Scan Week: Day 3

I got my radiation pill (radioactive iodine) today.  When I was going through my diagnosis, the nurse that gave me on of these pills said she referred to her patients as being "hotties" afterwards so I've always liked that...I'm a radiation hottie today! Unfortunately though I have been feeling the side effects since about an hour after I took the pill.  I have had a headache and tiredness all week (side effects from my thyrogen shots) but today I added feeling nauseous to that list. I didn't do very much today as a result which bums me out.  I wanted to finish painting my dresser.  But I slept most of the afternoon until it was time to pick my little girlie up from school.


Pics from today...









Tomorrow is my day off from the hospital for the week. Woohoo! Hopefully I will feel better and I can get that dresser done as well as the housework that I skipped today.

A very blustery day

Today has been such an odd weather day.  Very, very windy.  40 mph winds with 60 mph gusts (last I had heard anyway).  It has been sunny and stormy all at once.










Today was my 2nd Thyrogen injection. It went a lot easier for me today than yesterday. I got a little dizzy afterwards but the nurse I had moved through the whole thing much faster which I believe helped the level of panic I felt to be much less. Also I had my hubby with me for moral support (and in case I passed out) and that helped a lot.

When I got home from the hospital, I worked on painting this dresser for the rest of the afternoon. I need to pull out the drawers still and do the sides of them and the inside trim of the dresser. But the dresser and drawer faces already have 2 coats of paint on them, so I'd say I'm about 90% done. After this is completed, I just have some shelves to paint and then the transformation of our bedroom furniture from unfinished pine to black/brown will be complete.





On tomorrow's agenda: radioactive iodine.

LID: Day 14, Scan: Week Day 1

Today was my first day of "scan week" which meant I got to go to the hospital this morning for a Thyrogen injection.  Thyrogen will get me ready for the blood test I need to have on Friday that checks for a thyroglobulin level in my blood.  I'd forgotten how much the Thyrogen shots burn.  Ouch!

It was a really rough trip to the hospital for me this morning.  Since I have panic attacks, I had sort of expected that it would be hard for me.  I had no idea how bad it would be today.  After all, I knew what to expect because I have done this more times than I can count.  Thank goodness for my husband who came to my rescue with coffee & anti-anxiety meds.  I really hope that tomorrow is better.

Progress

I started one of the projects I've been dreading but knew needed to be done. I am refinishing the armoire that my Dad built for me when I was 18 (it was my 18th birthday present).  It's all dinged up and it's a medium oak color that doesn't match anything else in my home. It currently holds our tv, DVD player, and all of our bedding.  I had a really rough day and I felt as though I needed to have a victory.  Starting this was a big breakthrough for me because I have not been able to complete any projects involving my Dad since his death because it's too emotional for me.  But tonight sitting in the garage sanding the drawers for the armoire, I know that I was not alone. I sat on my chair with my sandpaper in my hand and asked aloud, "Should I do this? Is it okay with you Dad?" and then it started to rain.  It poured actually.  I felt like it was my answer from him.  While I was sitting there sanding, I felt his presence quite strongly.  I could smell him. I know how this sounds.  I know it sounds nutty, but this is the first time this has happened and it was a very special gift to me.


My not-so-awesome camera phone photos to show you my progress on the drawer face.



Oh and yes, that is my knee. LOL

BEFORE (with varnish removed)....






DURING (after 1st coat of black/brown paint)...

LID: Day 11

I'm so blessed to have a sweet husband who is willing to stay up late making me muffins from the Thyca Low Iodine Diet Cookbook.  So this morning I have some yummy pumpkin cranberry muffins for breakfast (with low iodine dairy free spread) and some tea.  I'm so happy to have a break from peanut butter and bananas.

Trying to be brave

It's Low Iodine Diet, Day 10 and Day 1 out of 5 for the trips to the hospital for diagnostics. I wish I had something inspiring to say or some great LID diet tip to share but I don't. Today was just a blood test, but as usual I had a panic attack going to the hospital and another leaving it. It hit me like a ton of bricks that I am going through this...it's happening.

