I HAVE BREAST CANCER

There! I said it out loud as I was typing just to be able to say I could say it! So I guess it's time to tell my story, or the beginning, because it is certainly not the end!

June 29, 2012
Getting ready for bed, I felt something like a hair on my left breast and just like anyone else would, I reached to brush it off. And that is when I felt it. Then I felt it again. And again. Then I called Frank to come in and feel of it. It was 10:30 at night and we had a wedding to go to the next day so we agreed not to worry about it until Monday because truthfully there wasn't anything we could do until then anyway. We enjoyed the weekend and celebrated with my family at the wedding of my cousin.

July 2, 2012
I started calling the doctor's office at 8:30, knowing it would take awhile to get through since it was Monday. But I got right through. They tried to put me off until later in the week, but I wouldn't let them. I knew the PA had worked in oncology before and with a lot of women so I asked to see her. I had an appointment at 2:00 that same day. We went through the normal questions and breast exam and she told me what I had known would be normal procedure. I had to have a mammogram. She said she would try to get me an appointment before we left for vacation the following week.

July 5, 2012
I had not heard back from the doctor or the women's center where I was to have the mammogram done. So I started calling. I finally got to talk to Sandra (the PA). She made a few calls and had my appointment scheduled for Tuesday July 10 at 3:00 PM, less than 12 hours before we were to be at the airport for our vacation.

July 10, 2012
I love the women's center at ARMC! Every time I am in there, no matter how many people are waiting, they are friendly and loving. I had the mammogram done and they decided, as per Sandra's orders, that a sonogram was needed also. WOW! I could see the lump and another one much smaller below it. I got all dressed and was told to wait back in the dressing room, that the radiologist would be in to see me shortly. At that moment I just had a feeling of what was to follow and at that very second I decided I was not going to be a Negative Nellie no matter what the outcome may be, because no matter what the doctor's tell me, God is in control of it all!!!
When the radiologist came in he told me that it was definitely not a cyst and would need a biopsy to determine what was in there. I called Frank and told him what they said and he agreed that we were going to stay positive and enjoy our vacation.

July 11 - 18, 2012
And vacation we did!!! We traveled to Orlando, Florida for the US Open World Karate Championships, just like last year only this time, things were different, Katie got to go with us, we flew instead of driving and God had given us something to think about instead of what was going on inside of my body. Frank won 2 world titles, 2 second places, and a 4th. I won 1 world title, 2 seconds and a 4th, and Mattie May won 2 seconds and a 4th. After the competition, we enjoyed 2 1/2 days at Walt Disney World. We had a blast. We got to ride many of the rides that we didn't get to last year and just really enjoyed our time together.

July 18, 2012
The first thing I did after we got home was start calling the doctors office to see if they had made my an appointment for the biopsy. This is the only day I can say I have had any type of frustration. They kept giving me the run around saying they hadn't received a fax telling them to make the appointment and that I would have to call the women's center to get them to fax it to them. I did call and Michelle told me that she had faxed it twice and she faxed it again while I was on the phone with her. Once she got the OK transmittal I called the doctors office again. Again they told me they hadn't received it and that I would have to call again but even if they received it they would have to wait until the doctor was in to make the appointment. And this is the point where I lost it. I told her that they needed to call the women's center to see why they had not received the fax because this is after all one of the reasons I pay for their services. And that the doctor did not need to be there because Sandra had already told me she could read the fax and make the appointment. I also told her that if this were her breast she would not be happy getting the run around either. My! How fast her attitude changed and how quickly they found the fax and Sandra called me back! Sandra had called the surgical center and they were going to schedule the appointment (I had already told her that I would be available at any time.) but if I had not heard back from her, to call on Friday before they closed at noon.

July 20, 2012
At 11:30, I had still not heard of any appointment being scheduled for me so I called Sandra back since they close at noon on Friday's. She told me she would call me back and in less than five minutes she called with an appointment scheduled at 1:45 the following Monday with the surgeon that would do the biopsy. We enjoyed the weekend by going out with some friends and renting movies all weekend.

July 23, 2012
My mom was out of town, so my Aunt Hymonda went with me to the appointment. He gave me the options on what type of biopsy they could do, needle or incision. I opted for the incision. I know! Weird for me! I hate to think about any type of procedure and usually go for the least invasive, but Hy and I both agreed that not only would he be able to get more tissue to test, but it would be possible he could get the entire lump. That would leave that little surprise lump in there but he wouldn't be able to get to it either way. The biopsy was scheduled for the following Thursday.

