Hi! I know it has been a long, long time since I have posted anything. Believe me it is not for a lack of content.....it is a lack of time.
My friend Angie James is walking in the Komen 3Day for the 4th time. I am posting this link to her web page so that you can donate. To be able to participate a walker must earn $2300 in donations. So far Angie is at 34%. I know times are tough but any amount helps. If 230 people gave $10 she would be golden. Since over 10,000 people have looked at my blog we should be able to get her to her goal.
I know that everyone is continually being asked to donate money to one cause or another. I like to look at this as an opportunity for you to donate so my friend can walk in this event. I also like to use the "Girl Scout Cookie" model. If I buy cookies from my neighbor Maddie I have supported the Girl Scouts and helped Maddie on the way to getting her badge for sales. I can then say to anyone else that asks I have already bought my cookies from Maddie. This gives me an honest way to decline at Safeway when another little girl asks me to buy from her. Then I don't have to avert my eyes and run into the store while ignoring the other Girl Scouts.
So it is with the Komen 3Day walk. If you donate to Angie and her team you can say that you already donated to the walk. After that you are golden until September. You might even be able to ride that donation through Pink October a.k.a Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
Angie has dedicated her walk to me and another friend who was just diagnosed with Stage IV metastatic breast cancer. This woman had been insured her entire life but with the current economy she is without medical insurance. The metastatic disease has spread everywhere because she could not get her mammogram this year as she had no health insurance.
Take a look at Angie's page and become inspired. She is an amazing woman and friend and all of us from the trenches surviving breast cancer we are grateful for every dollar that is earned and every mile that is walked.
Let's find a cure and save the boobies! (.)(.)
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
CHANGE URL FROM WWW.TEAMHYRA.BLOGSPOT.COM
The new URL for the website will be www.meeshopolis.blogspot.com. After 10 years (teamhyra@msn.com registered 9/14/2000) I will no longer be using TeamHyra as an identifier for my online URLs or emails. There is no Meesh in TeamHyra. Look for an upcoming change in my email, facebook and other accounts that were attached to the "TeamHyra" name.
More fascinating info on team trades, free agents, the injured reserve, the second string, the locker room and the Hyrettes to follow.
Meesh
More fascinating info on team trades, free agents, the injured reserve, the second string, the locker room and the Hyrettes to follow.
Meesh
Saturday, September 19, 2009
RE-MISSION IMPOSSIBLE? OR POSSIBLE
All had been quiet on the blog front because I have just been soldiering on through my 6 cycles of Avastin and Abraxane. My final treatment for this series, which began in April, is September 25th. I was prepared to have a PET scan (the 1st one since February when I had 13 new active cancer spots on my skeleton) after the 25th and then consult with Dr. K. He was not satisfied with this situation because if the outcome was that I was to remain on the Avastin and Abraxane we would get off of our established schedule. Cancer buggers can do a lot while the proverbial "mice" of chemotherapy are away. So, I had a PET scan this last Wednesday and consulted with Dr. K. yesterday on Friday.
I had prepared myself for the worst. These scans really do a number on me. I get a bad case of "scanxiety" and continually imagine that I am going to hear, "It didn't work at all and we are going to have to move onto Door #3 and you are going to have to have a harsher drug and it is going to suck more than you can imagine and blah, blah, blah." I suppose that this is a coping mechanism, of sorts, because when you are a mets girl to even allow yourself to think that something is going to go right is just not something that we do. We prepare for the worst and hope for something on the scale just above the worst and this is progress. It really is absurd because we all want to live in a place of hopefulness, a place where our condition will somehow change from a death sentence to life without parole.
Well I guess the Governor of Cancer called up on the bat-phone and in a way commuted my sentence for the time being. Over the past 6 months I have heard Dr. K use the "R" word (remission) twice. I NEVER thought that remission was a possibility for me. I thought that even if the outcome of any treatment was good that there would still be metastatic disease on my skeleton and even thought it wasn't active it would always be there. The internal evidence of my scarlet letter "C."
On Friday, I hadn't looked at my results and so Dr. K was the first one to read them to me. I literally felt like I was in the middle of a miracle moment as he shared my results with me. I had to make sure that he was reading MY results not someone elses. The PET scan sealed the deal. Because my CA 27-29 has gone from 150 to 70, my pain is all but disappeared with the exception of my low back which has all those collapsed vertebraes and fractures, I have been feeling better than ever since I have been diagnosed and according to some (not me) I look better than I have looked (even without any hair) since my diagnosis in July 2007 we were hopeful that the PET would reveal progress. I didn't imagine it would reveal a small miracle.
Originally I had 6 tumors in my left breast and axilla. Many of them were big like baseball and golf ball size. Two had disappeared awhile ago, two were gone from this scan. I mean totally gone. The last two (baseball and golf ball) are down to 1cm by 1cm, they are petering out. The two last buggers are there but they are not doing well. They aren't thriving, they are dying. Good riddance. As far as my skeletal mets, which were EVERYWHERE in my body. THEY ARE GONE!!!!! There is no evidence of any disease with the exception of a small spot on my right 4th rib and possibly a spot on my pelvis, but that is probably a post-radiation spot not a cancer spot.
