10 days away and STRESS

All couples have told me that the weeks before their weddings were stressful... Managing the final payments, settling with the vendors, finalizing the small touches etc. Needless to say we are stressed. Most things we have to do, we actually need to do ourselves & what people could help with would take minutes. We have people who offered to help & we have been turning to them here and there to help put the last things together for the wedding. Since I am a stubborn mule, I want to do some of this myself to make myself proud that I put that wedding together with Kyle.

On top of wedding stress, we learned yesterday that my scans from this past Friday were not ideal. I had progression on Carboplatin & Gemzar. My doctor reported that the progression is in my pleural linings of my lungs and not my lungs & the ommentum (the lining in our abdomen to protect and hold organs together) has spots of cancer & those spots are over my liver, which already had 3 1cm tumors on it in November. Off of Carboplatin & Gemzar... and now onto Halaven.

Halaven will cause me to loose my hair in the next 3 weeks. I could have begged for another chemotherapy, but my doctor picks aggressive treatments when we are strong and can handle them. I am ok with going aggressive & this Chemo is not in any trials I would ever be eligible for. Since I like to hit my cancer as hard as I can & I wont be blocking myself from future treatments & trials, I feel this is the best choice.

People have asked me why I didnt wait to do my scans until after the wedding. I did not want my cancer to keep growing. My markers rose twice and I have two pea sized lymph nodes I literally can feel on my right collarbone. So I am not putting off chemo just because I am getting married or because I paid a decent amount of cash (8grand) on a custom wig to cover the patchy baldness I ended up with from brain radiation. That wig will be virtually useless in 3 weeks, but the salon said they will work with me on that & I hope they can and will.

So I would say the days before our wedding are layered with my medical stress & also the financial strain due to the cost of my cancer treatments, surgeries, wigs, gas into NYC, parking, trains etc. AND I am most likely going to have to pay for a whole new wig that will run a couple grand unless I get a grant for a wig to get the next one for free. I keep hoping my insurance will cover the whole cost of my wig, but they don't even cover my infectious disease doctor and felt that my crainiotomy surgery part deux was unnecessary (because I could live with an infection in my head...what idiots) and they refused to pay the plastic surgeon in full. I seriously owe both of those doctors a decent chunk of change, but they are still working with my pain in the butt insurance.

Kyle has been out of work for 3mo, because he had no choice but to stay home & take care of me when I was on IV antibiotics. He is really a good man. Not many people would do that unless they knew they could get paid from FMLA or Unemployment. Kyle did not qualify for either of those benefits as we are not legally family and he left his current freelance job on his own will not because there was no work, so no unemployment. He is a good man who has supported me for 7yrs of cancer and 10yrs of my life & many more.

I have known Kyle for 10yrs. We met on 3/17/07 and my life has been blessed ever since. Well blessed because I have had him with me and I with him during all the ups and downs that have happened in the last 10yrs. Like I said, Kyle is like a rarity. He listens, he cares, he goes out of his way to make others happy, and he truly loves people and will never leave someone behind if they need him. He also deals with my distractability, poor driving, cancer poop, whininess (because sometimes I can make everything sound tragic, so "tragedy had befallen me" has been an ongoing joke with us), how I am late for EVERYTHING, and has held back his own emotions to help me cope with mine. I wish I could care for him better. I wish he didn't have to deal with so many trials in the last 10yrs, but I am also glad he has been there to hold my hand through it all. I am so glad he will be my husband. 10days until we are officially married.

I am trying to not focus on being on yet another cancer treatment, which means I am getting a shorter list of available drugs to keep extending my life. I am glad I have a new treatment plan and don't need to think and obsess about what the popping nodes mean anymore, they mean exactly what I suspected the cancer wanted to grow and was on the move.

I am going to use these next 9 days to 1. appreciate my life, 2. enjoy the wedding planning, and 3. find a solution to my hair & hope that plan A still works which will be - use expensive custom wig, glue on head on the 31st, and style like a normal girl and well then I don't care what happens to my hair anymore. I will be alive, with Kyle, and if my hair falls out & that means I will have my Kyle Cancer can take my hair for the third time. It cannot take my spirit and it cannot take the love I have for Kyle, my wedding or my honeymoon. So up yours cancer YOU SUCK, but I RULE.

OK now for serious wedding planning! I feel like Kyle and I have been married 6yrs already & this is just our big party we decided to have after a crappy 5mo... I think thats how I will look at it. Kyle and I have been together longer than most marriages or relationships. I cannot wait for our party to celebrate a decade of happiness and fun and memories and love and dedication to each other.

I am still running my GoFundMe. Thanks for all the donations and caring thoughts and meals that people have helped us with. Thanks for even the wedding gifts! Seriously we are speechless for the help and thoughtfulness of everyone.