4/25/13 Friends=Gratitude

4/25/13

Friends = Gratitude

I’ve been fortunate enough to spend this past weekend with friends and am so grateful for the time together.  Saturday morning I was able to reunite with my St Joseph’s family which is full of healers and fellow cancer survivors.  Thank you for such a warm welcome.  Saturday evening and Sunday were spent with college friends, such beautiful people that I’ve now been friends with for over 20 years.  I truly feel privileged.  Many of you have commented on how many people these emails go out to and I often joke that this goes out to “100 of my closest friends”.  And I honestly believe that.  All of you are so close and dear in my heart - I just have to consistently remind myself of your love and thoughts for my health and happiness.  That is the main reason why I do this blog - to stay connected with all of you.  It’s been too easy for me to forget the love and connection of all mankind and that is one thing I’m trying to change. 

A few weeks before the bowel obstruction/hospitalization I lay in bed one night worried about what I was going to do.  I knew the pain was increasing and could actually feel a mass on the right side of my abdomen.  I feared in that moment that I would have to turn to chemo.  The thought completely devastated me.  At that moment, I thought if I do chemo I will not tell anyone.  I will seclude myself and will not be able to face anyone because I would feel like a failure.  I felt like people would be thinking that all of my alternative methods failed, and how ridiculous I was to think I could heal the cancer on my own.  I truly felt like a failure, but I see now this was devastating because it was my ego talking.  No such thing ever happened.  I went into the hospital and was pretty much faced with the choice of having chemo or allowing myself to deteriorate due to a dysfunctional bowel.  There was no choice: chemo was it.  

A month or so after doing chemo I had the realization that I was never made to feel defeated or like a failure by anyone, BESIDES MYSELF.  You all remained in a place of love and caring for my ultimate well being and nothing more.  You accepted me into your arms and remained gentle with my struggle of the choices in front of me defined by the ultimate desire for health and happiness.  I THANK YOU so much.  You really have no idea how much it means to me to be able to have gone through the struggle of feeling defeated and accepting of the chemo and have NO ONE think of me as a failure and instead shower me with your love. It is simply amazing to feel the well wishes, prayers, healing energy, healing light that all of you send. Thank you, again, to Meika, for sending out the email asking for people to come together twice a day to pray for me.  I know it makes a difference. 

So thank you for holding the space for me to BE.  To see myself as simply someone trying to heal in her own way, whatever that may be,  someone on an adventure to find the definition of healing (thank you Sandy Z for this lesson).  Most important in this journey is not only to find value and acceptance of all types of healing, but to truly find ACCEPTANCE of MYSELF and my JOURNEY of life.  

So for the medical update: With one chemo treatment my CA 125 (tumor marker) decreased from 256 to 28.  WOW!!!  Thank you for making that miracle happen.  After two courses of Neupogen (to boost my white blood cells that were depleted from that first chemo) I was able to get my second treatment of chemo on Friday, April 5th, after a complete emotional breakdown on my part.  I was looking for every reason to NOT get the chemo.  After my blood tests passed, my temperature and my blood pressure were normal, I finally surrendered to getting the chemo and allowed it to be.  I remained in bed, for the most part, until the following Thursday.  I finally felt like I was coming back on Thursday.  I guess I felt too well and pushed too hard because on Friday I was much worse.  I began to vomit and have intestinal pain.  I remained in bed again that Friday.  I woke up Saturday feeling well again and unfortunately I ate normal that day.  By Saturday night my intestines were a mess again and my mom had to take me into the ER.  I spent 6-7 hours in the ER and had another CT scan.  The good news was there was no bowel obstruction, the bad news was the “thickening/narrowing” of the intestines were even worse.  The ER doctor recommended I stay on a liquid diet for an indefinite amount of time. Why the intestines were doing this remains to be debated.  The radiologist read the CT as this being cancer.  This was very disappointing and yet confusing to me.  How could my tumor markers improve in such a miraculous way, and the CT look worse.  I spoke with my oncologist the next day and he said he specifically compared the CT from Feb to this current one and every lymph node measured smaller.  He explained the  problems with the intestines could be inflammation, possibly from the chemo or the cancer.  There is no real way to know what is the cause without a surgical biopsy (which is not an option).  So for the past two weeks I’ve remained on a liquid and now soft food diet and have done well.  I’ve actually been able to go off all pain medications this past week.  I did blood work yesterday that passed so I will have my third treatment of chemo tomorrow.  I’m also happy to report that my CA 125 is now 15 (normal is 2 - 35)!  

Thank you for being interested in my progress.  I appreciate all of you in my life and make it a goal everyday to feel your love and well wishes for me.  

