It is amazing how the years repeat themselves. Every year I promise
myself that I will begin my preparations early, and every year I wait
until the week before the event to begin my preparations.
I dislike shopping in crowds. Anyone with good sense would do
it early. I'm retired! I can do what I want when I want! Ha!
The fact is that I am busier than I ever was. I think it may be
that I am slower than I ever was. I never seem to accomplish
as much as I would like to.
Sometimes I think that we forget that this is the time that we
celebrate the birth of Christ, not the time to see how many
lights we can put up and on our houses or to make sure that
the Christmas tree this year is the best ever.
I would like to take a step back and think what a remarkable
birth that was and how that one single man, the Christ
child, started a movement that has brought hope to every
man, woman and child who will accept it. It is my solace,
my comfort in knowing that He gave His life in order that
all of us could have eternal life.
I look forward to the Christmas Eve services. They are
always so powerful, and I come away with a sense of awe
and peace.
Happy Holidays to All!
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Saturday, December 8, 2007
Friday, December 7, 2007
Unwelclome Visitor - part 2
Dr. Smith told me about a shot, Nulasta, which would keep my
white counts normal for 4 weeks. I received the first Nulasta
shot in Central Florida, and for the first time I thought, maybe
the chemotherapy won't kill me now. I was overjoyed.
Later on that month Dr. Smith ordered a PET scan and it
highlighted new tumors in my lungs. He had to bring out
the big guns now. He put me in the hospital once again
on a Friday afternoon, intending to get a double port
implanted. Here I don't want to get hung up on the comedy
of errors. Just know that every time a port is replaced
the patient must be put to sleep for the surgery.
I had 3 double ports, which leaked, imbedded in my
body and finally one port on either side of my upper
chest. We had to wait Saturday and Sunday because
the surgeons did not work on Saturday, and finally
about Tuesday I finally had two single IV ports which
worked properly.
Then I had extensive chemotherap every day for 4 days.
After many days of chemo and the introduction of
Ritalin, Dr. Smith ordered another scan. I don't remember
whether it was cat or Pet, but the test showed no change
in the tumors. My doctor said if what we did at the
hospital had no effect on my tumors, then I was up a
creek without a paddle.
In the meantime he called in two specialists,
one for bacterial diseases and one for transplants.
I went home and on the internet we found that the
Lymphoma-Leukemia transplant center in Durham,
North Carolina might be a better place for a transplant.
Of course, there was no guarantee the treatment would
affect my disease, but my family wanted me to try.
So my husband, Dan, and I made that long trek to
Duke. I did not want a transplant surgeon who did
a few transplants a year; I wanted doctors who did
thousands of transplants a year.
I made this trip because my family wanted me to. At
that time I was just too young to give up. I had too
many unborn grandchildren to love. I would fight with
all the power I could muster.
By now it was spring 2002. It seemed as if I had lived
years in those months. Many days in the hospital; many
days; many days just existing at home. I don't think I
fixed many meals in that time and did none of the house
work. When I was able to be up, I would sit in my chair
work puzzle books. It was difficult to read books at that
time. I would begin them but I finished very few.
Without the support of a loving husband , family and
friends, I could never have survived the ordeal. I had
friends who would come by weekly and take me out.
My niece Elizabeth came a week and took care of me.
The day after she left, I was admitted to the hospital
with a staff based pneumonia.
I'm trying to shorten this and not go into too much detail.
The second time I went to Duke they took 27 different
vials of blood for various tests. Then they sent me home
with a list of tests they wanted done before I came back up
for the stem cell transplant. Dr. Smith's office arranged
the tests.
When the results came back, I was in the hospital again, and
he came in with the results. "I'm so sorry! I put you through
much pain and suffering and I didn't have to. The biopsy
of the tumors showed no cancer. You have something called
sarcoidosis!"
Let me digress and talk about that week. It was May and
Mother's Day. My daughter came in and told me she had
bought a little dog for herself (and Sam). Later on that day
Jeanine, my son's girlfriend called me and told me about the
ring and the proposal. I told her that she had not had a chance
because I prayed her up. I had , too. I had prayed daily for
the past two years that God would send him a good person
who truly loved him for a wife. I don't think she knew
just how to take that, but she finally realized it was a
meant as a compliment. Now I have 2 year old Chelsea to
love. She is a wonderful gift!
