Thirty-two

Been so busy being a new auntie again I forgot to post it here! Thor is here! He arrived the evening of the 20th at 8 lbs 6 oz and 20 inches long. Adorable and healthy in every way. His mom's doing very well, and dad made it through the delivery without passing out, but saw some things that will haunt him.

I'm enthralled. As much as I love my neices, I didn't think there'd be room for another one, but I guess that's one of the joys of being human - you can always find more to love.

The pic with me, he's about 2 hours old, the other he's 4 days old. The helmet was provided by Cori's coworker Miki. Boy-God O'Thunder! He's a good baby though. Not much of a fusser (yet, lol knock on wood). And his dog Lumpy is his biggest fan. It's very cute to see the giant german shephard swipe a lick at Thor's head when he passes by, or to see how agitated Lumpy gets when Thor squeaks or fusses. Lumpy comes to get you and won't leave you alone until Thor settles lol.

Well, back to my boy.

Cheers

P.S. Cancer stuff is about the same. I've gained some (mostly water and soft tissue) weight from my favorite pill Dex. I'm still going, but noticing I'm slowing down a little and maybe sleeping more. The wound won't ever really heal over, but the tissue is healing up a bit and it's not as big a pain/mess as it was. I've still got lots of great people taking care of me.

Continuing to climb out of the pit I was in - I'm sorry I was such a shit for so long. Thanks for hanging around.

Cheers and Love

Thirty-one

Howdy

So I don't know if it's being totally off chemo, or being on this stupid steroid to help with swelling and energy, or if it's that the doc gave me some speed (prescription) that I've been experimenting with...

But I seem to be back to mostly myself. Sorry, I hadn't realized how pissy and dark I'd gotten. Don't get me wrong, I'm still pissed and not happy with this whole situation, but it appears I'm not making everyone around me miserable anymore, and things are encouraged to be fun and happy again.

Things are still progressing, I'm still on hospice, but I'm feeling pretty good and I've been able to get out and about for some fun stuff. The nurses still only check on me once a week and haven't made any signs that they need to come see me more often. I even gained a few pounds back so I don't look like a Boingo caricature. Ooh ooh and since my blood isn't being kamakazied every week, my counts are up and for the first time in probably 3 years, I can get warm.

Yes, some of you will say, "You're still terminal, you're just shittin rainbows." Yes to the first, and frankly, yes to the second because I generally get up in the middle of the night with a low-blood-sugar crash and have a bowl or two of Lucky Charms til I stop shaking. TMI? Hehe.

Well, whether it's the new drugs, or lack of old drugs, or an attitude revamp on my part, or the combination - I'm okay. I hope y'all are doing well and enjoying your summer. I just wish we'd had a spring to enjoy - crazy weather, huh?

Cheers and Love

P.S. I probably won't blog much here (like I was a regular anyway, right?) because I've been sucked in by Facebook and make my random comments there. I think you can view my pages without being on my friend list, just search Casey Jo Givan (salt lake network) or add me if you're there too.

Thirty

Hey there.

Things are going fairly well right now. My hospice nurse visits once a week to check up on me. I'm on a long-acting pain killer now, which has made a big difference because the pain baseline doesn't dip up and down all the time - I haven't had any of my fun episodes where the pain gets away from me, and I start puking so I can't keep any anti-nausea or pain-killers down so I just spiral down into pain and dehydration until I go to the ER two days later and get fixed up. By the way, I don't have to go to the ER anymore if that happens. The hospice will come out and give me shots and stuff to get me back on track, no questions asked, and especially no 2 or 3 hour wait as they try to figure out if I'm just drug seeking.

I'm sleeping a bit more, but that's to be expected. And they prescribed me some speed for if I need to be awake and obnoxious. I'm also finally eating mostly normally again, with all the chemo out of my system and the pain under control. I'm still losing weight just not as fast. For those of you who haven't seen me in a while - last June I was about at my heaviest at 254 lbs, and my last weigh-in I'm at 168 lbs. Even though I've been a frustrated dieter and active and eating healthy most my life, I don't think I've weighed this little since high school. Not a diet plan I'd recommend. Cancer sucks.

I'm still ambulatory and even take the dog for short walks. Long-day events are starting to require a wheelchair, as the lower tumors have spread into my groin muscles and it irritates the absolute shit out of them if I walk fast or a lot. It ends up feeling like I have a dual, heavy groin sprain. I had my first trip through the grocery store in one of those disable carts last week - it was embarrassing (kind of, nice to have it and not get so tired, but embarrassing).

Just rays of sunshine today, huh? Sorry but people seem to want to know this stuff but don't want to ask. My wound is still open and draining, but seems stable. That's another great thing about hospice, I don't have to drag myself up to LDS wound clinic once a week to get it checked anymore. I really like the peeps at the wound clinic, it's just far away, and tires me out, and takes up half a day of somebody's time to take me.

We're still waiting on the day when baby Thor is born - he's not due until the middle of July tho. My sister is worried because he apparently is his daddy's boy and she'll have to give birth to a big cow-headed baby. He's measuring about a week ahead in growth overall, but 4 weeks ahead with his head. But the cutest thing is when they did the last scan, in profile you could see he had lots of hair and it was all smeared up into a mohawk.

Cheers