Hi Phyllis and Diana...two big welcomes from me. It'll be nice getting to know you both. Just jump right in and rant if you want!!  Relatives either don't believe the seriousness of things or think you 'have gone on now long enough' and change the subject ! We all understand what it means, and really value one anothers friendship, and we LISTEN....we may sometimes seem to talk about everything under the sun but bc, but, in a heartbeat, we can offer what we know on many bc related things.

I have been to another appointment with my psychotherapist today....waste of my time I am beginning to think, but don't know how to tell her ! She is trying to help me with my needle phobia, but I can't see she is helping at all. I have been 5 times now. Today she showed me some videos of people having injections... repeatedly !! I got angry with her because it had no effect at all. She says IF I sit long enough and watch this...like 2-3 hours ! My anxiety will go down...well, it doesn't. She wants to cart me off to hospital next week to the blood test room, sit me in there, and if I sit long enough I will no doubt think 'isn't this hunky dory' and my fear will evaporate. ppfftt. I have had 3 'no shows' at the dentist lately. Thanks to Arimidex I need 7 teeth out, and I keep having to pay for the dentists time ! I am thinking industrial strength vallium might help ! Never taken it before, so not sure of any dosage that'd make me do a quick waltz into the dentists chair without a care in the world ! Anyone taken this for help with dental treatment, and remember what strength ?

While I was out this afternoon DH decided to call up to wash his car...easier to make a mess in my backyard than his ! He got out the pressure washer, decided my hanging baskets and troughs needed water, they most certainly did not, and turned the pressure washer on them. OMG, a great deal of the plants were either blown out of the baskets or beheaded. He'd blown soil all onto my newly whitened walls, and all over the windows. Looked like a war had broken out.I just pulled into my yard as he was standing surveying his devastation. I cannot tell you what I screeched at him, but it certainly wasn't ladylike. If I was going to have had a heart attack then this was certainly the moment !!! I am still muttering to myself about it now 7 hours later. I just cannot understand WHY he didn't stop after demolishing the first one...he said he thought he could 'press them all back in again'  I'll press him back in again !!!  I told him he can get to the garden centre and BUY me some more baskets...he has no idea the cost of a full hanging basket at this time of year, so will be in for a shock ! He has done 3 in , plus a big old horse trough that was teeming with plants...can't buy that again, and I don't feel like setting to and replanting again. He had the cheek to go away shouting at me to calm down, and not get into such a tizzy over a few plants !!!!!

So, after my brush with a silly woman making me watch needles going into arms, then walk straight into my nice quiet back yard, to see holocaust, has got me on the white wine tonight. I shall laugh my sox off about this in a few days, but at the moment I am pi**ed at everything ! I shall laugh because DH will have to get his hand into his pocket, and very deep in, because of yet another fine mess he's got himself into.

Isabella.

Diana, sorry you have to be here but welcome.   Feel free to say whatever you need to say (I even say some unprintable things from  time to time...)  Marybe, I have been through that same thing and resent that they are all so disrespectful of my time.  They certainly guard THEIR time very well.  Saw the PS today and he spent his usual 3 minutes with me.  Phyllis, so sorry you're going through this with kids at the braces stage.  The cancer costs enough as it is.  You are definitely in my thoughts.  I've had to spend a lot of my retirement "fun" money on medical stuff as DH and I both got cancer before we were eligible for M-Care.  I think what your daughter is expressing is that she is just scared to death of losing you.  Sometimes people don't express that very well, esp. kids I guess. 

There probably isn't anything anyone can say that all of us haven't said or heard.  We should be able to rant, at least here!  I spent a lot of time feeling guilty for "feeling sorry for myself," but isn't that just what we should do with a cancer diagnosis?  Yes, I feel sorry for me and for anyone else who has to go through any of this.  This is a good time for all of us to be easy on ourselves.  I'm usually the one holding everybody else up so it's a real challenge to let go and let other people help out and take care of me.

Tomorrow I scheduled a "quiet day."  Not sure what that means yet but I know I want to stay home and bake some healthy bread, make some chili, and eat all that for dinner.  Simple things can be healing!

