When life hands you lemons,

take those lemons to the Bahama's and have them make you a DRINK!!!

That is exactly what we did last week!  It has been no secret that this year has been pretty tough for these Johnson's.  We have had to cancel two trips and have really just been concentrating on my health and treatment.  NOW WHAT FUN IS THAT????  Not so much.  About a month ago Jason and I decided that my chemo schedule had become somewhat predictable (chemo Tuesday's, start feeling like crap Thursday, down for the count Friday/Sat turn around Sat night or Sun) so we thought a family vacation would be in order.  Time to get away from ALL things medical for a week.  We talked with my doctor, she said it would be just fine and so we headed to our favorite place on earth~The Bahama's!  Jason and I were there in 2004 and always swore that one day we would take our family back there.  No time like the present right??  Off we went for 6 glorious days!  Highlights include: beach time, pool time, "The Not so Lazy" River at the hotel (as we call it!  The river has rapids, Kenz was turned over twice, once with me on the inter tube and once with Jason, trust me though, it was a ton of fun!!), the water slides, Dolphin encounter, the aquarium at the hotel, the weather, the food, EVERYTHING.  It was fun and relaxing and exactly what we needed, a true family vacation!!  Here are some picture highlights.  If you want to see more feel free to click here:   http://flickr.com/gp/84976568@N05/b52WqU/ 

Blue skies, turq water. the greenery!  We ♥ you Bahamas!

See why it's our favorite place???

Not a bad wake up!!

The fam on the beach!

Our girls were in awe of the aquarium walls

The fam at Dolphin Encounter!  Kenz gets a kiss!

Ta-DAH!!  The girls in their element

Bedroom Overhaul

*Sigh*  The nursery in our house is official gone.  The signs of baby are no more as at the age of 3 Kadence grew out of her "Cribby Bed."  It's funny, poor Kenzie was KICKED out of her crib at 18 months.  There was another baby on the way and we needed her crib, so into the double bed she went!  Kadence on the other hand has been totally content with the crib, we modified it as time went on (removing the front part) but she still fit in it and was happy as can be.  Well, as she continues to grow we figured it was time to transition into a big girl bed!  A few months ago we found her a cute little trundle bed and the girls have loved it!  With the trundle Kadence loved having Kenzie "sleep over" in her room and Kenz loved being there.  See below:

Bye bye cribby bed!

Sleep overs with the trundle!  FUN!

And when it's clean... ;)

As all parents are, we are just suckers watching the girls together and seeing what great friends they are and how close they are.  With everything that has gone on Kenzie has really gone the extra mile watching over Kadence and making sure she is comfortable when they are at peoples houses, helps when I'm not feeling so hot etc.  So, Jason and I figure, you only live once and as they are just the best of friends why not get Kenz a bunk bed so they can have sleep overs in Kenzie's room too?  Is it impractical?  Totally.  Is it so much fun for them?  Definitely.  We love that they love it.  See below for Kenzie's room makeover.  Come on over for a visit, I'm sure she'll let you have top bunk ;)  

The old room.

New room with a bunk bed!!!  WOO HOO!

On the back half...

It's official.  As of last Thursday I completed round 7 of chemo which means I am officially on the back half. WOO HOO!  MORE than half way done.  THANK GOD.  I have told y'all a bit about the lovely side effects that I've had.  Well I started thinking, all of the pictures I post are normally of the "good" days: at clinic or after the "chemo funk" has worn off.  Who wants to take pictures when they feel like crapola right?!  Well, I thought, that's not really fair now is it SO here's the reality folks (and it's not pretty ;)   )  And yes, in picture #1 I feel as good as I look LOL!  When the chemo hits it is a pj wearing, no contact putting in, hair in a pony tail, just get through the day kind of day.  I'd make a really good "Before and after" for a makeover show, no?! :)

Round #7, I can see the finish line!