I am so thankful for the supportive comments people leave on Facebook.  Quite often, Josh and I feel alone in the cancer battle.  So those comments are really helpful!



My "I'm trying to be brave" face this morning...




My thyroid cancer survivor pin. I'm going to wear it every day that I have to go to the hospital. It's my good luck charm.

LID: Day 4

Today was day 4 of the low iodine diet.  I did my weekly weigh-in as well and found that I hit a milestone of 20 pounds lost.  I was really happy to see that. I am sure that the LID has something to do with hitting that goal faster than expected.  Especially after the past weekend where I ate whatever I wanted and I have not worked out this week at all.  By the way, I discovered over the weekend that not only do I not miss fried or fast food, but it grosses me out now. I did really miss pizza though!

The LID is making me feel icky. I feel tired, my stomach acid is out of control because of all the fruit and no dairy. When I log my calories I notice that my sugars are too high and my protein and fats are way too low.  This diet is definitely not a healthy one.

Breakfast: Homemade turkey sausage, pomegranate fruit bar, orange juice.

Lunch: Grilled chicken, grapes.

Dinner: Mexican corn (I cheated a little), fruit salad, Matzo cracker with unsalted, organic peanut butter.  I had such a taste for the Mexican corn and I knew it had some dairy on it and probably salt, but I thought a little taste of normal might keep sane.  So I had maybe a 1/4 cup of dairy altogether between the cream and cheese with the corn.

Snacks: fruit strip, grapes, raisins.

A week from today I will be getting my first blood test for the scan.  I'm trying so hard not to wish October away, but I'm happy about each milestone that I pass that brings me closer to this phase being over with.

LID: Day 3

So the best thing I can say about day 3 of the low iodine diet is that I made it through! I feel like with what I am allowed to eat that I wind up having a series of snacks rather than meals. My husband did go to Trader Joe's and got me 2 cool things last night: iodine free tortilla chips and iodine free bread.  The chips are pretty good because they have a lime flavor to them. The bread takes some getting used to. 

Yesterday was also rough because I spent too much time online.  I discovered two things...there is NOT enough online support for thyroid cancer patients & if you spend enough time online, you can really freak yourself out.  I am also wondering how necessary the low iodine diet is too after reading other people's experiences.  It seems that each patient's experience with LID depends on the physician.  Some people avoid seafood, some do nothing for a diet, and some do the strict LID like I am.

I don't have any cool camera phone photos of my tasty treats for you today, but here's what I had yesterday:

Breakfast: sugar-free kool aid,  homemade turkey sausage, banana, Archer Farms pomegranate fruit bar.

Lunch: Chapatti with grilled chicken, Coke Zero

Dinner: Iodine free tortilla chips with homemade pico de gallo, iodine free bread and organic unsalted peanut butter, sugar free kool-aid.

Snacks: Red grapes, Archer Farms fruit strips.

I know it's there, but I haven't found it yet...

"Challenges make life interesting, however, overcoming them is what makes life meaningful." - Mark Twain

I feel challenged right now. I feel challenged by life, cancer, grief, motherhood, marriage, friendship, family...all of it.  I feel like there must be a lesson in the challenges of the past few years, but I can't seem to see it.  I feel like I'm not learning the lesson and that is why the challenges keep coming because they are trying to teach me something. When I feel so overwhelmed as I do know, I like to sit back and try to evaluate what is going on.  What can I learn from this?

My Dad was one of the wisest men I knew.  He was my go-to-guy for advice.  Most of my life I thought it was my Dad's experience that made him wise, until one day (when I was 32 and he was 62) when I told him that I thought he was the smartest person I knew.  He chuckled and said that if he was wise it was because he "knew enough to know that he didn't know everything".  That really struck a chord with me.  I thought huh, maybe wisdom is knowing that you don't know all the lessons rather than how many lessons you know.