In love and health,

Denise

Update 4/3/13

4/3/13

Well I’ve delayed in writing a post because I was trying to send out some profound words, plus give a health update as of 3/29.  I’ve lacked the motivation to create the profound for some time and have now probably waited too long because several of you are reaching out asking what is going on???  So I decided to delay the profound for now and will suffice to just give the health update.  

I still only have had the one chemo treatment of both medications on March 7th.  My white cell counts continue to be too low to receive chemo again.  The plan was to skip day 8 of treatment (day 8 is only one of the medications) and resume with both medications at the scheduled date of round 2 of chemo on March 29th.  I did my pre-chemo blood work on the 28th and shortly after was contacted by my oncologist, Dr. Ng.  He said my white cell count stayed the same (still below normal), but the auto Neutrophil count was even lower than the testing 2 weeks ago.  Chemo was cancelled again.  This time it really didn’t bother me.  I was strong in my feeling that there is a stronger power deciding when and if I need chemo again, and that is what is determining the schedule of chemo treatments, not the medical protocols, the doctor, or me.  

I met with Dr. Ng in the office on Friday, March 29th.  His plan is to lower the dose of each chemo agent for future treatments.  He gave me the option of whether to stay on the day 1 and day 8 treatment plan or to just have day 1 only in the 21 day cycle.  I chose one treatment only at this point.  He ordered another course of Neupogen injections to do now and the plan is to do the injections with each round of chemo, now knowing what an effect the chemo has on my bone marrow.  The Neupogen is a growth factor that stimulates the bone marrow to produce at a much greater rate.  Although, right now it seems necessary, it is a very difficult medicine for me to tolerate.  It too, has the potential, to create extreme muscle and bone ache.  I seem to have gotten far more aches than the average person, but also not considered dangerous (just painful).  On Sunday, March  31st the effects were so bad all of the pain medication I have could not control it.  I ran a fever for about 24 hours and really could not function.  Fortunately, the rest of the days have not been quite that bad.  

On the more positive note, much more positive note...with my blood work done on Thursday, March 28th, we also checked the CA125 (ovarian cancer tumor marker).  My previous level the week after chemo was 256, this time is was 52 !!!!  It had dropped 204 points.  My surrender to the chemo definitely helped.  This is why I believe the past few treatments have needed to be canceled.  And why I don’t think I need day 1 and day 8 of treatment each round.  I have even challenged Dr. Ng’s thinking about whether it’s necessary to do 6 rounds of chemo.  With such a positive result after one treatment (not even one complete round), why do more than necessary?   Medical protocol says with ovarian cancer you give no less than 6 rounds (NO MATTER WHAT).  I’m starting to open the door in Dr. Ng’s thinking to treat me based on me and my results, not what medical research/protocol dictates.  Either way, I’m very confident in my ability (with higher guidance) to decide what I need in treatment and even if it is suggested to do more based on research and protocols, I will do what is necessary for ME!

I have been resisting the chemo since I last received chemo (April 2011) and I believe with the surrender to the treatment it allowed me to relax and trust so much that it opened myself for everything else I’m doing to work even more.  Especially for me to reach a place where I could be open to feeling all the love and support of all of you out there and dissipate the feeling that I was in this all alone.  Thank you.  

I will get you the profound when I feel inspired to write in that way.  

In love and health,

Denise

Roller Coasters

3/15/13

Roller coasters

Does anyone out there love roller coasters?  Do you like the fast, thrilling rides or the upside down/corkscrew types?  In 2002, Robert, my nephew, and I spent a whole week riding roller coasters at some of the greatest parks in Ohio.  

The more appropriate question for this post today, is how big a fan are you of the roller coasters of LIFE???  Not nearly as much fun as the roller coasters in the amusement parks, are they?

So I made it through my first treatment of chemo in round 1 last Thursday.  It was not nearly as awful as the chemo agents that were used the first time I had cancer, but still was much worse than I had hoped.  My mom always phrases the symptoms as...”the train has hit”.  Well the train started to hit Saturday morning with nausea.  I was able to enjoy a nice visit with my co-worker from Kaiser Fremont, Angela.  Thank you Angela for coming to visit.  By late afternoon Saturday the train had hit and continued to be parked in my station through Sunday.  With this new chemo regimen, the complete fatigue has been the main theme.  Each day it has been a challenge just to get moving around the house.  

I went for blood work yesterday, Thursday.  Before each chemo treatment I have to have blood tests done to check that my values are strong (or normal) enough to receive chemo again.  My oncologist, Dr. Ng, called yesterday afternoon to say that my blood values were already too low to receive chemo again today.  The plan is to give me a daily injection of medicine called, Neupogen, for the next 5 days that should help my body boost the white blood cells again.  

