The rest of 2012 (and some 2013)

As I mentioned at the beginning of the year, my goal for 2012 was to kick cancer's ass.

Thanks to the wonderful news I got on Wednesday, I am definitely doing what I need to to achieve that goal.  There are still a few steps on the process to truly kicking thyroid cancer to the curb (mainly finding the right medicine to keep my TSH nice and low).  I'll never be fully done with thyroid cancer.  But once my thyroid levels get back to normal, I should be feeling up to getting back to a normal life.

Huh... gotta think real hard about what life was life before we were looking into fertility clinics and found those dang lumps in my neck.  Ok so life will never be like THAT again.  But we will figure out a new normal and forge ahead.

For the last couple of months, I have been keeping kind of a mental list of the things I wanted to do once we got this cancer business behind us.  It is still sinking in that the hard part is behind us.  That is a different post for a different time.

Here's what we have planned for rest of 2012 (and the beginning of 2013):

- Europe!!  Our good friend, Ryan, recently moved to The Netherlands for a couple of years.  Sounds like a good excuse to go to Europe to me!!  Our grad school friends are all planning on going over there for like 2 weeks to see Ryan and do some travelling.  I am so excited about this trip!  So far, we are thinking Ireland, The Netherlands, and Spain. 

- Work on my photography skills.  Since we are going to Europe and all.  I want some kick ass pictures this time.  Not like the point and shoot ones I took when I lived there.

- Run again.  I signed up for The Color Run on Team Smuppies with Jes.  She says she isn't a crazy marathoner and she'd better not be lying since I haven't done much in the way of physical activity in the last 6 months.  Hopefully when we actually meet each other in real life, Jes and I actually like each other.  If not, this could be an awkward 3.1 miles.  I also kind of want to do the Walt Disney World Half-Marathon (mostly because I want to go to Disney World) but I don't think that will happen.

- Visit Karla again.  I miss that girl.  She must have g-chatted with me every day while I was waiting for my scan results.  It was a wonderful distraction.  And since I haven't gotten to see her since her wedding, it has been too long.

- Learn Spanish.  Preferably before we go to Spain.

- Visit Phil's college roommates again.  Those guys are stinkin' awesome.  Seriously.  I am secretly hoping I can convince all of them to move to Oregon.  I'm thinking Oregon girls are the best chance for this.  Too bad ALL of my friends are married.

- Find my inner domestic goddess again.  Remember when I used to cook and clean?  Back in the day when my husband didn't have to do ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING for me?  Yeah... those days did exist.  I would like for them to exist again.  So would my husband.

 

- Become Mrs. Dr. Janney.  Techinically it would be Dr. and Mrs. Janney.  But whatever.  We are SO CLOSE to Phil being done with grad school.  As if the last 6 months weren't hard enough dealing with cancer, we have about 4 more months and then Phil should be done with grad school and be a full blown Toxicologist.  Yay!

I think we are due for some fun adventures and I am really excited because I really feel like there are some good times ahead of us.

Hello there Gym... It's been a while

Something unexpected happened yesterday afternoon.  After months of absense, countless hours of sitting and resting, and endless minutes of feeling like a blob...

I went to the gym.

In an effort to loosen my very stiff, still tense back muscles I went to yoga.

It was weird.  And hard.  I'm super weak.  The mirrors in the exercise room were very unforgiving.  I feel like my fitness level is back where it was in 2009, which is pretty depressing.

Phil keeps telling me to cut myself some slack.  I have a good excuse.  And he's probably right.

But I need to get back in shape.  Especially since I signed up for the Color Run with Jes and Team Smuppies.

Jes says she isn't much of a runner, but I not much of a mover these days.  Not sure if I could even crawl 3 miles (ok slight exaggeration).

Remember how I used to run half-marathons?

Oh man... I am currently working on lowering my expectations and figuring out a plan for getting back into shape without killing myself.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Almost 2nd Anniversary

{photo courtesy of Miller Photography}

I realized this morning that our 2nd wedding anniversary is only a month away.  This means I need to get crackin' on my gift.

Last year, I did awesome with a gift for Phil.  1st anniversary gift is supposed to be paper.  I got him concert tickets.  I was pretty proud of myself for that one.

Since we are trying to get a puppy and pay for all my medical bills, we decided we weren't going to spend much on our anniversary gifts for each other.  Like $50 max.  And in case you were wondering, the traditional anniversary gift for the 2nd year is cotton.  The modern gift is china.

I am going to make an executive decision and say that china is out.  Tell me that wasn't created for a woman trying to complete her wedding china set.  I don't think Phil would be all that excited for another place setting.

That leaves cotton.  For some reason, my mind keeps going to undershirts and underwear.  What a romantic gift... underwear.

He's a lucky man.  I'd better keep brain-storming.  I'll take suggestions.

Puppy Perspective

A combination of stress and still being hypothyroid are taking a toll on my body.  I had a tension headache for 5 days while I was waiting for my test results.  And even after getting the good results, my body still hasn't been able to relax.  I think I may actually be getting a cold or something now from being so stressed.