Cancer has taught me to look at things differently.  I don't wish away getting older anymore, I embrace it. Cancer has taught me that no matter how much you don't want to do something, sometimes you have to. Cancer has taught me that it can be cruel and take one of the people you love the very most away from you quickly. Cancer has taught me a lot of lessons and I thought I had a good grasp on all of them, but it apparently I'm not done learning.  This scare of the return of my cancer is happening to teach me something.  No matter what the outcome is here, there is a reason why this is happening. 

I wish that I could go to my Dad for advice, but I can't.  But I will remember that advice he gave me. I think I'm finally wise enough to know that I don't know what the lesson is.  I do know that cancer and I are going to not done being dance partners yet. But I feel fairly certain that as we spin around the dance floor, I will be learning some new moves.

LID: Day 2

I've made it through another day of the low iodine diet.  Woohoo!  Today's important lesson: salting the unsalted organic peanut butter with iodine free salt makes a big difference. I'm trying hard to be positive and see the little victories, but I have to be honest....

Ok, I'm already sick of fresh fruit.  And my stomach is tired of the extra acid.  I didn't even bother logging my calories today because I hardly ate anything.

Breakfast: Homemade turkey sausage from the LID cookbook, a banana, and some sugar free kool-aid. My husband is so awesome with cooking this stuff for me. I really appreciate it. The sausage was pretty good when it was fresh and not so great when it was reheated in the microwave.  Tomorrow I will be reheating it in a pan on the stove top instead.





Lunch: An Archer Farms pomegranate fruit bar and a chapatti flat bread along with Coke Zero Vanilla.

Dinner: Matzo crackers with organic unsalted peanut butter and red grapes.

Snack: Homemade popcorn with sodium free margarine and non iodized salt.

Last night, I also tried a baked apple (with brown sugar & cinnamon) from the LID cookbook. It was pretty yummy especially since I could add the margarine.

Low iodine diet (LID): Day 1

Today was the first day of my low iodine diet.  For those of you who aren't well versed in the whole thyroid cancer world, the low iodine diet or LID is necessary in preparation for radioactive iodine. I will be getting a small dose of radioactive iodine at the end of the month for scanning purposes so this diet is necessary for me. So why low iodine of all things?  Because our thyroid cells are the only ones in our body that uptake iodine.  The logic behind the LID diet is to starve the thyroid cells of iodine so that when the radioactive iodine is introduced into the body, those cells will suck it up like a sponge. For about 3 weeks, I will need to do this diet.  And it SUCKS!  If you want the full scoop on LID, please visit the Thyroid Cancer Survivor's Association  for more info.

The hardest part for me about LID is that I can't eat the foods that were a big part of my healthy eating plan such as turkey bacon and dairy. Fresh fruits and veggies are great, but they can get boring in a hurry for me.  The challenge for me is to make the fresh fruits and veggies interesting.  This is hard to do when so many key ingredients are on the "not allowed" list for LID.  We did hit Jewel today and found a butter substitute which makes life easier.  Fleischmann's margarine does not have any dairy or salt in it.  Woot!  I am also very lucky to have a supportive & empathetic husband who loves to cook.  He made me some Indian flatbreads that I can either eat plan or use as a sandwich wrap.  They are a little plain but beggars can't be choosers, right?

On today's LID menu was:
*bananas
*raisins
*homemade chappattis (those flatbreads)
*orange juice (which I normally don't drink because of the calories)
*fruit strips--my only "packaged food" of the day
*sauteed onions, tomatoes, garlic and mushrooms--these were great with the chappattis.
*Aldi's fruit punch drink mix (happily does not have the disallowed dye)
*about 4 ounces of grilled chicken

For my healthy eating plan, I typically eat 1850 calories per day.  Today I ate 1178.  Yay for eating less of course because I am working on losing a lot of weight.  But what sucks is that I feel like I ate less.  I feel hungry and just "off".  Hopefully tomorrow will be a little easier for me.

