Ring any bells?

We were treated to some especially good news today. Dad has been responding so well to the chemotherapy that he gets a break! His PSA is down several hundred points (to 250!) and the lump in his neck is completely gone.

As a tradition in the hospital where he receives his treatments, outgoing patients get to ring the bell on the day of their last chemo treatment and everyone cheers for them as they head out the door.

Ring-a-ding!

We are looking forward to seeing some hair covering up that bald noggin' for the winter time. (He and Liam are going to have a race to see who can grow hair the fastest!)

Week in Review

Since I was a little preoccupied with other things this last week, writing everything down sort of fell by the wayside. I need to play a little catch up with the "goings on" before I get into the thoughts that have kept me so distracted.

Monday: Got the invitation to an old and very good friend's wedding. We were best friends when I lived in Hawaii back in 6th to 8th grade. I am so excited for her. She is an amazing person - I can only imagine that he is too. I wish I could go and be with her on her big day!

Tuesday: I got to go to chemo with dad and the rest of the "entourage". (Mom and 4 out of the 6 kids were there with him.) He has a little train of people that follow him through the office. I personally think it's SO cool that my sibs make the time to come with him to so many of his appointments. I am grateful for such a close knit family!

Kenna had tumbling so I got to hang out at my sister's house and contemplate a family history project with her. (My sister has a tumbling studio in her garage...)

While there I learned that my niece is expecting a baby!! She is the one that miscarried not to long ago so I am doubly excited for her and her hubby. What great news!

Wednesday: Some sad happenings with friends from work. I found out that a former co-worker and beloved grandpa type friend has been diagnosed with cancer. It breaks my heart to hear that yet another person in my life has been afflicted with this horrible disease.

Another sweet hearted person that is in my work group found out her 23 year old nephew was killed in a car/motorcycle accident. This also breaks my heart. I have some nieces and nephews around this age and couldn't bear to lose any of them, especially like that.

Thursday: Crazy busy day at work. So many things had to get done and it felt like I just couldn't find the time to do it all.

I found out a project that was scheduled to move forward this week didn't go because someone didn't get the submission packet turned in until today and it missed the approval committee meeting. It killed me to see the project get stalled after the person had known the urgency and had promised to move it forward. I was extremely disappointed, especially since the person responsible has not yet called to let me know - I had to find out from another source.

Got to go to lunch with a dear friend. She needed mashed potatoes and I needed some time out of the building. Being with her always cheers me up.

I was also able to spend some time with mom and dad, and review the family history project with them as well. I actually got some of my old junk cleaned out of their basement too. (I've only been married for 7 ½ years...and officially living on my own for 11. It's about time!) I found some old cards and letters which I'm thoroughly excited to read again...just as soon as I can catch a spare minute at home!

Matt had his last day of class for the semester. One more class and he's done!

Friday: Another busy busy work day. Deadlines were moved up, which always creates a special type of chaos. We finished the most important items though, and I was able to sneak out a half hour early to get a head start on a weekend with the whole family at home. I love Matt's weekends off - four days straight of having him home in the evenings goes a long way to improving my sanity levels.

Saturday: Matt took the girls shopping to get a few of the things we need to get the yard/garden in shape for the summer. As much as I really hate yard work, I'm excited to get things spruced up and looking nice. I know the girls will love having some flowers in the front yard that they can help take care of (they even have their own watering cans now thanks to daddy).

I was able to get a few things done around the house while they were gone, and I got a little one on one time with the boy.

Grandma and Grandpa T. took the kids later that evening so we could have a night out. They had the 4 other local grandkids over too so it ended up being a very fun evening for the kids...although I'm not so sure about poor grandma and grandpa.

Matt indulged me and took me to look at a camera I've been ogling for a while. It finally came out on the market this month and I've been anxious to get a look at it. Not that we can afford it right now, but it's nice to know what you want should you ever be the recipient of a large sum of money you can't figure out what to do with. (I must say I'm unimpressed with the staff of Best Buy and their knowledge of digital cameras.) We ended up getting a small (and cheap!) digital camera for the girls to play with.

