West Side Park

God has placed me on a journey. I have agreed to go on it, but I do not understand it and I'm frustrated! I know my frustration is part of the journey, and that I need to learn to trust God one step at a time. I wish I could learn the lesson quickly, but I tend to take a long time wrapping my head around life's lessons to the point that they sink into my heart and they stick. So onto this journey I go, knowing that it will be painful at times, frustrating at others, and miraculously amazing at still others.
Even before I left Church in the Park (a ministry to the homeless of Modesto that Jason and I were heavily involved in for two and a half years), I felt drawn to West Side Park. I thought maybe I was just trying to create my own "CITP" because I was frustrated with the one I was involved in and didn't act on my pull toward that park. Then we left CITP and I found out I had cancer. My life took on a whirlwind of its own and working with the homeless in any way, shape or form was out of the question for awhile. Then I started to feel better and the draw to West Side Park returned. I prayed and prayed and prayed about it, at times excited to see what God wanted to do there, and more times than that asking God to please ask someone else because I was definitely not qualified to "run" any type of homeless ministry. I kept remembering the story of Moses, telling God he wasn't the right man for the job, that he wasn't a good speaker, etc. I used to find that story strange. I mean, after all, if God tells you to do something, why in the world would you argue?! He knows what He's doing, right? He's not going to ask us to do something and then not enable us to do it, so why in the world would Moses be afraid, or feel inadequate? Now I understand because I too found myself arguing with God, telling Him that I really didn't think this was a good idea.
Then I found myself wondering where we would get chairs and canopies and sound systems and volunteers and food and...and...and...and how in the world does someone start something like that?? "Pray. Walk around the park and pray." Repeatedly, I felt the Lord prompting me to walk around the park and pray for it and for the work that He wants to do there. I'd love to say I obeyed, but I didn't. I prayed, but I didn't walk. I prayed from my room, not the park. To be honest, I don't know how to go about something like this, trying to serve in an area I've been told is too dangerous for me to go to alone. Is this one of those times when I trust God will protect me and just go, or do I need to use some creativity and find people to come and pray with me? I don't know. One of the things about this journey is that God seems to be guiding me in HIS time and HIS time is much, much slower than mine. I want to take giant leaps and He's taking me on baby steps, really, really slow baby steps, teaching me to trust and wait.
As I was praying, we got hit by a heat wave and I felt drawn to take ice water bottles to West Side Park and hand them out. A couple friends and I went down and did this and I was flying so high by the time we were done! I felt like I was finally home again and couldn't wait to do more. I decided that for every day the temperature in Modesto reached 100 or more, I would take water out. I started putting the word out and the water donations started pouring in. Several people dropped off cases of water and others donated money. The man-power, however, has been slim. It's the week of July 4th and everyone is busy. So again, frustration sets in and I am reminded HIS timing. HIS timing. HIS timing, not mine.
Yesterday, my friend Stephanie and I handed out twenty four water bottles and could have handed out more, but that was all we had brought with us. I was so excited about today, but unfortunately, the person I had lined up to go with me had something come up and couldn't go, and I had forgotten my phone at home, so I didn't get the message until later. I drove by West Side Park three times, hoping to see someone I knew so they could help me pass out the waters. There were so many people there in the heat, but I couldn't stop because I was alone with the kids. Since I had forgotten my phone at home, I couldn't call anyone else to join me either. So I drove by with 48 bottles of ice water in my trunk wondering how stupid it would be to just stop and hand them out on my own. But there's a difference between risking my life and risking the lives of my children, so we went home.
I know it's not a huge deal. The homeless go without water all the time and it's not like our 48 bottles would have made an earth shattering difference, but I'm really sad about it. Ironically, I listened to a sermon last night just before bed and one of the points in the sermon was that when God gives you a task, a dream, and you set about to do it, you will invariably come across road blocks.
I don't know what God has planned for West Side Park. I don't know if this is a personal journey for me, about letting go and trusting God, or if He has something bigger up His sleeve. Honestly, I have NO clue. I'm trying really hard not to panic about failing, about dropping the ball, about doing it "wrong". Instead, I'm focusing on listening to His voice and following it, one step at a time, and I think that means it's time for me to get my butt down there and do some praying, like He told me to weeks ago.

