OK...I admit it...

I did loose my ATTITUDE for a few days. If you read my last blog make sure to look at the 2 comments.
1/My daughter in law Deb posted a great article on victim/survivor/attitude.
2/My good friend, Michelle posted me with an upbeat reminder...I lost it for a few days, folks!

This will be my last post until I come back from Mexico.
Love Suzanne...cancer survivor!

Courageous and strong people also have a weak /feeling lost side to them

I have to admit to you all that the last few days have been emotionally low...really low. While I present myself as up beat and positive ,I am MOST of the time. This journey is hard, really hard. With my right leg swollen and hard to bend and walk, I notice there is pain, a tenderness on my right side groin area. Right side ovary position. I dont know if that is where they cut and stiched part of my colen and it has unraffeled, OR the cancer had come back and grown in that area. Something is going on. The doctor says if/when the cancer comes back it would be in the same area ...which is my LEFT side.
I had a CT scan Friday at 5pm. Technition says results wont be back till probably wed. I will be in Mexico with my son Joe and with out much phone access. And do I really want any bad news when I am down there?...NO I will leave a message for the doctor to call Carl/barry and he can make any arrangements needed.

I also tested my alkline level and it is only at 6 when I need it at 7.5. I have worked so hard at this alkiline diet, I have sacrifice so much to stay on it. It angers me. I dont know what else to do to get it there. That means cancer is winning.

I thought about hidding these feeling from all of you( after all its xmas time). I have gotten such good strokes for the courage I have. And right now, I dont feel like I have any courage. I feel like I am battling a monster that I cant handle, just way too big, too strong, I am being over powered.
Maybe I will look back on this and laugh. It's just there have been so many bumps in the road that right now I am feeling damaged.
So I go thru my paces, on the verge of tears most minutes. Again I am face to face , eye to eye with my mortality. I have so much more I want to do.
I never realized what it REALLY meant when some one says"Sez the day" "dont wait-do it now" Well here I am having so much I want to do and not sure it is going to work out.
Yesterday I was watching people walk. Do you realize what a GIFT it is to walk? Since I can only walk short distance (with pain) I look at walking and say "gees, if I could walk like that again". It is just a given, you get up, you get dressed, you go out walking. What a joy that would be for me.
Appreciate your walking ability, someday it may be altered like mine.
Love Suzanne, wondering if I will be a cancer survivor

Industrial strength bummer

Monday I found out my CA125 had jumped to 110. Needless to say I was outta my mind. I was steadly doing so well,I was a crying mess that day. Tuesday I saw my oncologist that said, it could have been a mistake, we will rerun it and order a stat CAT scan. She just called this am and said the CA125 is now 149. That means in 4 days it has gome from 110 to 149. The tumor is growing.

The first day I was down for the count, but tuesday I got back on my feet and I am back in the fight.

I will most likely start some chemo, along with some "creative oncology" reccommemed by Pine Street Clinic.

I am w a i t i n g for Pine Street to call back. It is hard, makes me wish I had a pager attached to him. I need my answers now. When my life is at stake , I tend to get a little panicky.
I still am in shock...in my mind I run my life fast forward...how long do I have?
I will write more once I know more. Love, Suzanne STILL a cancer survivor

Words can pull you up or blast you down

I wrote 2 blogs to day, be sure to read both.

I want to tell you a story about HOW words from another person can give you warm fuzzys.
I was never much of a student in school. In fact my mother had the wisdom to sign me up in the 4/4 program at high school. That meant I went to high school four hours and beauty school four hours each day and all day Sat at beauty school. By the time I graduated from high school I had a beautician license and went to work.

Many years down the road I stopped doing hair (people started making me nuts, no, I wanted the curl here...not here etc). I got involved in "having your colors done" (remember those days?) and I also got invloved with wardrobe planning and mind awareness seminars. I discovered that I wanted to help corporations with HOW their employees dressed, the dress for successs mode. Looooong story short, I ended up getting a job at Macy's SF corporate ,training personal shopper "how to be personal shoppers" and traveling around Northern California doing Dresss for Success Seminars at corporations. ( Wow ! how did I manifest that!) Any way, I was working with all college grads . Every one on the internal office team -regionals etc were all college grads. Many of the personal shoppers were "college grads". I some how had slipped in thru a "back door' to Macy's with out a college education. I always felt inferior about that. While I had the skills I needed to do the job, I had this feeling of not being good enough. AND what if one day they fired me because I did'nt have a college education ( I know better now)My writing skills were not that great. I didnt do a good job with sentance structure. In fact Macy's sent me to take a course ( didnt work).
After Macys I went to Gottschalks Corporate in Fresno and then onto Crown Books Corporate in Washington DC. Still, I always felt inferior about my writing skills. I always tried to avoid having to write a proposal. Or if I did, it was in bullet style.( OK, I know college grads who writing skills suck, but this was how I felt)
Not until now have I recived so many positive comments about my "writing style"
Friends, it FEELS really good !
Today I was emailing with a highschool friend Janis Lynn, now know as Jan Rivers ( lives in Stockton area, her and husband in real estate). At the end of her email she said " you are a good writer"
WOW...makes me feel good all over again. Makes me want to share/write more (maybe thats why I wrote 2 blogs today?)
I write from my heart and throw in my sense of humor. The blog does not have spell check, so I have to be careful and use a dictionary. So if there are snafus, it's cuz I didnt know any better, or didnt catch them like wonderful spell check can do.