We went for a late dinner and ended up running into Matt's brother Joe. Seems he was working the off-road show at the convention center up the street and was able to get us in for a peek after we finished eating. It was fun to look at all the tricked out Jeeps and other off-road vehicles.

It was even better to hear about all the progress that Angie (Joe's wife) is making though. The last few months have been amazing. She's almost rid of her cane and they are talking about moving forward with her transplant in August.

Sunday: Church was nice. The girls were pretty good and Liam slept most of the way through it. I had a dead arm, but it was worth it to get the chance to concentrate on the lessons. My visiting teacher still thinks I'm her project, but she's nice and helps with the baby when I need it. The Relief Society teacher did a great job and I had to hold back tears all the way through the lesson. (When did I get to be such a cry baby!?! I get choked up at everything these days...)

We had a pretty nice slow day at home. The girls were able to go outside and try out their new camera. Lyssa took a bzillion pictures of everything. Kenna's were a little less prolific and a little more interesting. I was able to press all the quilt blocks (finally!) and finish getting them arranged. Matt was able to work on a schedule readjustment for work in the hopes that they take his suggestions instead of what their current plan is.

If you actually read all that, I'm impressed. I barely had the attention span for it myself. Here's a little reward for your stick-to-it-iveness.

Probable reasons for not blogging (much) this week...

1. It was my dad's birthday and we were too busy partying.
2. Two of my three children (ACK! THREE! Still getting used to that...sorry.) have coughs that have kept all of us awake at night.
3. I'm lazy. (I know, crazy talk, right? RIGHT?)
4. I may or may not have spent a day in bed and/or hugging a big porcelain bowl.
5. Potty training is hard work.
6. It has snowed four times this week and I'm protesting.

So I guess I have some catching up to do. We actually had some other stuff happen this week, like...good stuff too.

Matt got a phone call from his sergeant on Tuesday night asking him to come teach a Defensive Tactics Class on Wednesday morning. While this created a bit of a panic when it came to baby-sitting arrangements for the kidlets, it's a great opportunity for him career-wise. Especially given that the sergeant called him, not the other way around. My ever helpful sister (Hi Lori!) came to our rescue, as so many of our family members have had to do lately, and took all three (ACK! THREE!) of the little rugrats for the day. The sergeant also asked him to teach four more classes in the next two weeks. Hopefully this is a good sign that advancement might be a possibility when his eligibility date hits.

We got some good news about dad as well. Turns out his PSA numbers went from just about 700 down to just about 500 after the chemo. This is like, stupendously amazing! The chemo is slowing down the cancer cells and that my friends, is some of the best news you can get.

I know more stuff happened...but after that, it doesn't seem all that noteworthy. Plus see reasons numbered 2 and 3 above. Lack of sleep and laziness is a bad combo.

It begins...

Dad started chemo yesterday.

They hadn't gotten the biopsy results back yet, so we were all thinking they would put it off until next week. So imagine my surprise when I get a text from my sister J. in the middle of my meeting telling me that dad was starting chemo right then.

I didn't take it well.

I managed to hold it together for the rest of the meeting, then promptly came back to my cube, called my sis to get some of the details, hung up and started crying. (You know that whole "it hit me like a ton of bricks" thing? Yeah. That's what happened.)

We did the chemo thing with Matt's dad a couple of years ago so we're semi-familiar with how the whole thing goes. But I'm not sure whether that makes the whole idea easier or harder to deal with.

Talking to dad tonight made me feel better though. He sounded more like himself than he has for a month. He was so chipper and happy. I felt all my worry wash away just hearing him talk.

I know that he will have more bad days and the worry will all come back, but it's nice to know that there are also some really good days to balance those out a little.

Wednesday

Alyssa and Kenna were arguing in the back seat of the car on the way home from Grandma T.'s this afternoon. To paraphrase how it went:

A: "I wanna go to Christmas."
M: "Go to Christmas?"
A: "Yeah. I wanna go to Christmas."
M: "You can't go to Christmas."
A: "Why, Sisa?" (her way of saying sister)
M (with her eyes rolling and the exasperated hand movements): "Because Christmas is a DAY. Not a place."
A (like the lightbulb finally came on): "OOOOOH, it's a WEDnesday."

