Graduating and Packing and Traveling....Oh My!

Dear Readers,

This past week I've been pretty productive. I finished my senior paper and all of my remaining assignments for school. After I turn everything in, I will officially be done with high school! Unfortunately, I will not be in town for graduation but the school is going to send me a DVD of the ceremony and the cap/gown company is going to send me a cap and gown for me to keep. I think my mom is also going to get a cake and stuff for the hospital room for actual graduation day. Although I'm sad to miss graduation, getting some healthy bone marrow is a nice consolation prize. My dad is also helping me plan a graduation/going away party for my family and friends before I leave. Look for invites soon!

I also started the dreaded task of packing. To be honest, I never really unpacked when I came back from Minneapolis in early December. I sort of told myself that if I didn't unpack, it wasn't really happening. Nice try. So basically I've been living out of buckets for the past few months. I thought this would make re-packing much easier. However, turns out now I have to take out all my winter clothes and replace them with spring/summer clothes. I've finished most of the packing and it looks like I'm only going to be bringing: one large blue tub, one pink tub (filled with goodies from classmates, friends and family) and one large black suitcase. I also have another blue tub filled with a comforter, foam layer for my bed, etc. But I don't really count those things. I'm an extreme over-packer so I think I've done quite well. Last night while I was adding some things, I noticed this:

I think this is my cat's way of telling me that she wants to come along. Unfortunately, the hospital won't even allow real flowers in my room. I doubt they're going to let a real cat. Sorry Gracie, you're going to have to stay home. Mental note: make sure to check luggage carefully before leaving to make sure there is not a cat hiding inside.

Lastly, I've been planning and getting excited for two upcoming trips! The first is this weekend. This trip won't be very fun but it's super important. My mom and I are making a quick drive up to Minneapolis so that I can get a ferriscan done. This is the test that measure how much iron is in my liver. My ferritin levels (amount of iron in my blood) have been dropping rapidly so we expect to see the same with the ferriscan. If that is the case, transplant is a go! If not, I might have to wait longer. The ferritin levels have indicated that my ferriscan results should be in my favor. We'll see. I'll make sure to blog during the trip. The second trip is next weekend. I'm going to New York City! Again. This time I'm flying by myself and I'm going to stay with Laura, that amazing woman I mentioned in a previous post. You'll learn much more about her when I blog during my trip. I'm going out for 5 days/4 nights. This trip's timing is great because it'll be the last thing I do before leaving for transplant. Hopefully the joys of New York will follow me and help motivate me through transplant. I'll make sure to blog about that trip as well.

Later in the week I hope to find time to blog about COLLEGE! That's going to need a post of it's own.

Hope everyone has a lovely week and ENJOY THE WEATHER!

**Reason of the Day: It's currently 65 degrees outside. Nice weather is always a reason to smile (RTS)**

PS- I've started a facebook fan page so feel free to join. Just click the link on the right-hand sidebar.

St. Patrick's Day 2010

Happy St. Patrick's Day, although technically the day is over. This is the one day of the year that being irish makes you awesome. You may notice that I'm blogging at 3 in the morning. This is not because I just got back from crazy St. Patrick's Day festivities. Although, that might make things more interesting. No, I'm still awake because I don't sleep much at night. I started having nightmares awhile back, probably because of the stress, so I just stopped sleeping at night. I find it much easier to sleep when the sun is out because it's soothing. As a result, my days have become my nights and my nights have become my days. Since I'm awake, I might as well blog. I know I'll be regretting this when I have to wake up at 7 to go to the hospital. Tomorrow, technically today, is transfusion day. The lovely day that I get to experience every two weeks where I go to the hospital and spend 6-8 hours getting blood and other goodies. This time It's two bags of red blood cells and a bag of phosphorus. Oh, the joy.

As I'm sure you've noticed, I've given my blog a makeover! I was getting tired of the old template so I went template hunting. Unfortunately most of the good ones aren't free so this is the best I could find for free. I'm thinking about splurging and paying to have a template custom made for my site but for now, this one will work. I've also added a box that allows you to become a fan via facebook. When I started this blog, I intentionally didn't make a facebook page for it because I didn't want to seem conceited. I'm not a big deal. However, after seeing how many people have been signing up for email subscriptions, I decided it was worth a shot. To my surprise, it took less than 48 hours to get over 100 fans. I think now I have almost 200 fans. I am so happy to see so many supporters of my blog! I also added a playlist so that you can listen to some music while reading my blog. I love music and my itunes is open pretty much 24/7, even when I sleep sometimes. I thought it would be a nice touch to add some songs that are either inspirational, emotional or just plain fun.

This past week has been crazy hectic. On sunday, my mom and I went to brunch to celebrate the good news. It was delicious, chocolate fountain included. Then I headed out to the legends to meet up with some friends for a hotel sleepover. It was the first time I've done anything social since January 2nd. I had more fun than I expected and was so glad that I went. The only negative was that I've spent this week being incredibly sore from being that active. The rest of my week was spent doing homework. My goal is to finish all of my schoolwork before I leave so that I can be essentially graduated. I won't be able to attend graduation but I think it's important that I finish everything and graduate on time. Since I'm missing graduation, I'm hoping to at least have a graduation party before I leave.

