Today's the day!

It's finally here, the last day of treatment! Do you think they did this on purpose? "Let's make him have his last treatment on the last day of the year." I guess it's better than starting the year with a treatment. It sure would be good to celebrate with a steak dinner down at Texas Land and Cattle Co., but that will have to wait about two weeks.

His hair is growing back nicely, I gave him a hair cut yesterday, but the really weird thing now is how the radiation has burned his beard off! He looks like he is trying to grow a go-tee. Everywhere the sun burn looking redness is along his neck and up his cheeks is just as smooth as a baby's butt and he hasn't had to shave in weeks, I guess since the redness showed up. So he's left with whiskers on his chin, mustache and slightly out on his cheeks... very cartoonish looking. Doesn't Homer Simpson have radiated whiskers?

That is nothing compared to this next part... and if you are squeamish, skip to the next paragraph. You know how your throat sometimes feels dry when you wake up in the morning? With his throat being fried on the inside, is literally scabbed over! So if he coughs or tries to swallow too much water or coffee he starts gagging. Yeah, that's not good for a guy with a very touchy gag reflex. He can gag just thinking about the smell of sour milk, or just thinking about gagging can make him gag. Then once he gags..... as Jolea says... he's calling the dinosaurs. Can you imagine having a 3rd degree burn on your throat and then having to go throw up? This can also happen if he starts coughing! Oh the fun just keeps happening!

That's enough of that.... I just know when he gets home this afternoon he'll feel better knowing no more treatments.... that's got to be an uplifting feeling. Then the voice comes back in two weeks, right along side the ability to swallow whole food. YES! I want you all to know.... I've been eating oatmeal and eggs right alongside him, when I'm not eating a salad or something he totally detests like Chicken Pot Pie........ Sorry, I drifted off there for a second, I keep thinking about cooking Chicken Fried Steak, and for me that's a stretch. I used to cook Chicken Fried Steak 3-4 times a week for him (it was all I knew how to cook.) I haven't eaten it in probably 20 years. But it's sounding really good right now.

When I think back on 2008 it's literally a blur, it went by so fast, well at least the first half of the year did.

January - work as usual and I finished knitting the coat. Started watering the seed of thought that Di put in our minds of going to the Virgin Islands in the summer.

February - work as usual and I probably started a sweater and frogged it. That seed started sprouting.

March - Yadda yadda work work work... started driving with the top down on the car.

April - Count down to the last day of school has begun. I was probably still frogging sweaters at this point.. 2008 wasn't a good knitting year. I discovered a sure way to get a Thunderstorm was to leave the top down on my car while at work. It worked better than a rain dance.

May - Booked my flight to St. Thomas! School's out for the summer....

June - insert dramatic music here.... Jody has a TUMA! But at the same time we had some hope. This could be cured. This could mean no more headaches!

July - Big trip! Loved it! Wanna go again! Soon! Visit more islands, see more beaches, snorkel more, and sail next time.

August - Back to school and Chemo began.

September - forget this, it's starting to depress me.... such a mundane life and besides you've already been bored with the last six months in this blog.

I do want to express how helpful this blog and all the readers have been. I would suggest blogging to anyone who is going through a stressful time in their lives. Jody was asked many times by the Doctors and medical staff, how I was doing... was I needing to talk to anyone? Of course Jody would tell them no, I was fine.... his thinking was that they were just trying to dig a little more money out of him. But in fact I didn't need to talk to anyone.... I could just open the computer and let my fingers fly. And even if I hadn't had comments to my posts, it still would have been beneficial, just to get it off my chest, really it was more like getting it out of my fingertips. A blog and a little red wine will get you through anything.

But it was the comments that were the most helpful. Many short and sweet, and then emails with more direct questions, or concerns or comparisons. Having other people from all over the world reading and letting me know they are there in a like minded community so to speak. It sure made this short haul easier to bear. Thank you!

This brings me to something I've been thinking about lately.... do I continue this blog once Jody is well? As you can see from my list of the year in events above.... I don't have an exciting life. And as Jody says about blogging.... "no one's life is that exciting that they can write about it every day." I know there are people out there with exciting lives.... but they aren't working at an Elementary School... they are sailing a sailboat around the world or living in a wildlife refuge in Africa (good blog but the writer had a huge ego... I had to let him go.) This blog was started to inform friends and family about Jody's health and to keep the word of mouth updates to a minimum at school. When he's well what will I post about? My minimal readership will plummet.... depression will set in.... knitting will drop off.... oh let's not go there.

Maybe I'll get a Hawaii Chair for work instead. That would give me something to write about.





Have a happy and safe New Year....