How to give the spouse of a recovering cancer patient a unnecessary heart attack

So far, for me, the worst, worst part about Dan's bi-monthly cancer checks is waiting for the Dr to come into the room...and the first few seconds after he's entered. We sit in the room for 10, 15, 20 minutes waiting. See a shadow on the floor from under the door...and it passes by. Another shadow...the door opens. And in the first 5 seconds we sit there attempting to analyze his every facial expression. If it was bad news, he wouldn't come in smiling. But if he's not smiling, that doesn't necessarily mean bad news. Ahhh! What is he going to say? Is this the time he walks in the door and our world drops out from under us again, or will we be given another 2 month reprieve before doing this dance again?

Today, he comes in and starts asking about how Dan is feeling. Ok, so that doesn't tell me anything. Soon he's asking if we have any fun plans coming up. I always take this as the sign I can start to relax, because who would come in, ask if you had any fun plans only to say: Well sorry about that. You're going to be missing out on those fun plans due to the Cancer coming back. Aren't you glad I asked?

He does a quick physical exam and that is usually it. Today though, he finished the exam and said: When did you do your blood draw? I don't think I've seen those numbers yet. I have to check on something, I'll be right back.

What?!? You mean the tumor marker numbers that are the only test this month to see if Dan is still Cancer free? You know, the whole reason we're here? Those numbers? If you haven't seen "those numbers" yet, why are you in here talking about my fun plans? You don't know that you get to talk about fun plans yet! You haven't seen the numbers!

And then he was gone for 10 minutes.

And I think I stopped breathing.

He pops in "Numbers are perfect! See you in 2 months" and pops back out the door.

I still hadn't recovered from the 10 minutes of the not breathing when we had to go out to schedule the next appointment and Dan is all Yay! Numbers good! 2 more months! Aren't you excited?!?

And I am, SO excited!

It just took me a few minutes to catch my breath.

Hey! Look who was pregnant! - Photoblog 8.26

Not Me!

I think I may only have one picture of myself when I was pregnant with Henry. But I don't think I have many of my pregnancy with Will either...so it's not a second child thing...ANYway.

Kari, that's who was pregnant! In between taking lots of pictures of my own newborn son I got to participate in a couple of baby oriented events with Kari, who was due about 9 weeks after Henry was born. Since clearly I was in a picture taking mood those days, I had a lot of pictures of Kari from those two said events. A Baby shower:



And an impromptu "My nails should look pretty in the Hospital" trip to the Spa:



I know that Kari was somewhat uncomfortable at this point in the pregnancy (I think at this point she was more pregnant that I have ever been since both my boys arrived 5 or so weeks early) but I love these pictures because she is so happy. Every pregnancy is special, but this was a very hard fought/hard earned/hard won (whatever the phrase is) pregnancy. So it was fun for me to be a friend who got to be there with her.

And fun to see what she got to bring home 4 months ago (rest are here:Photoblog 8.26)

Hodge Podge - Photoblog 8.20

Just a mix of stuff from early June. We were busy in June it seems, I had a lot of pictures from June. Will got his first Bike, was in a wedding and got to go on a pirate ship. Well, not really a pirates ship, it was actually an accurate representation of the Nina (of the Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria) but Will had been pretty obsessed with pirates and it was close enough for him.
Here are the faves, rest are here: Photoblog 8.20

Will asleep at the wedding:



Goofy faces from Henry:



Will's Pirate Ship:

On vacation - Photoblog 8.19

So, 'photoblog 8.19' will be more like 'photoblog 8/20' this week because I've been kicking it out in the Mountains for the last couple of days. We're home now, but still feeling that vacation vibe. So I think I am going to shut off the computer or I will find myself answering work emails and doing excel spreadsheets. So tune in tomorrow sometime for a slightly delayed post.

Playing

I've been fooling around in Gimp Shop again, I'm constantly surprised at what a powerful tool it is. I know I am just barely scratching the surface with it. I had the thought that in my copious free time I would start taking tutorials...or at least it might be something more productive to do when insomnia strikes than watch an NCIS marathon. Here's what I tried:

Original:First try, last week

Tonight's attempt

Nana and Papa come to visit Photoblog 8.12

So one good thing, wait, one thing that didn't totally suck, about the whole Cancer umbrella was that my parents became this beacon of support for us. Now, that isn't to say that they haven't always been supportive. Because they have...except for that one time I was 15 and was SURE they were trying to ruin my life by not really wanting me to go out with this super cute junior(totally won that argument by the way)...anyway, I digress.
Facing something like we did is hard on the people who want to help. People have a hard time knowing what to do, what do say. I did, and I was living it. We were incredibly lucky to be surrounded by an abundance of people who did and said amazing things. But my parents? They came out and were here, living in the trenches with us. They came for Dan's first week of Chemo and my mom came out for almost 2 1/2 weeks during his last round when I was 8 months pregnant. They came out after Henry was born and Dan was still feeling all of the physical repercussions of just being one month out of chemo and I was so, so tired yet completely unable to sleep. My mom has sat up with me at 2:00am countless times in the last 9 months talking to me, distracting me from my anxiety, keeping me company when I felt alone.
So, the good thing that came out of it, yes, back to the good. They got to spend so much time with Will. I know it is hard on them that they are not here to be part of his day-to-day, but in this last year they were a very strong presence in his life.
So, in June they came out and we wanted to get out of town, to just be away from all the stress and anxiety of this last year. We rented a place at the beach - Mom and Dad took Will a day early for some special time. It was good - we laughed, a lot. Here are some of my favorites, and as always, link here: Photoblog 8.12

Photoshoots and a Party - Photoblog 8.25

So, this set of pictures is not so big. It spans pretty much the last couple weeks of June through the first couple of July. In looking at them, I couldn't figure out why there were so few - we were pretty busy during that period. But my parents had just left after an awesome 2 1/2 week trip (next weeks photos!) and I think I was tired of taking pictures.

When Henry and I are home together during the day, I mostly work while he hangs out in a sling or naps on his chair. This time period was when we first discovered he would sleep in the big yellow chair, so there are a lot of pictures of that. He still wasn't sitting up so there are also a lot of him during our breaks, on the boppy. Poor kid is going to hate the sight of those sherbet colored stripes when he gets older. Here is one of my favorites from our at-home-alone photoshoots:


There was also the 4th of July - a spectacular even hosted by our dear friends Sarah and Dave. They know how to throw a party. It was interesting - there were SO many more children than there were last year this time. Last year there were 3, this year there were 10 with 8 of them being under 15 months. That is a lot of kids - added to the chaos and the fun:


We also took several trips to the zoo. We really have a wonderful zoo here - here is my favorite of the entire month and as always you can view the rest here: Photoblog 8.5