And finally we're supposed to get some sun in Portland!  I'll believe it when it happens.

we need a picture Chrissy

Oh Phyllis, I so wish I'd read this post before I answered your PM.  You're having such a terrible time now, but it will get better once you get the preliminary things done and get the surgery over with.  Your daughters are so afraid of losing you, I'm sure, that they're saying things they will later come to regret (I regret things I said to my mother to this day, and she's been gone 28 years) but when they see you carrying on with your life, they'll be more accomodating.  They're scared now, and like with you, the rug's been pulled out from under them.  You're in the worst place now, but once you get going with your actual treatment things will move quickly and you will start getting your life back.  And I know I had my share of sleepless nights and too early awakenings, still do sometimes, as I imagine we all do.  I think the actual diagnosis is so shattering that we simply cannot absorb it completely and it is overwhelming.  I couldn't even talk about it without crying and honestly, I still have trouble with that.  It's hard when you're the family caretaker for everyone and now the tables are turned.

Diana, welcome even though you'd rather not be here!  Like everybody has said, talk to 3jays.  She'll be a wealth of information on the MS part, and you can rant anytime.  We've all done it, and we'll all do it again.  As Chrissy said so beautifully, here you've found a family who will always support you, no holds barred!

Yay for you Chrissy!  Did you christen it by cooking tonight?  That's one awesome stove and I can just imagine you cooking away on it!

Marybe, complain and complain, girl!  What you went through was ridiculous.  We all realize the economy is is deplorable shape, but cutting staff in areas like where your treatment is done, where people need the efficiency and the personal relationship with caregivers, is inexcusable.  I'll be thinking of you tomorrow with your neulasta, and hope the claritin will help make it easier than last time.  

My goodness, Isabella, the man is totally nuts!  How on earth could he think that watering hanging baskets with a power washer wouldn't completely destroy them?  And your"immersion therapy" with the needles.  Got to be a better way to do this, although I really like what Marybe said!

I'm going out of town for the weekend so won't be back on until Sunday night, not taking the laptop. Hope all of us have a nice weekend.

Kathy

hey ladies.. wanted to stop and say Hi! and im glad i heard isabellas' story... my life is a mess right now, and im so happy to feel the laughter with you girls!!

   Isabella... i'd apy BIG BUCKS to see you "push HIM IN again!!!" im still laughing at that one.. and MAKE SURE he pays for new flowers, and washes at HIS OWN house from now on!!!

   i'm so glad i didn't have 1 day of my ex at MY door.. it wouldn't have been pretty!!!

    Diana, i sent you a PM and PM me anytime, sweetie.. special circumstances are just that.. special. the hospital will have to figure it out. i was at one much smaller, with less knowledge than Dana Faber, and im still here, so they didn't  muck it up too bad...

    chrissy yahooon the new stove..

    i got a sample to be cultured today, so in a few days i'll have the right antibiotics, and maybe start feeling better. i've got that shell knob clock ticking...

   the grief is going to be a "wave" kind of thing. i want to curl up, and just not deal..but i did that when me dad died, and i ended up having a stoke. right, i won't do that again... learned better when my mom died... so, i'll muddle through this one now... its' a hard thing, though, i won't kind about that... so close, but still too far away to travel to the family there...

   phone calls' did well with Rae, so they'll have to do with the rest of them for now. i'm just concentrating on getting through yet another day...

  im so grateful to have you there, my frineds....     3jays

Just stopped by to say goodnight.  Off to bed since I keep falling asleep.  The granddaughters wore me out this evening at the pool so I am glad that we are in a hotel so that we can run them off home and then we can get some rest.  Night all.

  BEAUTIFUL,CHRISSY!! ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL!!  People who are not into cooking and appliances cannot understand the thrill of this, but believe me, I do.  I looked at stoves and dreamt about them for years, have a big folder of the original one, I looked at still...la Corneau (sp), then as it got more and more expensive I went down a bit and started looking at AGA, which also went up and I think now probably just as high now as the lst mentioned, then I found this one called Fratelli that was an Italian brand and was salivating over it and found a place here that I could actually go in and look at the floor models, but did I get one....NO.....and I am still kicking myself in the ass for not sticking to my guns and getting what I wanted. I want the cast iron emamel....either a cream color or this georgous bronze I saw a few years ago.  It seems like you gals down under really know what it important in the the kitchen....I know Alyson has her nice stove and who else has one, is it Shiela?, and now you.   And I am sure it was worth the wait.  I am pea green with envy. Maybe I will put that back on my bucket list.

