Wednesday, March 21, 2012

First Day of Chemo

Here I am, looking like my first day of school. One of Bridges friends gave me the backpack. She used it through all her treatments, said it was her grab and go to chemo bag, always helped  to have it pre-packed with snacks and magazines.                                  

 This is my oncologist, Dr. Candice Ruby, she's on the walk with me.

      So here I am loaded up to go, wrapped with hugs from Eileen,

Had my ribbons on.....

But warmed them with my moma's love...


 I also took a book of Mom love that Bridget made for me....
All to meet my nurse: Berta. She was so patient with me and all my questions.

This is a shot from when Lynn and Terry came over for dinner.
So all in all it went good, they were very happy with how I took the drugs. Staying strong and positive.
Thank you to all who have sent cards of encouragement and prayers. And I am on constant phone text with my kids, they are the best.I cant take the worry away, just get better.

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Sheila Update

OK, so chemo it is. I am triple negative and the follow up treatment is: chemo. It will only be 4 treatments. three weeks apart then follow up with 7 1/2 weeks of radiation. So that's how my summer is shaping up. Not the path I wanted to take, but we'll get through it and plan a bigger vacation next year. Thanks for your continued prayers.

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Duggans doo

This is Duggans new doo, she's getting ready for the coming holiday. Sport'ng her Irish roots for all to see. Her mommy is so clever.

March Birthdays

We have so many BIG birthdays this month. This one is the BIG40 for DanO. Wow, on the 10th, hope its a good one. We love you and wish you all the best as you enjoy your 40's.

Then we change the time and on Mar 11 it's Danya's (17) and Brianne's (12). Miss Corrinne sneeks in there on the 12th turning 9, shes just trying to catch up with everyone else in the month. On the 14th Marietta turns the BIG 30 and on the 18th my Ryan turns 30 too. .  What a great month for everyone. Have an extra piece of cake for me.

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Danya's Beautiful Day

Danya & her mom,Cheryl, belong to National Charity League. On Feb 26 at the Disneyland Hotel they had a fundraising Fashion Show to raise money for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Those that went had a great time, lovely lunch and the girls did a great job at modeling for the show. I took Kaia for a treat. We had so much fun, winning gift baskets& picking from the surprise gift bag. 
  

                                    Here's KD with Kaitlyn,
                                Here's Margie, Kaitlyn, Allie, Kaia and myself.
 Here's the big bunch. Aunt Marion, Nan(Sheila Hoban), Tom & Cheryl too. Cheryl's parents were there also, with lots of other family friends.
                  Heressss Danya, she looked so cute.

                   This is her final outfit, all the girls wore prom attire, then they thanked their moms...


giving her mom a rose....
                                 

                                     Tom & Cheryl

This was a class of 23 girls & all their dads were working too. Tom did the live auction, raising $2300.00.
I haven't heard the finale tally, but they all worked very hard to put on a very nice event. You rock Danya!!

Monday, March 5, 2012

The left turn in the road

You don’t always get what you want!


So I thought I was handling things pretty well. I knew I would have to have radiation treatments. We saw Dr.Quan, on Monday 2-27; she recommends 34 treatments, every day for 71/2 weeks. BUT she said, let’s not set up your schedule till after you see the oncologist tomorrow. There is a test she might want to run that takes about10 days to get results. Ok, so off we went, to the Hoban’s for dinner. Really it would be the last time I’d see Aunt Marion, so I wanted to say goodbye. But there were 4 brothers & 1 sister there too. Tim was in town for a quick stop, Tom, Kevin, Jerome & KD all came to say good bye too. We had a very nice dinner.

On Tuesday the 28th we went to the oncologist, Dr.Ruby. Well she wants to run the test, it’s called Oncotype DX. She is not happy with my hormone numbers, so the higher the number the better chance I have at doing a hormone treatment instead of chemo. It took me a week to wrap my head around this. My odds are not good; I will most likely have to do radiation. Mainly because she says “which side of the 1 are you on the right or the left?” If my numbers come back lower than what they were at the last test in December, then I am considered a Triple negative. So then you look at the size of the tumor, .05 to 1cm is “consider therapy”, 1cm and up “Chemo”.

If the number is larger I will still need Chemo, but that number will tell her how much, and what kind of drug cocktail. Right now she says minimum of 4 treatments 1 every 3 weeks. But that could change based on those numbers we will see at my next appoint on 3-7.

I could refuse all treatments, and then the odds are 1 in 5 of recurring within 5years. Those are all my options.

So that’s my update, hope it wasn’t to much detail. I told you at the beginning this was a process to get through, the surgeon was very happy with his work, my seams are healing beautifully. But that was just the first step. Maybe you don’t get all the information at once because you need to go in steps? Yes I have talked to other women who have and are going through this. But I have found out it’s like the birthing horror stories you hear when you’re pregnant, every one has a different one, yours is never like what they tell you. So I’m trying to stay positive, I will get through every thing and come out a survivor.
Thank you for your prayers, Sheila Marie