I woke up yesterday morning and my entire body hurt.  Neck, back, joints all hurt like crazy.  I finally got out of bed after I got on facebook and saw that the litter we are on the list for a puppy from was being born. 

YAY!

We were 2nd on the list for girl puppies.  All we needed was 2 girl puppies in the litter.  An ultrasound had been done showing there were 5 puppies in there so the odds were definitely in our favor.  There had to be at least 2 girls in there, right?

I checked and checked and checked facebook all day.  There were no updates.  Finally the breeder called us last night:

4 puppies were born. 3 boys.  1 girl.  No puppy for us.

We are sad, but not too sad.  The breeder has another litter due in about 3 or 4 weeks.  The owner of the sire has dibs on the first girl from that litter, so again we are hoping for at least 2 girls.  If that litter doesn't work out, she has another one due a month after that.  By the end of the summer, we should have a puppy.

Phil and I have decided we aren't really be too disappointed about this though.  Afterall, I did find out my cancer hadn't spread this week.  :)

Overall, we will still count this week as a win.  It's all about perspective, people.

Scan Results

There's a long and annoying story about how I got my scan results.  Let's just say it involved me going to the doctor's office at the end of the day and standing there until I got my results.

It worked.  I got to see my doctor. 

I walked into the exam room and she said:

"Good news!  No metastatic disease!"

YAY!!

The doctor was sick Monday and Tuesday morning (of course).  I had called this morning and the nurse said he would call me this afternoon.  Then he didn't.  I had had a tension headache for like 5 days and was about ready to blow, I was so tense from waiting.

Thankfully, the nurses and staff at the endo's office are nice and very understanding.  They even said I was one of their favorite annoying patients.  Don't worry they said it in a nice way.

They were all pretty happy for me that the scan results were good.  We had a nice moment.  One that would have been missed had they just called me back.

The good news hasn't really sunk in for me yet and I'm not sure why.  I think I am having a hard time accepting good news these days.  It will hit me eventually.  Next steps will include getting my TSH (thyroid stimulating hormone) levels nice and suppressed (around 0.5).  In 6 months I will have a ultrasound and thyroglubin levels checked.  And another scan done next year.

In the meantime, I would like to thank all of you for your kind words, thoughts and prayers.  They were definitely answered and I am very grateful for all of them and all of you.  Whenever you hear the word "cancer" one of the first thoughts that crosses your mind is whether or not it has spread.  This is the part I was the most scared about (which is hard to believe because I was pretty freaked out by the first surgery).  I'm not sure how I would have gotten through everything if it weren't for my family, real-life friends, and my blog friends.  :)

Ok... it is really starting to sink in now.  Kind of want to cry now.

{image found HERE}

I can follow a recipe...

Saturday I mentioned that I wanted to make THIS recipe.  Well, while Phil was gone Sunday I went to the grocery store and bought the ingredients.  That was a step in the right direction.

Once Phil got home, we both realized we were starving.  So I decided I would muster up the energy to get in the kitchen and actually cook dinner.  I'm pretty sure the heaven's parted just then as this was nothing short of a miracle.

I got half way through assembling the dish when I realized:

1) I had bought the wrong kind of parmesean cheese (shredded not grated).  Not a big deal.

2) I wasn't supposed to add the 3 cups of mozzerella to the ricotta mix.  Turns out I wasn't supposed to add any of it.  I ended up using 4 cups of cheese instead of 3.

3) The dish had to bake for over an hour.  I needed to be eating in about 7 minutes.


I was feeling pretty spectacular about my ability to read a simple recipe.  I finished putting the casserole together and then put it in the fridge.  We had a frozen pizza Sunday night and ate the dish Monday night.  It was good.  Cheesy, but good.

A Case of the Mondays

I tried calling the doctor's office to see if I could find out the results of my scan.  The doctor was out sick today (of course) so there was no news regarding the scan.

I was pissed.

The day was made even better when I found a metal wire in my lunch (care of the brush we use to clean the grill).  Then I came home and Taylor was all kinds of needy.  After I got her to leave me alone for 5 seconds, I got to spend the next 2 hours listening to her hack up part of her crate blanket that she spent all day eating.  It really is wonderful to hear/watch her hack things up into her mouth and then have her eat it again.

Yum.

In an effort to cheer me up and distract me, Phil asked me to help him with his data analysis reports.  He had two reams of print-outs that needed to be stapled together.  Each report was 3 pages, so every 3 pages needed to be stapled  together.

{2 reams of paper stapled together.  The glorious life of a graduate's wife.}

I was happy to help and save Phil 2 hours.  At work, this isn't the type of task I would usually do (since it isn't the best use of my time).  But considering the fact that Phil will eventually be a doctor (of philosphy), I will be the least qualified person in our house (with just the master's degree and the engineering license).

Add my stapling experience to the fact that Sunday I bought Phil 12 pairs of the Nike socks he likes, and I gained some MAJOR wife points.