I'm not even sure what that means, or why, but it struck me as REALLY funny this afternoon.

Maybe that's because I had just gotten done going to the hospital with Mom and Dad and some siblings for Dad's biopsy (only to discover that we weren't actually DOING the biopsy today, we were just MEETING the doctor that would do it on Friday) and I really needed something to be funny.

Don't get me wrong, it was a good time hanging out with the FAM and all, but I like hanging out under more pleasant circumstances. Sometimes I feel like all this with dad being sick is just a bad dream and I'll wake up and everything will be right again. Sometimes I can let myself forget about it and it feels like life is just normal. But you never know when you will have good days and when you will have bad ones. Today was one of those days that the weight of it all just came crashing down on me again.

Today's worry was that I already miss that my dad won't be there for all the big events in my kids lives. I know it's really stupid to worry about things that haven't happened yet (or in this case haven't NOT happened yet...) but family has always been such a big deal to me. I want them to be able to have him there. I want them to KNOW him. To know how fabulous and amazing he is. To know his great sense of humor and positive attitude about everything. To hear all his funny growing up stories. I want them to REMEMBER. Remember how much fun they have with him. And then I feel this desperate need to write everything down, commit everything to memory, or carry my video camera with me everywhere just so they will have a record of it all - so they can know and remember all the great things about him that I know and remember.

It kind of makes me think that this is how the prophets might feel in trying to teach us about Heavenly Father (not that I am worthy in ANY way to parallel my life to a prophet's...) They wanted so badly to convey everything about our Father, so we too can KNOW and REMEMBER.

It reminded me of a scripture in John 17:25-26:

"O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee...
"And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them..."

I hope I can do this for my children.

Broken Heart

Dad went to a new doctor today. They've been worried about some new symptoms that have shown up lately. That and his hip is getting worse.

So the appointment was at 4:30. At 6:30 I still hadn't heard from them and I needed to ask mom a question about how Liam had done that day so I could report to his doctor. Once I got her on the phone, the majority of the short conversation after asking about Liam went like this:

me: "You're still at the doctor?"
mom: "Yes, we're waiting for some more tests. We'll probably only have about a year."
me: "What?!?"
mom: "They think it might be the cancer or congestive heart failure. We're not sure yet. We'll let you know what we find out."
me: "..."
mom: "I need to go."
me: "Call me as soon as you get done."
mom: "Okay, bye."

I hung up and immediately started crying. How do you deal with this? How are you supposed to handle the news that your father is dying and might only have a year left with you here in this mortal existence? My beliefs about the afterlife aside, it still hurts. It's still scary. And I would still give anything to keep him here with us. He won't be here for all the things I wanted and needed him for. He might not even see Liam's first birthday. It breaks my heart for so many reasons. I want him here. He's one of my best friends. He has always been the one that understood me and the one I could talk to about anything. I want to be selfish and just keep him here with us forever.

I ache for my mom. I know it kills her everyday to see him suffering with pain or to just worry about how he's doing and what is really going on inside his body. They have been a team for over 50 years. How do you deal with the prospect that your companion isn't going to be here much longer? I cannot fathom what she must be going through...or what dad must be going through knowing that he has to leave her. Yet both of them continue to put on a brave face and act like this is just another hurdle to get over and they will be able to handle it like any other trial. Dad was almost chipper when I talked to him later this evening and mom was very calm about everything as she explained it to me.

How was I blessed with such amazing parents? They continue to astound me and make me wish that I had been better at listening to their immense wisdom all along the way. I am in awe of both of them. They are the most selfless and charitable people that I know. Always concerned about other people and always doing the right thing.

So... Now we're back to the waiting game. Waiting on test results. Waiting to talk to another doctor. Waiting to see how much longer we have together here.

I hate waiting.