Speaking of side effects I have another positive.  As of 3 weeks ago I started doing acupuncture once a week, primarily to help with the nausea effects of chemo.  I felt like I was taking medicine like it was candy and I still felt awful!  Desperate times call for desperate measures friends!  Luckily the cancer center downtown offers acupuncture to all patients so I decided to try it.  I am happy to report that it has made a HUGE difference for me!  My nausea has improved immensely and I don't feel sick for as many days.  During acupuncture I still have yet to open my eyes while the pins are in me, I think that would really freak me out.  I just know she puts in about 25-30, I lay there for a half hour, the pins are taken out and I'm on my merry way.  It's magic people, just magic ;)  So that's the latest with me.  5 to go...

Someone's been watching...

too much of the Olympic diving trials.  The whole "I can do THAT!" attitude applies to pretty much everything!  Notice the calm, cool, collected voice of Jason??  I asked him if Kenz had ever done a flip before.  "No." he replied.  Good thing I wasn't there, I think I would have been a bit more animated ;)

4th of July

You know that crazy Uncle every family has that everybody loves cause he's so cool and up for anything at anytime?  Enter Uncle Josh. He is "that" Uncle to our girls. My brother came out to visit the week of July 4th.  It was a chemo week so he helped immensely being our "Manny!"  The girls loved it!  Between the zoo, the children's museum, the trips to the yogurt shop, bike rides, and jam sessions on the ukulele the girls loved their one on one time with crazy Uncle Josh!

The 4th of July brought about a first around here too:  a lemonade stand!  Kenzie had been asking for at least a week if she could have one.  A table, some signs and several pitchers of lemonade later, she was in  business!  We are happy to report it was quite the success!  She gave away quite a bit of lemonade and was thrilled with her "customers!"

  

She was so proud of her "stand!"

Quite a few customers!

Fireworks.  FINALLY this year I was able to get some awesome pictures of fireworks in our neighborhood!  On the actual 4th we were so busy watching fireworks, visiting with neighbors, monitoring the kiddos it can be hard to get decent pictures of fireworks. WELL, we were lucky enough to have some neighbors that had a delayed celebration several days AFTER the 4th.  It was like our own private show!  Our whole family just sat on the street enjoying the view!  Here are some awesome highlights!

Life goes on.

Enough of all that depressing medical talk, time for the fun stuff, right???  So alongside all the medical craziness that is going on currently, we are trying to retain life as normal.  On "good" weeks we really try to take advantage of our time.  Luckily, several fun events have fallen on good weeks.  Kenzie in particular has had a lot going on. Here's the latest:

Kenzie LOVES soccer!  We are so proud watching her too and she really has taken to it!  Here she is after making a goal one game.  The smile says it all, "WOO HOO!"

Kenzie with her Pre-K teacher at the end of the year music program.  The shirt says it all "Swimming into Kindergarten."  How can this be?????

End of the year singing program.  They were so cute!  Kenz is first row 3 from the left.

Dance recital pics.  She had her recital pics taken a few weeks ago so I snapped some of my own while she was in recital mode!

Well look who made the local newspaper!!!  She had a performance  at a festival downtown.  Of course  there were  SMALL carnival rides, games and pony rides.  She happened to get snapped in full costume on her pony ride!

Turning 5 was a blast!  The smile says it all :)

Summer is in full effect and someone is big enough for tree climbing.  Tell me you're not surprised ;)

While her sister is climbing trees someone is trying to spray her with the hose!   Oh summer, we ♥ you!!

Chemo.

How odd.  I have not been consistent with my blog posting this year but here I go to enter a post and my whole post about my cancer diagnosis is GONE!  Gotta love computers.  Anyhow, that may be fairly confusing to anyone just tuning in to see a post about chemo!  May have to do a small timeline here.

Feb.15, 2012 I was diagnosed with Stage 2 colon cancer.  Had surgery to remove half my colon, tumor was removed, considered cancer free.  Doing 6 months of chemotherapy every other week as a preventative measure for future reoccurring of colon cancer.  Chemo began middle of April.

