A slow go

Things still are going very slow, I did take more chemo. The first chemo was one that I had before and it didn't treat me very well. I only had 1 round of it but then after that I took 3 days worth of a different kind. As well as an oral chemo pill at night. This started bringing my counts way down as well as my blood pressure. Having to go in about every other day to get either blood or platelets. You have to wonder where the blood products are going. Dr. Travis feels like my counts will come up over the weekend, I hope he is right. It gets very old going in everyday. My WBC is still in the zero's so I still can't be out in the public, town, stores or resturants. I know if my counts start coming up I will start feeling better. I believe today was day 11 for the shots I've been getting to try to raise my WBC. I even go in on Saturday & Sunday.

A new year & more bad news

Well I've let another year go by without blogging anything, last January when I posted things were beginning to start to get better. Slow but sure I was starting to feel better, thinking I was on the right path. About April or May started feeling bad again, after many tests were ran, they found out my AML was back, so back on chemo to try to beat it, this treated me really bad & threw me in the hospital June & July 2014. Watched the 4th of July fireworks from the 4th floor lobby window. Things took a terrible turn for the worse later in the month, the oncologist on call said the cancer had spread to all my organs and it was time to call the family in. Some were there but others arrived not to long after, I was so sick. the worse started about 4 but with God's grace by 9 that evening things took a better turn, I had yet again beat the odds. sometime later that night I went to sleep & I think slept all night. I woke up the next morning, Clay had stayed with me all night, I remember asking him what had happened, I do remember talking about my funeral & making plans because that's what it had came down to. I'm glad things took a good turn for me and my family, I still have things to do. It took me a few months to get myself back together, I had a home health nurse coming in to run IV antibiotics here at home each day. I was walking with a walker because I just couldn't get around. I got up from my chair & used my walker to get to the kitchen, passed out & broke my ankle. Not an added thing I needed at the time, it was a pretty clean break so thank goodness no surgery. Things gradually got better till around January/February 2015 started feeling weaker & not like myself. My counts started taking a drop here & there. My 60th birthday was coming up in March & I begin to wonder if I was going to see it. Had to go in quite often for fluids because I was so weak, my BP bottomed out alot. It took a little while before they found out what was going on. I was getting so low on platelets & blood, going to WRMC to get transfusions. They decided to do a bone marrow biopsy & that confirmed it. Then Dr. Travis had to come up with a treatment plan, even though we said & he said I wouldn't take anymore chemo I really don't have much of a choice. He is given me a lesser dose due to my history & see how my body can handle it. If this will buy me some more time then this is what we are going for. I had a chemo treatment last week, it didn't give Dr. Travis the outcome he wanted so this week I'm going in three days for a different chemo, I also started a chemo pill last night.

Please pray for healing of my body, if not complete healing then some quality of life for as long as I can have.
I will try to update a little more often. 

Another Year

Well here it is 2014 already, I'm looking forward to a good & healthy year. Things have been going good with me lately, health wise. I still go into HOG every 3 & 4 weeks for bloodwork & to see Dr. Travis. It's been busy around here, we had a good Thanksgiving, then we moved right into Christmas seems like but always have to get some birthdays in there. We won't include the adults but Jude turned 1 in November then in December Cooper also turned 1. Then we celebrated Jonah"s 5th birthday in January, I can't believe our first born grandson is 5 and will be starting to kindergarten this August. It's been a fun time, now we just wait for our other little boy to arrive in April. Boys are fun, if we never have a granddaughter it's ok, we will form a team of some kind or start a band. Jonah has drums & a guitar now so we have a head start on that. Everyone stay healthy & away from the flu. Have a Great Super Bowl Weekend!!!! Go Broncos!!

Not My Time

I didn't want a year to go by before I posted again, what a ride we have had since January(last post). If you have kept up with my blog then you see there are alot of gaps, most of you that are close to me or know someone that is close to me kinda know what's been going on with me. Since my last post my sister had tried to keep up with her/ my journey to keep people informed. Just a little gap from the January post to where things got started in Little Rock. As I had mentioned, my counts & platelets just kept dropping, they couldn't find what was going on with me, I was getting platelets & shots but still just couldn't seem to find all the pieces to the puzzle. After Dr. Travis (HOG)ordered a bone marrow biopsy they found I had Acute Myeloid Leukemia, again something we weren't familar with. It is another blood cancer, one that I got due to a chemo that I was given either from multiple myeloma or ovarian cancer years ago. Who would have thought, something you do you think in the best interest at the time & then down the road see what can happen. When we met with Dr. Travis he broke the news to Clay & I that I would have to go back to Little Rock for treatment, if we chose not to do that I would probably have less than 7 months to live. Well that's kinda a no brainier don't you think. So then next step was back to Little Rock for testing January 25 & I would check in the hospital January 26 th. Had my central line put in for all the drugs & chemo to run through. With all the testing I had go through they found that I had some type of infection, probably better know as some type of crud. I had to be clear of this before they could start any kind of chemo. They did finally get the infection to go away so we could get started with the chemo. Probably from here it picks up where Candes started with caring for sis. Seems like we never really finish the story or the ending part of this journey, so I will skip thru some parts and just fast forward a little bit.