Not so bad

Ah. Finally a minute to write...and my brain is so tired I can barely think straight. Jason's been gone on a business trip all week, and I seldom sleep well when he's gone, so I'm pretty tuckered out. Not to mention that my doctor still has me on Ativan, which makes me a bit sleepy as well.
I started having muscle spasms about three days after I got my Lupron shot. The spasms were similar to the ones that landed me in the hospital last Easter, and when I met with my psychiatrist, he said he thought it might be because I went off the Ativan I was on for chemo cold turkey. No one had told me not to do that, but apparently it can be pretty dangerous, so he had me go back on the Attivan. Sure enough, my spasms faded away into nothingness. I see him again tomorrow and we'll discuss how to get me off this stuff the right way this time!
The journey since the Lupron shot has been amazingly easier than I expected. I've been moody and irritable at times, with a hot flash here or there, but nothing like the thick depression I was expecting. Thank you to all of you who prayed for us. I will get my second shot in about two weeks, and then my estrogen levels should be down to zero, and I can start the aromatase inhibitors. No idea what to expect from those, but honestly, it doesn't matter. My health journey over the last two years has been incredibly trying and yet God has faithfully been there with me every step of the way. So no matter what lies ahead, I know He will walk it with me, and I find great peace in that.
I must go get James and take the kids to the library, so I will keep this post short. More to come later :-).

Giving

I'm sitting here at the computer, wondering if I will be able to produce a somewhat coherent blog post. My mind is racing with my new-found, post-chemo freedom. There is SO much I want to do, but I'm forcing myself to put the brakes on so I don't end up sick again, or having to back out of numerous commitments I made when my time and energy seemed endless.
Life is good. Life is really, really good these days. The children are out of school for the summer. We are all adjusting to Jason working from home, and I am feeling so much better. In about five weeks, my treatment will resume (not chemo, but other possibly not so pleasant treatments) and life may get a bit more challenging at that time, but for now, I'm enjoying life.
I want my life to matter. I've always wanted this. For as far back as I can remember, I've wanted to make a difference, but now, having gone through cancer, I feel it even more so. I really believe that if we all did the most we can with what we've been given, this world would be a much better place!
My pastor Scott Nelson said in his sermon a couple weeks ago: "If you have twice as much as you need, why are you not giving 50% away?" This has played over and over in my head since, and I've realized I'm not as selfless as I thought I was. I like my Starbucks. I like having nice clothes and going out to eat. I like having the A/C on a comfortable temperature all summer long. I never thought I was attached to money, but to be honest, I don't give away nearly as much as I could. Is it right for me to have so much when people are dying of hunger and I could do something about it? Is it right for me to enjoy a frequent drink from Starbucks when that money, over a year's time, could provide a life saving operation or two for someone in a third world country?
I heard Francis Chan say in a sermon once something like the following: "Is it possible to give too much away? Possibly. But would it be too bad to stand before God and say: 'Oops. I gave too much away and died of starvation.'" I find that concept hilarious, and yet saddening at the same time. I am not there yet, in that frame of mind that is ready to give it ALL away. Oh, sure. I'll give some of it away. The extras. But to give away when it hurts, to give away the food out of my own cupboard when I'm out of grocery money? That's harder.
I had a mentor several years back who felt like the Lord was telling her to downsize in preparation for something to come. She didn't know what that "something" was, but she went through her clothes, and kept only about five tops and bottoms that she could mix and match into different outfits and gave everything away. Talk about blind devotion! She had no idea where God was leading, but she followed His instructions and ended up, down the road a little, using her home as a halfway house for convicts getting out of prison.
I want to be sold out, completely sold out, where "me" no longer exists and all that is left to see is Christ in me. I am not there yet, but I yearn to be, and I know that God will honor that desire and mold me to be more like Him in the years to come.

Mind their own business!

