Tag Archives: Cancer

Happy New Year 2024 !!

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I am wishing you all a Happy New Year 🎊🎊🍾🍾

2023 was a stressful year, full of hurt, disappointment, illness, death, struggle, and ineffectiveness. Despite all of it, I am grateful that I overcame it all.

Being a caregiver to my Mother, who now has cancer for the forth time, has been soul shattering. I felt trapped and unappreciated. My mother was experiencing a type of dementia due to the meds she had to take. A few months ago, the meds stopped working ! Her oncologist immediately changed protocols. The new protocol is working on shrinking the two tumors in her liver and destroyed the nodule in her lungs.

I am embracing 2024 as my year of triump. I am focused on winning and will NOT allow anything nor anyone to distract me.

My daughter is now 7. She is the most amazing gift 🎁. She is thriving and so intelligent. This child is so much different than we were as kids. She is almost like a little adult, the way she processes things. She is very compassionate and sensitive.

I look forward to exploring the world 🌎 with her this year. We are researching and trying to select a country to expat. I am over the US. I need a change and I am determined to ensure that my child cultured and educated. She loves learning and exploring. She has more stamps in her passport that most adults. She loves going on ‘Holiday’…

I am looking forward to preparing for a move and being able to spend half the year abroad every year and prepare to purchase a home in another country.

2024 is going to be epic !

It has already delivered bad news. We arrived at the beach and got settled into the condo and went down the hall to let CGB’s honorary Grandparents know that we arrived safely and learned that her Grandmother passed away unexpectedly two days before Christmas ! We would have expected for her Grandfather to pass, as he too has cancer, but it’s on his nose. He is 101 years old. It was heartbreaking 💔. He didn’t even recognize us. A nurse /caregiver opened the door, which was strange because we were expecting Rose Marie to open the door. She fell a fee months ago and broke her shoulder. She didn’t tell us about that and we knew that Armand had fallen. She got a UTI and bed sores in the facility she was in so her brothers hired a private duty nurse and had her moved back to their condo. The nurse told me that she was skin and bones, although she was always tiny, she was withering away. The nurse was fattening her up, and she seemed to be improving and was doing a lot better. Two days before Christmas, she took ill and was hospitalized and passed away 18 hrs later with Armand and the nurse by her side. My daughter was hurt and could not understand why Armand didn’t know her

I brought them so Lemoncello that I made, which they Love. He smiled when the nurse told him that we brought Lemoncello. She told me that he had had a very bad day was way off, which was unusual for him. He is normally very sharp and aware. A few weeks ago, he and Rose Marie were super excited that we were coming to visit and staying for at least a month. I was looking forward to cooking some of their favorites and spoiling them.

Despite this sad news, I refuse to get sidetracked. I am determined to be productive and make this happen for my family.

I pray that you all have a productive, successful, healthy, and abundant new year.

Until next time,

V

The Grace and Favor of God – The 411

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So… remember the lesion the radiologist said was on my mother’s spine? Remember that the oncologist was perplexed as to why she had no pain or discomfort in the left shoulder area, given the diagnosis?

My mom was sent the next day to radiology oncology for further evalution and to get scheduled for radiation therapy to nuke the area. The doctor looks at her PET Scan and CT Scan and does another scan in office and looks at my mom and says “THERE IS NOTHING THERE!” Well, look at GOD ! Won’t He Do It?

The doctor informs my mom that even if there is a lesion there, that is nothing to worry about. He ordered an MRI to be on the safe side and said that if it shows anything there, they will do five radiation sessions to nuke it so it does not cause problems down the line, but it is not a life threatening situation.

My mom is over the moon, as are we.

Only God !

IVF #5 – Stim Day 19 – The 411

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ivf 5 - keep calm stim on bear

19 days and counting…. Just two more days of stims and then hopefully Thursday night is trigger #1 and Friday is trigger #2 and then I can get these little eggs out of me before my babies come out looking like Benjamin Button ! lol

I did my normal injections this morning of Ganirelix, Lovenox and Neupogen.  I took the 20mg of Prednisone, Claritin, and also took my prenatal vitamin.  This afternoon, I took the Folate and also the Synthroid.  I will inject Gonal-F tonight (ran out of Follistim and the two are interchangeable) and the Menopur.  I have a pm prenatal that I take along with more Prednisone and the Vitamin D emulsion.

I just packed up my clothing, shoes, notes for my book, sheets, and heating pad into a box and have it sitting waiting on FedEx to pick it up and ship it ahead to the hotel.  I am elated to not have to drag luggage with me all around New York while I am in the city for the funerals.  I will leave from the funeral and head to midtown, grab lunch in Penn Station or nearby and then hop on the train to Albany.  It will be nice to be in a quiet hotel suite, equipped with a full kitchen, and no grandmom to ask me every five minutes if there is something she can help me do !  Thank you Jesus !   🙂    She means well, but at times, it is taxing. I wish she could do some of my writing so that I can take a nap LOL.

