2005 ROCK-TOBER CHEMO GIRLS

Graycie

Debbie, you are too funny....Was Mark stuck in there for day's while you were trying to post the picture?..lol..Somehow I don't think he minded. He seem's to like it in there after all he is smiling. It must have been the crisps and pop....lol

Deb, I wish your Mom a speedy recovery.

Laura, That is so awesome about the modeling show and how lucky for you and Jan Claire that she get's to join you. You two will make awesome models.

Tracy, Have fun on your trip.  My daughter's FIL used to live in Calgary and from the pictures I have seen it look's beautiful. 

marymelodi

One good thing about a higher level of awareness of BC is that women do not have to be ashamed of having BC.  Someone told me a story of their grandmother being diagnosed decades ago, having bilateral radical masectomies and never telling anyone except her husband.  No relatives, no friends, no children, no neighbors . . . to support and help her.  She never would talk about it and only after she died (not of BC) did her husband reveal what she went through and then the daughters and grand-daughters rushed to get checked.  Her kids knew she was in the hospital, but did not know why.

I think that is a terrible thing.  So, being more open and activist in this respect is a good thing.  But, I do agree . . . . the pink ribbon industry is a bit too much.  I often wonder if the money rerally does reach the research scientists who need it.  There are some agencies you can trust and some you cannot.

I also understand the reluctance about using another service for our communications.  My primary motive, as I stated before, was being uncomfortable with arbitrary monitoring of our conversations here at this site.  So, I am glad that we will have someplace to talk freely and even disagree, politely and kindly, without babysitters.  If I need to log into 3 places each day it will take more time, but I am commited to all of you and so I'll do it.

Please, lets start a rally to LET MARK OUT OF THE CRATE.  He is too cute to be locked up.  Surely he did nothing that terrible!!!  LOL

love you all,

Mary

Anonymous

OMG - Debbie -

What's next? LOL You guys are so funny! I just love your sense of humor!

Curlylocks

Hi My sweet sisters,

Life has been pretty busy at work so coming home exhausted but have read all the posts here.

My thoughts on gmail is that it is like an email.  I use a computer all day at work and to go through more emails when I get home is too much work.LOL.  I do like the idea of the yahoo group!  I am use to the new board format but being almost two years out of diagnosis coming here is like a constant reminder of "cancer".

We are headed up to the trailer tomorrow night after work, cant wait to put my feet up in our lazy chairs and just listen to the crickets churp! The weather is suppose to be fabulous, maybe we will take a boat ride to see the colours on the lake. 

Victoria - I have pm'd you.

Laura - take some time out of your busy schedule for some r&r.  When do you have to start working on Christmas projects or should I not even mention that as Halloween has even got here.LOL.

Is your sister doing a little better?

Debbie - your sense of humour is awesome, poor Mark let him out of the cage, although he doesnt have a frown on his face either.

Brenda - where are you my International roomate?  Did you get your masks yet?

Paula - did you decide to go and visit your cousin for Thanksgiving?

Rosemarie - havent heard from you either...

Graycie - We will have to talk about getting together with yourself and Mary as you too live not too far from me but it will have to be in late spring as the roads are too treachous in the winter especially in Buffalo!  Maybe you can come and visit me and we can have a few drinks in our new hottub!

Tracyseattle - I find that my toes and the backs of my heels hurt the worst and I hobble when I walk now especially my left foot although my right one hurts still too when I had the fight with the ladder at my parents place a few weeks ago.

Cathy - I looked at the article in Real Simple, we do sell it here in Canada, it was a great article and the picture of you is wonderful.

Deb - I do agree with you on the pink issue, gosh they even sell pink m&m candies.   I also agree with Laura that awareness is so important if it means preventing another women from loosing her life to this dreaded disease.  I am a sad this week that our "Shelli" lost her battle after fighting so blasted hard to be here for her little ones. 

I was diagnosed in October so would rather forget it altogether!