My favorite foods for today:






Chapatti, chicken, sauteed veggie sandwich:

Nifty 9

Our celebration of our 9th anniversary was perfect. We started the day off with mimosas after the kids were at school. We had an early lunch at a lovely tea & sandwich spot. We went wine tasting. We relaxed. We sat in the park and talked and enjoyed the warm sunny day. For dinner we got food from Noodles & Co and ate in.

I thought of my Dad. The thoughts of it being exactly 1 year from his terminal diagnosis were fleeting. Instead I thought of the good things. Like when we were first married and he called me on November 8th, so excited to tell us "Happy 1 month anniversary" and I laughed and said "Umm, that was yesterday". I thought of my dance at my wedding with my Dad, how surprised I was that he was such a good dancer. I listened to "our song" which was "I Hope You Dance". I remembered the times that I shared with my Dad the sweet things that my husband did for me. It was nice to see that he was happy that I was taken care of and married to someone so perfect for me. Lots of good memories.

All in all, it was a perfect day!

Some photos from our day....

Operation Getting Healthy: Week 6

I had a really rough week with staying on track, both with emotional eating and making healthy choices while eating out. I was also only able to get to the gym one time, but I was really pleased to see that I was able to swim laps for 1/2 an hour before I got tired. The emotional eating has been hard while I'm dealing with the fact that my cancer might be back. It's my first impulse to go to ice cream or pizza when I'm sad or worried. I'm also really missing my Dad which is making it hard to be good about not emotional eating. Having made this progress though, I do not want to slip up and lose ground.

On Monday I will start the low iodine diet and hypothyroid mess I need to go through for the cancer stuff. It's not that unhealthy things are really allowed on the diet because I can't have dairy or bread that I don't make myself. Those are the places where I'd have a hard time. But being hypothyroid will mean that I'm tired and won't want to work out as much. It will also mean that my body isn't really burning calories. So that will be a challenge. I'm going to have to really focus on my commitment to working out. I plan on going on Tuesdays & Thursdays for sure and one weekend day.


Weight lost: 18.9 pounds!

It's my birthday

The gift that having cancer has given me is that instead of dreading becoming another year older, I appreciate the chance. Happy 34 to me today!

Happy Anniversary to Us!

Today is 9 years of wedded bliss.

Busy, but good

What I've been up to lately...


Sanding & painting our bedroom furniture to match our black/brown IKEA desks in the master bedroom. So far I've worked on one nightstand and a shelf. It's been a little slower going than I expected but it's been really relaxing for me and a way for me to still feel close to my Dad.


(Excuse my messy garage)

PostSecret

Last night one of my best friends took me to a PostSecret event at College of DuPage where we both used to be students. She bought the tickets for my birthday gift and I have to say it was one of the best gifts I've ever received. What's better than a girl's night out with one of your favorite people?!

I didn't get to take a lot of photos because pictures & videos were only allowed to be taken for about 5 minutes of the event. It was very interesting and inspiring event. Some of the secrets that Frank Warren shared were icky, some were incredibly sad and some were really hopeful.








I didn't get any good photos of Frank, so I'm borrowing these from Alycia (who is a better photographer than I)...

Pumpkin Pickin'

Yesterday we took a trip to Jonomac Orchard for some fall fun. We were hoping to pick apples, but they were all gone just a few hours before we got there. We had a great time picking our own pumpkins (They were on 3 for $10!) and taking a wagon ride. We also had some yummy hot apple cider and our daughter took a ride on the apple train.

My early birthday gift to myself:







Haunted house luminary from Bath & Body Works. It has room for one of their 3 wick jar candles inside. I love it.

Stop and smell the roses!

There are miracles in our lives every day. It could be something as simple as a beautiful sunset, a patch of pretty wildflowers or someone saying something cheerful that brightens up our day.  It could be something bigger like finding a long lost friend or relative, or life changing news. It's so easy to be blind to those miracles if you are focused on the junk in life instead. When the miracles reveal themselves, it's an amazing feeling to open your eyes and enjoy that moment. It's those tiny joys that make life so precious.

So do me a favor today, enjoy the beautiful little things in your life.  Even better if you feel like sharing what they are!