Long time, no blog...

It has been so long since the last time I blogged, I had to look way back under links on Facebook to even remember where I moved my blogging to! LOL

Forgive me my friends, for it has been over three months since I last blogged. :o)

Things have been pretty busy and continually hopping for me in the past three months. So far, all tests (Pap with the gynecologic oncologist every three months and tumor markers via blood work every month) have shown no signs of cancer. Praise God!!! I was still having trouble with vertigo and just a general feeling of dysequilibrium, but after more testing, and a completely normal brain MRI, it has now seemed to clear up. I have not had that feeling for about a month now. Again, I am praising God for that!!!

Meanwhile, my weight has ballooned up to the highest it has ever been.

What I am about to share with you is one of the most difficult things I have ever done. Being obese is embarrassing...no, it is humiliating. But they say one of the first steps to recovery is to admit you have a problem, so here I am. My hope and prayer is that as I work through this with God's help that maybe someone else will be helped along the way too.

I have struggled with weight issues for as long as I can remember. If you look at pictures of me in high school, you might not believe it, but I was always comparing myself to my friends even then and I always felt I was fat. As an adult, I started putting on more pounds and have gone up and down in my weight more times over the years than I can even remember.

About halfway through chemo, I got to the point where it was too difficult for me to exercise anymore. I had been walking at least 30 minutes a day 4-5 times a week and was maintaining my weight for awhile, which was already too high. But after my hemoglobin started dropping, along with my energy and ability to breathe normally most of the time, I got to the point I was just sitting around basically waiting for chemo to be over. In the meantime, I watched TV and ate.

My weight started going up and by the time I finished chemo, I thought, okay, I can get started on Weight Watchers and exercising again and get this weight off and get healthy. Just the opposite happened. I continued to eat more and watch a lot of TV. It was pretty much the equivalent of burying my head in the sand. I did not want to think about my weight. I did not want to think about all the bills that had piled up when I could not work full-time and the financial mess we were in. And, I most certainly did not want to think about the possibility of the cancer coming back.

I blissfully continued to escape with food and TV. Thankfully, God loved me enough to intervene.

Last week as I was working, I was suddenly overcome with the whole situation of me running away and not truly facing my emotions, etc. I had reached my highest weight ever, and while sitting at my desk typing away, I just broke down. I got on my knees and cried out to God for help.

That evening, I was online and came across something by another woman who had struggled with gluttony and she had something typed out in all caps that hit me like a ton of bricks:

GOD DOES NOT WANT YOU DRUNK ON FOOD!

You see, I sobered up a few years ago after struggling with a problem of overindulgence with alcohol. I am what most people would call a borderline alcoholic or social alcoholic. I got to the point that I did not know when to say when. I would drink until the bar closed, or until I blacked out. Yea, it was pretty bad. Then one New Year's Eve while at a friend's house, I cried out to God for help that night, and I have been sober ever since. In fact, it will be 16 years as of January 1st.

I was feeling pretty good about that - not in a prideful way like "look what I did" but just in the fact that God had heard my cry and truly helped me to overcome that stronghold on my heart. So you can just imagine what I felt when I read the words above. I completely broke down. It hit me that I was no longer getting drunk on alcohol - I had just switched over to doing it with food.

A lot of you will probably not understand this blog. You have never had problem withs self-control or addiction. However, some of you will totally get what I am saying.

When you can quit something cold turkey, it is hard, but it is easier than having to still deal with it on a daily basis. You cannot quit eating cold turkey for the rest of your life. So, what do you do?

I believe each person has to find the answer to that themselves, but I know for me, it is about learning how to eat like a naturally thin person. I learned this a few years ago when I went through something called Weigh Down, but unfortunately I pretty much treated it just like any "diet" where I did it, lost a bunch of weight, and then went back to eating too much again. But since then, I have watched people like my mother-in-law, who has never been overweight a day in her life, and my grandmother, who has never had more than maybe 10 pounds to lose, as well as some friends of mine. They eat whatever they want to; however, they only eat what they need when they are physically hungry. They do not overeat all the time. They do not binge.

I quit smoking one year to the day after I sobered up from alcohol, and I thought that was the hardest thing I had ever done. This is harder...but with God's help, I am going to take it one day at a time and learn to eat only what my body needs for nourishment and quit using food as a drug.

And so it begins...

The F Word

No, it is not what you think. The F word I am referring to is, FEAR.

I once heard Zig Ziglar refer to fear as "false evidence appearing real." I would say 99% of the time that is true. However, there is that small percent of time that fear is the result of something very real....like cancer.

Just the word "cancer" can strike fear into the heart of man (and woman). A lot of it is fear of pain and suffering and the possibility of death. I think that is normal. None of us really want to be in pain, and most of us really want to live. I believe that is a God-given trait. I also believe with all my heart is it something that God understands.

Just read about Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. He did not say, "Wow, Father, I am really excited to be beaten and scorned and then suffer and die on the cross for the sins of man." No, He prayed, "My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will." (Matthew 26:39b ESV) I am not a theologian, but what I get out of that is that our Savior was not particularly looking forward to what was going to happen. However, He was willing to do whatever the Father wanted. But the one thing I do not get out of that is fear. Christ was not afraid. Out of perfect love, he set aside the earthly flesh that he was temporarily walking in and continued to walk in the spirit in God's perfect will...without fear!

I have had so many people call me courageous in the past few months. I am not at all courageous. Fear is something I have struggled with a lot in the past few years. The fear that has bound me at times is the type that Zig Ziglar referred to - it was fear of nothing real. It was fear over what might happen, not what was happening.