 SO, onto chemo.  I officially have 3.5 rounds under my belt.  What do you mean 3.5 rounds?!  Well, one misconception people have is that when I go into the clinic for my infusion on Tuesday's, chemo is done.  Not the case (although I wish it was!)  Here's how it goes:  Every other Tuesday I go to the clinic.  I sit down and am stabbed.  Yes, STABBED!  (that's what I joke to my oncology nurse)  She sprays my port with a cooling spray, takes a needle that is kind of like a thumb tack, pushes it into my port, connects an IV line to my port and voila, I'm hooked up.  First things first, she has to take two tubes of blood to be tested in the lab.  Bad blood= no chemo.  What constitutes bad blood?  Low white blood cell count and low platelet count.  Sometimes I meet with the doctor to review side effects and sometimes I don't.  Normally I am in clinic from 9am-2:30pm.  Here's where the ".5" part comes in.  Before I leave the clinic they hook me up to my "Chemo-to-go."  I call it my Sachel.   You know like the one Alan has in the Hangover??  See here:  

I used to joke that I needed to Bedazzle the thing but it's pretty incognito and not to mention I return it on Thursdays and other patients use it.  Don't know that a 75 yr old man would want to be walking around with my bedazzled sachel ;)  Anyhoo, when I leave the clinic on Tuesday's I am hooked up to an IV that leads into my bag that contains my box with my chemo medicine #2 in it.  I wear this for 46 hours.  Yep, I sleep with it too.  Showers?  Don't ask.  Let's just say I take a shower Monday night, sponge bath it Tues. and Wed, and then Thursday when I get disconnected I come home and jump right on it!

So, how does chemo make you feel?  I compare it to the worst hangover/stomach flu/food poisoning you've ever had in your life but it lasts for 5 days or so.  I have learned that the term "least aggressive chemo" is an oxymoron and at the end of the day it is poison that takes quite the toll on the body.  My doctor says I have been having pretty severe side effects so she has lowered my dosage a little bit in hopes that it will help.  Fingers crossed.  What kind of side effects you ask??  I won't get into all of them but I'll share the weird ones.  So the nausea is awful.  (for me).  My nightstand looks like a pharmacy with all of the medication on it.  They have given me 5 of "the best" anti nausea medicines and nothing does the trick.  That is one of the worst side effects.  That along with "razor blade throat."  Chemo affects nerves pretty significantly and creates sensitivity to cold, swallowing or touching.  The sensitivity to touching cold just started this round.  I reach into the refridgerator to grab something and it stings my finger tips. Swallowing is definitely bad.  Drinking cold drinks I cannot do.  It is hard to explain but it really feels like razor blades cutting my throat when I do.  Room temperature, I can't even drink that for about a good week or so.  Same effect.  I'm the girl drinking hot cocoa, coffee and tea when it's 95 degrees out!  So much for cooling down this summer!  Last round I literally could not drink anything but a few cups of cocoa Tues-Thurs. so when I went in to get unplugged they had to give me an IV of fluids to keep me from getting dehydrated.  Neuropathy.  This is a nerve condition causing pain and numbness in the hands, arms and feet.  I do not have much pain at all but the numbness just started last round.  It is not constant by any means but weird things like I go to move my hand and arm and it feels very heavy and I really have to concentrate of trying to make it move.  I went to grab something something off the counter, imagine your thumb touching your middle finger.  Well, my thumb wouldn't move back into place.  I had to use my other hand to move it.  That happened just a few times.  My lips will tingle on occasion.  This is just the tip of the iceberg.  I receive shots every other week to boost my white blood cell count.  Chemo round 1 totally wiped them all out.  No white blood cells in your body means you can't fight infection and since chemo kills your immune system you need the white blood cell count to offset that a bit.  The shots are working for me which is awesome!  One thing I have learned is that everybody and every BODY reacts differently to chemo.  Some effects I have others don't and vice versa.  Just interesting.  In a nutshell all of these lovely side effects and more have me bringing sexy back in a big way ;)  