They say good things happen in threes and the third
bit of news was that my daughter Vicki and Don,
her husband, were going to adopt a little girl. That
little girl, Marla, is now five and a half.
I began taking Rituxin treatments. It is a biotherapy
which attacks only cancer cells. It took about two
years for it eradicate all the cancer cells in my body,
after 4 1/2 years I was cancer free. I have been that
way now for 3 1/2 years.
Now I finally get to the real purpose of the story.
During the first 4 1/2 years I had prayers from
churches and individuals all over this country.
Prayer does work! Sometimes it takes a while.
I have been so blessed. There is asmall
Baptist church in Meridian, Mississippi, where
every Wednesday night at prayer meeting they
would pray and send me notes written by every
person there. Those were so appreciated.
A Methodist church in Meridian, Ms and one
in Cleburne, Texas, also sent messages to
me and prayed for me weekly for those 4+
years. There were many others, most of whom
would send messages. I felt so blessed that
so many would take the time to pray for me.
I could bore my readers with many more
lists than they would enjoy reading. My
own special prayer group in my own church
was faithful to pray for me all those months..
I thank God for every day and count it as a
blessing. I thought the telling of my story
might benefit someone out there.
white counts normal for 4 weeks. I received the first Nulasta
shot in Central Florida, and for the first time I thought, maybe
the chemotherapy won't kill me now. I was overjoyed.
Later on that month Dr. Smith ordered a PET scan and it
highlighted new tumors in my lungs. He had to bring out
the big guns now. He put me in the hospital once again
on a Friday afternoon, intending to get a double port
implanted. Here I don't want to get hung up on the comedy
of errors. Just know that every time a port is replaced
the patient must be put to sleep for the surgery.
I had 3 double ports, which leaked, imbedded in my
body and finally one port on either side of my upper
chest. We had to wait Saturday and Sunday because
the surgeons did not work on Saturday, and finally
about Tuesday I finally had two single IV ports which
worked properly.
Then I had extensive chemotherap every day for 4 days.
After many days of chemo and the introduction of
Ritalin, Dr. Smith ordered another scan. I don't remember
whether it was cat or Pet, but the test showed no change
in the tumors. My doctor said if what we did at the
hospital had no effect on my tumors, then I was up a
creek without a paddle.
In the meantime he called in two specialists,
one for bacterial diseases and one for transplants.
I went home and on the internet we found that the
Lymphoma-Leukemia transplant center in Durham,
North Carolina might be a better place for a transplant.
Of course, there was no guarantee the treatment would
affect my disease, but my family wanted me to try.
So my husband, Dan, and I made that long trek to
Duke. I did not want a transplant surgeon who did
a few transplants a year; I wanted doctors who did
thousands of transplants a year.
I made this trip because my family wanted me to. At
that time I was just too young to give up. I had too
many unborn grandchildren to love. I would fight with
all the power I could muster.
By now it was spring 2002. It seemed as if I had lived
years in those months. Many days in the hospital; many
days; many days just existing at home. I don't think I
fixed many meals in that time and did none of the house
work. When I was able to be up, I would sit in my chair
work puzzle books. It was difficult to read books at that
time. I would begin them but I finished very few.
Without the support of a loving husband , family and
friends, I could never have survived the ordeal. I had
friends who would come by weekly and take me out.
My niece Elizabeth came a week and took care of me.
The day after she left, I was admitted to the hospital
with a staff based pneumonia.
I'm trying to shorten this and not go into too much detail.
The second time I went to Duke they took 27 different
vials of blood for various tests. Then they sent me home
with a list of tests they wanted done before I came back up
for the stem cell transplant. Dr. Smith's office arranged
the tests.
When the results came back, I was in the hospital again, and
he came in with the results. "I'm so sorry! I put you through
much pain and suffering and I didn't have to. The biopsy
of the tumors showed no cancer. You have something called
sarcoidosis!"
Let me digress and talk about that week. It was May and
Mother's Day. My daughter came in and told me she had
bought a little dog for herself (and Sam). Later on that day
Jeanine, my son's girlfriend called me and told me about the
ring and the proposal. I told her that she had not had a chance
because I prayed her up. I had , too. I had prayed daily for
the past two years that God would send him a good person
who truly loved him for a wife. I don't think she knew
just how to take that, but she finally realized it was a
meant as a compliment. Now I have 2 year old Chelsea to
love. She is a wonderful gift!
