I know I started this blog when my daddy was sick. Then it was my private blog, because I used his blog to keep people informed of his condition. Then when I got breast cancer, I was talked into making it public so that I could keep people informed of my condition and what I was going through. Well, now, I am going to use it for what I intended it to be, where I share what is on my mind, vent about whatever is going on in my life, or just document details that I want documented in writing somewhere. It may or may not be of any interest to anybody out there but me, but here goes.

The path I am currently walking is being the caregiver for my mom. She has Alzheimer's Disease. It is a hard disease to watch anyone go through, much less someone who is close to you, or at least used to be close to you. This disease has been termed the "long goodbye". People will tell you it is a disease that affects memory. But the ugly truth is, it is a disease that slowly but surely drives the person insane. It is so much more than a "memory issue". If all my momma did was repeat a question over and over, or tell me the same story over and over, that would be a welcome change to what is going on with my momma these days. We just celebrated Christmas, the day set aside to celebrate the birth of Jesus, our Lord and Saviour. As momma would open her gifts, she would put them in a large gift bag that was sitting there from someone else's gift. Later that evening, when she was getting ready to head to bed, she pulled that sack over to her chair a little closer and asked "what is in this bag?" As I pulled her gifts out to show her, "this is the box of candy Beck got you", and "this is the puzzle that Beck got you", and "this is the Circle the Word book and Snuggie that Kell got you" etc. , it was like Christmas all over again for her! She was all excited again! It was like this was the first time she had seen any of these gifts. When we are doing school at the table, mom will try and correct somebody and will read the numbers backwards or upside down (if they are on the other side of the table). For mom it will look like a 6 and to the child it is a 9, and she will tell them they are doing it wrong. Then the child will look at me, as if to say, "how am I supposed to respond to this situation??" I have told my kids "Grandma is always right, no matter what. Don't argue with her, it doesn't do anything but make her mad, so just agree, and move on." Mom has played dominoes all her life, she has taught all my kiddos how to play dominoes! But now, she doesn't remember the rules, and will play on any leg that she has a domino for. And she will get angry at anyone that plays on their own leg, if their play messes up her ability to play the only domino she had that she could have played! She will berate the child for messing up her chance to go out, because she could have played on that and now she can't and now she has to draw from the draw pile. Needless to say, we don't play dominoes very often anymore. And if we do, the kids know, we play by Grandma's rules, and Grandma always wins! My kids are getting to see a "Grandma" that is not the Grandma they have always known and loved. She will tell Emma Jean to go upstairs and go potty over and over, saying things like "your dancing, I know what that dance means, I used to have little girls, you get upstairs and go potty before you wee wee in your pants!" And Emma will go upstairs and go potty, or at least pretend to, and then come back downstairs, and five minutes later, momma will start again, "you need to go potty little girl before you wee wee in your pants." Emma will look at me with that pleading look, but will obediently go upstairs, go into the bathroom for a few minutes, then come back downstairs. After about the fifth time, she will begin to say "Grandma I don't need to go potty, I just went potty" and momma will get mad and say "you are not going to do what I say? Debra Faye, you need to intervene here, she is not doing what I am telling her to do". Kimberly, my 12 year old, has told me in private that she thinks Grandma just misses being a mom and telling someone what to do. Wow, how's that for wisdom from the mouth of a child? She is also losing the ability to use the right word in her thought process. Like instead of saying "bring the Pledge over here, I can see the dust on that TV cabinet", she will say, "bring the psssssshhhhsss stuff over here". If she can hear Adam's music, she will say "his level of hearing is high". Instead of "where is my trash can?", she will say "where is that thing you throw this kind of stuff into?" as she holds out her hand full of candy paper. But there are moments of clarity that pop up here and there, where my momma is once again....my momma! It is in those moments that you want to stop the world, stop whatever you are doing and chat with her about what is going on in your life. But as quickly as she appears, she is gone again. This really is the hardest part of this disease. The part where she doesn't think there is anything