A busy week

I have a busy week scheduled. Some how, I have four doctor appointments, plus I need to work two days, go to the gym three days, and keep packing to move. Oh, and find a new place to live.

Tomorrow, Sunday, we are having our neighbors over around 9am so they can take a look at our house to see if they want to buy it. I am giving them first dibs because they are nice and I know they have been  house hunting for a while. But that means today I have to make the house look semi decent so they can actually look at it tomorrow. Then we are going to four open houses in the afternoon.

Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday I have doctor appointments. These are just a major time suck and I need to remember everything I want to ask them all (that means I need to start write them my questions down). And I need to get bloodwork done.

I think I am going to work Monday after my first appointment and then another day later in the week, maybe Thursday.

Oh, and did I say my back is giving me lots of pain these days? That could make me whiney.....

Its been a long ten years

I used to be a healthy person, really. Those of you who have known me for more than ten years know that. But for the rest of you I need to reassure you I was healthy at one point.

One of the big reasons we are selling our house is that we bought it when I was working full time in Boston. I needed the easy access to the city. I will never work full time again, nor will I ever work in Boston.

We bought this house in February 2005 and moved in. We got married in May and then my health went (I really do not believe that my marriage played any part in my body's decision to go to hell in a hand basket).

That August, I was home alone waiting for my husband to come home from work so we could leave for a long weekend when I started experiencing intense abdominal pain. So painful, it took me ten minutes to reach across the bed to get the phone. My husband had a new office phone which was saved in my cell phone which was far away - across the room - so I just called 911 for an ambulance.

It turned out I had fibroids and one had died off and caused a massive internal infection which put me in the hospital on IV antibiotics and ended up with a hysterectomy and home on medical leave for six weeks.

A year and a half later, I was diagnosed with breast cancer which lead to three surgeries, chemo and radiation. Then my gall bladder was removed. Then my back started hurting. And lymphedema, rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia.

Now I am looking toward to retirement and a healthier body. If that is possible. Could I ever be healthy again?

House selling and buying

So life is rolling along as we try to get our house ready to put on the market but we also need to find a new place to live. We have finally decided the house will go on the market Oct 16 and have two days of open houses.

We keep house hunting as well and finding houses we like but we can't put in an offer until we have our house on the market. If we do no one will accept our offer without a kick out clause (meaning they can accept other offers and ditch ours in the meantime). But we are trying to be good sellers and are house hunting because our realtors tell us to. 

Its just aggravating. However we have decided what we want in a new house. The real answers are: one floor living as much as possible, lots of storage, and a fire place and garage. Plus in our price range and near enough to my husband's job. Nothing complicated or fancy. A newer kitchen and bathrooms and no wall paper would be nice. But we can be flexible. They are all blurring together. 

In the meantime, we just pack and 'negotiate' with each other - mostly 'do you remember the house with the whatchamacallit?' The answer is always 'no, which one was that'. Maybe someday we will find one that is memorable and we can actually remember it.

We are still waiting!

I haven't nagged in a while but I would like to remind the world that all of us unhealthy people are waiting for that cure. We have aches and pains and doctor appointments and prescriptions (out the whazoo!). We would like those cures so we could return to our normal life as soon as possible.

Once diagnosed with something nasty, life changes (and we are told there is this new normal - that doesn't exist) and are stuck in a yucky limbo waiting for medical advancements to put us back together.

There are a lot of politics and corporate policies and big brother and much more involved in medical research. We don't really care. Take your billions and fix us.
K? Thanks.

PS I am whining and in a cranky mood today.

Who has the time?

I started wondering (which I admit can be a dangerous proposition) who has the time to waste spend on all this pinkification? It takes a lot of shopping to buy all the pink crap, time getting dressed in all the pink stuff, and everything that goes with it?

I am just amazed at the people I see out almost in a costume of pink at this time of year. Everything from jewelry, feather boas, shoes, bags, clothing, etc. Then there are the pink ribbons on everything. NFL players have pink towels. Buildings are lit up in pink.

I admit I bought a pink t-shirt with some slogan on the back of it to wear to chemo. I wore it once to my second infusion and never took it out of the closet again. I like the color pink and wear it often but I do not pinkify myself.

Personally I do not have the time or the energy to allow any one thing to take over my life like that. I live a multi-faceted life (note the big word early in the day) and allow myself to enjoy many different things, and squeeze in a few million doctor appointments.

I cannot imagine allowing anything to monopolize my life like that. I think a bad medical diagnosis, like breast cancer, is a wake up call that life is important. But it is not appropriate or healthy to obsess over it and allow it to monopolize your life. No one thing should be so important in anyone's life. Life is meant to be enjoyed and not have an obsession. Don't waste your time on any one thing.