My Christmas video for you all......
It's Christmas Eve and I sit here alone in the comfort of my office at 5:30 in the morning thinking of all the things I have to be grateful for this year. It's been a tough year, not only physically but emotionally! I have feared for my life from a disease that generally takes most of the lives of people at the stage of the disease I had, when it was found. And because of the skill of a good doctor... I am almost completely free of cancer. It's amazing...no doubt about it.
Seems like yesterday and yet I am almost 11 months into this battle. A battle that I had lost who I was... in fear of ...not being able to be who I am, at times. I have cried more tears through these months than I probably have all the rest of the years of my life added up together. The thought of me dying was the hardest thing I have ever had to face. My life seemed to just flash before my eyes all of the time. I could not stop thinking about how things would go for my girls without me here, it hurt so bad. It hurt more than I could ever describe and now I sit here and I am 99% free of this cancer. I believe there are a lot of factors in me being alive. I think that all the prayers and all the love I have been shown is a HUGE factor in my recovery.
When I started the Y90 process, the end of May, I was so scared. I had to make the decision to go for it, regardless of the outcome I had to left go of my fears and just go for the one chance I had at getting rid of the monster living inside of me. BEST decision I ever made.
I wish I would have just listened and done it from the get go. I had to waste money and time traveling the country for several months before I could make that decision to do the procedure. It was a tough one, the one thing that made me feel better is Dr. Chamsuddin. I was telling someone yesterday even from the very first liver biopsy and I was so afraid, my doctor sang to me while he did it. I felt like in that moment I was in the right place with the right person overseeing my care. I just didn't want to do anything before I had tried everything. I did alternative medicine and unfortunately it raised my cancer marker and I knew that was my last chance effort at alternative medicine. I knew that I had to go for the Y-90......
Throughout this disease I knew the cancer was bad. I knew before treatments that I was on a time limit. My will to live was so strong that I honestly would have done almost anything to save my life. I deserve to live and that's how I felt and what I kept telling myself. Throughout each procedure it's been so hard my body. I would lay in bed in pain and asking myself would I ever feel better again? I did and I do. I am happy. My mother use to ask me all the time "Christy, what's going to make you happy?" If I could tell her now I would say going through this and coming out of this fight and being able to have my life again, That's my happiness.... I miss my mama, but I don't know that she could have survived every thing I have been through it just might have killed her seeing her baby enduring all this pain. I have gone to the cemetery many times and just sat and talked to her. I found some of her loving comfort there and it was good!
I have joined a group on facebook that the people are either a patient or a family member of a patient with this same cancer that I have. It's comforting to talk with people that have gone or are going through the things that I am going through. I find comfort there ... I share my story and hope that maybe they too will consider doing the same things I have ... Most have just had chemo and no other treatments and some have. I guess it's a place I can go and share and be totally understood. I love that... I have thought about going to support groups but why go... I can do it all online.
Each of us take chances with our lives every time we leave our homes. I was thinking yesterday how I use get impatient when I drove and I would take chances all the time. I don't take those close call chances anymore, because I have not been through all that I have been through just to die in a car wreck or something. I use to be the driver that passes everyone and had road rage when people were in my way, not anymore. Not Worth It!!!
It's Christmas and I'm here. I am alive and well and on my way to a full recovery with one more procedure (i hope that's all) this monster isn't giving up, I think about all that we have done to rid my body of it and I wonder how this 1% that is left in my liver can continue to keep fighting for it's own right to stay inside me???To bad cancer, your time limit is up and my time limit has began to start multiplying! This next time we are taking this monster out. It's not going to have anymore chances to get me.......And that's a fact!
As I understand it there is a new patient about to endure my same cancer travels and I wish them the best of luck and If I could say one thing to them it would be "You are at the right place because the right doctor is there to treat you"
Tonight, I am having dinner with my oldest daughter and grandson. Poor Evan will miss out on the Japanese food, she is with her dad and will be home tonight. I miss my little girl when she is gone. It's quiet almost to quiet! But, the second she is home it's like a whirlwind blew into the house. She is full of energy and questions and just talks all day long (just like her mama). The other day, I paid for something with cash, and she asked "Don't you want to use your card, mama" I do use my debit card for everything, and rarely do I have cash. I told her the card was like money, the money comes straight out of my account to the people that I am buying something from and then I explained the difference between credit/debit cards and she didn't get it.. One day she will. She proceeded to ask me about how you get paid at work. I said "You work and you get paid by the company you work for" She said "Oh they pay you, and you pay them" I am needed to be here to guide her along that was a clear example of that for me. She's 6 but I have so much to teach her, I have let her grow up more so I can really tell her the important things. I want/have to be the one helping her throughout her life I want to be there to see her walk down the isle even though she says she is never getting married and she is not having any children. I asked "No kids, you will want kids one day" She looked me straight in the eyes and said "No, I do not want kids they are just to much work" LOL LOL LOL is all I could do .....
The simple conversation's I have with my child are even more precious to me now. She is my heart she loves me so very much, she calls at least twice at day from her dad's house asking "how many more day until I come home, mama?"It makes me smile I know what is she is going to say every time I see her dad's number come up.
This morning is Christmas Day at her dad's house. They do it on Christmas Eve so the poor guy can have all 5 of his children together. It's good because I want her home Christmas morning. I can't imagine waking up Christmas morning without her. Christmas morning through the eyes of a child is priceless. I enjoy seeing the excitement .. I love the getting up early and racing to see what Santa left for her. Santa also leaves Landon presents at Grandma's house too. This year has been a little more questions about Christmas as she asked why Santa never wraps her presents, they are all just sitting out for her to see Christmas morning. I told her that is how Santa has always left my presents and does the same for her.I can't imagine wrapping them when I grew up with them unwrapped .. Funny how you carry on traditions ...
Well this year... I had my own Santa Claus, Dr.Chamsuddin to give me the gift I wanted most of all ... the gift of life. I hope that he finds in his own life the happiness of giving me back my life, I think he does. I tell him how much I appreciate him all the time. I write about my appreciation and I know that I have done what I need to do to show my gratefulness to him and his staff. I got a message for one of precious girls on his staff at the very beginning of finding out about the cancer and she and I became FB friends after my biopsy and in between making the decision to do the treatment she wrote me this....
Hi Christy. My name is Holly. I work at NMC in the radiology department. I was in there with your biopsy. I read your blog. I just want you to know I am praying for you. I also want to tell you Dr. Chamsuddin is the absolute best dr you will probably find. He did your bx. I've been in the medical field a long time. I have NEVER seen a doctor as good as him. Please let me know if I can do anything.
That's simply awesome.
Merry Christmas and please if you have something going on in your life and you are not a peace with a friendship/relationship make peace... whatever it takes to make it... for yourself . Sometimes, walking away and letting it go is the peace you need or maybe it's you giving into the someone that you love to make things right. I have peace in my life. I really do... More than I ever have before. I am on this whole new clean slate thing for the new year. My life is to precious now to waste a second of it!
No comments:
Post a Comment