So as an out patient stayed in the hospital right at 75 days, I did get to come home in March to celebrate my birthday. This was in between treatments (in which we knew nothing about) had a nice time being at home with family and friends. There are still things that happened to me during my hospital stay, I guess it was during the time I was having the silent seizures, it was a very scary time, maybe even more so for my family since most of the time I didn't even know what was going on. Not talking, eating or drinking for a few days has to take a toll on anyone. I guess the day or night they couldn't get me to come around or wake up I was taken to ICU, these are things that I have been told because I had no idea what was going on. I do know this, that night I feel in my heart that I died on that table, I could hear Clay & Candes talking about calling the kids but I couldn't do anything. The Lord has a plan for me, it wasn't my time to go, I have babies to watch grow up. I'm so thankful that God saw fit to pull me thru that night. When I did get to come home I had a pretty hard time, couldn't do alot of things for my self, someone had to be with me all the time, I walked with a walker or used a wheelchair. They set me up with physical therapy, I think it was probably like having a stroke, I kinda had to learn to walk again, it would hurt so bad lifting my arms & doing some of the simplest things. Over time things have gotten better, the Leukemia is gone but the multiple myeloma is still with me & probably be for life, we just have to keep it incheck. Our plan is to stay away from Little Rock if possible, Dr. Travis (HOG) is taking very good care of me right now. I will start back on some chemo after Thanksgiving, the plan is for it to just be in a pill form, Yea!!!!! This is the maintenance for the M.M.

2012 Coming To An End

Wow!!!! I knew I hadn't posted in a while, but I didn't realize that I had missed the whole month of November. As we all know starting October or November things get really busy, birthdays & Christmas, shopping along with decorating & baking. Always something going on, I have thought about my blog alot, thinking I need to post but I just never got around to getting it done. I will try to keep things in order as they happened, I don't want to start off talking about Christmas because that would be leaving alot of other things out.

It's really hard to back track and remember what you have done, what's gone on & what you did first, for two months that is, I am having so much trouble with my memory lately anyway, I don't need anything extra but I'm going to try my best. Sometime in mid September I developed a very deep, deep cough, I had no other symptoms but a knock you over cough. I didn't feel bad at all, this cough lasted 16 weeks, I was on antibiotic 2 different times as well as cough syrup 2 times, either one didn't seem to help much. Finally it just about got the best of me, I just couldn't hardly go anymore, they did a CT scan on my chest, it was borderline pneumonia, I was put on pneumonia strength antibiotic, cough syrup as well as Albuterol & Advair, to help me breath.  I finally have gotten back on track for the most part anyway.

Candes & I made the trip to Little Rock in November, she had her Thyroid dr. check up and I had to have some tests ran and then back the next week for Clay & I to see Dr. Barlogie. There are so many bugs around, I think people just pass them around or back & forth. Clay ended up getting sick while we were in Little Rock, he kept saying while we were there that he just felt bad and sure enough he went to the dr the next day and got meds & 2 shots. I of course was trying to be really careful &; was not feeling very well as it was, having that cough for so long. Trying to get myself well, PaPaw as well because we have grandbabies coming real soon. I watched Jonah November 19, while Adrienne went for her checkup (Jude) they made the decision to just do a C-section the next day, nothing like short notice. So Jude Chandler Woody was born 11/20/2012 weighing 8'1". I waited a few days to get real close to him because I wasn't for sure what I had, as it was it was nothing I could have given to anyone.  He is a cutie, he looks absolutely just like Jonah when he was born. We debated on Thanksgiving, it was our year to go

to my sisters house (Candes) but I just was not feeling very good at all so I was really torn. Clay & I did go and I was so glad we did. Jeremy, Adrienne & Jude came home from the hospital, her mom was going to come over to stay with her so Jeremy & Jonah could come down & eat lunch with us but Jonah got sick I think before they left the driveway, we fixed care packages and brought it back by to drop off. 

The first Saturday in December we took Jonah to ride the Christmas Train in Springdale, he liked it alot.  It took him awhile to warm up but after awhile he wanted to ride the ponies and a little of everything else too. Between new meds & floating germs I have missed several weeks of church, I don't think I have ever missed this much church. 

Grandbaby #2 arrived 12/14/2012 Andrew & Kara welcomed Cooper Jack Woody into this world at 4:37 weighing 6'7" & 20 inches long. We really weren't sure who he looked like, probably a little of both, when you are looking at a newborn it is so hard to tell who they really look like, then in a week or two they can change so much. 