Then I was told I had cancer. Talk about a real fight with the big F. Most of the time, I was at peace, but since chemo has been over, there have been some real fear-fighting moments in my life. I have to be on guard because there is no fear in faith. You either fear, or you have faith. They cannot coexist. You either focus on what is going on and what could happen and let it control you, or you focus on the One who is truly in control and knows what His plans are for you (Jeremiah 29:11)  and has more love for you than you can even fathom.

Fear can paralyze you. Fear can steal blessings from you. Fear can keep you from living your life for God.

Faith can free you. Faith can bring God's blessings pouring upon you. Faith can give you the courage to live your life for God.

Okay, so I know all this in my head. The challenge is to get it ingrained into my heart. That is something I am working on with God. His Word is a huge help. When I find my thoughts going down a crazy, fearful road, I will get my Bible and open it up (usually to the Psalms) and start reading it out loud and oftentimes wind up praying the words that I read to God. His peace comes in and fear goes out. Another thing I do that gets me through it is to start praying for someone else. Even just this evening, I found myself reading some posts from different people who had battled cancer and some of whom had it return a couple of years later in different areas. Fear started to grow, so I stopped and started praying for someone else I know who is now battling for his life against cancer. Before I knew it, the fear was gone.

God is amazing. My prayer in typing this is that it might one day help someone else that battles fear and that they too will come to find out that there is another F word (FAITH) that can overcome that fear with God.

Psalm 56:3 "When I am afraid, I put my trust in You."

Update on life after chemo

It has been eight weeks tomorrow since I received my last chemo dose. It is hard to believe. I am feeling pretty much back to normal, except for the vertigo. I still struggle with it a bit, but it is nothing compared to how I was feeling as a whole while still receiving the chemo. I am extremely thankful to be feeling so well.

The CT chest, abdomen, and pelvis was negative - no signs of cancer of metastases anywhere. My CA-125 (a blood marker that helps them determine if cancer recurs) was low, which is good. This was all on June 28, when I met with my oncologist, Dr. Page.

I was set up for followup with Dr. Vasques, a gynecologic oncologist, for physical exams. I was a little surprised to hear that I would still be getting Pap smears. I honestly did not know what to expect after them removing all my "female parts." I still am not sure I quite understand it. However, I did meet with her and was very impressed with her, even though my head was spinning a bit by the time I left.

She gave me so much information to take in...I cannot remember it all now...but by the time I left her clinic, I was set up for appointments with a genetic counselor, a nutritionist, a psychotherapist, and also to get my CA-125 checked again. I was told that I needed to get the CA-125 checked once a month and I need to see Dr. Vasques for a Pap smear every three months. Then at six months, she wants another CT.

After I had a few days to process everything, I called them back to cancel the genetic counseling because I had decided not to do that. In the meantime, the counselor herself called me because she had not gotten word that I canceled. We actually wound up having a good talk over the phone. It had seemed to me that everyone was really pushing for me to get this to see if I am genetically "marked" for breast cancer. I asked Darren, "What are they going to do if I am? Lop them off???" LOL  Well, the counselor explained that there were extra steps and precautions they take if someone is genetically marked for breast cancer. She also calmed my concerns about the cost. After talking with her, I think I may reconsider in about three months, after life is a little more back in order...maybe (cause does life really ever get back in order?).

I also cancelled the meeting with the nutritionist because Darren and I had already met with her. I did call her, however, and had a good talk with her as well. She is having a six-week class called "Navigating Nutrition" this fall that is free. She goes into more detail about what she told us when she met with us the first time. I asked her to please let me know when it starts. It is actually open to the public, which I think is great.

I left the psychotherapist appointment set for now because...well...I am still debating that one. LOL

So, in the meantime, I am watching my hair grow out and am surprised that so far it seems to be pretty much the same as before I lost it. It is still early though and I would not be surprised at all if it starts to curl on me. Right now, it literally feels like ultra soft baby hair.

I am also back to working full-time and even covered some doctors for a couple of ladies that took some time off within the last couple of weeks. That felt really good - to be able to help someone else out instead of them constantly having to bail me out because I could not work at the last minute. I am so very thankful to have the health, strength, and stamina to be working like this again.

I work on stuff around the house as I have the energy, but lately, I have become obsessed with crabgrass in the yard. We have an open field behind our backyard fence and crabgrass has started invading the back yard. I also noticed a couple of patches in the front yard. I read where if you allow it to continue, it will eventually kill off all of your grass and you will have a yard full of crabgrass.

I have been using two methods to get rid of it. One is to pour boiling hot water on it. I had read this somewhere, and believe it or not, it works! Of course, it kills a little bit of the grass as well, but not enough to really damage it. The other method has been just digging it up, one at a time.

At one point, I had been working on it and when I stopped for the day, I looked at all the crabgrass along the back fence and thought for a minute that I was fighting a losing battle--that there was no way I could beat this crabgrass.

Then it hit me how much my walk with Christ is like that. There are constantly things that pop up, seemingly sometimes out of nowhere, that cause me to trip and oftentimes fall. But I am learning that there are things that need to be "weeded out" just like the crabgrass in order for His Spirit to continue to grow stronger inside me. If I give up and allow those things to grow and multiply in my life, it starts to crowd Him out. I have to work daily at getting rid of the sins that so easily beset me so that He can increase and I can decrease, just as getting rid of the crabgrass allows the regular grass to grow and flourish.

Hebrews 12:1b (KJV)
"let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us"

So, let's all go kill some crabgrass! LOL

Testing, testing...

This is a test of the new blogging system. This is only a test. If this were a real blog, you would be notified where to go to read it. This is only a test.

goodness, someone is getting goofy...lol