our little adventure.

about a month ago. well it really started back in august when my sister in law was in town right after we got the cancer diagnosis. i told her i was having a real hard time sleeping. so she decided to set me up with a little google reader and added some of her favorite blogs. something for me to read at 2am or 4am when my mind was racing. one of the blogs was enjoying the small things. a blog by kelle hampton. check it out. its big. and inspiring. begin with the birth story. needless to say i started reading it. loved it. and found joy in her writing, pictures, and her story. so when cancer was not that fun to talk about sara and i would text, chat, or email about kelle's blog posts and it began to be something we enjoyed to together although states away. so a month or so ago when kelle mentioned her daughter's upcoming birthday...sara texts me with...wouldn't it be fun to go to nella's party (kelle's daughter. who is ava's age). to which i respond...i will email her. and sara says...okay if you get us invited to this party i will fly us to there. so i decided to casually send kelle an email. and i did not tell sara or justin. in case i never heard back from her or whatever. well when i woke up the next morning at 7:30am there was an email from kelle. i was shocked. this women has thousands. maybe millions reading her blog. no joke. but she said come. with open arms she invited us. not knowing us. or whether or not we were crazy. she got us. she understood it. so we went. the floyds and the ryders flew to naples. to help celebrate nella. meet family. meet friends. share in it all. and man...did we share.

we have great husbands. they willingly took off work. watched the kids so we could hang out with kelle, meet her friends, and go to isle of capri although it was a little cold and mostly just a girl thing. they helped make this entire weekend possible. as soon as we received the email from kelle justin said...we have to go. i have not seen you this excited about something in a while. we need to go. and we will make it happen. and we did.

it was a great combination of our family sharing an unexpected wintertime vacation together and sharing in the festivities of the weekend with kelle, her family, and her dear dear friends. we shared a hotel suite with the floyds. that was a little crazy with ava and jack and isabella running around. but we laughed. and we laughed hard. ate good food. and just spent time together. it was so nice. and i did not feel sick at all. writing that made me cry. i like not feeling sick. i like that the only thing that reminded me i had cancer this weekend was my hat. and meeting new people where in turn i shared our cancer story a few times. and i felt loved. and strong. and it was good.

thanks for a really special weekend.

 isle of capri 

naples.

we are on vacation. all is well. more than well. enjoy the sunshine and our family. no chemo until next thursday. enjoying a break from feeling sick. ava is doing better too.

my heart.

i feel a little broken today. mostly because i finished this book yesterday and oddly enough watched an interview on nightline with michelle williams about heath ledgers death (weird i know. as they are celebrities). the book is called the middle place. its about a women who is married and has two young daughters. its her journey of breast cancer. and in the middle of her own diagnosis, her father is diagnosed with cancer as well. although it was sad in parts. it did help me begin to process cancer. and what is means and what is does not mean. and that its okay to feel the way i do because someone else with cancer has felt that way too. and in the interview how everything in life can change in a mere instant. not something i recommend obsessing about as it could cripple your life. and the joy in it. to live in such fear. so its not that it made me scared. it reminded me that its true. and part of me is beginning to mourn the loss of the past five months. for what i thought they would look like. and feel like. and what would happen. and how it looked terribly different than i ever imagined. and as you know. if you read this blog. i am joyful. i trust God. i know He is using our cancer. but at the same time i think its okay and normal and possibly therapeutic to feel sad. and angry. and to really begin to talk about the parts of my heart that hold lots of pain. and simply deep deep sadness over cancer and what it does to you and how it changes you. forever. that this morning for example. life with no cancer would mean ava would eat her banana nut cheerios in her highchair. justin would make coffee. and we could talk in the kitchen about what we had going on today. and if ava slept through the night...

and all that is true but this conversation was added. today justin said...i think its time. time to shave your head. to which i respond...what? really? you think? why? i mean i am almost done? to which he says...babe, you told me to tell you when it was time. to which i say...i hate you (but i don't really. and i told him that after i said it). to which he said...do you really want to wait until you only have three hairs left? i laugh. because that is funny...but maybe i do. we go back and forth. i even try my wig on for the first time. i hate it. he says i look beautiful and that i would no matter what. to which i say...thank you. but come on i hope i look better with hair. and because i am in denial and will continue to be i say...babe, everyone tells me it looks good and they are surprised i still even have some hair (but as i type this i am thinking...possibly everyone who has said this is lying). so he says...okay. don't shave it then. so we/i opt out of shaving for today and instead use my trusty old hats.