wrong with her, other than she is getting "old and forgetful". She is 73 years old. She is way too young to be this forgetful. No, this is not normal aging. But you can't tell her that either. The experts say we are not to tell them how bad they are, it will cause them to be stressed, or depressed. And the speed of progression of this disease is directly related to their anxiety or stress. If you can manage their anxiety, protect them from anything that causes them anxiety or stress, then you can slow down the progression. Every traumatic event could send them to a whole different level, a level that they will not recover from. The doctor says that when she declines, when she slips to a different level, that I am not to expect her to "come back" to the same level she was at before the trauma. That is so hard to accept.. And it is so hard to implement as well. This is my momma. In the past we were able to talk, have conversations about whatever was going on in my life, and she would give me some advice or at least a listening ear, some support. Not anymore. Recently, when she was complaining about a decision I had made, I gave her a frustrated answer like...."momma, I don't know the right thing to do in this situation, I just know that as a Christian, we should forgive, show love and move forward. I am open to any suggestions you have for a better way to handle this." She looked at me and for a minute, a moment of clarity, a brief glimpse of my momma appeared. She said, "well Debra Faye, you need to listen to the Lord then, because what I am thinking, and the advice I would give you is probably not very nice." I laughed out loud!! I tell you, on some days, she is there, spot on, and then other days she makes no sense at all, and nothing she says goes together, and it leaves you thinking "what was she trying to say to me??". There are days she is like an adult woman, and then there are days she is like a ten year old, trying to start a fight, being very antagonistic, trying to get someone, anyone, in trouble. I try and give her jobs that she can help me with, like setting the table, or folding the towels, or using the dust mop on the floors. She wants to do something to help. But if she sets the table, then she sets down and with a tone will say "someone gave me a small fork!" When one of my kids offered to take the small one and get her a larger one, she acted as if she was angry that they were trying to take her fork! I'm telling you, there are days that are just harder than others. My kids are being real troopers, but making memories with their Grandma, well, it is not exactly like that. I can see a couple of them starting to withdraw from Grandma. They don't want to come in and be in the same room with her, especially if it is on one of her bad days, and yes, they have learned to recognize the signs that this is indeed a "bad day". On those days, they stay in their rooms, do their school in their rooms, dodge Grandma at any cost. I find myself second guessing myself constantly, am I doing the right thing, taking care of my momma here in my home? Will this Grandma be the one they remember? Am I pushing the good memories of Grandma Adams completely out of their memories and replacing those memories with these feelings of fear and apprehension? I doubt that I will ever know if what I am doing is the perfect solution, but at this point, I doubt that I could do anything different. I can't put momma in a facility, when she doesn't think there is anything wrong with her. She will say "I am not there yet, I am not that bad yet". And the reality is, when we go and visit her friends that are in those facilities, she is worse than them mentally! Yet, there are so many sitting around in wheel chairs, in diapers, staring off into space, and yes, there is more to consider than her mental abilities, or lack thereof. When people spend their days in those situations, no wonder they give up, and cry, and want to die! What a way to spend your days. Where are these facilities that you see on TV, where the Senior Adults are having the time of their lives!? All I know is she is my momma, and I put her through all kinds of mess when I was a teenager, and so did my siblings. This is the time for me to rise up and call my momma blessed. This is the time for me to honor my parents, even if it is hard. It is a thank-less job. You don't get any thank yous, or any appreciation. You just do what needs to be done, what has to be done, "even if it is not fun, it still has to be done". Maybe I am teaching my kids that no matter what, no matter how hard it is, no matter how inconvenient it is in our lives, sacrifices have to be made to do the right thing. Because it helps us to focus on the fact that we should not be living this life for us. It ain't about us. Greater love hath no man than to lay down his life for another. Servant hood is caught, more than taught. In this society, serving others' needs above our own, is hard to find. And maybe, just maybe, as we do this very very hard thing, they will get it.