I will say there is nothing more humbling though then sitting in a chair next to somebody twice my age or more, who receives chemo every week and has for over a year and is literally fighting for their life.  I am constatantly reminded of how lucky I am for the situation I am in.  My situation is not bad.  I have life.  I am cancer free.  Another thing I have learned is that Cancer patients/survivors are each others biggest cheerleaders.  It's kind of an unspoken thing.  You don't want anyone to endure the pain you have.  I had a girl who was going to be going through breast cancer chemo knowing she was going to lose all her hair say to me "I heard you don't lose your hair with your chemo!  I am so glad you don't have to go through that!"  Talk about love, support and grace.  Also, when anyone in the clinic is having their last chemo treatment you cannot help but feel SO HAPPY for them!  It is like we are all in the same race, but it's not against each other, it's against ourselves.  When someone crosses the finish line we are all cheering them on knowing eventually it will be our turn.  Also, I have to do a shout out to Oncology doctors and nurses.  They have the kindest hearts of anyone I have ever seen in the medical field.  I do not leave that office without getting at least 2 hugs during the time I am there.  They laugh with you.  They cry with you.  They hold your hand and listen to you. And they remind you that you can do it and it will be all worth it in the end.  A special breed they are for sure.

3.5 round (we'll call it 4 ;)  )  which means 8 more to go.  1/3 of the way there.  WOO HOO!  So, here's my update.  Maybe it's TMI but I'm just updated all of those who have shown so much love and support to me and our entire family during this time.  The cards keep coming, the texts and emails to check in, the prayers and prayer lists I have been put on cross country, it all means to world to me.  My cup runneth over, truly.  Thank you for keeping my spirits up and for all the love. ♥

Occupy Hospital

What have you been up to the last month?  The Johnson's, well, we have started our own "Occupy Hospital" movement.  Where to begin?
Let's start with sweet Kadence.  Remember how she had surgery in January?  Adenoid removal and tympanoplasty (hole in ear drum patching).  Well, that didn't fix the problem.  She continued to have infected ear drainage and the patch in over the hole in her ear drum didn't take.  In fact, another hole surfaced.  2 large holes in her ear drum.  The only solution was to do a mastoidectomy.  Long story short her mastoid bone (the bone directly behind her ear) was infected and the infected mastoid cells needed to be removed.  You can google the surgery if you want, it involves slicing along the back of the ear and drilling through the mastoid bone.  Also, tissue was graphed from Kadence's skull to rebuild her ear drum and patch up the two holes.  Timing with surgery was key as we knew I would be having my own surgery and then beginning chemo.  On March 23 Kadence had her surgery, all went well with one small hitch.  A nerve branch was weakened in her face causing temporary facial paralysis.  She could blink her eyes, pucker her lips but the right side of her face could not smile.  Due to the complication they admitted us to the hospital for the night, administered 4 IV bags of steroids to Kadence (to reduce inflammation around the nerve to hopefully "wake" it up.) Luckily the steroids worked and we were able to take her home the following afternoon.

Baby girl before surgery.  Right ear!

Right out of surgery

Taking a tour around the hospital in a wagon!

Left side smiles, right side does not.

The next day our Angel got her smile back.  Phew!

Kadence recovered well, very well in fact.  Grandma Rhe-Rhe (Jason's mom) had come out to help in Kadence's recovery and be there to help with the girls while I had my "Outpatient" port surgery.  (Port being placed in my body for the chemo to be administered through)  I put "outpatient" in "quotations" because I was told "this is a very easy surgery, takes about 30 min, you'll be in recovery about 2 hours and then you'll go home."  Not this girl.  Come to find out, I am the 1%.  Somehow during surgery my lung was punctured which caused it to partially collapse.  Imagine this:  I am wheeled out of surgery, my doctor and anesthesiologist are standing over me "Jessica, how are you doing?  Jessica, take a deep breath for us!"  I do as I'm told and say "I have pressure.  It hurts."  BOOM.  All of a sudden an X-ray tech is at my side, they are sitting me up taking an X-ray.  The X-ray is read immediately, I am told I have a Pnemothorax (giant air bubble in my chest cavity) that is putting pressure on lung causing it to collapse and I have to go right back into the O.R. for immediate surgery #2, putting a chest catheter in place.  HUH?!  SAY WHA???  THIS IS OUTPATIENT SURGERY!  WHAT IS GOING ON????  Back comes the anesthesiologist, into la la land I go AGAIN and I wake up with this:

The device is the chest catheter, below the cut to the right is my lovely lady lump ie. my port.