July 26, 2012
My appointment was at 2:30. Mom was back in town so she met me at the surgery center. I'm not sure who was more nervous, Mom or me. Her worried about her only baby being cut on, or me worried about her passing out on me! LOL
If you know me, you know what a wiener I am. I have a very low tolerance for pain. I was not looking forward to getting that shot in my breast. I can't stand it when I have to get my flu shot every year and here I was about to have a lump cut out of my breast. I made it fine through the shots and didn't even know when he made the incision, but I did know when he started to cut the lump out. I could feel it and it didn't take me but a couple of seconds to let him know I could. He stopped and did some more deading and we proceeded with the procedure. They told me I would probably get hot from the deading shot but I wasn't expecting to be in an oven. When it was all over, I set up and mom and the nurse, almost at the same time, said I was looking a little pale. They got me some cool water and a fan. I was pretty shaky and mom said I was not driving home. I had to sit in there for a bit until I got some color back. While we were in there by ourselves, we decided to look at the incision together. Neither one of us passed out!! Yay us!
I called Frank. He was just getting off work so he met us at the house and Mom took him back to get my car. That evening we just relaxed some more and enjoyed the cool air in the house.

July 31, 2012
Dr. Yost had told me it could be late the end of the week or even the first of the following week before we heard anything back from the biopsy. So when my phone rang 10:15 with a local number I was not familiar with I really didn't think much about it. But it was Dr. Yost himself. He had the results and they were not what we wanted to hear, it was breast cancer. He wanted me to come in as soon as I could, so I was at his office at 11:00 am. Mom met me there, but I recorded the entire conversation so Frank could hear it when he got home. I am really surprised Frank didn't have me call him when Dr. Yost walked in the office. That's just the way he is. He wants everything to be OK and he wants to be with me to hold my hand through it all.
Dr. Yost went over the results. We still don't know what type it is, this is just the early reading. We will get the rest of the results later on. But he wanted me to be able to start thinking about what I wanted as soon as possible.

So that is the beginning of my story. I sit here watching the Olympics and waiting for Frank to get home from work. I have called the insurance to see what my coverage is. Not only is it good, God lead me to a breast cancer survivor in Mary, the CSR that handled my call. She was just like me, absolutely no history of breast cancer in her family, but she was the lucky number one that got it, then her sister three years later.

I know God is in control and has an awesome plan for me. I just hope I have the patients to give it to him and not try to take it back like I always do. If you catch me doing that, please give me a gentle reminder that He is taking care of it all.

Until next time, God bless.

Only Eight Days Left

I just don't know where the time goes. It seems like it was just yesterday I was typing this post about Mattie starting kindergarten and now there are only eight days left of the school year. She has done some amazing things this year. She is, for the most part, a good student. She has her normal six year old days where she ends up having to move her pin to yellow or worse, but she has mastered everything she was supposed to this year. On her iStation test she is reading at a 1.8. What that means - if she were in the first grade she would be ready to go on to second!

She still loves to help me around the house, cooking, cleaning and doing laundry of all things. She makes Frank and I laugh on a daily basis just from being herself. She is improving in her karate which she loves and is looking forward to karate camp this summer. She told us last week it was her favorite part of karate! I so glad she loves karate so much. It keeps her constantly moving.

Tournaments are still a high priority on her list but she is not going to as many as she did last year. It was just too much. They are fun, but by the end of the year we were just worn out!

We are not quite sure what the summer has in store for us yet. She will be going to karate camp and she has a huge ready list waiting for her including a new series of chapter books and we'll be doing some swimming too. We may go on some new adventures, take our usual trip to the beach or just hang out around the house. Whatever we choose this year, I know it will be great.


Until next time,

God Bless

Wild Wild West Karate Championship - My Failed Record attempt

As I stated in my previous post, I tried for the record in power concrete foot. I didn't succeed, but I hope to try again soon. Here is the video of my attempt.

Well, I'll keep practicing and hopefully I will get it soon!!!

Until next time:

Gob Bless.

Wild Wild West Texas Championships - My Turn

I have not competed since last July when we went to the US Open in Orlando, I have not even worked out since then. Because of the lapse of post on my little bloggy here, you don't know about my arm injury. Long story short - I fell, got a shot, burst two bursa sacks in my right arm, had extremely limited usage for several months. A good reason not to go around breaking things with my hand huh?! But I'm better now, so I competed.

I didn't have any competition so I decided to try for some records, but I chickened out when it came to my arm. For concrete elbow and hand (which I had never tried) I just tried to break one brick. Elbow - I succeeded, hand - I did not! Don't know that I will be trying either of those anymore. I have a really nice bruise on my arm and palm. I need to rethink the technique I use for my hand if I do decide to try that again, but I'm thinking I will leave the concrete breaks to my foot!