Today, my mom had her first radiation treatment.   All went well and we met with the doctor afterwards. I took her to lunch at PF Chang’s and then home we went.  After she worked for a while, I made her go to bed to take a nap and rest.   She is probably downstairs on her Ipad or cellphone playing around on Facebook lol.

In regards to my swelling ovaries, I spoke too soon !  Those things seem to start filling up late last night about 11-12 and felt like they were being blown up a bit kinda like a balloon for several hours.  It was so noticeable that I could not sleep from the discomfort.  My tummy is now a bit distended so I am hoping that nothing is growing out of proportion or too fast and I end up having the surgery on Friday.  I was looking forward to having all day Friday to relax and maybe catch a movie at the mall up the street from the hotel, hang out in the huge Border’s Bookstore and get a juicy burger from Five Guys in the food court.   Hopefully I will be able to get that in.

More tomorrow after my scan…. I am going to take a nap before I have to go to infertility support group meeting tonight !

IVF # 5 Stim Day 15 – The 411

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ivf 5 - meds 2

Today is my 15th day of stims !   One more week to go before retrieval !!  Woot Woot !

I got up this morning and did my morning injections of Ganirelix, Lovenox, and Neupogen, popped the Prednisone and ran out to my early am monitoring appointments.   I got my scan done and my follicles are finally starting to grow.  I have a 12mm as the largest.  I have 9 on the right and another 4 on left so far.  I am to stay on my same meds and then go back for scans and more blood work on Monday and again on Wednesday.  I will possibly trigger on Wednesday, depending on how things look and report to Albany on Friday for retrieval and then a transfer on the following Monday or Tuesday.

ivf 5 - follicular stim day 15

I had to order more meds as I was out of Ganirelix since I have been taking it for 15 days now.  I was able to get two boxes from another patient and got five more from another patient who are on the Facebook support group boards I am on. Why pay the pharmacy $250 per box when I can get them from other patients for $50?  #diapermoneyforlater

Now that I am no longer injecting the delestrogen and my estradiol levels are dropping to normal range, I am not as tired as I have been.  Then again, I have been stressed and sleeping more, so that could be why I am not as tired.

My friend, Cristal, who lost her son and grandmom this week and my best friend, Gary, who’s mom has stage four cancer, have both launched funding campaigns that I am promoting, so I have not had much time to work on my book this week with that and all the documentation I had to pull together for the network submission of my show.  I have to tape additional segments this week and get them to the editor to revise the sizzle reel plus tape an interview.

Tomorrow, I am attending a class at Howard University School of Divinity that my dear friend, Pastor Nawanna Lewis-Miller is hosting.   I am really looking forward to attending the class with my mother.  I hate that I will not have the time to do acupuncture tomorrow, but I will try to get an appointment and go on Tuesday in the middle of the morning. Parking is so horrendous in DC during the week….

Tonight, I will be injecting 175 units of Follistim and 37.5 units of the Menopur.  My tummy is starting to look black and blue and depending on which med I am injecting, since the needles are different, I am noticing that I am bleeding a lot.  The Lovenox is the culprit !  I am being very careful not to bump into things or fall since I bruise so easily on Lovenox.

Have a great weekend !!

IVF # 5 – Stim Day 14 – The 411

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ivf 5 - keep calm and stim like a champ

Today is stim day 14… I am starting to wonder if we are ever going to get to the end of stims !  I do not feel the “full” feeling I get when my ovaries are about to burst with follicles.  I can not wait, actually yes I can, to get to that point.  Stimming slow and steady is the best way to get quality eggs so I am being patient.

I have been so stressed out the last few days.  One best friend losing her son and grandmom at 10pm the SAME night on Monday, My godmother and mother both undergoing cancer treatment, and my best friend, actor, Gary Anthony Sturgis, has finally gone public with his mother’s stage four cancer diagnosis.  He finally got his mom to tell her siblings and now he was talked about it publicly, so I feel heartbroken for him, but at the same time relieved that he will have additional support.  Cancer SUCKS rocks !  In the midst of all of this mortality, I am trying to create life.  It seems strange.

In better news, my agent and I are submitting the final (although it is really just the beginning phase) mock ups of my reality tv project.  I am excited about the possibility of this show about my life, my struggles and the fertility struggle so many women and men face that I get to put a face on, being on national television !  I also know what this exposure can do for my career and other projects I want to launch in the future.  I am trusting God to open the right doors to the right people at the right time !

I am so eternally grateful for the opportunity to even be able to take this journey and I would be remiss to not thank God for His faithfulness because there are so many who would not be able to even dream of doing what I have done this past year.

