Follow up Week

I'm so sorry - I didn't even realize that it had been over a week since I had posted! We had the party on Monday and it was incredible!! More on that later :) And my sister Marissa has been in town from Seattle and it was her last week here so I was soaking up every minute I could with her cute little fam. And I threw a baby shower for my sister-in-law (another Marissa!) yesterday so it's just been pretty crazy. Fun and crazy!

Oh, PS - if you get tired of checking my blog all the time and me not posting - there is a subscribe link on the right that if you can put your email address on there and it will send you an email when I post on here. It will save ya some time :)

PPS - Really don't want to pester anyone but just to make sure you know - today is officially the last day to order a team Ashley t-shirt. I think the plan is for all you wonderful people to wear your shirts on my surgery day and to post pics of yourself wearing your shirt that day on Facebook or Instagram. We already had I think 150+ tshirts the first order and the current order of 25 just got filled as well so it's not that we HAVE to have people order shirts, just wanted to make sure you knew what was going on. I have had a few people tell me that they were disappointed when we closed the first order sooner than originally planned but of course I can't remember who told me that so this is my way of getting it out there :) http://teespring.com/teamashleyfight_archive_1

This week I spent about 10 hours at MD Anderson for follow up visits with my various doctors. It was nice to have a break from that place for a little while. Matt and I have a love/hate relationship with our hospital. We love all the people there are we are so grateful that they are saving my life, but we hate going there and hate that I have cancer. I hate the odd stares that we receive as we walk down the hall. The other patients there, most of whom are at least 20 years older than me, look back and forth between Matt and I trying to figure out which one of us is sick. I still have my hair but he looks so healthy, so it's very intriguing to them. Or it might be because I'm always wearing wedges or some other loud footwear so they're wondering who the obnoxiously loud shoe girl is.

A couple of random stuff from this week included my labs coming back that I am slightly anemic and I still have a low white blood cell count so I have a few precautions like no eating sushi (uh, gross. No problem there) and no eating salads at restaurants because apparently they don't wash their lettuce or produce which is pretty gross too. I need to work out more before surgery and up my protein intake so my recovery is better. Surgery will definitely be on Wednesday, September 24th. I have been terrified for surgery but on Friday as I was driving up to the hospital I thought, "I wish surgery was today. I wish it was just today and I could stop having to worry about it!" So that is pretty big since I have been oh so scared.

I will definitely be having a complete hysterectomy before my tumor removal surgery. I've started having hot flashes and night sweats which is all kinds of disgusting. I can't be on anything prior to surgery though so I just get to be nasty for a little while. I'm really hoping to get these side effects under control not too long after surgery. My surgeon told me I will be in the hospital about 5 days but he had said a week last time so I'm just planning on a week and if I get home sooner, yay!

The best news of all was the MRI showed that my tumor and the affected lymph nodes have all shrunk significantly!! Like more than 50%! I was so thrilled when I heard that! The tumor has shrunk up, leaving more room to resection which is exactly what we have been praying for. The surgeon is extremely optimistic that the bag will just be temporary and they will be able to save function. Relief doesn't even begin to cover how I felt when I heard that. I'm still pretty freaked out about the stoma and the bag - I don't think that this will be something that I just one day think is fine. Maybe after surgery but definitely not before. I'm trying to put on my big girl panties and be brave but I am pretty scared still.

I'm just ready for the fear to be gone. Today I was saving something on my computer, a lesson for church, and I thought "Next year, if I'm alive, I can use this to teach this lesson again." And then I had this second where I realized how unbelievably screwed up that is - that I had that thought. "If I'm alive." And then I realized that I think that thought all day long. "If I'm alive in February, I'm going to have the biggest birthday party ever for the twins." "If I'm alive next summer, we are totally going to the beach since we didn't make it this summer." "If I'm alive next year, I'm totally making up for the fact that I'm going to have a bag and be hospitalized for our anniversary this year."

I'm just ready to have those thoughts out of my head. I am going to survive this. No way is butt cancer going to take me down. But there are no guarantees and crazier things have happened. I just want to be through this and be healthy and be normal again. I will never again take good health for granted.