It is after 10:30pm. I've already taken a sleeping pill, and yet I'm here on the computer, typing. I was laying in bed, when a memory from thirteen years ago hit me and I really felt a strong need to type this blog post. I don't know which one of you needs to hear this, but I sense that this is something I need to share.
Thirteen years ago, shortly after Jason and I were married, I went through an incredibly difficult time emotionally. One night, I cut on myself with a razor over forty times. The cuts weren't deep, but they were a sign of a serious problem. Jason drove me all the way from our apartment to a hospital in Portland, OR about 25 miles away. Jason was a paramedic in Portland at the time, so for privacy concerns (he didn't need his co-workers asking him why his wife was in the ER), we were put in a room and they closed the curtains. Unfortunately, the social worker thought the closed curtains were a sign that we had already been helped and we waited a LONG time, I believe it was about an hour and a half, before the social worker realized that no one had been in to see me yet and finally came in to talk to us. By that time (45 minute drive + 1.5 hr wait), I had calmed down and was back in a "rational" frame of mind. Because I had already begun seeing a therapist the week before and didn't want to harm myself at that immediate moment, they sent me home with no treatment whatsoever. No lock up. No meds, and I don't believe they called my therapist either.
Fast-forward to last October. I downed a bunch of Ambien in a suicide attempt. I was taken by ambulance to Memorial Hospital, then transferred to Doctor's Behavioral Health (Mental Hospital), where I was put on a suicide watch for two days. I saw a psychiatrist there twice, for about ten minutes each time. I declined meds, and was released, with no follow up. I was not under the care of a therapist or a psychiatrist and no appointment was made for me by the staff to see one.
Why am I telling you these things? Because I want you to understand that if you have someone in your life who is struggling with depression, who is hurting themselves in anyway, you CANNOT count on the institutions or the hospitals to make sure they are safe and/or getting the treatment they need. I also want to point out that most people with mental illness, be it anxiety or depression (I can't speak for any other mental illnesses because I haven't experienced them), are incredibly overwhelmed. Even the smallest decisions of day to day life can seem insurmountable. When you can barely drag yourself out of bed and can't decide what you want to eat, or even if you want to eat, calling the insurance company, finding out what your coverage is, then calling several doctors before you find one who is accepting new patients, then making an appointment, getting to that appointment and then explaining what is going on with you is about tantamount to summitting Mount Everest! If you have a loved one who is steeped in depression or overcome with anxiety, offer to help them navigate the world of insurance and doctors. You may not want to be "pushy" or "interfere in their business" but I'm going to say it again: the institutions will not keep them safe. They may help you figure out how to keep them safe, but if you check them in and leave it at that, more times than not, they will not get adequate help. I honestly don't know where I would be today if I didn't have the help and support of my husband through those incredibly challenging and dangerous times. So be nosy. You just might save a life.

That's a wrap!