Hey there folks! I just signed on to see when the last time I was on here, and read my last post, teehee. Apparently my husband had some time on his hands, while I was passed out in the hospital! I love him to death. Life has been super busy since I woke up from the over 7 hour surgery. It was a very painful and slow recovery. And let me tell you, I have a very high tolerance for pain! I have birthed 6 babies at home! I thought I was tough, until this surgery. I don't mind telling you, it flat laid me down. I think, if I had it to do over again, I would have made different choices. What I have been through, in pain, not to mention the inconvenience of it all, is not worth this body part I have now. The doctor says I have two more surgeries to go, but they will not be anything like what I just went through. The next one will most likely be a one night stay in the hospital, and the third one will be an out-patient surgery (same day?). And that I am not to make any "judgements" on his work until after we are all said and done. Yeah, right. I have an incision from hip to hip, that looks worse than Jen's scar from her C-section. And well, the other incisions are just plain weird looking. Keith says I went into surgery on Thursday morning, June 17th, at 6:30 a.m. and didn't wake up and actually talk coherently until Saturday night! Sunday I had to have help to get out of bed and go to the bathroom. Monday, I was able to get up, slowly, but at least I got up by myself. I had to roll over, and set up, but I could do it. On Tuesday they brought in my discharge papers and told me I could go home. I walked all hunched over like an old lady! I could not stand up straight, and therefore my back would begin to hurt if I stood up for very long. When I laid down, I had to have enough pillows behind me to keep me in a semi-upright position. Jenna, my daughter, had brought my momma down to the farm to help me in my recovery. Yes, I have a crew of kiddos to get this and get that, but they need a little guidance from an adult to make sure the chores get done, if you know what I mean. They told me it would be a 6 week recovery, with no driving for at least 4 weeks. I still have a weight limit on what I am allowed to lift. But, every day I am feeling a little stronger. I am not quite to the point of getting up and staying up and at it all day until dark, but every day I can stay up and at it a little bit longer! Believe me, I can tell when I have overdone it, too. My muscles in my stomach area are extremely tender. This makes it hard to hold my grand baby, Quincy for very long, but I am beginning to hold her a little more each day. She is such a joy, and I am missing being able to cuddle with her and play with her, and hold her up, and and and and. You get the picture. July 9th, Keith drove my mom and I to Portageville Missouri for my 35 year high school reunion. I didn't do much more than walk in and sit at a table and visit with friends from my past, but I did enjoy getting out of the house and seeing people! My mom got to visit with her BFF Thelma Harmon, which is where we stayed. We are getting ready to leave on Monday morning to drive my mom to Stuttgart Arkansas, because her brother, Henry Carl White passed away. We knew him as Uncle Shorty. It has been many years since my mom has gotten to see and visit with her family members from Possum Valley, and she is actually looking forward to her "White Reunion". I am sure it will be a few days of mixed emotions. Funerals are sad events, mixed with the silver lining of getting to see so many of your relatives and friends all in one place. It is about a 6 hour drive, so it shouldn't be too hard a trip. We will leave on Monday morning, and drive to Collierville, and stop and have lunch with mom's friend, Janice. While there, mom will get made beautiful again! Janice is a beautician! We will get back on the road, and head toward Stuttgart, the duck capital of the world, LOL! The visitation is Monday night, from 5-7 p.m. The funeral will be a grave-side service, per Uncle Shorty's request, on Tuesday afternoon at 2 o'clock. After that, we are playing it by ear. We may stay in Stuttgart and visit some more with momma's family, or we may get in the car and head at least part of the way home. I am not really sure at this point. I would appreciate your prayers for my momma, as I am sure this is going to rattle her good. I am looking forward to getting to actually meet some of my momma's family face to face. One of her family members in particular, I have been talking to in emails, Facebook chat and on the phone so much in the past three years, I feel as if we are best friends. Yet, we have never met face to face! I am really looking forward to that meeting...Cousin Bill, here I come!!

