Another Crazy Christmas in France

January 12, 2018January 12, 2018Leave a comment

I love going to my in-laws in the French Loire Valley for Christmas, which is a sacred familial time for them.

This year getting out of Nashville was a bit exhausting due to all the normal get-out-of-town craziness and preparations for my last Peptide Receptor Radionuclide Therapy (PRRT) which is scheduled for this week (January 9-12). I’ve been feeling good, but I was definitely burning the candle at both ends. Even so, I was a little surprised that my therapy clearance blood work showed my red blood cells and platelets plummeted. Sure, it’s not unusual for this to happen and there’s a good chance I even sabotaged myself.

I’d been hearing so much hoopla around the ketogenic diet, including that it is good for cancer patients since it starves cancer cells of the glucose they need to grow. BUT, as it turns out, guess what red blood cells need to reproduce? If you guessed glucose, then you are correct. Oopsy!

Fortunately, the counts were still well above the therapy minimums and gave me a self signed permission slip to reinstated carbs, which would’ve been an epic failure (and just all together wrong) in France and Italy anyways.

Enough cancer.

Flying to Paris and arriving was a shit show but no more than usual. Travel in Europe is a physical work out, but I was happy to arrive to my beloved village of St. Cyr en Val to be greeted by droves of family. Also, it was extra fun this year since my friend from Nashville joined to experience a French Christmas.

We spent the first few days getting adjusted to the time, visiting Chateau de Chambord and locating a few Camino shells throughout Orleans, a potential stop for those walking to Santiago from Paris.

In the hot seat!

Christmas Eve was the big event! This is when 50 of my crazy french in-laws drink oodles of champagne, sing, dance and eat platters of oysters. This year the chaos was amplified by a photo booth, introducing them to white elephant/dirty santa and CLR….until 4am. It was really fun and I can officially say that I am completely acclimated (it only took nine years). We even ventured off to midnight mass where Father Jean-Baptiste called me to the pew for a little interview. I was throughly embarrassed, but also touched since I know he prays for my health often. Last year he blessed me and this year he expressed excitement about my trip to Rome to see his boss, Pope Francis.

The following days after Christmas Eve shenanigans were filled with gifts and visits and food and drinks and naps. I was tired and my brain hurt from french but I think it was my favorite Christmas in a long time.

On the 27th, we were off to Paris for a couple of days. Day one was spent walking around Galerie Lafayette, seeing the sights on a Bateaux Mouche, a comedy show and a long, late dinner at a tapas restaurant. My Nashville friend also had a great time with the exception of the last night where she was hit with food poisoning and spent the whole night sick. With her night reminding me of the months I spent laying on the bathroom floor I felt so bad for her having to travel all day feeling like that. Fortunately, I don’t leave home without a couple Zofran, which helped her make it home after a looooooong hard day.

As she soldiered through, my husband and I got to experience something really special at the Paris Zoo. His cousin is the giraffe keeper and invited us for a private visit with her 15 giraffes. We got to feed and pet them and take pictures. It was incredible and it took everything I had not to steal one. With the day spent fawning over giraffes, we walked around the Champs Elysées and met an old friend for dinner. We haven’t seen him in seven years and wow a lot has happened and changed. Satisfied with a wonderful time in France, we went back to our friends tiny apartment for a long sleep before jetting off to Italy in the morning.

Cheers to many more Christmas celebrations in the Loire Valley!

See…they cray!

Top Ten of 2017

December 31, 2017December 31, 20172 Comments

Overall, I’d say 2017 was a decent year. In January, I set out to get a handle on my technology addiction in an attempt to stop wasting my life behind a screen. For the first six months of the year I did really well at, but the 79th organ (aka the iPhone) slowly crept back into my bedroom around summer time. You can’t win them all, I guess and I will take January 1 to do what yogis do – begin again.

However, a big win was my second New Year’s resolution to stay present by not worrying about the traumas of the past or uncertainty of the future. I feel that I not only accomplished this well most days, but I also have been able to let shit go – I’m talking to you fear. I’m really looking forward to exploring this more in 2018. Stay tuned for some drastic steps I’ll be taking to work towards this in January & February.

Then, the elephant in the room – finding more neuroendocrine cancer after undergoing a GA-68 scan which lead to Peptide Receptor Radionuclide Therapy (PRRT). I am so grateful my insurance covered the treatment, it’s working well and I’m feeling great.

