These Days are Amazing, but Oh So Hard

A dear friend procured a scooter for my sweetie. It has made him more mobile, so he has been able to get out a bit better. On his birthday, we went down to Huntsman for another paracentesis. They removed 4 liters of fluid from my sweetie's abdomen, but the doctor said she could have removed a lot more except that it is hard on his kidneys. If you remember, they are failing. 

Not too long after that, we took the scooter out for its maiden voyage to the high school to watch Baby Doll play volleyball. It was a scrimmage, which was nice, because she played the entire time, which we loved, of course. Curly took some pics for you.

 Finally, we celebrated his birthday with cake and stuff which I told you already. It was a great day!

Happy Birthday!

We have amazing friends and neighbors!! Every night, people brought  food, including this beautiful cake for my sweetie's 62nd birthday.

He has tons of great memories, but here is one more new one.

Happy birthday, Sweetie!!

Guest Blog: Big Changes by the Dog Walker

 Mom has asked me to guest blog for her. We're sorry that we haven't blogged for days. The reason that is is because Mom, the family and I are feeling overwhelmed to learn that my dad is going to pass on and we're really devastated. Ever since Mom told me about this sad news, I was really worried about how the death of my father is going to impact our lives, like going through a financial crisis and having to remember certain things with yardwork tasks and the right materials for them. Everything has been happening so fast ever since, Dad got home from the hospital and put into a hospice bed.

Mom had told me that we'll make it through even after my dad passes on. But despite this scary experience, for the last few days, we've had a lot of nice neighbors and friends give us some homemade meals and treats. It was really nice to have times not to have to cook for ourselves for a little while.

On Sunday, we went to church. Well, I went to the singles ward, but Dad was able to attend church with Mom and the other siblings in the family ward. After church, we had a family party for Dad to pay tribute to him. A lot of family came over to celebrate the August birthday parties. Mostly for Little Warrior, Curly, Drama Queen, and of course Dad.  It had been the last family party for him and we cherished every moment of it. 

One other cherished moment that Dad had was playing poker with his siblings who came over. They had quite a blast while some of the kids stayed in their rooms to either work on homework or watch a movie.

There are a lot of things I'm going to miss about my dad, but I'm mostly going to miss him, because he had helped me improve my life through challenges, like learning how to cope with hard times like this. The best advice he ever gave to me and my siblings, was in times like this, you always need to prepare for the worst, but always hope for the best.

Wordless Wednesday: Drawing of Dog Walker and Sweetie

 Dog Walker drew this picture of him and my Sweetie to pay tribute to him.

Cancer Sucks! - Eight Long Days

 Last Monday morning, my sweetie had an appointment to see the oncologist. We were excited about getting started on a treatment plan for his cancer since his port was supposed to be placed on Tuesday. That plan went out the window when his blood pressure was 60/40. I was privy to a Rapid Response team coming in (it was sort of terrifying!) and eventually he was transferred to the ER at the University of Utah. I joined him there. 

By nightfall, he was transferred to Huntsman, the best cancer hospital in Utah. That was over a week ago, and he is still there. 

Mostly, he sleeps, but he has managed to put in some hours for work with a few left over to spend some quality time with us. On Saturday, Beauty and The Beast dropped by and my sweetie challenged The Beast to a game of Backgammon. My sweetie won.

The waiting game is hard. They said they had to get him stabilized and he is still not quite there. His kidney function has been all but destroyed with today's reading at 21. I am impatient. I want to get rid of some of the monster inside him that is eating up everything in its path. He puts on a brave face.

Cancer SUCKS!

Traveling as Two - The Glacier by Princess

On the third day of our cruise, we had a different kind of destination. Rather than stopping and getting off the ship, we sailed through some beautiful Alaskan scenery. The water was a unique shade of green with chunks of ice–some big and some small–dotting its surface. We saw all sorts of wildlife that day, though of course from a distance. Sea lions, seals, and orcas. But the most impressive thing we saw was the glacier. 

I’ve seen ‘glaciers’ before while hiking. But usually it just looks like a random patch of snow. This was different. It was like its own little mountain. We sang “Let it Go” from Frozen more than once, because the white and blue ice really did look like it belonged in Queen Elsa’s castle. 

Just about every picture looked like it could be a postcard. I was spoiled and relied on The Frog to control the camera. I just got to watch in the binoculars. But I’m glad he took the time to capture the moments. I’ve definitely looked back at some of the pictures and thought, “Wow. I was really there and saw that!” It just looks too pretty to be real. 