DAY IN A LIFE

hello all,this is Keith, debs husband.the day is Sunday June 20, fathers day. We are at BJC Hospital in the third day of recovery of reconstruction surgery. Deb is doing much better this morning, took a little nourishment drinking fluids . RN"s plan to set her in chair today. I've pondered a lot of thoughts over the last few days as i watch my bride of thirty years lay in controllable pain. how can one woman withstand so much and still give so much. As most of you know the last 3 years have been a little trying to say the least, filled with hospital visits and hospital stays. Many many trips and countless miles back and forth to hospitals and to loved ones.YET in all that has transpired deb has never lost her focus on the task at hand, always ready to be there when needed, sacrificing her own children's time and mine to be there for her mother or who ever is in need. and her children will call her BLESSED. I sometimes wonder where she gets the strength, i am reminded of her constant faith,unwavering faith in our LORD JESUS CHRIST. I know that our time to enjoy is coming . It"s been awhile since we got to enjoy time off . As you probably know deb spent her birthday cleaning her mothers garage out so the termite man could drill through the concrete to treat the house every 14 inches, all day long. June 7, Monday,our 30 year anniversary she drove her mother to Memphis then over to little rock to spend time with old family friends, came back on Friday in time to take her to the doctors for mammogram got back to the farm on Saturday, June 12 left for hospital wed. June 16, really don't know how she has time for it all. she always says you have to make time and make it a priority. So here we sit and lay on fathers day enjoying each others company even if its in a hospital room in the middle of the city. we don't get to choose our paths sometimes we just walk the path that the lord lays before us . My thoughts and prayers go out to all those who cannot grasp the whole concept of true servant hood. Giving of yourself and your time when its inconvenient not convenient,sacrificing your own true enjoyment to give enjoyment to the less fortunate. sacrificing, do we really know the true meaning ,I know my wife does, I see her push her self to the limits all so often,I can stand by her and support her as i always have and always will. WHERE THE LORD GUIDES THE LORD PROVIDES''

Processing lots of stuff these days...

I signed on and was surprised to see that I had not been on here since March. Life has been so incredibly busy. On March 15, I had my port removed. On March 17, my mom had a fainting spell at church while at her Wednesday bible study. On March 18, I took her up to Excel Imaging to have an ultrasound done to check for blockages in her veins that might be a contributing factor to these dizzy spells. On March 19, her neurologist called and suggested we add another drug (Trileptal) to her prescriptions. On March 20, I moved up to mom's so that I could watch her for any reactions to this new drug. I figured I needed some quite time to work on her tax return anyway, so I packed a bag and moved up there. It also was spring break for the Sullivan kiddos, so they came to my house for their spring break! On Monday, my sister Lois came to mom's to join us. Mom kept asking me how I was coming on the tax returns and why don't I take a break and come join them, so eventually I just closed up the laptop and went and sat outside in the swing with them. We did lunch with mom's friend from House Springs, and mom really seemed to be having a good time. Not long after we laid down to bed on Tuesday night, Lois stuck her head in the bedroom telling us that she was heading up to pick up my sister Becky from the St. Louis airport! Beck had been somewhere to watch her daughter play volleyball for her school, and because of a huge snowstorm in the Denver area, her flight had to be re-routed! Woohoo! So, it took an act of God, but all three of mom's girls were there with her for her birthday! Beck and Lois arrived at mom's a little past midnight, and were leaving the next morning by 9:30 a.m. I don't mind telling you, I was hoping for a little longer lay-over, but it was nice that momma got to see them and spend some time with them both. Then we made it through Palm Sunday and Easter, got mom started on Meals on Wheels program, and finished up the tax returns and got them in the mail. On April 20, while up there to get her grass mowed, we found termites. We made the appropriate phone calls to get someone over there to inspect and confirm, and yes, it was confirmed. He did a walk through of the basement to make sure there were none on the inside, and there were not, thank God! There was some damage to a door frame on the outside of the basement, but that was minor. We made the appointment to have her house sprayed on May 12th, the soonest he could come. After giving me the instructions to have her garage cleaned out, everything away from the walls before he returned, we made the appointment. April 22, mom had another doctor's appointment, that was just a check-up to make sure everything was fine. They doubled her Aricept and her seizure meds based on their assessment after giving her the MM test again. She is now on 10 mg of Aricept once a day, 1000 MG of Keppra twice daily, and 300 mg of Trileptal twice daily. We keep her pills in a pill box with the days of the week to help her know if she has taken them or not, and Kelly makes sure she gets the morning dose before she leaves for work and I call her around 5ish and remind her to take the evening pills. Sometimes Kelly has to work until closing (8pm) and mom will go to bed before Kelly gets home. Other than the Dementia issues/Alzheimer's issues, mom is doing great. She is still considered to be in Stage 5, with some days (her off days) some issues that are considered to be Stage 6. You can read through the stages on www.ALZ.org But most days, she is a solid Stage 5.