Glad to hear that your luggage made it back home too! 

Mary - I appreciate your hard work in setting up the yahoo group, it is there if we decide to change formats.

Ladies, I'm am beat....have a wonderful weekend, enjoy the sunshine!

Love

Michele 

Anonymous

Meeshell -

You "sound" so exhausted...keep thinking about JA land and it will be here b/4 you know it. My sis is doing better. She is more "with it". And is able to help the girls with homework and everyday responsibilities. Thanks for asking...you're so sweet to take the time to ask. Hang in there...HR girl!

------------------------

I have spent the last 2 hours writing my "speech" for tomorrow's rally. I am so nervous...but I keep telling myself that no matter how good or bad I am, my presence as a spokeswoman for bc is whats important. I'm keeping my speech short and sweet! Atleast until I can be considered a "savvy spokeswoman" like Tracy. When I finalize it, I will post it. I am so desperate for a cure...and I am so thankful that the corporation I will be visiting is so much in support of us girls! Isn't that incredible? I'm sure I will learn tomorrow of an employee there or a relative there that was dx'd with this monster, but still...I am so touched and honored with their support and dedication. I spoke on the phone today to the gal who is organizing tomorrow's rally and when I told her I'm a survivor, she said "THAT IS AWESOME". I was so touched by her response. This whole thing is still somehwhat sureal. But we are so fortunate to have such an incredible amount of encouragement and exposure.

TracySeattle -

If you and I lived close to each other...I would be sitting at your kitchen table BEGGING you to help me write my speech! You are my inspiration.

ravdeb

Debbie...that pic is so funny!

Thanks to those who sent wishes for my mom. I spoke to her late yesterday Israeli time and she sounded great. Laura..she had a knee replacement. It's painful but she is determined to get through the recovery quickly. She had been told that it was going to be more painful than the hip replacement (yes..she is almost a bionic woman!) but she didn't think that would be the case for her! She has a high tolerance for pain, as I do, so she will get through this.

Yom Kippur starts tonight. I won't be back on for a couple of days.

Time to fix dinner.

ravdeb

I just read the rest of the posts...

Laura..good luck tomorrow.

So far the gmail group is only organizing and nothing is really happening.

There is chat there but I'm not sure that we could all chat together on it.

But, we never did that here, either.

I gotta go cook.

take care.

Graycie

Deb, Have a nice Yom Kippur.  A few of us did go into a chatroom last night, you missed it......It was hysterical, of course I kept getting kicked out. 

Laura, I didn't realize your speech was today. I wish you the best. You will be a great spokeperson.  That has always been something I have admired about you.  You are great with words and you always know the right thing to say.  Let us know how it goes. 

Anonymous

Laura, good luck on your speech! You will do a fabulous job!

Is Mark out of the crate yet???

Ravdeb, wishing you and yours a wonderful Yom Kippur.  Pretty soon its time for Sukkot.  We always miss our parents more when one of them or us has surgery. Wishing her the best. 

Everyone, have a good weekend!!! 

marymelodi

Just wanted to say that the chat last night was so reminiscent of the cheeta pj party.  We just needed a loud knock on the door telling us to be quiet!

We've got to find another time when more of us can get on and jabber with each other.  Even if you don't want to get e-mail at g-mail it might be worth it to set up an account so when we do decide to chat again you can join in the fun.  At one point 6 of us were merrily typing faster than our brains could think.

Happy holy days, Ravdeb.

Wellness to all.

Happy Birthday to Nic!

Is Mark free yet??

bye~

marymelodi

I just found this prayer for Yom Kippur on beliefnet.com

Wow - makes you think of all the mistakes you can and probably have made.  Thank goodness for repentance and forgiveness.

September 21, 2007

Yom Kippur Confession (The Al-Chet)

For the mistakes we committed before You under duress and willingly.

For the mistakes we committed before You through having a hard heart.