Just those few words "you are a good writer" have lifted me up and made my WEEK.What I get is that Jan and you who read my blog enjoy reading it. I really love that!

Jan Rivers has the most beautiful skin ever. She could easily sell skin care, because we would all believe that the creme would make our skin look like her's. She has kept her shape and her looks, she knows how to dress. AND she has stayed sweet and giving in her heart. Her husband sings like a fox. He has even gone to Las Vegas ( and maybe other places) for karaoke competition. They are cute as can be together. At our class reunion he sang out on the dance floor all by himself, and Jan did a soft little sexy dance around him. It was fantastic! I will always remember it.

I hope Jan reads this. She said something (that she thought true) to me and it made me feel good. I said something to Jan (that I thought true) that I hope makes her feel good.
Makes me wonder...what if each of us said something to one other person that could lift them up. Just one line can do it...see what happened to me!
Love from, Suzanne, a cancer survivior

NEWS FLASH "Girls life wrecked by dead hair"

Just kidding...but lets talk abut this. We women know that if our hair is wrecked, everything else changes. No matter what dress, or what makeup you put on YUCK! You look in the mirror and say "who is that person?" Ever had a bad perm? Zap, you are not the "you" that you know. Ever had a bad hair dye, same thing, Ever had a bad hair cut-yep same thing. Yes, we women all know that hair grows out and "this too shall pass" but come on....It makes us cry. We are very attached to our hair and the image we want to present. When you see a woman with a very dated hair do ( which will probably come back in a few years). You know, like when we backcombed out hair WAY out there and sprayed it solid so it wouldnt move in a wind storm. Oh yes, exactly how I had my hair for my senior ball and senior picture (ha ha). Well the point is , that woman who in 2006 continues to wear that dated hairdo, she is attached to that image, most likely because that was a time in her life when she felt beautiful,HOT,her "best days in the sun".
My point is...we think we are our hair! or we think we are our "image"
When we are so much more that that. Our hair and image is only our superficial packaging. Our hearts are the gift from God we need to share.




Sorry, think I got off on a tanget . Really what I wanted to tell you, friends, was that I said along time back that when my hair started falling out from chemo that I would shave my head. Well, my hair only fell out a little bit week by week. Thru this process I always had "hair" that looked OK...UNTILL NOW, whats left in DEAD. I see that I have some new hair coming in and I have little by little cut some of the stringing ends off. Right now my hair is NOT presentable and I do have a 3 in long patch on my crown and that hair is brittle and just plain dead ( but I need that dead patch). and YES you can see my scalp every where big time!I have enough
growing that I dont want to shave my head and I dont plan on any chemo presently. I plan on my hair growing.
People say what do you do with your day? Sometime I wonder? it takes me at least 2 hours or more to get dressed-ready. I just cannot move at the speed I once had. I cant think at the speed I once had. I can not multi task as I did. It is really one thing at a time. So, mushing my hair around to make it look like "something" takes a while.
Eureka! Last week a found a fake hair piece in a drawer, this has been a life savor. I am able to backcomb (yes, those past skills pay off!) the hell outta my hair( this is why I need that dead patch)
, pin it up, push it around ,spray spray spray,pin the piece on and walla I have "a look"
Also, I am missing some eyelash's(OK , you know whats next!)Yep, I saw a program on TV about how to put on eyelashes. Ok,course I ran out and bought those baby's!
Superficial maybe, part of feeling good is looking good. It makes me feel much better and much stroner and much healthier to look good.

I think I am starting to get my "groove" back..YEAH !!!!

Thanks to all of you who have kept up with my blog. if I dont write , its because I feel I have nothing new to say.
Love, and Happy Holidays, Suzanne a cancer survivor