So needless to say, I’ve felt a roller coaster of emotions over the past two weeks.  I was very resistant to do chemo for the longest time.  Then by having a do or die type of situation, I sought out the chemo treatment to reduce the size of the tumors that were restricting my bowels.  And I felt completely beat down by the first chemo treatment, but tried to ready myself to receive the 2nd treatment.  Only, to then find out I’m not healthy enough at this point to even get chemo again today.  It feels like being disappointed that you can’t drink the glass of poison.  I obviously don’t like how chemo makes me feel and struggle with that, but I also know that it is the one thing that can help me heal the tumors.  

After a few hours of disappointment and grief, I chose to surrender to the outcome and trust that I didn’t get chemo today because I didn’t need it.  I choose to think that the first treatment worked so well that today’s treatment wasn’t necessary.  

So now I get a two week break from chemo.  With the daily injections for the next 5 days, I hope my blood values will improve and I will begin to feel better.  Dr. Ng said he will put together a plan to try to find the happy balance of an effective chemo dose for the cancer, but not so effective that it is destroying everything else in my body. 

I am open for visits if anyone would like.  Of course, you must be very healthy and have no risk of developing any illness (like if you have a family member who is sick) since my immune system is wiped out right now.   

I think the key to having the most fun at any type of roller coaster, whether, it’s the topsy turvy fast one’s, or the emotional life altering one’s is just to relax and literally ride the wave.  For every climb up the mountain, there’s a fun ride down the hill on the other side and I find it’s the most fun if you raise your arms over your head and scream with joy!!!

Aha moments

I'm on a roll with aha moments in the past 24 hours and it feels great.  I would like to share the one from today and see if it provokes any thoughts with all of you.

"All death is a reminder to turn up the volume on your life." Oprah

I have struggled with dealing with the thoughts/fears around becoming more ill and dying.  This goes against the thinking that I want to live by because my belief is that the fear CAUSES illness.  You see the vicious cycle that can form.

So I sat today and pondered Oprah's words and came to the conclusion that this journey of cancer is exactly that, to turn up the volume on my life. There is no death to come from this. If death were the goal here, than it would have already happened.  I had enough cancer in my body, even with this second go around, that it could have already advanced enough to cause death.  That is the reality of it, plain and simple.  My surgical oncologist even said last week: keep doing what you're doing.  The thought is that at your advanced stage of cancer that you'd be dead within a year without treatment.  She considers the recurrence to have started in Dec of 2011 so I'm well over a year now.

BUT, I'm not that sick, and I'm not advancing in my illness, and I'm definitely NOT dying.  No more than anyone else that is.  The reality is: I'm thriving, I'm living, I'm exercising, I'm BEING and I'm turning up the volume on life.

Fear in my life has evolved from the fear of being alone,  to the fear of death,  to now - the fear of not living life to its' full potential.

What can you do to turn up the volume on your life?  Let's live life to its' full potential TOGETHER!!

In love and health,
Denise

1/31/13 Exercise - What it means to me

1/31/13

Exercise - What it means to me

Please don’t turn away so quickly just because I intend to talk about the E word.  That’s right.  Many people are so opposed to exercising it has become like another 4 letter word.  

I write today because I was completely moved during exercise this morning, pun intended.  Today I was able to do U-Jam (hip hop type aerobic dance class).  The bonus was the class was taught by my favorite U-Jam instructor, John.  This guy can move. Whether you want to exercise or not, it’s worth it to go to his class just to watch him move.  The big deal about today is that it’s the first time I’ve been able to exercise in the past 6 weeks or so.  I’ve been doing some heavy energy work which has led to a lot of detoxing in my body.  This has left me feeling under par, to say the least.  

John usually plays some strong, inspirational music during the cool down and like I said I am completely in awe of his movement.  During the cool down today, I became so emotional with the thought of wow I completed the class, and on a bigger scale WOW I’ve been diagnosed with cancer and I can move.  It was one of those moments of complete appreciation for life that brought tears to my eyes.   I felt happy to be alive, happy to truly FEEL alive, happy to be able to move, and so grateful to be able to exercise.  

Many people complain about exercising, but I challenge you to TRULY consider how fortunate you are to have the capacity to exercise.  I feel fortunate that I do enjoy exercising, I’ve rarely looked at it as a chore.  So, to not be able to do much more than walk the past 6 weeks was emotionally challenging.  And I also look back at this cancer diagnosis compared to the first when because of surgery and chemo I wasn’t able to exercise for 8 months or so.  Some days, a walk to the neighbors house 40 yards away was considered a success.  I am absolutely thrilled that today, not only did I take Oliver for a walk, I completed 60 minutes of inspiring, exhilarating, and lively U-Jam.  