I did my AM injections of Ganirelix, Lovenox, and Neupogen.  Tonight, I will inject 175 units of Follistim and 37.5 units of Menopur.

ivf - menopur  IVF 5 - Follistim  ivf 5 stim day 4 neupogen  IVF 5 stim day 2             Vitamin D emulsion

Tomorrow morning, I have another blood draw and sonogram.  Prayerfully there will be a little growth in the follicles, but not too much of a leap !  I want all the little ones to grow to the same size as the larger ones so that I have plenty of quality eggs to transfer back next week !

In the mean time, I am working on little gifts for the staff at the clinic.  I bough EOS balms and made cute hand tags that say “You Are The BALM!”  Thanks !.  I also got peanut M&Ms and put hand tags that say ” Thank You For Helping Make My Little Peanut (s) !”.  I also had Banana Bakery out of Dallas Texas make medical themed cookies that say thanks on them and they are shipping the cookies to my hotel in Albany to arrive next week and they are already hand wrapped individually.

To keep my mind occupied, I have been making flour with hard white wheat berries and baking and my team and I are working on the launch of Valerie The Pajama Chef, my cooking show.  You can pull up my flour escapades on Youtube that I shot with my cellphone LOL.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8jkyWBJWp8

I am headed downstairs to my kitchen now to make mile high buttermilk biscuits !  I am craving them, so I am making them and will go get some molasses  🙂   I know I am supposed to be doing gluten free, but one little biscuit is not gonna hurt much !  With all the hell going on around me, I deserve one little biscuit right?  🙂

IVF #4 – 3DP3DT – The 411

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baby - one more day praise the lord

Today, I am three days post three day transfer.  I am feeling great !  I have been taking it pretty easy.

Last night, I took my mom to the emergency room at the urging of my sister.  Her blood sugar had dropped from the 600 range down to 285.  Her platelet count is coming up a bit, her red blood cell count is low and her white blood cell count is elevated because of the Neulasta shot she was given after her chemo 2 weeks ago.  I asked the ER doc if she should be on a low dose of Metformin to help regulate the insulin in her body and he agreed with my assessment and thought I was a doctor LOL.

We left the hospital at 10:30pm and the roads were a sheet of ice !  We got home safely and in one piece.  I wanted to go to the grocery store to get the items I needed to make authentic Pho Beef Soup, which by the way is AWESOME for pregnant or TTC women.  Any bone broth soup would be.  I decided to drive straight home since the temperatures were plummeting.

This morning, my mom had a follow up visit with her Oncology nurse.  All is going well and they are glad that we made her go to the ER and that I suggested the Metformin. (something they should have done from the onset considering they knew 2 wks ago her blood sugar was at 400 because of the steroids she is on !)

I was able to get InfuScience to set up my in home infusion services for weekly intralipid infusions.  I refuse to go to Albany on the train every week for this !   I will just pay the $235 out of pocket and submit to my insurance company in case they will pay for it.  I am out of state so they may give me grief…

I get my infusion done tomorrow after my morning acupuncture session.

infuscience

I did go to the International grocers today as well as Harris Teeter to get all the items I needed and I have been simmering oxtails with a whole onion, garlic, and some spices since noon.  I will turn it down and let it simmer overnight, just as they would in Vietnam.   I can not wait to make it for lunch tomorrow !!

For dinner, I made the Guinness Beer Chicken, Fresh Corn on the cob, and a five cheese skillet mac n cheese.  It smells divine so I am going to eat with my mom and grandmom.

IVF #4 – 2DP3DT – The 411

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baby- bloating

Today, I am officially two days past three day transfer (2DP3DT).   The progesterone is starting to kick in.  The sore full boobs, the weird slight bloat, the prednisone food cravings… etc.

I am a bit tired, but other than that, I feel good.  I guess what they say about every cycle being different is true.  This IVF cycle, I did not have the pain and bloating I had with the first three.  The 1st cycle was the worse.

Today, it is snowing in the Washington DC Metro area, where I am visiting my mother.  I only went out to the mailbox and I have been taking it easy.  My mother cooked breakfast at 5 am (she thinks about food while awake or sleeping because of the steroids they have her on !)   I was up so I ate.  I spent the day watching tv and cooking.

I  made homemade yeast rolls, cubed steak with onion gravy, corn on the cob, mustard greens, buttered rice and also chocolate chip english toffee cookies for today.  Once I finished prepping today’s dinner, I cooked the Guinness Beer Chicken I seasoned yesterday and allowed to marinate in a bottle of Guinness beer for 24 hours.

It looks phenomenal !  The sauce has brown sugar, scotch bonnet sauce, red rice wine vinegar, and ketchup in it.  I am going to make skillet mac and cheese for my mom to go with it.  Soft foods go down easier for her.  Her gums and mouth are sore and her throat gets sore off and on.

