Fighting Nausea and Lovely Neighbors 

I am fighting nausea. And for the first time in my life I really don’t have an appetite. This is such a foreign concept to me. B.C. I could pretty much eat anytime, hunger was secondary. I learned not too…but I could!  My primary goal now is to get enough protein each day and a secondary goal is to eat healthy. I really do not want to eat any processed foods or sugar. But I’m eating some candied ginger if that sounds good for nausea and I’ll eat a protein bar now and then. B.C. I lived on salads. I had salads for lunch most days and then some salad with dinner also. Salads really don’t appeal to me, now. In fact most of my favorite foods are really unappealing: salmon, chocolate, wine, salad. I’ll save them for post chemo, then have a feast!

I am trying to fight nausea without pharmaceuticals. I really do not want to take more pills that have names I cannot pronounce. I have taken them this week and I will if I need to but I’m trying to find other means. I’m finding hard exercise helps (dammit). As you know I am not famous for my love of exercise. I hate to sweat, it itches and is yucky. But sweat I must. Everyday this week I’ve gone down to the nearby stadium and walked the track and run the stairs. I’m going for that interval, short burst of aerobic exercise that they say is so good for you. After the stairs we (Mike has joined me a couple of days and Carrie joined in one day) do lunges, planks or push ups on the wall, and plenty of stretches. Then we do a series of 8 Qi Gong movements (the silken movements) taught to us by our neighbor and massage therapist, Sue. Yesterday after all of that I came home and did yoga and relaxation with Roz. Today I did a little yoga and “mediation". Yesterday I worked out the hardest and most I had in a long time and my nausea was so, so much better. Yesterday afternoon I went to Jim for an acupuncture treatment to help with the nausea, also. I’m wearing sea bands which may be helping also. On Tuesday when I see Dr. Kaplan I’ll find out where he stands on medical marijuana. I can pronounce that word and know several other friendly names for it, too! I’m willing to give it a try. In the meantime I’ll continue to exercise, wear sea bands and drink ginger tea and see how it goes.

We have lovely neighbors, Lizzy, Vince and baby June. They are dear and we are so glad they live next door to us. They are the neighbors who took a very run down piece of property and turned it into a darling house. They had chickens for a long while and provided us with many dozens of eggs. We get to go grab little June for a baby fix almost anytime we want. And Vince is the artist/contractor who remodeled our kitchen. They are both musicians and therefore automatically cooler than we are.  Really…could neighbors get any better than that…well, yes!

For over a year we’ve talked about building together, with them, a wood fired pizza oven on one or both of the properties. We even talked about building it on a trailer so we could take it places with us for wood fired pizza celebrations, to the beach, perhaps! Anyway, almost as soon as I was diagnosed with cancer, Vince said, “I’m building the pizza oven.” That’s all there was too it. We were planning to finance it and weren’t ready for that part, but that was not going to stop him. So one night Vince and Mike and Betty walked the property and in the end they decided on their front yard right next to our property. And now…there it is! It is not quite finished but last night Lizzie and Vince cooked hot dogs in it for dinner and then after June went to bed we all made s’mores! Vince has a few more things to do to complete the project, but we are planning to have pizza this weekend to celebrate Maggie’s 23rd birthday! Isn’t that the coolest! I’ll add pictures next week, cause I know it is hard to believe there is a pizza oven in our neighbors front yard!!!

I am missing school. I cannot imagine trying to do school at any level and am so very grateful for sick leave and insurance. But I miss my teacher friends. I miss the kids. I miss the energy. I always said my job completely filled me up and completely drained me. I miss the fill up part, but cancer is what is draining me now.

The families of my last year’s class are in the midst of doing the absolute sweetest thing for me. They are sending me short videos of their kids reading. These guys are going into second grade and I taught them for Kindergarten and First Grade. It is an honor and a pleasure to be a part of the magic of helping kids learn how to read, so the fact that I’m getting one or two videos a day of my cuties reading to me is just making me so happy! I love it! Thank you, Salmon Clan!! 

So, today is the scan. Mike and I are heading to Swedish in about an hour and I’ll have a CT scan to see how it’s going in there. Since my scan is so late in the day and it is a 3 day weekend we will not know the results until Tuesday. I have plenty of distractions this weekend though, we’re celebrating Maggie’s 23rd (this is the first time she has been home on her birthday since she was a senior in high school!!). Michael and Eva are headed up tonight. I’m expected to be fully entertained by them and their friends. It should be a great weekend! (and by the way if pizza doesn’t taste good to me I’m going to be really pissed!!!!)

love and blessings and pizza to you all

Janet

And, thanks Betsy, I'll have Eva pick out a shrink dink salmon for Mamu!