For the mistakes we committed before you through things we blurted out with our lips.

For the mistake we committed before You through harsh speech.

For the mistakes we committed before You through wronging a friend.

For the mistakes we committed before You by degrading parents and teachers.

For the mistakes we committed before You by exercising power.

For the Mistakes we committed before You against those who know, and those who do not know.

For the mistakes we have committed before You through bribery.

For the mistake we have committed before You through denial and false promises.

For the mistake we have committed before You through negative speech.

For the mistakes we have committed before You with food and drink.

For the mistakes we committed before You by being arrogant.

For the mistakes we committed before You with a strong forehead (brazenness).

For the mistakes we committed before You in throwing off the yoke (i.e. refusing to accept responsibility).

For the mistakes we committed before You through jealousy (lit: 'a begrudging eye').

For the mistakes we committed before You through baseless hatred.

For the mistakes we committed before You in extending the hand.

For the mistakes we committed before You through confusion of the heart.

Jewish

source: Traditional

RoseMarie

Laura, good luck on your speech! I'm sure you'll do wonderfully!

Michele, enjoy your weekend!! I've been reading the posts but have been too lazy to actually sign on and post. Is that bad or what?! I miss not having to log on and having the bookmarked page always end up on the last post...

The g-mail or google chat or whatever we did last night was fun! Too crazy!  Will we ever figure out how to do it again?! Gail??

Deb - we'll have to figure out a time when you can chat too!

Debbie - lol, Mark does look happy -

Ok, got to go but thinking about all of you and hoping you're all having a wonderful day!!

RoseMarie

I'm sure many of you have already seen this but for those of you on Tamoxifen here's some news regarding "Evista":

http://patient.cancerconsultants.com/SurviveNewsletter/Default.aspx?type=breast&MenuId=40568&DocumentId=40506

Anonymous

Did anybody see the article on Arimidex and bone loss .... some drs are switching their patients back to Tamoxifen due to the bone loss.

TracySeattle

Darn it!  I missed the chat - sounds like you all had fun!  We do need to try it again!

Deb - I will remember your mom in my prayers.  Hope you have a good holiday.

Laura - I am excited to hear about your speech - how was it???  I need to start working on mine again.  I started it but then didn't get back to it.  Maybe I will have some time while I am on vacation....

We are leaving for Canada in the morning.  I am taking my laptop so I am hoping to send you some pics and check in once in a while.

Hope you all have a good weekend and week....

Love you all

maryannecb

Hi,

sorry for the long space.

Laura, I am sure you knocked them dead with your speech. What did you say?

Ravdeb, I hope your Mom recovers well from her knee replacement. It is usually a few months before most people say tit was a good idea...

I plan to set up a gmail account right after this. Chatting might be fun! I type very slowly so it would be hard.

Tracy, have an awesome trip. I have traveled through the Rockies and it is spectacular. Can't wait to see photos.

Debbie, you must get upgrade seats on your next passage to London. Too funny.

Mary, good point about making BC more public with pink. Although I agree somewhat with Deb too...pink is overdone and BC is trendy(NOT). Still the extra awareness does drive research and maybe the next generation of women will benefit.

Fists up!

Mary-Anne 

Anonymous

I'm here and I'm still teaching kindergarten. Remember little Johnny? I have him in my classroom. He took a swig from the Spanish teacher's water bottle, dropped his pants during music, and tried to grab my breasts to get my attention! And, he is NOT my biggest behavior problem!

Anonymous

Brenda, all I can do is laugh!!!!!! 

Anonymous

And think of Little Johnny jokes!  Remember them?

debbie444

Hey Brenda - I will swap little Johnny for some of our new nursery kids!! We have 2 who dont speak , another 2 who speak no English (along with their parents - they brought a 9 year old neice to interpret the other day) , another 3 still in nappies , even tho we dont take them in nappies unless they are special needs , one who has been excluded from 3 other nurseries for kicking and biting, another who we think may be deaf although her parents refuse to talk about it , one for the womens refuge who we hsve to hide, another 2 on the social services register and one who has just come out of care.

