Sunday, June 4, 2023

It is COLD (48 degrees). What a shame that the summer-like weather from late last week couldn't have lasted through the weekend. Lots of very cold and wet graduations and parties. Yesterday's party was supposed to be outside but ended up in the house. It was really a great gathering. Lots of adorable toddlers and babies. Younger DD and her BF came too. Everyone was super friendly and I think my niece had a good time. I enjoyed traveling to and from the party with my 2 SILs so we could catch up.

My niece is going to change from the local hospital to Mass General partly at the encouragement of the oncologist she trusted most locally. They have technology unavailable at the smaller hospitals and one can't help but wonder if they may have misread some of their tests given that they failed surgically twice. The local people keep confusing her by discussions about freezing embryos etc, when she may not truly be able to do that safely. Apparently her cancer is estrogen stimulated and very aggressive. She and her husband have already resigned themselves to her becoming infertile so bringing it up again may just be giving her false hope. The doctor encouraging it admitted that she didn't know if the hormones and time needed to do it were safe. She probably starts chemo this week, followed by mastectomy, followed by radiation. It will be a tough summer.

I stayed at my home last night to save the extra hour of driving at night but was at DH's home by 6:25 am. He and Justice were sound asleep but Justice raised the alarm when he heard me at the door.

More of the same weather for the next few days. I wish we were stil in Florida!

Have a safe Sunday!

Quick check in before the hectic dog show day begins. Liz, FYI, my food modifications may be helping me, but there is only minimal weight loss. Most of the work I have been doing is simply getting a handle on how to manage my eating disorder and prepare for a very SLOW weight loss. For someone with an addictive-I want it now type of personality, slow weight loss is not in my wheelhouse. It is very hard to wrap my head around. Thus, I am still a good 70 pounds heavier than I would ideally like to be and a good 95 more than my lowest post VSG weight.

Dad has made some good progress this past week. He will go back to assisted living on Tuesday. We have increased his service by the tune of $3,800 per month, so his monthly fees will be close to 12K. YIKES! But at least the money is there.

We have been having lovely, lovely (almost too hot) summer weather. Yesterday it was 91 degrees. Starting Wednesday we are cooling off by about 20 - 25 degrees and expecting rain. RAIN IN CA DURING JUNE?????? A rarity - practically unheard of....

Best to all.....

I'm glad your Dad can return to his place. That's great progress.

There is a measurement in breast cancer called HER2, and if that is positive, mastectomy is usually recommended. This factor makes breast cancer more aggressive. You can be HER2 positive and be either estrogen positive or estrogen negative. I was estrogen positive, HER2 negative. Since my tumor was small, I could just have a lumpectomy and radiation. The Tamoxifen works on estrogen receptors in cancer cells. If I get a similar cell going, Tamoxifen blocks it from feeding off of estrogen, so it can't grow. My SIL had a estrogen positive, HER2 positive tumor. She did all the treatment you are describing for your niece. It's a rough protocol, but the good news is treatments developed in the last decade have been very effective. We are optimistic SIL will continue to be cancer free (her diagnosis was 3 years ago). Hopefully your niece will have the same good outcome.

Sorry the weather is so bad in Massachusetts! We are in an amazing stretch of sunny days, with high 80s, some peeks into 90s. When it rains, its like Florida, strong downpour, but then clears away. Usually thunderstorms her are all day events with cloud cover the day before. I love it, but I still don't forgive Minnesota for the terrible winter/spring we endured... But I sure am happy now!

Today we are planning to paint the porch floor. Since we were away most of the summer last year, we didn't do much outdoor maintenance, and things are shabby. We decided to treat the yard like 3 rooms, front yard/porch, side yard/deck, backyard/ fire pit. We dealing with one "room" at a time. We've worked on the front yard this week. I think we can turn the corner (literally) and start the side yard tomorrow or Tuesday.

Thank you for the info on breast cancer. It gets very confusing.

Weather is so fickle! It's been hot with no rain in MI and they are having big wildfires. Here in AZ, the heat is ticking up (87 today), but it doesn't feel bad.

I slept really well last night finally! But the smoke settled into our area again last night, so I woke up and had to shut the doors.

I dipped in the pool yesterday and laid on the loungers listening to my audiobook. Made for a nice part of the day! I got the munchies again yesterday evening. I think I need to recommit mentally. It feels like I'm in that frame of mind where I "feel" like I'm doing the work of losing weight, but I'm actually not when it comes to quantity. So all of the emotional work, but not the physical. My brain reads the emotional part and thinks I'm doing great, but the scale doesn't agree. Weight loss is hard!

Anyway, off to start the day. Hope you all have good ones!

PS - on the subject of chemo, I read there is a dangerous shortage of up to 17 chemo drugs that is making people miss rounds of it. One is cisplatin that helped save my dad. From a CNBC article: "The cancer drug shortages have forced some hospitals to ration medications by reducing the dosage to extend the supply and prioritizing patients who have a better chance of being cured."

One problem is that most of these drugs are not made here. Cisplatin is made in India and the FDA felt their quality control wasn't good enough and shut down their exports to the US. Some are made in China. Why have we allowed everything to be made overseas?? One oncologist in an article I read said, "some companies have been reporting to the FDA that manufacturing costs have exceeded sales prices, forcing them out of certain markets." You can't make a foreign company make a drug...

It is crazy that a country with the capabilities of the U.S. lets itself get in this position.

Is it not??

Greetings

late night check in on iPad. Gallery duty day and then binge watched the rest of dead to me. We loved it.

helped studio buddy buy a plane ticket on line. Only took an hour.

lady bought a $300 piece of art today and payed with 3 $100 bills and a pile of coins. Funny of the day.

made eggs and Canadian bacon for dinner. I am craving blt sandwich. Maybe made with Romain lettuce as bread

dogs are zooming at 11 pm. So it goes

more. tomorrow

Nite nite. Dianes