For power wood hand I also decided not to try for the record, because now I have a bruise on my palm! I stacked 6 and broke 3. Not the best success but I will keep trying, maybe. That downward strike left some pain in my arm that I am not two happy with and I really don't want to end up back in the doctor's office and PT!

Last year at the US Open, I didn't know what the record was until after I broke. I missed the record by 2. I was not a happy camper and that record has changed since then. It is now 10 and I was ready to break it. But I guess not ready enough! I stacked 11 and broke 7, one less than what I broke last year. I will continue to work on that before July when we head back to Florida.

My final event was power wood foot and the record for it was also standing at 10, so I stacked 11. Funny, it seemed such a small stack to me after stacking those 11 bricks!

 Yes I did it! I was so excited! Now we just need to keep working on Frank so he can hold a record with me!

We are probably going to Houston next weekend to participate in the Houston International. That's the tournament where Mattie won a bicycle last year. So hopefully I can get that concrete record then!

Until next time:

God Bless.

Wild Wild West Texas Karate Championships - Frank's Turn

Frank did some breaking Friday night during the breaking portion of the tournament. He didn't win anything thing, but he had some personal accomplishments that are just as important. He didn't think he could break concrete! Don't ask me why he thought this, I break concrete after all! If I can do it I knew he could.

His first attempt was the Power Concrete Foot, or as we call it foot stomp concrete. He stacked eleven bricks and only broke eight. But for his first time that was great and just that he did it made me happy.

So proud of you! Love you Honey!

 Until next time

God Bless!

Not Even Going To Try To Play Catch Up!

It's been way to long, seven months, since I have posted on my little blog page. I have missed it, but have been wrapped up in life. Since it has been so long I am going to only go forward. I am not going to try to go back and play catch up. I do have some things (Mattie's tournaments and school) that I will post about when I have nothing else to say, but until then, Forward HO!

This past weekend, was the Wild Wild West Texas Karate Tournament. This is our tournament to host, well, our dojo's anyway. This year I took on some of the registration and tracking jobs. Let's just say the things that need to be done on the computer. Did I take on more than I should have? No, just took me a bit of time to get them done because I was learning at the same time. Will I do this next year if asked? Of course. If Larry and Terry think I did a good enough job and ask me to do it again I will. I still have some things to learn but I also learned some things to do differently to make the process flow a bit better.

Frank, Mattie, and myself all participated in the tournament. We tried to get Katie to do some breaking but she didn't. But she did run those long legs of hers all weekend. And I mean run. She was at our beck and call all weekend and she did a great job. But she needs to learn to delegate a bit more, but I think that also comes with experience (age) and it will be easier for her next year.

We had some great personal accomplishments for all of us. But I want to focus on what I believe was Mattie's personal best accomplishment this weekend.

A few weeks ago, Larry asked her if she would sing the National Anthem to kick off our tournament. That little toot didn't even take a breath before she answered "Of course I will Shihan!" So we began practicing. First with clips from Youtube with either the words or a person or persons singing. Then we just found some instrumental pieces for her to practice with. She never got discouraged while she was practicing, but most of her practice sessions took place in the car between home, school and the dojo. Time is very limited around tournament time as I'm sure most of you know.

One day she told me she really didn't want to sing with music, so she started practicing without it. And she was doing great. The Star Spangled Banner (National Anthem) is not an easy piece of music to sing for an adult that has been singing it forever, much less a six year old child that has only a couple of weeks to learn it. But she was determined she was not going to let Shihan down. My biggest fear for her was not remembering the words, but getting a case of stage fright. She would be performing in front of 365 competitors and their families/spectators after all, probably about 600 people in all. Yes, this grandma was a bit nervous!

Friday night, she did get to practice in front of a smaller crowd during the breaking/grappling/continuous sparring part of the tournament, but that was at the dojo in front of mostly our own families and friends, not many strangers.

How did she do? Well watch the following Youtube and you judge for yourself.

WOW! I love the crowd's reaction! She had a few mistakes, but I think she did great. Her placing her hand over her heart, she did that herself! We had concentrated so much on learning the song we forgot to remind her of that. But like any proud American, she remembered and did exactly what she was supposed to do! The child has no fear! I know she will go on to accomplish great things.

Until next time:

God Bless

Where Have I Been?

WOW! I have been MIA from my little bloggy for almost a month. Didn't mean too, just haven't had enough time lately! We have been busy bee's around here. I promise to get some good post up soon. I have several karate tournaments to tell you about, the fair, and an injury. 


But all is well and we are all happy. 


Until next time, God Bless.