I am up because my shoulder is killing me.....this has been getting progressively worse and I dont like it since I know I have bone mets there.  Right now I have one of those freezable icebags tied to my shoulder with a scarf....NOT one of yours AmyJo....those I will use only on my head!  As I do this I am thinking about those women who use those penquin cold caps to save their hair and am wondering if I would find doing that worth it....wearing them for three or four hours post treatment?!!  Maybe early on I may have, but at this stage of the game and knowing what a lot of SEs are other than losing hair, I don't really think so,in fact I know so,  but more power to them if that is what they want to do.  I HATE cold, hate being cold....if it gets rid of pain I am willing to do it, but just don't think I would do it just to save my hair which I did find grew back quite fast. 

Kathy, Sometimes it is nice to be away from the computer and everything.  I hope you have a wonderful weekend

DFM,   I hope you have a nice weekend also.....my sis who is out there was telling me how summer is just really slow on coming, but she did say her wysteria did great.

3jays....good to see you posting....we are all with you.

Amyjo, Continue to enjoy sleeping, your family and the pool.   Phyllis, I agree with the others....your gals are also scared for you and of losing you, I forgot to say this when I wrote....but I still feel you should talk with them and reassure them that cancer is not an automatic death sentence and that this is not something you chose, just something that happened and something you have to deal with and maybe if you make them feel like they can be a part of helping you, that will help them.....and tell them believe it or not, there will still be a lot of fun time ahead.  Everyone else, I think of you all am am so glad we got to know each other....nice to see all you, Ls....Lassie, Lisa, Liz.   Now I am going to go see if any insomniacs are up before trying to go back to sleep...I think this is the shoulder and not the steroids.    I will be back this weekend to let you know if the claritin worked.   . 

Hope you have managed to get some rest Marybe. I must get away to bed as it is getting late here. Spent the morning shopping with DB and SiL which was a bit trying as SiL spends so long looking in every shop. then DD arrived with the little ones which was great. I managed to have some time with Sam when she took Bea up the road.He laughed and smiles and made those lovely noises little ones make.

Must find a cake recipe for DH as it is his birthday on Tuesday. I do enjoy my stove - its cream enamel on cast iron and its cooks brilliantly. There are no elements in the ovens as the heat come in from the back via a fan. It has taken me a while to get used to this as its a much more moist heat in the baking oven and hotter and drier in the roasting oven. It works like an AGA. (Well it is a baby Aga).

It is a holiday weekend for us in NZ - it the Queen's Birthday. Well it's when we celebrate it even though her birthday is April. And at present it looks as if it not going to be very fine. The weather has turned very quickly to quite cold after a wonderful autumn.

 Hope you all have had a good day.

Chrissy,

I absolutely love the stove!  I think I now have stove envy.

I have to run downstairs and find out why my washing machine is beeping but will be back on later to fill everyone in on my latest issues.

I'm also getting ready for a baby shower I'm throwing for daughter #2 that's having a little girl.  Sure glad I was able to finally figure out how to post pictures but this one isn't due till 8/2.  Such excitement all around!

Marianne

Okay,

Well, the washing machine looks to be breaking.  It's only 7 or 8 but I'm learning that most appliances are built to last only until it's the worst possible time for it to break.  I think it has little senses in it that tells it "Hey, her wall oven just broke so since she already had one repairman out we'll break down a week later"

The wall oven is too expensive to fix v getting a new one.  DH and I kept discussing black or stainless steel.  We have to use our Sears charge and they were having a great Memorial Day sale but since we took so long arguing, we missed the sale.  The lady at the store said they are having a special sale on 6/12 from 6pm to 9pm and she figured out our price for that sale and it wll actually be $25.00 cheaper. Yahoo!  I don't cook to much anyway in the oven this time of year so it's no big deal. 

Now, onto the washer.  It's having a hard time spinning.  I already had the "one time only under warranty" drum replaced 2 years ago so this will probably have to be replaced also.  Of the "everything happens in 3's) theory, I'm hoping that since I had to have my rotars replaced in my car yesterday that I've hit my 3.

I have to concentrate on getting everything finished for the baby shower on Sunday so I'm putting all appliances out of my head until Monday.

I can't wait to hear her reaction to our family, aunts, cousins, sisters and Tom and I getting her all of the baby furniture she wanted.  She found out about the shower but doesn't know her DH is setting up the furniture in the baby room while we are at the shower.  She's hard to get one over on.

