I got my first tattoo(s)

But they were nowhere near what I imagined my first 'ink' would be. (Warning - this is long - so either grab a cup of coffee or just pretend that you read it and skip down to the ecard!!!!!)

Really thought it would be more like this!

Thursday was 'test' day. A second MRI to find out just how large Fred is. Apparently the first one didn't actually reach the top of the tumor.The first one was at a lovely little private centre, this one at Kaiser. The first one was smaller -so my face was out of the actual machine, but this one I was all the way in with my face just a tad off the top of the machine.

The 'little' one - i went in to about mid chest

This gives a good idea of how it feels - although you are up higher to the 'roof'

The first hour - yep, you read right, the first hour - was fine. I just close my eyes and pray, and doze on and off. Then I needed the contrast. Last time I had no problems at all. This time - not so much. I was chatting away with the nurse as she was shooting me up (she'd out me on tap before I went in the tube) and after just a little bit I started to feel very queezy.
"Is this likely to make me feel sick?" - and well, apparently the answer is yes. I still had 3cc's to go and she waited until I thought I was OK and then started to push it through a little slower. But this time the queezy turned vomitous ( a new 'Megan" word!) and I had need of a kidney dish right away.

the vomitous culprit

{"Well - just try not to move your legs while you vomit" - great advice I'll keep till my dying day!!! Mind you - my legs tied down and my feet taped together, so movement was unlikely.

That queezy feeling never really left me for the rest of the day, but I soldiered on over the road to St Joseph's for my CT planning scan. What a trooper - I'm impressed with me too!

The MRI took about 90 minutes, so we were early to the CT - enough time to get a cup of tea and calm down a little. It's really hard to find anyone ho talks about these scans online - trust me, I've scoured blogs!!

This looks pretty much like the room I was in - just beige instead of green

So for the sake of anyone else who might find this information useful (and I pray that you never do) here is my story.

It starts........now! (I love Graham Norton - what a guilty pleasure)

I may or may not need to confess after I've watched this!

My doctor was in the room with the machine - along with two nurses. Great gals - I'm gonna like working with them daily. (On a side note - as we went into the waiting room, a girl was leaving with a certificate. She had just finished her treatment plan and everyone was congratulating her and wishing her well. Cool or what?) I had to leave Piet in the waiting room while I followed one of the nurses to the room.
The doc chatted with me a bit and then explained what they were going to do - namely a practice dry run with the lasers.This is where it got a bit different for me - I have to have my treatments face down.
So while they explained that they were going to be placing some stickers on me as guides, and a few tattoos so that they can 'line me up' with the radiation machine, I had to sign a waiver. They may or may not have told me what I was signing away - but at this point I think Fred is worse than anything else that might happen.
I have to have my treatment with my face down. So I had to take my pants off and get down on the 'table'. There was a foam pillow like on  a massage table for me to place my head on, and for my legs there was a big blue pillow. But my face is just an inch or so from the table - can you say claustrophobia? The table was a covered mattress on a base that wheels in and out of the scanner. But while you have your face down you can't see when they touch you or wheel you or move your legs where they need to be!

kinda like this but nowhere near as comfy

While I was on the table, I could hear the doctor and the nurses talking in the little offside room where they could see the scans. Then someone would come out and move me, or the table, sometimes both. After about 45 minutes of this (remember my face has to be down this whole time - and I have to 'try not to wriggle'!) they had me where they needed to be and one of the nurses came in to 'mark' me. I think that by then I had a fair bit of Sharpie on me, but now it was tie for the tattoos. And really all that was was a large needle with some ink in the hole through the middle of it. So just a jab for each one got the job done. It's just a blue dot - and trying to find them on my legs is like trying to find a needle in a haystack - or rather a blue freckle among millions of brown ones. I hope they glow in the dark!!!

if my skin was not as freckled as it is, this is what they would look like!

After they had stopped bleeding, I got my jeans back on and the nurse gave me my check in card (barcoded) and showed me where I would wait to be called. We watched  a little video and chatted with another nurse about the expected side effects, and then 90 minutes later we were on our merry way.

So there you go - what to expect of your 'test' day getting ready for radiation. Not recommended peeps, not recommended!
I start treatment on the 16th, and the lovely Kelly is organizing  a signup for drivers and feeders. So - if you have been dying to spend some quality time with me, I'd love for you to come and drive me to my appointments! Just let me know and I'll pass on the info to her (my first self confessed groupie)

radiation won't really make you like the Hulk!

Thanks for hanging in there - you deserve a medal!!

Hugs
Megan

I like Mondays too

Welcome to 2014.

Here's what we saw last night Downtown with Willie and John. Good job Denver - I was pretty impressed.


I've been waiting for this day for quite a while. Goodbye to the year of horrors - I'm ready for a new start.
I've always loved a new beginning...
- a new pencil
- especially a new journal
- a new month
- a new week (hello Monday!)
- a new morning
- even a new pack of chips is better than a day old opened one!

So of course, the start of a new year is like the Grand Daddy of all new beginning. (do not let me start about how exciting it was for the start of a new millennium!!!!)
I love the possibilities that all this newness offers. I set goals - NOT resolutions (and that's really because they don't usually change from one year to the next) and I've got a brand new set of 365 days to get them all done! Don't bother asking why it needs to be a new year to start on some of these, it's just easier to get my head in the game.

one of them is to turn the calendar every day!