As a general update, my mom has spoken to my doctor in Minneapolis and we've settled on some dates. April 1/2 my mom and I will visit Minneapolis and I'll get a ferriscan done. The ferriscan is the test that measures the levels of iron in my liver. We expect these levels to be greatly decreased from my last test (based on the blood tests that measure the iron in my blood). Then we'll come home and celebrate Easter. The next weekend, April 8-12, I'm taking a trip to NYC by myself for the first time. I'll be staying with Laura, an amazing woman/friend who is originally from KC and now lives in NYC and works for MTV. She's incredible and has done so much for me over the past two years. This trip will be the last time that I will be able to visit my favorite city for at least a year. The next weekend, April 17/18, my mom and I will pack our things and move up to Minneapolis. Again. This time, i'm not coming home without some healthy bone marrow. The week of the 19th will be spent doing the pre-transplant tests and check-ups, bone marrow biopsy included :(. Then sometime shortly after that we will start chemo. I don't know the official start date for chemo yet, we won't know that until we get closer to the time.

Well, I think that's it for now. I'm trying to blog more frequently so you'll be hearing from me within the week. Maybe.

Reason of the Day: I'm not a big sports fan, but the Kansas Jayhawks won the Big 12! and K-State Wildcats got second. Much more Kansas success is expected throughout March Madness. Also, NDT (National Debate Tournament aka BIGGEST DEAL EVER) is coming up and three teams from KU qualified! This is extremely rare and impressive. Two of these teams consist of Patrick and Sean Kennedy, both of whom are East graduates and assistant coaches for our debate squad. A KU team won the NDT last year and one of these three teams could win it all this year. KANSAS PRIDE is always a reason to smile (RTS).

Good News

Dear readers,

I'm aware that I haven't blogged in awhile. Again. I decided not to bore you all with my continual crappiness. The past few weeks have been pretty tough, as have the past few months. For a quick update, I am still doing the iron chelation and the drug has become a little more tolerable. I'm able to eat more regularly and haven't thrown up in awhile. I still have stomach problems and I've still been feeling pretty crummy but it's more manageable at this point.

As far as my mood, it's no lie that I've been struggling with anxiety and depression since I got home. Anyone who knows anything about what I've been through would not be surprised to hear that. It's hard to admit to feeling depressed because it requires you to admit a weakness and admit not having control over things. As I've said before, I'm learning it's ok to NOT be ok. It's ok to have a bad day. It's ok to feel like crap. It's ok to wish things were different. As long as you realize that life won't always be like this. I'm happy to say that although I feel depressed a lot, I do feel in control because I can distinguish the fact that I will not always be depressed. Life is unpredictable and things can always change.

(clever segway to my good news!)

Speaking of change..... :)

Today I went to the hospital for a clinic visit for the third day in a row. Today I was just there for four hours to get some phosphorus by IV. A few hours in, my Nurse, Cathy, walked by and here's a lovely little play-by-play (as I remember it).

Cathy: Have you checked your email yet?

Me: What email?

Cathy: I'll be right back!

(walks away and comes back with two pieces of paper)

Cathy: The first page is the chart I sent to Doctor Tolar (my doctor in minneapolis). It's a chart to show your ferritin levels decreasing from the iron chelation we've been doing. The second page is the response that he sent me.

(I take the second page)

Second page: "Cathy, I think Elizabeth is ready to come for transplant now that her ferritin is below 1,000. She is remarkable! JT"

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! <-- lots of exclamation points

That's right ladies and gentlemen. I'm ready for transplant! I've been on this drug for three months and they expected it to take 6-12 months for my ferritin to be low enough to get me ready transplant. There was even a chance that my ferritin would never be low enough to safely transplant. My results have been, as Tolar said, "remarkable"!

So what now? Well, I'm going to pack up my things, again, and move back to minneapolis for transplant! For those of you who have not been following my blog, you're probably quite confused by this post. Sorry, you'll need to catch up on your own. After talking to my parents, It looks like I'm going to leave in about a month- April 17/18. This will hopefully give me time to pack up, clean, and maybe finish my last class so that I can basically graduate before I leave.

I think that's enough good news for one day. I will be updating more frequently as things unfold and as I plan to embark on this tough journey.......again.

PS- For those of you who have not already done this, you can get emails every time I post if you type your email in the box on the left. This takes away the hassle of having to check my blog on your own and allows you to keep up with my crazy journey.

Hope everyone else is having a great day!

Another PS- Special thanks to everyone who donated blood a few weeks ago at school. I get transfusions every 2 1/2 weeks and I can tell you, donating blood really does save lives! Without people like you, I would not be here right now. Thank you for your selfless actions.

Reason of the Day: This whole post? Duh! Good news is always a reason to smile (RTS).