Most of the day was spent looking out windows or sitting on Mom and Dad’s balcony. We did take a short break and went to a fancy tea party, just for the treats, of course. They were pretty good, but not as good as our daily (ok, maybe more than that) bowls of ice cream.

Baby Doll's Awesome Game

Baby Doll played her first volleyball games this week as an official member of Bingham's actual volleyball team! These are my pics from the first game. She is #27.

Curly took pics at the second games. He is just plain better than me.

You can see her face. She played so well at the sophomore game that she was invited to sit with the JV team!!

So proud of this girl.

Wordless Wednesday - Love from New Jersey

You need to find 2 more sweaters, Teach!

Crazy Life

 In the last 30 days, my entire life has been turned upside down. My sweetie went to the ER for a cough and we came home with Stage 4 Bile Duct cancer. Like me, if you don't know what this is, Dr Google will destroy almost all hope. Fortunately, we have a forever marriage that transcends all earthly heartache and pain. There is no cure. We pray for remission and humbly ask you to join us. Please love and support our children as we all travel this rocky path.

Traveling as Two - Juneau

Sorry for the delay. We decided not to buy internet access this time.

The ship is nice, but a little smaller than the ones we have cruised on before. The Westerdam is sleek and black like a missile. There aren't as many amenities like a waterslide, or mini golf, but they do have pickleball table tennis.

We had not been in our room for long when Princess and The Frog knocked on our door. They were so amazing!! Always right there, pushing the wheelchair, filling my sweetie's Coke cup, anything that needed to be done.

They took me up to dinner with them every night and they always looked so put together.

My sweetie got off the ship with us in Juneau. We had prepaid for a tram ride just like the one we did with the kids in Georgia. 

We watched a presentation from a native Alaskan.

We spent lots of time on the deck,  looking at all the beauty and wildlife. My sweetie felt pretty good that day. The tram took a toll though and he slept most of the rest of the day.

Such beautiful country!

Traveling as Two - Seattle

So this is Seattle.

We left the Elara this morning at 8:00. I have to say that it is definitely one of my favorite hotels we have ever stayed in. The Uber was right on time and we made the relatively quick trip to the airport. 

We had to wait in line behind 7 other wheelchairs before it was finally our turn. I didn't want to push my sweetie's chair in an unfamiliar airport.

It wasn’t long before we were at the terminal.

Then they called me up to the Delta desk. There was one seat in 1st Class. Did we want it? My sweetie shook his head. We would stick together in Comfort+. I believe this kind lady moved up the other person in our row to the available 1st Class seat and left my sweetie and I in a row by ourselves. It wasn’t 1st Class, but he was able to get much more comfortable.

When we got to Seattle, my sweetie's wheelchair driver was a fiesty little woman at least a head shorter than me. I worried a little when she needed someone else to help push my sweetie up the ramp, but she was amazing!

When we got to baggage claim, I pulled my sweetie's bag off the carousel, but the only purple one had someone else's name on the tag. We waited a bit longer before she grabbed a Delta attendant and they pulled the suitcase off and took it in the office. The attendant called the owner and he turned his car around and quickly came back to the airport with my bag.

Disaster avoided, I started to worry about my ride. We were already 15 minutes late for our pickup and I was afraid that the driver wouldn't wait. I had tried a new app called Get Transfer and I was unsure of their policies other than that I had already paid for the trip.

I shouldn’t have worried. Our driver was there within 5 minutes. We loaded up and I grabbed a few pics on the drive.

It took about half an hour to get to Coast Downtown. It's no Elara, but it will do until we get on the ship in the morning.

We are on the 28th floor, so there are some nice views of the city.

We even got a little origami.

Traveling as Two - Las Vegas

We started planning this trip a year ago, long before cancer became an ever-present part of our lives. Every doctor, every nurse told us to just go and make it the trip of a lifetime.

So we are on our way to Alaska.

Our trip package required us to stay in Las Vegas for a couple of days first. Our flight was originally set for Tuesday morning, but we moved our flights to late Wednesday because of the biopsy.

We got here on Wednesday about midnight. The Elara is a beautiful hotel. I have some pics for you.

The coolest part is the projector.

You just close the enormous shades over the windows and it projects on the backside of the shade. We have watched a few movies, but my sweetie has not left the room.

I went out yesterday to pick up some scripts for him and to grab Panda Express for lunch.

Our hotel is attached to the Miracle Mile mall. It is nice to relax and just be with my sweetie.