My mother’s nurse called her at 2 am after reviewing her labs that had just come in to leave a message saying her glucose level, because of the meds, has shot up over 600.  Her platelet count is extremely low, so they could not do her chemo yesterday.  It has been rescheduled for next week when her platelet count is above 100.

We called her doctor’s office to try to get her seen or have them call in a script for insulin, but because of the terrible snow storm they were not open today.  I am going to take her to emergency room in the morning after the snow has stopped and all the roads have been plowed.  They do not come to clean our driveway and sidewalks until tomorrow.

My sister, who is an RN has been on me all day to make her go to the ER as she is worried about her getting deathly ill because of the high blood sugar.  My mom used to be diabetic before having gastric bypass 10 years ago, so her blood sugar has not been elevated in 10 years.  With a compromised immune system, my sister says it is worse.  I would go out now, but the roads have not been dragged and getting into a car accident would not be cute either !

My my mom says she feels fine so she will just go in the morning. She is more worried about the “non-driving” people around here LOL.

IVF #4 – Stim Day 8 – The 411

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baby - ivf 4 stim day 8 scan

This morning, I went in for my monitoring appointment and labs and I now have 14 follicles !! One on the left is 2cm and there are two on the right that are larger than the others.  By Wednesday, they feel the smaller ones will catch up and I will be able to trigger on Wednesday and double trigger on Thursday for a Friday morning retrieval.

I am starting to feel very tired and ridiculously sleepy.  When I came in from my appointments this morning, I climbed back in my bed, turned on the heated blanket and went to sleep ! I woke up a few hours later and went upstairs into the kitchen and whipped up another pan of the soft and fluffy yeast rolls I made for the first time on Sunday.  They are so soft, sweet and yummy !  I had several colleagues who saw the pics on Facebook and demanded that I send them some.  I now have 8 bags of them in the freezer and will ship them out tomorrow after I get back from acupuncture.

I am having trouble trying to  focus.  My godmother was just diagnosed with recurrent breast cancer and my best friend’s mother was just diagnosed with lung and spinal cancer.  Although my godmother will be okay, I worry about my friend’s mom because the cancer on her spine has been there for years undiagnosed; to the point that it has mangled her ribs !  The good news is that the cancer on her lung is on the outside and the doctors feel that the cancer is treatable, but the work “inoperable” is what scares me.  2015 has been a true bitch for a lot of people I know.  I am just trying to stay positive and spread as much love and faith around as I can.  I am a witness that God can do exceedingly, abundantly above all we can ever think or imagine and He is also a healer.  I am putting all of them, my mom included, in the palm of His hand and I am standing on the unshakeable faith that God is bigger than any problem.

IVF #4 – So It Starts – The 411

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baby - estrace

 

Today, I started taking Estrace (estrogen) for my estrogen priming protocol !  I have to take two of the little blue pills per day.  What is so odd is that these are the SAME little blue pills we put up out hoo-haa later in the cycle.  Where they do that at?  lol

I am taking Estrace for seven days then I have to wait for my period to start, which should be next weekend.  Once my period starts, I am to go in for a baseline and pending no cysts or weird stuff, I start stims.

I am taking 4 maca root pills in the afternoons until my period starts to ward off cysts due to high estrogen levels.  The maca root balances out the estrogen by adding progesterone to our system.

In other news, my mother has completed the first round of chemo and has a little break for three weeks until she starts eight weeks of the second round of chemo (toxil) which is really harsh. She will have a chemo infusion every 2 weeks. After she finishes the second round of chemo, she starts daily radiation and then will have reconstructive surgery.

On the dating front, my mom suggested I join sites that exclusively feature European men since they are more my speed and definitely are my interest. European men, according to several people I have spoken too, my personal experience and as read in several articles, are a bit different than American men of the same age bracket.  They are more mature in terms of relationship and are more apt to be looking for marriage as opposed to a booty call or hookup.  Now, we can not categorize all American men as such, but over the past few months, it is becoming apparent, with my experience on dating sites, and the experiences of others I have spoken too that American men in the age bracket of my interest, are still in party mode.  You meet more men who want sexual escapades without commitment than you do men who are serious and looking for a committed relationship.

There are several renowned sites, such as Meetic.com, Flirtbox (Ireland), Parship (France), EuropeanCupid, etc that I am looking at and putting up profiles on.  Hopefully, I will run across a tall, intelligent, gorgeous Italian, Englishman, or Greek ! 🙂  I am also joining two language exchange groups which is another place to meet the kind of man who peeks my interest.  Wish me luck !   I figure the one way to find what you want is to start actively looking for it and placing yourself on the path of where those things are.

Would it not be awesome if I pop out some twins AND find Mr. Right or a few Mr. Rights to take prospect applications from? lol