And of course. as we know!, things don't always end up the way that we imagine that they will. There is just no way that this time last year as I was dreaming about all of the possibilities that the year offered that I thought it would end with me getting ready to have radiation treatment.
But even after the year of suckish proportions that we've just endured, I still look forward to this year as one that will be one of the best ever.
Regardless of what happens, regardless of how the year ends, I've just decided that this will be a better year.
Radiation is only 33 days out of this 365 - that leaves me 332 to make it a year to remember.
I know that you are dying to know what sort of goals I've set (just pretend you care, k?!) so here they are:
- finish my first half marathon (Colfax in May)

the half runs through the zoo - how much fun is that?

- to Kill Fred Dead - duh!

this is what I imagine Fred looks like - I'm sure it's nothing at all like this, but I need a visual!

- to get into my healthy weight range via Weight Watchers

love this program. I go Friday mornings - meet me there?

- to finish level 347 on Candy Crush (I always give myself something that's really silly easy!!)

it's been about two and a half months now... I'll get it eventually!!

- to read through the Bible (I used to do this every year, but have done different reading plans for a few years now. But I miss it - some of the people in there feel like old friends and family to me!

I use a Bible reading plan that NIV had in the Student Bible - some OT, NT and a Psalm or Proverb every day.

- to get some real definition in my arms - hello shake weight!

yep - that's what I aim for.. got the crazy down already!!!!!

I've got some other more personal ones also, they may or may not show up here... oh the suspense may kill you!!!
So there you have it - a new year. Love it

Hugs
Megan

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: Reflections on The Year That Sucked.

Now that's a title to make you want to jump right in, huh?!

It's the last day of this suckish year however, so of course that means a bit of time for reflection. Auld Lang Syne and all that.

It was actually hard right off to think of the good that has been part of this year. Just one of the reasons that this year sucks is that the Ugly seems to eclipse the good and fabulous. But let's be honest - the way the year ends is really what you remember the most, right?

The Good.
The Princess Graduated High School and started her gap year working at Starbucks.(coffee always appears on the 'good' list!)
We had a fabulous vacation in New Orleans with my big sis, Baz and Mitch.
I ran my first 5k and 10k races.
The kids got a fabulous new bathroom (but that's connected to a'bad'list item!)
Mitch got engaged (congratulations again!)
Simey got the metal contraption off his leg and just has a boot (again though - connected to an 'ugly')
Piet's sister and husband surprised him for Christmas and flew over (they are still here with us!)

Those last three on the list happened just this month - so fresh goodies!

The Bad.
Piet had to fly home to Australia to be with family (see the first on the Ugly list)
I got to work with the health care system here much more closely than I ever would have cared to (see the next in the Ugly list)
We had some calls to the school in the first half of the year for the Princess - 'nuff said!
The kids bathroom needed a complete gut and reno because of a leak.

And The Ugly.
Piet's brother Simon's horrendous motor bike accident.
The months of testing, phone calls and doctor/specialist visits that resulted in the tumor that is Fred being diagnosed.

Now when I look at these lists I see that the good has so much more in there - but those will not be what this year is remembered for.
And when I think back to the start of this year, there is no way that I would have imagined most any of the bad and ugly happening. So there is a bit of me that is glad that its over, and another that is hoping that I have learnt from it.
I feel more loved than ever - from both family and friends, both near and far. And I think that I appreciate what life offers more than ever too. Kind of morbidly realizing that it is such a gift that we do take for granted all too much.

So thanks for sharing a little part of what this year looked like.
And if you made it this far, you KNOW you deserve a reward....



Hugs until next year
Megan

Phone calls, Family & Feels

The phone is becoming a bit of a necessary evil in this process to kill Fred. I seem to spend an extraordinary amount of time on it. And waiting for it to ring. I'm not sure I'm liking it all that much.

Especially when it's booking in for treatments. I was still managing very well in denial until this past week. (was pretty happy too in that 'oh, it'll be fine' space too!)

But this week, after calling, and calling, and -yep, calling some more, I finally managed to get the page turned to 2014 (WHAT? This year is almost over folks - and not to scare you too much - Christmas is next week!) so that I could book in for my MRI and planning CT scan. 

Now there is no way that I can pretend Fred is not there and that I truly am just injured from running. Let's pretend here that I AM an athlete (Mum - try not to laugh till you pee at that, k?!) 

So - the phone is not my friend. This week at least. 

The family bit? Loving FaceTime for seeing and talking and laughing with some of the fam this week too. 

Part of this whole denial thing was avoiding talking to Australia. It's hard being away from them all at the best of times. So at the worst of times..... It sucks. Big time.

But chatting with the big sis and the mother was so much fun - why was I avoiding it? I'm thinking I need to take on Mandi's philosophy that if I'm gonna have to have something icky, I best be able to have fun with it. 

So we did. And thanks for the visuals girlies - and the urban dictionary. Who knew a dictionary could be so funny?!

But then after the laughs comes the feels. Lots of them.

This side effect of tears is just not the fun part. I went to see Dr K this week, and so the pain has been sorted mostly. It's this emotional bit that is hard to handle.

And just as a side not - what is with the acid years I'm getting? You know - those ones that sting? Not a fan peeps, not a fan. 

So there you go. My week in review. The good the bad and the ugly.

And your reward for hanging in there for such a long post?  Here you go....