I'm still having so many issues with my counts right now, just cannot get them boosted to a good number. I have dealt with that several times but now I'm dealing with my Platelet count and its not good, I don't think my platelet count has been this low since I was in Little Rock doing treatment. Dr. Rosenfeld is trying to get in contact with Dr. Barlogie to see what plan of action we should take. Normally if I was in LR they would probably give me platelets/blood, I hope I don't have to go to LR to take care of this matter. I've been going in three days a week to get shots to boost my white blood count but it hasn't done it so far so we will find out Thursday if it helped this week. I guess I really didn't say anything about Christmas, I hope everyone had a nice Christmas, we certainly did. We only had one busy grandson but just wait a year or two & Jude & Cooper will give Jonah a run for his money. It will just be fun to watch. Just like when our kids were little, it was no fun unwrapping clothes. Jonah was a little that way, he would go more for the toys and just lay those gifts aside. Christmas is a wonderful time of year. Now that it is 2013 while I'm finishing my post I wish everyone Health and Happiness for the upcoming year. Since I didn't finish this Wednesday, I thought I would just hold off till after Thursday's appointment. Clay and I met with Dr. Rosenfeld & his nurse Amy, of course my counts are still really low, so that means no treatment. Amy did speak with one of Dr. Barlogie's nurse's and they said just go ahead & treat her. Well that was not our decision, with my counts so low as well as my platelets the chemo is just going to drag me down even more. So for the next few weeks I will go in for bloodwork and hopefully watch my numbers gradually come back up. Hopefully as my counts slowly come back up, then I can slowly start feeling better, more like myself anyway. Happy New New to each and everyone!!!!!!  I hope your prayers were answered and your dreams come true.

It's Fall You'All

Wow just realized how long it had been since I have posted on my blog, I guess I just haven't had much to say. I love this time of year, the nice weather, the trees turning beautiful shades of color, now the wind is a little much though. Seems like it always does this, when we have a pretty fall with the beautiful leaves then the wind blows real hard for about 2 weeks and all the leaves fall on the ground. So if you aren't mowing you are raking leaves. 

Everything has been going pretty good with me lately, except the stomach bug caught up with me somehow.

It's been a couple of weeks now but I sure didn't feel good, I couldn't eat anything & I wasn't even hungry for several days, I just tried to keep drinking. My counts went crazy, my sodium got messed up and I was dehydrated, I had to get fluids to help me get back up & running you might say. I drank an awful lot of Gatorade, not a big fan but I did it, seems like it lasted quite awhile too. It hung on a good week, I was definitely glad to see it go that's for sure. I just can't believe how fast this year has gone by, we have babies coming soon, Thanksgiving & then Christmas is just around the corner. I actually wrapped a couple of presents today that I had already bought, but that's about the extent of it.

Get out and enjoy this beautiful weather, because it sounds like it is going to be COLD this weekend.

Could Fall Be Near

I'm loving the weather lately, the nice cool mornings are great, even though the afternoon warms up, it's not miserable at all. I prefer 80 degree days much more than 100 degree days that for sure. Seems like when football season arrives so does fall, especially when we have had a hot summer, we are so ready for fall. Just when we think everything has dried up, crunchy grass and all, we get a little rain and like magic everything starts to look green again, you hear lawnmowers everywhere. Most everyone got a little break from mowing for awhile but back to it now. It has been perfect weather to drive our little convertible, we have had it out a few times lately.

The day after my last post I mentioned my steri strips were still very much attached, when I went in for treatment on Thursday my nurse looked at them. She said they should come off, she would clean the incision area and re bandage it. She thought it was healing nicely though, that was good news, the strips just wanted to stay with me I guess. I have had this awful cough for about three weeks, the nurse did ask me about it, I figured it was just allergies, like everyone else. She prescribed me some cough syrup, I take it mostly at night, It may be some better, but just hanging on.

Its beginning to look alot like Christmas, around some places that is, I want to enjoy the Fall first. The stores have had their Christmas stuff up for quite awhile now, even putting it on sale already. It does get you a little excited though, seeing all the wrapping paper, ribbon and all the trimmings. This year seems to have flown by, I really don't know where it has gone.

Our little mother to be's seem to be doing just fine, these two blessed events will be here before you know it, I can hardly wait, two little boys. One by Christmas for sure hopefully both, alot of fighting if there is only one baby to pass around but if there are two it makes things go alot smoother. Doesn't everyone just love babies. I know I do.!!!

I made some Pumpkin Bread today, sure did smell like Fall in my house. I love baking things that call for spices, I just love how it leaves your kitchen smelling. Who needs candles???

I'm going to go pick up Jonah in a little bit so he can hang out with us a while tonight.

Get out this weekend to enjoy this beautiful weather.