To me this is just unbelievable. This chemotherapy/biotherapy/bone builder regime has worked and it has worked well. All the fatigue from the therapies and the pain from the marrow builders and the Thursday-Friday-Saturday trips to the cancer institute have been worth it and worth it in a way that is amazing.
I'll give you a little quote from the report:
"There is remarkable interval decreased or complete resolution of abnormal activity see in the entire skeleton now." and "There is almost complete metabolic response of the osseous skeletal lesions."
The plan is this. I will have 6 more treatments of the Abraxane and Avastin which will run me up to December 18th. I will be sending out an email blast for chemo buddies and Neulasta shot ride friends on Saturday. Dr. K believes that with the 6 more treatments that I could go into complete remission. Now, me being the metastatic pessimist I am not going to hold my breath BUT I will be visualizing the death of the final 3-4 spots that are left.
Thank you all for the rides, sitting with me, playing with the girls, the meals, the support, sitting with me through the interminable chemo sessions. Thank you for the well-wishes, the prayers, the cards and the emails. Thank you for being a part of getting us this far. We couldn't have done it without your help.
Most of all I have to thank my family without you three I wouldn't be able to make it through the treatments, and the tests and the shots. Matt, Anya and Mila this victory is yours. You have sacrificed so much to get me here. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.
I had prepared myself for the worst. These scans really do a number on me. I get a bad case of "scanxiety" and continually imagine that I am going to hear, "It didn't work at all and we are going to have to move onto Door #3 and you are going to have to have a harsher drug and it is going to suck more than you can imagine and blah, blah, blah." I suppose that this is a coping mechanism, of sorts, because when you are a mets girl to even allow yourself to think that something is going to go right is just not something that we do. We prepare for the worst and hope for something on the scale just above the worst and this is progress. It really is absurd because we all want to live in a place of hopefulness, a place where our condition will somehow change from a death sentence to life without parole.
Well I guess the Governor of Cancer called up on the bat-phone and in a way commuted my sentence for the time being. Over the past 6 months I have heard Dr. K use the "R" word (remission) twice. I NEVER thought that remission was a possibility for me. I thought that even if the outcome of any treatment was good that there would still be metastatic disease on my skeleton and even thought it wasn't active it would always be there. The internal evidence of my scarlet letter "C."
On Friday, I hadn't looked at my results and so Dr. K was the first one to read them to me. I literally felt like I was in the middle of a miracle moment as he shared my results with me. I had to make sure that he was reading MY results not someone elses. The PET scan sealed the deal. Because my CA 27-29 has gone from 150 to 70, my pain is all but disappeared with the exception of my low back which has all those collapsed vertebraes and fractures, I have been feeling better than ever since I have been diagnosed and according to some (not me) I look better than I have looked (even without any hair) since my diagnosis in July 2007 we were hopeful that the PET would reveal progress. I didn't imagine it would reveal a small miracle.
Originally I had 6 tumors in my left breast and axilla. Many of them were big like baseball and golf ball size. Two had disappeared awhile ago, two were gone from this scan. I mean totally gone. The last two (baseball and golf ball) are down to 1cm by 1cm, they are petering out. The two last buggers are there but they are not doing well. They aren't thriving, they are dying. Good riddance. As far as my skeletal mets, which were EVERYWHERE in my body. THEY ARE GONE!!!!! There is no evidence of any disease with the exception of a small spot on my right 4th rib and possibly a spot on my pelvis, but that is probably a post-radiation spot not a cancer spot.
To me this is just unbelievable. This chemotherapy/biotherapy/bone builder regime has worked and it has worked well. All the fatigue from the therapies and the pain from the marrow builders and the Thursday-Friday-Saturday trips to the cancer institute have been worth it and worth it in a way that is amazing.
I'll give you a little quote from the report:
"There is remarkable interval decreased or complete resolution of abnormal activity see in the entire skeleton now." and "There is almost complete metabolic response of the osseous skeletal lesions."
The plan is this. I will have 6 more treatments of the Abraxane and Avastin which will run me up to December 18th. I will be sending out an email blast for chemo buddies and Neulasta shot ride friends on Saturday. Dr. K believes that with the 6 more treatments that I could go into complete remission. Now, me being the metastatic pessimist I am not going to hold my breath BUT I will be visualizing the death of the final 3-4 spots that are left.
Thank you all for the rides, sitting with me, playing with the girls, the meals, the support, sitting with me through the interminable chemo sessions. Thank you for the well-wishes, the prayers, the cards and the emails. Thank you for being a part of getting us this far. We couldn't have done it without your help.
Most of all I have to thank my family without you three I wouldn't be able to make it through the treatments, and the tests and the shots. Matt, Anya and Mila this victory is yours. You have sacrificed so much to get me here. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.
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