Anyway, that's my story for today.  Other grandbaby is doing great and will be making an appearance at the shower so all is good.  I'm not going to think of health issues until next week.  I am going to pretend they don't exist.

Marianne

Thanks Marybe,

I just ran vinegar through the washing machine hoping to clean out the hoses/pipes to see if that helps.  When the towels were in it it wouldn't spin but without anything except the vinegar is did spin so I'm going to keep my eye on it and hope it can last a little longer.  Mine is a front loader and I have always loved it.  It's also on a stand and is great on the back.  I bought it when they first started coming out with them so I have had it a long time but don't want to part with it. 

I'm the one who wants stainless so I will win the argument.  Before I stopped working to concentrace on BC I sold real estate and told my DH that it would help re-sale.  Of course, I'll still have to replace the bisque stove top, black dishwasher and formica countertops but the stove top is now pushing 20 and the diswasher 10 so they will end up picking a holiday and breaking. 

Take care,  I also just noticed that I had forgotten to crochet a pink baby hat to match the blanket so will have to get busy and get that done tonight.  Thank goodness they're easy to do.

Marianne

Hello Ladies:

I wanted to drop you all a line and tell you that I have been in touch with 3jays. You are correct she is a fountain of knowledge!

To Chrissy who posted the picture of a new stove -- How absolutely beautiful! To the person who posted a picture of a beautiful baby girl -- What an inspiration! And, to the person who shared a very funny story about a person watering her plants with a pressure washer -- Laughter is just what the doctor ordered in (although I hope your plants recover!).

To the person who asked me about chemotherapy, -- although I am a bit of a naturalist, I realize with this diagnosis, everything is game! So, when I went to Dana-Farber, I really tried hard to be open-minded about the chemotherapy. Unfortunately, I was told that the breast cancer I have is from the chemotherapy I had before for the aggressive MS that I have.

Therefore, the first line of chemotherapy agents that they would use for my breast Cancer is not an option because of this. The second line of chemotherapy agents that they would use for my breast cancer is not an option because it causes slight neurological damage, which I cannot have because of my severe MS. The third line chemotherapy agents that they would use for my breast cancer is not an option because this means that I would never again in my lifetime be able to treat my MS with an immunosuppressant because my heart couldn't handle it. So, it looks like they are just recommending radiation for me after the surgery. However, the jury is still out on all of this as it looks like I may have to go to rehab for two weeks after the surgery. And, even then, they cannot guarantee that I will come home ever. I am almost a quadriplegic at this point and if I do not get partial use back of my hands, I may have to go to a nursing home. The kicker of the whole thing is that I still work from home over the Internet with a voice recognition program as a legal assistant. Again, if I do not get partial use back of my hands, I may not be a to do this. Oh, the joy!

Lastly, to the person who is having struggles with their children, I would like to share this last story. When I first got sick in 2000 with MS, I was not healing from the spinal tap. I had to lay in bed flat for six days. My daughter was 11 and my husband was not used to "manning the ship." My house was in chaos and I was fighting depression. Each night, I heard my daughter and husband fighting. One night, my daughter stormed into our bedroom crying and begged me to get better, telling me that she had lost popularity at school because I no longer picked her up daily and gave her friends rides home and that she did not look good for school anymore, etc., etc. My husband then stormed in and yelled that he was not ironing athletic pants and that that was where he was drawing the line! My daughter then whispered to me, "mom, you've got to get better, he's cooking again. He's frying a paper thin steak, making instant mashed potatoes and opening a can of slimy green beans!"

 I was so busy laughing at this point, there were tears coming from my eyes. My daughter accused me of not taking her seriously. My husband called her a spoiled brat. I decided at that point they were both spoiled and there was no one to blame but me!

I am happy to say that after 10 years (and it has been a long road), my family has stepped up to the plate. My husband now cooks fresh vegetables, cleans house, does laundry and pays bills. My daughter, who is now 21, works full time, goes to college full time nights, rents upstairs from us with her boyfriend and runs her own house. Somehow, it all worked out.

My sincerest best wishes to all... Diana 

I love the stove Chrissy, I know you will too

Marybe, it's so funny that you just posted about using cake mixes as a base for fancier desserts. I just finished making a Boston cream pie using - you guessed it, Duncan Hines yellow cake. Yum.

Chrissy, the stove looks wonderful! Enjoy it for many years.

Our Sabbath starts in less than an hour so will just write some more tomorrow night.

Leah