what is interesting to me is that last night before bed. for the first time in a while. like a while while. i took out my handheld mirror and checked the back of my head out in the mirror. since i do not check it out that often i was a bit shocked at what i saw. wow. getting pretty thin. but put the mirror away and went to bed. and then we had the conversation we had this morning.

so that is was what our conversation over breakfast looked like. and its fine. because life never turns out exactly the way we thought or imagined. at least not every detail. and that is okay. life is hard sometimes. but for today. or maybe the past week or so i starting to process cancer a bit more. maybe something that is impossible to do right in the middle of it all. i do not think you can really. and what i feel in my soul is so hard to articulate. because its bigger than just sadness or anger. its beginning to realize that in many ways i am not who i was before. but also still very much the same. can the two exist? i think so. and i sometimes think i am supposed to come to some conclusion or answer about it all. all that is going on inside my heart and head. but i know i don't. not yet at least. and maybe not ever. it will simply be a new chapter in my life. one that i did not think i would ever need to include. but i do.

turning a corner.

usually three days after chemo i finally begin to feel a little better. still tired and lazy, but not nearly as sick. ava is still sick and i hate it. thankfully we have an appointment with the doctor today and we can figure out what is going on with her. i do not do well when my daughter is sick. and then i really do not do well when i am sick on top of it. but we made it. we made it through the toughest days post chemo. and little ava was so sick on tuesday, but so precious. she woke up at like 6pm from her afternoon nap and justin brought her into bed with me. and although i wish more than anything that ava would cuddle with us...its just not her style. but on this tuesday night it was all she wanted. and i will never forget it. i will hold on to it deep in my heart. i held her in my arms and within minutes she was asleep. she woke up ten minutes later and took a few bites of bread (we were trying to get her to eat). she ate and then feel back asleep on me again. then woke up, ate some bread, and feel asleep again. i can not even find the words. but before we knew it was 8pm and we decided to steam up the bathroom to help with her congestion. well as our sweet naked ava laid in my arms, with the shower running, she fell right to sleep. it melted our hearts. its something inside a parent. can't explain it. but your child's pain is always more important and grander than your own.  justin loves to sit in the bathroom and read with the shower on. its his favorite. so we were not surprised that maybe ava enjoys the same thing as her daddy. she stayed asleep as we put her diaper on. her pajamas on. and then her sleep sack. and that sweet sick baby slept through the night. it was all we needed.

chemo has just been a lot for me this time. not sure why exactly. just emotionally exhausted. trying to muster the strength for two more. which i know i will. i have said to justin a lot this week that i am just done. i am over it. i am tired. i am sick of cancer. on tuesday night when we were laying in bed justin said to me, "i just miss seeing you happy. like genuinely happy." obviously i immediately want to defend myself and say i have been happy. i am happy. i am not depressed. but i do not think that was what he was saying. of course there has been happiness and joy. but what has always been lingering...is our dark cloud of cancer. we know it wont always be there. it will be lifted. and we will move past this season. but sometimes its just a lot for us. thank goodness we are not alone in this.

i was talking briefly to this women next to me at chemo. she had two treatments left too. and it was interesting because she felt the opposite as me. she said, you should have seen me in the beginning. they had to bring me in here in a wheelchair. i had nothing to give. i was scared and overwhelmed. but now i am ready to fight and end this thing strong. i think for me it has been very different. in the beginning i was so like we got this. we can do this. and just sorta went after it all. but now its harder to muster that same level of energy. and i hear that this is a little common. that the end of the line. although exciting. can be very draining. i think part of this is the emotional roller coaster of having a good week, then a sick week, good week, then a sick week. just ready for no more sick weeks.

but finally the end is in sight.

update.

well our sweet miss janurary slept through the night last night. yay. she is feeling a lot better today. so thankful. i am feeling alright. we had our dear friend pam over today and she took good care of ava so i could sleep. i am so appreciative. all i got for tonight. so sleepy. just got to get through these next couple days. but its tough. only two more. wow that sounds nice.

miss january...

chemo number ten.

chemo went fine. i was so sick throughout the entire thing. but its over. and i am miserable.

but ava is sick too. she has her first real little cold. real congested. a cough. and a slight fever. we had a precious night with her. but i will blog about that later. i am just too tired right now.

but...

i wanted to write real quick and ask those of you that read this blog and care about our family to pray. pray hard that ava sleeps through the night. no more cough. no more fever. and no more sneezing. she is so sleepy but is not able to stay asleep sleep since its hard for her to breathe. and we do not do well when our baby is sick. so please pray for her health. and then pray that we experience another miracle for me. little pain. little nausea. and the ability to sleep and recover quickly from chemo.

its getting hard around here at the ryder house.