn’t miss out! So I skipped Grad Nite at Disneyland to go to my friends parties.  Graduation parties were “the thang” back in the day! Who can get their hands on the booze! haha

Funny Stuff huh…we were so young!

I’m not going to post ALL the pages from this scrapbook…some are just too sad…and some boring (silly high school romances!) and FYI I kept EVERYTHING from that year, total pack-rat!!…birthday invitations, newsletters, ticket stubs, heck Nichole Lindersmith…I kept the valentine you gave me!!! Seriously!! But Anyway hope you all enjoy THIS blast from the past as much as I did!!!

Even the flash back for my Irish peeps!

 

Now…back to my grown-up life of serving dinner, washing dishes, bathtime with Owen and hopefully a glass of wine to start off the work week! Ü

Mother’s Day…

This year was my 3rd celebration as a Mommy…and I can honestly say that each Mother’s day just keeps getting better and better.

My first Mother’s Day (2009) wasn’t great…Owen was about 6 weeks old and his projectile vomiting had started days before…and we had no clue what was wrong with him. Was a scary time for a first-time Mama…but after his surgery (on May 18th, 2009 for the Pyloric Stenosis) he was all good! No more exorcist baby, which = a happy Mommy,Thank God! Ü

When I look back at these pictures…gosh my life was so different. Its weird to think that I had a very large cancerous tumor wrapping itself around my heart here…and had no idea! Our life was consumed with Owen…and well I guess things never really changed in regards to that Ü heehee  I had NO idea what was in store for me that day…cancer was the LAST thing on my mind…never would I have thought.

My second Mother’s day (2010)…I don’t even remember what we did…so obviously it probably wasn’t something extordinary BUT I was healthy, alive, not sick from chemo or anything else…and was able to enjoy the “title” of Mommy with MY Owen and MY Hubs!!!

I sometimes wonder when Owen looks back at the millions of pictures we have, some with long hair, short hair, bald, what will he think?? I hope I am around to explain to him how his love for me (along with his fathers) made me feel so beautiful during those rough rough times, even when I knew beauty wasn’t in the vocabulary. No hair, no brows, no eyelashes, nothing…Owen still loved me…he knew no different! Yosh still loved me… he had no other choice! haha Just Kidding…my husband is seriously one of those amazing ones that seriously didn’t mind my hair being gone…not all women are so lucky

 

And my third Mother’s day was awesome…I got to spend time with the people I love…no hassle no pressure! I woke up to the cutest, most thought gifts that Yosh had come up with in a long time.  He had forgotten his creative juices the past few years…but they are back and he did a great job! He made me a frame that says “A Mother’s Love is Unmatched” and filled it with cute pictures of me and My Owen! He also did some sneaky work…by having Owen hand paint an apron for me.  One of the evenings I was off getting my zumba on…Daddy let Owen have some fun with the paints!! I love it.  And since I’m cooking sooooooooo much I’m sure that apron will get some real “mileage” (**I hope those of you that know me will hear the sarcasm in this..since I’m a HORRIBLE cook and rarely even TRY to better my skills!** haha)

My silly little man making funny faces…I think picture opts will start getting more and more tricky as this little dude ages!! I love it.

We headed to Redlands around 10am to visit with Yosh’s parents, who were boarding a train that day heading to New York to visit my sister-in-law and family.  I love going over to Mya and Papa’s house..Owen knows that house like as if we go there all the time…the puppy, toys and he especially loves the ability to run his Papa all over that house!!!

Marilyn getting to spend some time with 2 of her 4 children, while anxiously waiting to board that train to see her ONLY daughter.  I must say…its got to be pretty cool when you have lots of kids to spoil you rotten on a day like Mother’s day!

And then of course like every other darn Sunday I had to go grocery shopping while Owen took his nap. I came home and starting “prepping” dinner since MY parents were coming over for a casual dinner of BBQ’d chicken, banquet chicken and Jody’s awesome twice baked potatoes with Apple Blossoms and vanilla ice cream for dessert! A lovely low key evening of eating and watching the movie “Cars”…pure bliss! 

I love my Mother and Owen surely adores his Nana! Thank you Mom for being so darn amazing…you are a true role model, an awesome listener and kind-hearted lady with high expectations and never worries about holding her tongue.  The laughs we have shared will never be forgotten (well I hope I don’t forget them…but you know yourself and this darn “chemo brain”…maybe I should start documenting some of the laughs we share, you know like the ones we share during our Killer Abs class haha) and I’m so happy to say you are not only my Mother but also my best friend! I love you Mother xoxo

Happy Mother’s to all my “mother friends”…new and old.