Our free play sessions are interesting - cant wait for the Christmas concert!

Paula15089

Rosemarie,

i clicked on the link but keep getting an error message?

Laura, how was your speech? 

Anonymous

Ok, I've chatter on gmail with Paula and Ro so far!  It's pretty neat but Cathy would have to tell me how to do the jabber thing, I can't seem to get it to work with my i-Chat and it should be a supported program with i-Chat.

ravdeb

I'm back...

Brenda...good luck with little Johnny. OMG! You must be a wreck.

Debbie...you have an interesting group! How do you keep your sanity?

Laura..how was your speech?

Mary..that is THE prayer for Yom Kippur and is repeated all day long. I will admit that I only went to services at the very end to hear the shofar. I can't get to my own syngogue that is part of the Progressive Movement in Israel. This is because on Yom Kippur nobody drives and so I would have to drive there before the holiday begins (sunset the day before) and stay until sunset of the day of the holiday. Since that isn't possible for many reasons, I have only the orthodox synagogue in our village and for a zillion reasons, I do NOT like their services.

Yep, Kelly, we have Sukkot starting on Wed evening. Nice, fun holiday. It is a week long and at the end we have Simchat Torah which celebrates finishing the entire Torah and we begin it from the beginning again. That holiday, 2 years ago...started on the day of my first chemo treatment of AC. I went after my treatment and danced with everybody else since I was feeling great then. I have mixed feelings about this holiday now....'

My mom is okay and was moved to rehab yesterday. I spoke to her. She sounded not as chipper as the other day. I will talk to her today and see how she is in the rehab. She wanted to be in a different one so I think she was unhappy that she didn't get into the one she wanted to be in. But she's tough. She'll do well, I think.

I was back at my beach today! Life is good.

Be well, everybody! I hope to get on and chat with y'all one time. I can be up late one time and do it with you. It's not easy, though to do it at 3 am! maybe on a weekend when you aren't working we can all get on.

Anonymous

Hi Girls -

My speech on Friday went really well! I keyed it in on my laptop, so I don't have it here to copy and paste, but...I thanked them for their sponsorship and said their participation will truly make a difference toward a much needed cure, etc. (I wasn't EXTREMELY nervous, because I took a mild sedative! LOL) And then I registered walkers for next weekend's race. The company is paying the reg fee for any employee that wants to walk, including family members. They asked if I would come back next year! The company is a food dist. who just signed an annual $250,000 sponsorship with Komen. They gave me a shopping bag full of the prods they dist...spices, baking ingredients, such as Mazola Free Cooking Spray, M&M's....all kinds of goodies. I really need to slow down though...I'm beat! But, on Thursday, I had a 90 minute massage - compliments of YOU KNOW WHO! It was awesome...thank you so, so much... 

I have reeeeeeeeeeeeeeally been busy this weekend. I WAS going to spend it catching up on all the things around here that I neglected last week...NOT! Little Shelby called and asked if she could come visit. So, OF COURSE AUNTIE CAN NEVER SAY NO! LOL We went shopping, I bought her a new outfit to wear to a b-day party today. And - the little Miss Melodi that she is - practiced singing God Bless the USA ALL WEEKEND (lol) - because she's singing it at school over the intercom system! Her voice - just like our MaryMelodi's - is really beautiful. She can actually sing the real high notes and the real low ones and all those in between (and it's so funny, because she makes the facial movements just like the real pros do!). I wouldn't be surprised if she's a famous entertainer/singer someday.   

Here's Shelby in her new outfit (and her favorite hat):

 

Meeshell -

Yes...Holiday he** is here. Halloween is DONE! Yikes...can I sneak into your suitcase and join you in JA!

