And it’s not being driven from the fact that I am dealing with my 9th relapse of cancer.  It’s from the realization that there is so much hate, anger, racism and sexism in this country.  It is really quite astonishing and baffling to me. I’m stunned.  Stunned. 

At the beginning of the treatment series, I was a little overwhelmed with the sheer number of treatments to do. But now that it’s just about over, it’s really hard to believe that Phase 1 is nearly done! I’m thinking that the waiting period between Phase 1 and 2 will be the most challenging part of all this. I’m not the greatest at the whole waiting game thing, but I guess I’ll be getting some practice very soon!! 

Only four more treatments to go. Feels like yesterday when I still had 25 to go!  

Post treatment scan and follow up appointments with the surgeons have all been scheduled. And pushing to get a tentative surgery date locked in now vs. mid-December given all the schedules that have to be coordinated. Last thing I want is to go in mid-December and then tell me, “oh we won’t be able to do surgery until mid-to-late January due to schedules”!

Phase 1 nearly locked in…and Phase 2 in motion. 

That’s right 20 treatments in the books today! Kinda hard to believe there’s only 5 more left, and a week from today I’ll be done with Phase 1!  

Cousin Update: Betsy’s relative is a bit of a slow one. Still the same size as he was 2 months ago which is a grrrreat thing!  And we’ll be taking care of him after Thanksgiving. 

The last few days have been filled with quite a bit of back and forth between trust and doubt about pretty much everything…health, work, relationships, etc, etc…granted, there’s more confidence in some areas than others. After chatting through some of the specifics with a good friend, they gave me some simple, yet hard to implement advice to remember “you are blessed, you are loved and you will be taken care of by a loving Heavenly Father. All other details to be filled in later.”

It’s the latter part of that advice that I struggle with the most, the “all other details to be filled in later.”  I feel like I’m a pretty go-with-the-flow type of person…yes, I like to have a general plan in play, but can adjust fairly seamlessly as the plan changes and trust everything will work itself out as we go.  

Whoa. I feel a bit like an idiot. Honestly, after I wrote that last sentence in the paragraph above and then re-read it for any grammar mistakes, I seriously had a mental palm to forehead, well duh moment.  Yes, I do have a very solid plan in play right now, and I’ve totally been adjusting each part of it as hiccups arise.  And so far, everything has indeed been working itself out.  

Once again my brain goes back to interval training…when you lose focus and have a bad set, you reset, refocus, take a deep breath and go after it again. 

So, here we go. 

Reset. Refocus. Deep breath. GO!!

Yes, she has a cousin. The cousin was identified at the same time as Betsy, but didn’t get to share the spotlight with ol’ Bets because he was just a speck. I had a scan of the lung today to see what little cousin was up to, but my doc is making me wait till Thursday to discuss results.  Will have to keep myself distracted between now and Thursday afternoon, but fingers crossed his still just a speck and hasn’t hit his growth spurt yet!

I honestly thought by this point in the treatment cycle I would have something way more interesting to write about. The fatigue and other side affects…which I guess really wouldn’t be that interesting for a reader. But I really did anticipate feeling a lot worse than I actually do…don’t get me wrong, definitely not 100%, but it could be much worse.  So, needless to say, another good day of treatment.  🙂

Taking a hallpass to not write much tonight.  Interval #4 has started, and like the beginning of all the ones before, it was easy peasy.  And that is all. 

Yep. It’s done. More than halfway through treatment….only 10 more left. Woot! 

And that is all for tonight…other than being super intrigued in watching my roommate getting ready to carve a pumpkin snowman while we are all wearing Mardi Gras masks…good times at Pine Street tonight!

Pumpkins ended up as The Pumpkintons from Gourdforshire. 

I feel like I hit a wall today.

Maybe it was the late afternoon latte that kept me up way later than normal last night.  Or maybe it’s the post-MDC blues finally kickin’ in.  Or a combo of both with a dash of harsh reality that nearly every part of my world is made up of giant questions marks right now.

I sent the below text (while writing this post) to one of my dearest friends…we’ve been besties since we were 4 years old!

“Scripture Quiz: Name a passage that brings calmness when everything in your world is filled with a ton of giant question marks…GOOO!! 😁”

Within five minutes, I got not one but two options…the one shown below resonated immediately and brought the GIANT question marks down to a slightly more manageable size…though, still quite large.

Some days, I really do love technology and how it can bring friends that are 1,000 of miles apart almost instantly.