Other notable events included climbing Mt. LaConte, finding a yoga home in Nashville and lots of travel – Amsterdam, Denver, Detroit, New York City, Houston, Austin, Toronto, New Orleans, the Gulf Coast, a cruise to Central America, Tampa, France and Italy. Next year, I already have trips planned to Spain for INCA (International Neuroendocrine Cancer Alliance) and a weekend of fun in Madrid with a friend AND the United Kingdom for a birthday celebration, which coincidently falls the same week of the royal wedding (eeeekkkk). Not too shabby for someone currently undergoing cancer treatment.

So, as I write this blog, I am standing in St. Peter’s Square in the Vatican, awaiting the Pope’s Sunday blessing and counting my lucky stars for another year on planet earth well lived. I want to thank you for supporting my blog, which has doubled it’s readership in 2017. It has touched me beyond words, especially when I receive personal emails where intimate stories are shared of how cancer and illness has touched your life. It is bitter sweet, but certainly makes a gal feel loved, supported and honored that you want to share such private corners of your lives. I wish everyone much health, wealth and happiness in 2018 and always.

I thought now might be a good time to share my most read posts of 2017. Again, thank you all for reading.
10. PRRT Diary #3: Magic
9. Waiting Out Hurricane Harvey
8. Nerding Out on NETs in NYC
7. Advocating for NETs
6. 7 Yoga Truths for Cancer & Life
5. A Day in the Life of a Cancer Patient
4. Things Are Not Always as They Appear
3. PRRT Diary #1: Coordinating
2. My Double Life
1. 10 Lessons for the Newly Diagnosed

A pic from last night’s walk home from dinner.

All is Unfair in Cancer and Hurricanes

September 13, 2017September 25, 20171 Comment

As featured on curetoday.com

Peptide Receptor Radionuclide Therapy (PRRT) is an exciting treatment for Neuroendocrine Tumors (NETs). While considered investigational because of its pending status at the FDA, Europe has performed this therapy with an 80% success rate for over a decade.

When a May Gallium-68 scan found microscopic tumors, my specialist recommended I pursue this treatment. It took a lot of coordinating, but I was able to access this therapy at a facility in Houston under Texas’s Right to Try law, a preferred option compared to traveling to Europe.

My first treatment went great, leaving me virtually symptom free and slashing my blood tumor marker a whopping 75%. Investigational therapies are not always covered by insurance, so it was also pretty exciting when I found my insurance company paid for the treatment.

Life was looking like sunshine and kittens, so my husband and I decided the next trip to Houston should not be completely about cancer. So, we booked a romantic beach weekend in Galveston before my next therapy, scheduled for August 31st.

Cancer has already taught me to quickly develop back-up plans, so when the Houston clinic called to explain there could be a delay due to the approaching hurricane, I jumped into action, developing a Plan B and Plan C. Little did I know after all the events transpired, I’d end up on Plan F.

Plan A – Fly from Nashville to Houston to enjoy a weekend on the beach in Galveston before returning to Houston for treatment.

Plan B – Take the scheduled flight to Houston, drive to Dallas for the weekend. Return to Houston when the storm passes.

Plan C – Drive from Nashville, stopping to visit Memphis, Little Rock and Dallas, where we would wait for the green light.

Plan D – Reschedule therapy until September 12th, the one week my husband had an important commitment.

Plan E – Get my older brother lined up to take my husband’s place by booking him a flight out of Tampa September 10th. Enter Hurricane Irma.

Plan F – Break my husband’s commitment so he can come with me to Houston and spend the next few days calling airlines, hotels, etc. to reschedule…yet again.

While all of this was unfolding, I could rationalize that it would have been pointless for me to try to enter Houston during the chaos or for my brother to leave his family in the midst of a disaster, but still, it was stressful. Cancer already creates feelings of powerlessness, fear and uncertainty. Piling on more seems unfair. Before I spun into a ball of anxiety, I stopped and gave myself an attitude and perspective adjustment. I am lucky my situation is not critical because there were/are others impacted by cancer who had/will have urgent situations in the midst of these disasters. Rescheduling is a minor inconvenience when a hurricane is barreling toward your home.

As I rationalized and calm myself, I realized the similarities between hurricanes and cancer. Both are natural disasters, with human contributing factors. Both are completely unfair. Both can be devastating by taking everything you have. Both have the potential to create resilience. Both can bring out the best in people. Both create perspective because when we or our loved ones are in danger, the stresses of daily life don’t seem so stressful. And both are reminders that there is so much we can not control.

“If plan A doesn’t work, the alphabet has 25 more letters – 204 if you’re in Japan.” – Claire Cook

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