Brenda & Debbie -

Awwwwwwwwwwwww...the cute little buggers! OMG - I would have quit by now! LOL Thank goodness there's people like you two who have the compassion and intelligence to fulfill such important roles. I bet they all love you both.

EVERYONE -

Hope you're enjoying this weekend...hope the weather is as beautiful where you are as it is here...

Graycie

Laura, Shelby looks so cute in her new outfit and I love her favorite hat. 

Brenda and Debbie, OMG, you have nerves of steel.

Kelly, I thought you were on gmail today and I tried to talk to you...lol....What does the orange dot mean?  I forgot. That was in front of your name.

I forgot to mention that it has been confirmed I have LE in my hand.  I had to buy the glove and am going to PT 3 x's a week.  I think it is a little better but for any of you that want to go in a hot tub I was told that is a NO NO if you have had lymph nodes removed.   I am really upset about that.  No steam rooms or sauna's either.  The only exception would be if you have your own hot tub and you turn the heat down to body temperature but public ones are way too hot.  What next?  At least I don't have it in my arm YET.

I can't believe the weekend is over.  Back to the old grind tomorrow.

Anonymous

Gail,

The orange dot means "not available" ... I don't sign out when I leave my computer so sometimes it looks like I am online, eventually it goes to the orange dot since it's been inactive for so long.  I've used my hot tub and not had any probs but I did only have 2 nodes removed since it appeared I had 2 sentinal nodes.  And I do heat it to about 100º sometimes 101º even .... hope I don't end up with LE.

Shelby is looking gorgeous, just like her Auntie who Rocks!

ravdeb

Gail..sorry to hear about the LE. I've been overly precautious about it and wore a sleeve and gauntlet on all my flights this year. I didn't wear it last year on my flights and I was fine but I'm paranoid! good luck with the pt and I hope it resolves it in your hand. I only had one node removed.

I had heard not to use a hot tub, etc. But after my lumpectomy and snb I went to the hot springs resort here and bathed in the mineral waters. I think they aren't that hot really because it is all natural so I guess I was okay. I mean..I didn't get LE from it. But again, I only had one node removed so my risk is really low.

the orange button means that she is inactive at the moment but on-line. The green button means she's active on-line so if you see green, then try to chat. Gray buttons mean off-line. I am always on-line so I guess mine would be orange when I'm not actively on-line. But my gmail is not up..wonder how that works!

Shelby is so cute. She's got great new clothes from her aunt. What a lucky girl she is! And she was terrific over the weekend..very helpful. Say hi to her for me :-)

Have a good Monday everybody...

Missjaq

WOW, I have had a busy summer and spent a good bit of it in Canada. I am the "Silent Sister-in-training".

I am here to learn how to help my friend and you have been so wonderful in showing me the way. I haven't posted in months and boy have things changed on this site.

I thought of you while I was away and knew you were traveling to Chicago? to meet. I am so glad you had a great time. I knew you would! I feel as though I know you. I am in the AVON WALK in Charlotte NC Oct 20, 21. I copied a picture of you from a few pages back and will carry it with me on my walk.

My friend is doing well. New meds and hopefully can keep the RBC's up. I have had some hurtful times not knowing what to do, Fearing I would say the wrong thing, or hoping I had not caused her to

"clam- up". Your varied personalities, positive and direct outlooks have made it easier for me to understand. Good Grief..Horrible time in life to have Two Women Friends with Hormonal problems too!

Any way, "cyber elation" hope you can feel my smiles and feel my hugs..

Hope I am not intruding in carring your group pix...If so let me know....Jacqui

Anonymous

Jacqui, good luck on your walk ... Wishing your friend health..... how nice of you to support her.

ravdeb

wow Jacqui..what a good friend you are. Just be there for your friend and listen. That's the best you can do for her. She's lucky she's got an understanding friend and support like you :-)

Laura..I just scrolled back and read about your sister. I hope she is doing better. Sorry I missed that. How are the girls doing? Wishing you all well....