I have made my decision. I will not be doing the Taxol portion of the chemo treatment, meaning that my chemo is over. YAY! And yet I'm terrified! Not about the cancer. There are pros and cons to either decision I could make and I made the best one I could. I'm not really scared about the cancer coming back, or anything like that. If it comes back, we'll deal with it then. What I'm really struggling with is returning to "normal" life.
As strange as this may sound, my cancer has been a shield of sorts for me. Coming off severe depression and a nasty, painful situation with the ministry I was involved in, having cancer provided me with a blanket of sorts. For the last six months, I have been flooded with love and support. Even perfect strangers have reached out and loved on me. The wounds of the two years prior began to heal and I started to feel loved again. Emotionally, I started to feel stronger and stronger. To be honest, I felt like once my chemo was done, I would be able to take on anything that was thrown at me. But now, my chemo has been abruptly shortened by three months and I don't feel so strong anymore. I'm scared. I'm scared to face the big, scary world out there. I'm scared about how things will change.
We came to Covenant Grove Church two weeks after I was diagnosed with cancer, so from day one there, I have been a cancer patient. They have loved us and supported us and we have started to develop some good friendships there, but, like I said, from day one, I had cancer. I was the needy one. Every week, people would ask me how I was feeling, if I needed anything, how things were going. Now...now things will change and that is unsettling to me.
When I was depressed, I was tired all the time, but it was something I fought and was ashamed of. When I was going through surgeries and chemo, I was tired all the time, but it was expected, and naps were encouraged. If I had insomnia, it didn't really matter because I could sleep whenever I wanted to during the day without anyone thinking anything of it. I had help with the kids, with the house, with meals. I was incredibly blessed and spoiled. I'm scared now, now that I have to be an adult again. What if I'm still tired? What if life becomes overwhelming again and I can't hide behind my cancer?
Don't get me wrong. I didn't exploit my cancer. I tried very hard not to take advantage of people, but people are naturally more likely to help when you are sick and bald. Not so much when you look "normal".
Cancer also protected me from myself. I needed to distance myself from some unhealthy situations I was in and undergoing chemo forced me to do that. I was physically unable to put myself in some of those situations without seriously endangering my physical health due to low blood cell counts. Soon, however, in a matter of four weeks or so, my immune system will be back up to par and the choice will be mine. I will have to decide what is healthy for me emotionally and what isn't. I will have to make those choices, and they scare me. When I was laying in bed, sick from the chemo and the anti-nausea meds, I thought I could take on the world if only I wasn't so sick. Now, I don't feel so strong. I feel vulnerable, and the pains of my pre-cancer world haunt me and try to rob me of my peace.
One of my go-to verses during this cancer journey has been Romans 8:28 "And we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose." My depression? For good. My cancer? For good. My broken relationships? For good. My chemo? For good. Covenant Grove? For good. ALL things. In ALL things. I just wish I felt stronger emotionally...but then, if I did, perhaps I would start to rely on myself again, and forget the Source of my strength. He is my Rock. He has been my Rock through terrible, horrible, God-awful storms. I read the following quote after my first stay in the mental hospital and have found it to be so incredibly true. "Sometimes God lets you hit rock bottom so that you will discover that He is the rock at the bottom." - Tony Evans.
I don't know what the future holds and it does scare me. But Jesus is sleeping in my boat, and I know that should any storm arise, He can quickly calm it...or He can hold me while it rages, and promise to see me through.

Taxol?

Next Tuesday, the 28^th, I am scheduled to begin my Taxol regiment. I want to cry. The Adriamycin/Cytoxan has been brutal and I so desperately want to be done. I want this “cancer” portion of my life to be over and be able to move on, to what, I don't know, but on from this.
I've been wondering if I should do the Taxol at all. At times, when I think about it, it seems like overkill, but when dealing with something that could take my life, is there such a thing as overkill? I sent my oncologist an email today with several questions, asking him to explain to me why he felt I should undergo further chemotherapy and what the long-term repercussions of this particular chemo could be. I also asked him what he thought of the “forks over knives” view of things, particularly that a vegan diet can slow or even stop the growth of cancer. This was his response:

There is no guarantee of benefit with any of this therapy. It is possible you were cured as soon as your surgical wound was closed in the OR. It is possible we could treat you with chemotherapy constantly with a variety of drugs for many months and the disease may still come back. Clinical trials would suggest that with your particular disease parameters there appears to be statistically greater benefit to adding Taxol (that tends to be much easier to tolerate than Adriamycin and Cytoxan) than without. Unfortunately at an individual level, this benefit can only be expressed qualitatively and not quantitatively. It is like saying there is a 23% chance of rain this afternoon; if it rains, do you only get 23% wet.
2: There is a potential for permanent nerve symptoms about the hands and feet but that tends to be uncommon and mild.
3: My challenge to schools of thought such as "forks over knives" is to show the data in humans in similar clinical setting as you that specifically support what is being promoted. There are no data to say a vegan diet can be even remotely compared in efficacy in therapy for breast cancer.

Having said all that, the choice of what to do is yours. This issues cannot be effectively and adequately be discussed in an email like this. I would be happy to sit down with you and discuss all this further before you decide whether to continue with chemotherapy or not.