They say good things happen in threes and the third
bit of news was that my daughter Vicki and Don,
her husband, were going to adopt a little girl. That
little girl, Marla, is now five and a half.
I began taking Rituxin treatments. It is a biotherapy
which attacks only cancer cells. It took about two
years for it eradicate all the cancer cells in my body,
after 4 1/2 years I was cancer free. I have been that
way now for 3 1/2 years.
Now I finally get to the real purpose of the story.
During the first 4 1/2 years I had prayers from
churches and individuals all over this country.
Prayer does work! Sometimes it takes a while.
I have been so blessed. There is asmall
Baptist church in Meridian, Mississippi, where
every Wednesday night at prayer meeting they
would pray and send me notes written by every
person there. Those were so appreciated.
A Methodist church in Meridian, Ms and one
in Cleburne, Texas, also sent messages to
me and prayed for me weekly for those 4+
years. There were many others, most of whom
would send messages. I felt so blessed that
so many would take the time to pray for me.
I could bore my readers with many more
lists than they would enjoy reading. My
own special prayer group in my own church
was faithful to pray for me all those months..
I thank God for every day and count it as a
blessing. I thought the telling of my story
might benefit someone out there.
Thursday, December 6, 2007
An Unwelcome Visitor
On January 2, 2000 I awoke to discover a small lump on the left
side of my neck. I quickly made an appointment with my in-
ternist. I had to wait several days for that appointment
because I had promised to chaperone my grandson Daniel
at Allstate Chorus in Tampa. By the time we arrived in
Tampa that small lump had grown to big that it was solid
from under my ear down to my shoulder.
We returned on Sunday, and Monday I saw the doctor. She
gave me antibiotics for a week. At the end of that week
there was only a slightly larger mass. No shrinkage at all.
It was not an infection
The next step was to have anaspirated biopsy of a lymph
node on the left shoulder. Then I had to wait for the results
which were not conclusive. Two days later I had a biopsy of
a lymph node on that same shoulder. I waited yet another
week for the results of that
For about three weeks I waited for an answer, dreading
and looking forward to the answer to the question:
Is it Cancer? The doctor began to give me little pep
talks saying , "If it is lymphoma, that is one of the best
cancers to have. It is so very treatable now!"
When I returned to the surgeon's office, he did say it
was lymphoma, large celled folicular lymphoma--the
worst kind. I went home in a fog. The people
in the doctor's office did not know an oncologist--it was
like they hadn't had a cancer patient there before.
They called and made me an appointment with
a cancer specialist they didn't even know. When
my daughter heard the news, she put out the news.
A couple of her friends had survived Non Hodgkins
Lymphoma, and she wanted me to go to their doctor.
By this time I was numb and, like a lamb, I let her
make the arrangements for me to see Dr. David
Smith at Hematology and Oncologist Associates.
I'm happy to say that was a very good choice. In
the next 18 months he had saved my live numerous
times. I had eleven months treatment with a rather
friendly cancer drug called Fluderabine.
The routine was that I had a treatment every
day for 5 days and then had 3 weeks to recover.
My white counts and red counts zoomed down to
almost zero each month, but I managed to stay
out of the hospital during the time I was taking
the first medicine. I also did not lose my hair.
I would look around and see all the bald people
and be so thankful I had my hair.
Every 3 or 4 months I would have a cat scan or a pet
scan or both. When my tumors began to grow again,
Dr. Smith said we would have to treat the cancer more
aggressively. By this time I knew that I had the
worst kind of lymphoma and that usually patients did
not usually survive past six years from their diagnosis.
We began another week of treatments and three weeks
to sort of recover. Well, I don't think recover was the right
word for me. That first month of the more aggressive treat-
ments, I managed to stay well enough to avoid the hospital.
Here's how the instructions were: "If you have even one
degree of fever, call the office once, day or night." What
I did not realize at the time is that when the white count
is down to almost zero and the red count is also down to nearly
zero, my body could not fight any kind of infection and if it
stayed that low, I wouldn't get that low grade fever. I didnot
have fever at all. I did, however, contract pneumonia, had a
staph infection in my blood and many other things. By the
time I finally did call, I always have to go to the hospital.