That's a quick update on my life with my momma. The update on my cancer walk has been pretty much normal until this week. I have enjoyed having a life that resembled my normal before cancer life. My energy level is still not what it was before cancer, but I am getting there. It has been 6 months since I finished my last radiation treatment. It has been 3 months since I got my port removed. So, without the regular trips to Barnes, I have fallen into the feeling "I am done". And, with that feeling, I began to feel good about continuing on with the "next thing". That next thing is re-construction. I thought I was ready enough to go to my doctor appointment by myself. Bad decision. I took two of my daughters, Jen and Jess, and of course, my grand baby, Quincy. They sat out in the waiting room, which put me in there alone, with the doctor that was giving me a run down of all the procedures that this would entail, as well as all the worst case scenarios. The more he talked, the more light headed I got, and it wasn't long before I was feeling the intense need to lay on the floor and feel the cool tile against my face. I told the doctor I just wanted to sign the consent form and leave. I had told him what I wanted, based on my research, made sure he understood that, and said where do I sign. He said, no way, that I needed to take it home, think about it, look it over with my husband, and fax it back to him. This was a huge surgery, and possibly life threatening and not to be taken lightly. It was not a "boob job". He said, he does those, and most of those girls return to work rather quickly. But reconstruction after mastectomy was a totally different animal, and involved severed veins, damaged veins, brittle bones from radiation, damaged skin, etc. Veins, arteries, important issues, these things would need to be moved around, reattached in other places to make sure that adequate blood supply was in place in order for tissue and other things to be able to survive. It is a 6 hour surgery. I should plan to be in the hospital for a minimum of 4 days, some require a week long stay. I need to report for surgery at 5:30 am the day of surgery, with nothing to eat or drink after midnight the night before. This surgery is a standard 6 weeks recovery, and I should expect to walk like "an old man", hunched over for at least a couple weeks, maybe longer. Lots and lots of details that I won't share here, but suffice it to say, I was feeling more than a little nauseated. What was I thinking?? I don't know why I thought I was "ready" for this. I came out of that office, trying not to run down the hall, down the stairs, and across the parking lot to my car. I wanted to be home, sitting on my deck, watching my birds, listening to my kiddos play in the yard....I wanted to be HOME. I know, I know that God is in control, and that God's got this, and I have faith He will see me through all of this, but I was feeling like a big fat human being, with a whole bunch of emotional hormones running rampant. I felt like that Amy Grant song..."they don't know that I go running home when I fall down". I wanted to run home. I called Keith, met him at the parking lot of the local gas station, and just cried as he wrapped his arms around me right there on the parking lot. It's not over, by a long shot. More surgery, more drains, more pain, more recovery, more bed time, more down time, more "he maketh me lie down" time. I will get through this, I will, with God's help.

Finally, a light at the end of the tunnel....