So the reality is that no one really knows if I need the next twelve weeks of chemo, and I want to run screaming for the hills, or bury my head in the sand and pretend that if I do nothing, all of this will go away. And maybe it would. Maybe it's already gone. But then again, maybe it isn't, and while the thought of spending my summer hooked to an IV isn't exactly my idea of a great time, it may, in the end, buy me years more of life.
I'm tired. I'm tired of being drugged up, tired of feeling weak, tired of fighting to muster the energy for every day activities. These months of chemo tagged on to two years of severe depression are taking their tole, and I'm just bone-weary tired. I do see the light at the end of the tunnel. I know it's there and I will be basking in its glow sooner than I know it. In the mean time, I ask for your prayers and rest in the strong arms of the One Who will get me through.

Comfort in the storm - Final A/C treatment

It is 3:30 am. In six hours, a nurse will be accessing my port and beginning the premeds for my final Adriamycin/Cytoxin chemo treatment. Following that, I will have twelve weekly treatments of Taxol, beginning in three weeks. My stomach is clenched in anxiety and dread and my mind is playing a revolving tape, sometimes in the background, sometimes on the forefront. "God, please don't make me! God, please help me. God, please don't make me! God, please help me."
As I was praying this prayer a few minutes ago, I was struck by the story of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. Now don't get me wrong. What I am about to go through, and what He went through are hardly comparable, but as the dread of and anguish over the events looming just around the corner rob me of my sleep and steal my peace, I am reminded of a time nearly two thousand years ago when a man, the Son of God, was in anguish and robbed of peace. Here are two separate recountings of the same event.

Luke 22:39-46: "Then, accompanied by the disciples, Jesus left the upstairs room and went as usual to the Mount of Olives. There he told them, “Pray that you will not give in to temptation.”He walked away, about a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed,“Father, if you are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.” Then an angel from heaven appeared and strengthened him. He prayed more fervently, and he was in such agony of spirit that his sweat fell to the ground like great drops of blood."

Matthew 26:36-46: "Then Jesus went with them to the olive grove called Gethsemane, and he said, “Sit here while I go over there to pray.” He took Peter and Zebedee’s two sons, James and John, and he became anguished and distressed. He told them, “My soul is crushed with grief to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.”He went on a little farther and bowed with his face to the ground, praying, “My Father! If it is possible, let this cup of suffering be taken away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.”

Then he returned to the disciples and found them asleep. He said to Peter, “Couldn’t you watch with me even one hour? Keep watch and pray, so that you will not give in to temptation. For the spirit is willing, but the body is weak!”

Then Jesus left them a second time and prayed, “My Father! If this cup cannot be taken away unless I drink it, your will be done.” When he returned to them again, he found them sleeping, for they couldn’t keep their eyes open.

So he went to pray a third time, saying the same things again. Then he came to the disciples and said, “Go ahead and sleep. Have your rest. But look—the time has come. The Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Up, let’s be going. Look, my betrayer is here!”

A few things jump out at me in these passages. The first one is this. Jesus, in His anguish, was brutally honest. "I don't want to do this!! Please don't make me do this!" but He also never lost sight of Who He was and what He had come for "I want your will to be done, not mine." In response, God the Father sent an angel to comfort Him. He didn't remove the suffering that Jesus was about to endure, but He gave Him the strength to endure it. Sometimes we pray in our anguish that God will remove the storms causing us pain, but instead He provides us the strength to walk through them.
Something else I noticed in the reading of Matthew's version of events is that Jesus didn't beg God the Father once. He, too, had a "tape" playing: "God, please don't make me. God, please don't make me. God, please don't make me." His anguish was deep. His pain was soul-wrenching. His plea was strong and heart-felt. And when He was done pouring His broken heart out to God, He got up and did what He had to do, for you and for me.
There is much about the Bible, Christ and Christianity that I do not understand, but this I do know. Jesus loved us with a love beyond compare. He faced an agony so intense because He knew what was ahead. He knew He would be brutally beaten and hung on a cross. He knew He was about to have the weight of the sins of the entire world cast on Him. His soul was in anguish, and still He went through with it...because He loved His Father and because, together, they loved us.
When you are going through something that is ripping you to shreds and you think that God just doesn't understand, think again. He does. He understands completely, but maybe His ultimate plan is not to save you from your pain. Maybe His plan is to walk with you through it.