In fact in one 90 day period, I spent 45 of those days in
the hospital fighting for my life.
In fact I was supposed to have five of those week long treat-
ments, but at the end of four, Dr. Smith said, "I guess you
I'm not going to give you the last treatment I'm afraid I
cannot save you again."
I replied, "Thank God! I didn't think I could survive it,
either.
During that four month period I had numerous shots of
nupergin for my white count and at least 8 pints of blood
for my red count. When my counts would get low, I
would faint. I fainted a couple of times in the shower.
I fainted in the doctor's office, I fainted many times,
many places.
I think I'll stop for tonight. Please tune in for the next phase
of my my miraculous journey.
side of my neck. I quickly made an appointment with my in-
ternist. I had to wait several days for that appointment
because I had promised to chaperone my grandson Daniel
at Allstate Chorus in Tampa. By the time we arrived in
Tampa that small lump had grown to big that it was solid
from under my ear down to my shoulder.
We returned on Sunday, and Monday I saw the doctor. She
gave me antibiotics for a week. At the end of that week
there was only a slightly larger mass. No shrinkage at all.
It was not an infection
The next step was to have anaspirated biopsy of a lymph
node on the left shoulder. Then I had to wait for the results
which were not conclusive. Two days later I had a biopsy of
a lymph node on that same shoulder. I waited yet another
week for the results of that
For about three weeks I waited for an answer, dreading
and looking forward to the answer to the question:
Is it Cancer? The doctor began to give me little pep
talks saying , "If it is lymphoma, that is one of the best
cancers to have. It is so very treatable now!"
When I returned to the surgeon's office, he did say it
was lymphoma, large celled folicular lymphoma--the
worst kind. I went home in a fog. The people
in the doctor's office did not know an oncologist--it was
like they hadn't had a cancer patient there before.
They called and made me an appointment with
a cancer specialist they didn't even know. When
my daughter heard the news, she put out the news.
A couple of her friends had survived Non Hodgkins
Lymphoma, and she wanted me to go to their doctor.
By this time I was numb and, like a lamb, I let her
make the arrangements for me to see Dr. David
Smith at Hematology and Oncologist Associates.
I'm happy to say that was a very good choice. In
the next 18 months he had saved my live numerous
times. I had eleven months treatment with a rather
friendly cancer drug called Fluderabine.
The routine was that I had a treatment every
day for 5 days and then had 3 weeks to recover.
My white counts and red counts zoomed down to
almost zero each month, but I managed to stay
out of the hospital during the time I was taking
the first medicine. I also did not lose my hair.
I would look around and see all the bald people
and be so thankful I had my hair.
Every 3 or 4 months I would have a cat scan or a pet
scan or both. When my tumors began to grow again,
Dr. Smith said we would have to treat the cancer more
aggressively. By this time I knew that I had the
worst kind of lymphoma and that usually patients did
not usually survive past six years from their diagnosis.
We began another week of treatments and three weeks
to sort of recover. Well, I don't think recover was the right
word for me. That first month of the more aggressive treat-
ments, I managed to stay well enough to avoid the hospital.
Here's how the instructions were: "If you have even one
degree of fever, call the office once, day or night." What
I did not realize at the time is that when the white count
is down to almost zero and the red count is also down to nearly
zero, my body could not fight any kind of infection and if it
stayed that low, I wouldn't get that low grade fever. I didnot
have fever at all. I did, however, contract pneumonia, had a
staph infection in my blood and many other things. By the
time I finally did call, I always have to go to the hospital.
In fact in one 90 day period, I spent 45 of those days in
the hospital fighting for my life.
In fact I was supposed to have five of those week long treat-
ments, but at the end of four, Dr. Smith said, "I guess you
I'm not going to give you the last treatment I'm afraid I
cannot save you again."
I replied, "Thank God! I didn't think I could survive it,
either.
During that four month period I had numerous shots of
nupergin for my white count and at least 8 pints of blood
for my red count. When my counts would get low, I
would faint. I fainted a couple of times in the shower.
I fainted in the doctor's office, I fainted many times,
many places.
I think I'll stop for tonight. Please tune in for the next phase
of my my miraculous journey.
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