I am sitting at Barnes, in the Infusion room, in a recliner. Today, as this Herceptin is being pumped into my veins, through my port, I am having all kinds of emotional feelings. Today, is my last Herceptin treatment. As I walked the familiar walk from the garage, this was on my mind. As I walked the familiar path to the elevators of the Siteman Cancer Center, this was on my mind. As my emotions were running wild, trying to process all that has happened to me in the past 18 months, it sometimes just overwhelms me. As I walk, I notice all the people that are coming and going, everyone has their own "normal" routine. This routine has been my "normal" for so long. I know, 18 months is not really "so long". That amount of time is but a vapor in this life. But this walk, this path, that I have been on, has been harder than I had thought it would be. Emotional roller coaster, definitely. Cancer seems to cause everyone to re-evaluate their life's direction. As my circumstances began to consume more and more of my time and attention, it caused me to constantly lose sight of who was in control. In one of my devotions last week, or maybe it was a couple of weeks ago, it was talking about how your biggest "danger was worrying about tomorrow. If you try and carry tomorrow's burdens today, you will stagger under the load and eventually fall flat. You must discipline yourself to live within the boundaries of today." There's wisdom there, folks. I need to stop judging and evaluating myself. That's not my job. I need to stop comparing myself to others. This will produce either feelings of pride, or inferiority; sometimes a mixture of both. And both are wrong and meaningless. When I first started out on this path, this personal path of cancer, the future was scary. When we try and think about the future, no wait, lets call it what it is, WORRY about the future, we are showing our rebellion towards God. We are taking those things that belong to God, and trying to manage them ourselves. The future belongs to God. All we have is today, there is no promise of tomorrow. It is a constant battle for me to look at today, not tomorrow, or next week...TODAY. If I start to look at the future, I get anxious. That should be the red flag that stops me from thinking about the future!! God is God and I am not. I am trying to train myself to always be THANKFUL. If God is putting something in my path, I should be THANKFUL for it. There is a purpose for it, HIS purpose. If I am not seeing my faults, God has a way of putting some person or some situation in my path that brings out that fault, in living color, so that I have to deal with it. I need to be THANKFUL for the opportunity to deal with it, so that I can try and become the person God wants me to be, minus that part of my personality that hinders that. "We all have issues" is a commonly used phrase to stop us from actually doing something about our issues. Yes we do all have issues. But, as Christians, we should be actively trying to change to be better people, better Ambassadors for Christ. We should make it our passion to make people want the Christ we have. They should see something about us that is different, something about the way we handle life, that makes them wonder what we have, what helps us cope. That could open up an opportunity for us to tell them about our faith, about our relationship with Jesus. I admit, there have been times when I have fallen way short of that goal. There have been times in my life where I am sure people walked away shaking their heads at me, thinking they didn't want anything I had. But, God is a loving and forgiving God, and knows where I have been, and knows where He is taking me. He knows how far I have come, and how far I still have to go, before I even get close to where He needs me to be. The key is to stay focused on God, stay thankful for all He puts in my path to get me there. Stay focused on the fact that everything He does is for my good, but more importantly, for His glory. Understanding is not a requirement. FAITH is a requirement. One foot in front of the other, walking, trusting, leaning, holding onto....GOD. I don't need to know the plan. I know the one who is in charge, and I know He loves me, and I trust HIM. Lord help me to not only be able to say that, but to live my life in a manner that shows that.

I have been going back and forth with emotions these days. Ok, not even "back and forth", more like all over the map. So, is it the drugs I am still on for the Cancer? Is it a symptom of menopause? Is it part of the everpresent grief process? Is it a symptom of my life? We as Christians are not supposed to be depressed. We are supposed to always show the joy of Jesus. Don't get me wrong here. I do have the "joy, joy, joy, joy, down in my soul." But, there are days that I allow the circumstances of life bump my focus. I should not allow that, I know. I need to get more in the Word, listen to more Christian music, but life keeps getting in the way of that too! I have been talking "at" the Lord a lot lately, and I know I need to do more "listening" for direction. That's the trouble. I know what I need to be doing, I know the right things to do, I just am not doing them. That makes all this even worse. "There are no good decisions, just decisions." We as Believers, we have all the head knowledge we need. Most of the time, we even have the heart knowledge we need. It is the application of all that knowledge that seems to make life a bit tricky. It is not enough to say we believe God is in control. What should set believers apart