I hope this blog helps you to appreciate the consistent movements your body is capable of doing and to challenge you to increase the movement you allow your body to experience. 

In love and health, 

Denise

Radical Permission, Yea Niners

1/20/13: 

Radical Permission:  This was a theme that emerged shortly after the 2nd cancer diagnosis.  Somehow, without cancer I put restrictions on how I made my decisions, how I spent my time and money, how I allowed my fun/leisure time, and probably many other things.  I would venture to say that most of us do this, but I’ll speak for myself. If you enjoy this post, than I would expect you relate to what I’m saying on some level.    

The perfect example of this radical permission came a little over a week after the diagnosis.  This amazing story is also a perfect example of manifestation: setting an intention and releasing any attachment to the outcome.  The SF Giants (my fav baseball team) won the pennant on Monday, Oct 22nd.  As I was celebrating the win in my living room, I looked to my mom and asked her if she thought it would be too morbid to send out an email to all my friends and family and announce that it is on my bucket list to attend a World Series and Superbowl Game, especially in a year where my team was playing.  I NEVER ACTUALLY SENT THE EMAIL.  Two days later, my dear friend Becky, called and asked if I would like to attend a world series game with her.  WHAT??!!  She said she checked on tickets and there are some still available.  My frugal self had to ask what kind of money we were looking to spend and then said, “hell with it, let’s go!!”  This was the first time we had talked since the diagnosis and so she proceeded to say some words of anger and such towards the cancer.  I openly admit my view on cancer is quite different than most and I usually insist on seeing the journey and positive experiences and growth that could come through this opportunity.  So I shared with Becky in that moment, without cancer, you and I would not have given ourselves permission to spend the money and attend this World Series game.  AND WE WENT TO THE GAME!!! And the Giants won the World Series.  Yea Giants!

The other part of this conversation is being able to honor my radical permission with decisions/obligations in my life.  I am now living with radical permission to say no if I don’t feel like something is right for me.  Anita Moorjani, author of Dying To Be Me, explains that our decisions are better made from the heart.  We are taught to decide from our head, but it benefits all on a bigger scale when we decided from our heart.  When deciding something, do you decide based on what is best for you or feels best to you OR do you decide out of feeling obligated based on the other people involved?  The more we can live from making decisions from our heart, the more our lives and cells stay in balance rather than in dis-ease.  This can also be viewed in examples where you say yes to someone when it doesn’t feel right to you, you are actually saying no to yourself.  You can also think about it from the other party’s point of view: would you want someone doing something for you because they felt they HAD to and not because they really wanted to?  

Radical Permission, think about it...  This one is for you Maria V. 

On a more lighter note, if anyone has means to help me attend the Superbowl, especially with 49ers going I would greatly appreciate it.  Just throwing it out there.  

In love and health to you all.  Thank you for your continued support.  Please feel free to share your thoughts via the blog or email.  

Denise

Welcome Back 1/6/13

As you can see I finally was able to get my blog working again.  This post is very much overdue.  Welcome back to those of you who enjoyed my blog during my first journey with cancer.  Welcome to all of you who may be new to the blog and are here to support me in the second journey with cancer.

Just to quickly summarize:
Dec 2011: I developed a slight pain, CA125 tumor marker was elevated (for me) but still within normal range.  CAT Scan was normal.
We (my surgical oncologist, Dr. Chen, and I) decided to do monthly lab markers and exams.
The markers created some confusion in that they decreased in value on two different months but overall continued to increase.  With each increase Dr. Chen was more and more convinced that the cancer was back.  With each decrease she became very confused because she said with cancer you will never see a decrease unless the person is receiving chemo.  She on several occasions recommended a PET scan, but I declined.  I felt great and believed that what I was doing was keeping me healthy.
All that changed somewhere around mid July/August.  I began to feel very fatigued and was having some abdominal pain.
Late September I agreed to do a PET Scan which was completed on Oct 13th.  The PET showed 6 tumors total that were located throughout my abdomen.

My one AND ONLY treatment option through traditional medicine was chemotherapy, and the same chemotherapy I had received with the first bout of cancer.  There was some concern of whether this protocol would even work due to how quick the cancer had returned after finishing chemo in April 2011.  One other important factor that played into my decision making was a statistic that wasn't meant to be told.  You all know that I'm not someone who compares my self to general statistics.  I don't like to fit into the boxes and Dr. Chen knows that about me.  She also has a bit of the PollyAnna syndrome so we agree on the matter of not comparing myself to a statistic.  She misunderstood a question my dad was asking in our initial visit after the diagnosis and thought he asked the success rate of using the same chemo protocol.  She ultimately said that there is a 15% success rate of being cancer free for a total of 5 YEARS.  WHAT???!!!  So really what she was saying was that with full treatment of chemo, there was an 85% chance that the cancer would be back for a 3rd time in the next five years.  I kindly said, no thank you.

I hadn't immediately ruled out chemo as an option, but it wasn't something I was jumping in to quickly. I decided to take some time to sort out my mind and while doing that began the "FUN TREATMENT".

I found out I had cancer on a Monday, gave medical notice to my job on Tuesday, worked my last day on Thursday, and drove down to So Cal on Friday to spend the weekend with my family at Disneyland.  Three days after returning from Disneyland, I cheered my SF Giants on at a World Series game. Three days after that I flew to the Riviera Maya to spend the week 60 miles south of Cancun in Mayan Paradise through Healingjourneys.org enjoying the area but also attending self-improvement workshops through the Tao Wellness Center.
In the next couple of weeks I saw my long time favorites, Barbar Streisand and Barry Manilow in concert, went to an Anita Moorjani lecture in Monterey (see pic of me swinging in Darla's front yard).  A few weeks after the diagnosis my dad asked,  "so when are you going to start treatment?"  I said, "I already am in treatment, fun treatment".

After a month or so, I began to feel the pressure to decide what I needed to do.  I met with a doctor in Santa Rosa who does alternative oncology.  He outlined a treatment protocol for me that would require me to be in Santa Rosa 2-3 days/week, would be at the minimum of 8-10 weeks, at the average cost of $1500/week, could make me fairly sick (similar to chemo) and he still recommended one chemo agent in addition.  WHAT?!

I decided to get away.  I was fortunate enough to have friends lend me there home in Aptos that was a 2 minute walk from the beach. (Thank you John and Chris)  Oliver and I escaped for 10 days to be "normal, non-cancerous" beings and enjoy time with nature, reading, and just being.  The time away was exactly what I needed and helped me to feel in control of my destiny again.

After returning from Aptos, on Dec 9th, I met with an oncologist in Stockton, who would be the facilitator of chemo if I decided to start treatment. He did his homework about me and came in with all guns ready to fire to place every fear possible in me for already waiting so long to start chemo.  He basically said that with "my disease" they would consider it a success if they could keep me alive for 5 years.  I kindly explained that was exactly why I wasn't so eager to choose THEIR treatment and find one of my own.  He tried to bargain with me and said, "go ahead and enjoy the holidays and then let's plan to start chemo the first of the year".

During the two months since finding out I had cancer again I had been doing many things to continue to increase my health (nutrition, movement, detoxing, supplements, energy work, meditation, spiritual work, ....) For those of you who followed my blog in the past, you read many entries on my meditation healer MerriAnn.  MerriAnn did her own research on alternative ways to "communicate" with cancer cells and created a meditation that specifically allowed me to thank the cancer for it's service and give it permission to leave my body and release it to the universe to be used in a loving functional matter.  This was in alignment with out I viewed the cancer cells and my journey with them.  I listen to the CD of this meditation daily.

One of my other main healing methods has been working with my friend Sandy Snider.  Sandy describes herself as an intuitive coach, but is so much more.  She is a communicator with one's angels or guides, whatever you prefer to title it.  We spend several hours each week working through my thoughts, beliefs, fears, and any other feelings that could have created imbalances or dis-ease in my physical body.  She, through her gift, is able to help me release the energy attached with these emotions and therefore help me to heal my body.

I believe that all diseases are related to the emotions and beliefs that we carry with us throughout our lifetimes.  There is actually a lot of science out there that proves this point, but I still write this as "my belief" because I know this is a fairly foreign concept to most.  With this in mind, as I address those fears/beliefs that have limited me in the past, the energy associated with them is released and the cancer resolves.  Since the height of my CA125 tumor markers at 143 in the beginning of November, the marker numbers have dropped 48 points to 95 on my last blood draw this past week.  Traditional medicine cannot explain this.  The belief is that the numbers can only drop through surgery, chemo, and radiation.

THE PROOF IS IN THE NUMBERS.

I will continue to treat in the ways that I feel serve me best.  I completely believe that I am healing the cancer WITHOUT chemo and will continue to do so.

I thank you for sticking with me on this very very long blog entry and for all of your overall support.  I hope to blog regularly and share not only what I'm doing, but some of my thoughts that have influenced my healing.
Love to you all,
Denise