is how they live their life. Do we actually live our lives as if God is in control? I remember when I found out that I was pregnant with my Emma Jean. She was baby number 10. I was 46 years old, and my "baby" was 5 years old. Enough time had passed since my last pregnancy, that I had already dealt with the mixed bag of emotions that came with being too old to birth anymore babies. Whether or not I wanted anymore children, is not the point. I had accepted the fact that I was too old to have anymore children. When I knew that I was indeed pregnant, and was going to have another baby, I had a flood of emotions. The main one was fear. Fear of birthing a baby at 46 years old. Fear of what people would say when they found out that we were going to have another baby. I shed some tears, I'm not going to lie. And what my husband Keith said to me was "God is in control. Either you believe that or you don't. And if you do, then why are you crying? You can tell people we are going to have another baby, when you can tell them without crying." I was scared! I let fear get the best of me. I let the fear of what other people think of me get the best of me. I let circumstances that were scary, shake my belief, or my confidence, in who is in control. I know better than that. I was raised better than that. Not only did I live with parents who set a very high mark and lived a good example, but since my marriage to my husband, we have developed a very strong faith muscle of our own. Every child has to develop his or her own Christianity, their own faith. When Keith and I were expecting our second child, Kelly Rene, the factory where Keith has worked since he was 18 announced they were closing their doors. Keith's dad worked at that factory. His grandpa had worked at that factory. It was a huge employment provider for this area. But here we were, with one child and one child on the way, and faced with unemployment and cancellation of our insurance. Even after the company offered him various positions within the company, in other locations, we prayed about it, and Keith felt very strongly that God was going to take care of us, and something else would turn up.....in Festus. He did not feel at peace with accepting the employment if it meant we would be moving our family away from Festus. Lots of years later, lots of faith trials later, and I am still letting circumstances fill me with fear. God has always, always been there for me. He has never let me down. Yet, like the Israelites, when trials come and make life hard for me, I doubt Him. After all He has done for me. It is so frustrating. When does Christian maturity come? How old will I be when I am mature in the faith? Will I ever be? I have received the news that a very dear friend that was in a car wreck about a month ago, has gone home to be with Jesus. She was my age. She was a good friend. I loved her.

Hello people! I realize I have not written anything on here in over a month. I am so crazy busy. I did have a wonderful Christmas with all my family here. My momma even agreed to come down and spend the night at my house on Christmas Eve, so that my daughter Kelly could be with us on Christmas morning. That was a first! We were all so thrilled and excited. It does make things easier when mom is agreeable and "goes along with the plan". That is getting less and less these days. As mom progresses in this disease, she gets more and more adamant about doing things her way. "You have to use this door, not that door, to go in and out of my house." "You need to wrap up the baby this way BEFORE you put her in her car seat." "You need to turn up here and take this road, it will be faster." Creative re-direction is the tool of choice these days.

I am still traveling back and forth to do my Herceptin treatments every 21 days. I got a letter in the mail Monday, telling me that my recent bloodwork pathology showed that I was extremely low on my Vitamin D levels. Normal readings should be around 40-50, and mine were 14! So, they put me on prescription level Vitamin D. You can buy 1000 iu over the counter. I need 50,000 iu weekly, minimum. So they gave me 50,000 iu pills to take once a week in addition to the over the counter ones I am taking. The fatigue is still annoying me. I still manage to push through my day and get my stuff done, but by dark-thirty, my mind is gone, and I can barely make a clear thought, much less a coherent conversation. And emotional? Geez, I am so emotional these days, if you look at me with your mean face, I will more than likely cry! I will try and explain to you through my tears that I am ok, and just to give me a minute, but still....will cry. I try and get all my emotional stuff out of the way in the mornings. But, occasionally, something will sneak up on me, and bam....my focus is whacked. Once I get a good night sleep, I am much better in the mornings! I am asking for prayer, as there are many issues I am facing at this time. So many that to try and put them into words would just make me cry, and then I would not be able to finish this, so just move me up to the top of the prayer list, please. God knows what the needs are, and God answers prayer. I know this to be true, which is why I am asking all my prayer warriors out there to pray on! I need to be held up in prayer, as Satan is attacking with the big guns. My daddy used to say, our biggest weakness, is an unguarded strength. Well, something I had always thought was strong, has recently been attacked, and I need some serious prayer from serious Christian believers. Thanks, in advance.....