Okay, the story gets better.  Are you ready for this.  Jason was in CANADA for business during all this.  This was not a big deal!  (Enter Ross from Friends voice saying "WE WERE ON A BREAK" but substitute the words "THIS WAS OUTPATIENT SURGERY!")  Poor Jason gets news that his lovely bride's lung collapsed and he's a 4 hour flight away....(ha ha ha, normally!) So he manages to get on the 1st flight out the following morning.  A Tuesday.  Tuesday April 3.  The day of MASSIVE tornadoes that hit the Dallas/Fort Worth area?  Yeah.  That Tuesday.  So, he hops a flight but funny, you can't LAND AT AN AIRPORT IN THE MIDDLE OF A TORNADO OUTBREAK!  His 4 hour flight takes 7 hours.  He was able to land in the small window of time that they were letting planes land and made his way to the hospital to once again be my partner in crime.  (An Occupy movement isn't very effective with 1 person ;) )

Now I've got to point out while Grandma was manning the kids back at the house, I had two dear friends with me at the hospital.  They were with me all throughout surgery and after and one even stayed the night with me in my room.  As true friends do, they gave me a pedicure (I was told "Girl, you can't go into surgery with those ugly toes!  We can't have them talking about you!") foot rubs and provided more laughter which was in fact the best medicine.  Turns out laughing with a chest catheter in is pretty painful, but it was worth it.  I was in the hospital 4 days, April 2-5, out on Thursday.  Thursday the catheter was removed and the pnemothorax was gone.  I was discharged just in time for Easter and to begin Chemo the following Tuesday, April 10th.  So I thought.

Occupy Round 2.  Here's the short version.  I get home, feeling a little beaten and battered but what do I expect?  I had surgery less than a week ago.  Then Sunday night, Easter night I started to feel different.  The right side of my body had been sore obviously but then the left started to feel sore and stiff.  My throat started to feel like it was closing in.  As I slept throughout the night it only got worse and then my skin started to feel "squishy."  Monday morning I went to the ER.  I had Subcutaneous emphysema, sometimes abbreviated SCE or SE and also called tissue emphysema, or Sub Q air, occurs when gas or air is present in the subcutaneous layer of the skin. Subcutaneous refers to the tissue beneath the cutis of the skin, and emphysema refers to trapped air. Since the air generally comes from the chest cavity, subcutaneous emphysema usually occurs on the chest, neck and face, where it is able to travel from the chest cavity along the fascia.^[1] Subcutaneous emphysema has a characteristic crackling feel to the touch, a sensation that has been described as similar to touching Rice Krispies;^[2] this sensation of air under the skin is known as subcutaneous crepitation.Subcutaneous emphysema can result from puncture of parts of the respiratory or gastrointestinal systems.  Yep.  Another. Complication.  Stemming from my punctured lung.  Which happened during my OUTPATIENT SURGERY!  I had to be admitted to the hospital for a week.  The only thing that cures subcutaneous air is time, your body needs to naturally reabsorb the air.  The reason I needed to be in the hospital is because the concern was if my body did not absorb the air it could potentially create enough pressure around my lungs to cause them to collapse again.  That would not be bueno.  SO, with this new complication the start date of chemo was delayed a week.  At once point I said to Jason "How crazy is our life right now that my "bad" day consists of NOT starting chemo!"  Sheesh!  At least with this hospital stay I was back in my old stomping grounds: same floor, same nurses, same room as my post Colon surgery.  Now, this is a HUGE deal because this is a corner room, the suite of all rooms.  You can actually walk around in it without bumping into things.  When you're a regular like me, these rooms become available ;)  (Joke! We got lucky, but if I had to be there, this was the ideal place to be!)

Now the good news.  One of my oldest, bestest friends had decided to fly in from Colorado to be here for my first round of chemo.  She was coming to represent the CSU Fab 5.  Literally, as she was getting on the plane in Colorado to come HERE I was in the ER trying to figure out what was going on with me.  So, although she was not here for chemo she was a huge help!  She was my hospital roomie.  My second set of ears with the doctors.  My hair washer. My walk taker-wither.  My therapist.  My laughter.  My reminder of my blessings, my life and all the angels I have met along the way.  It takes a long time to grow an old friend and I couldn't have been more thankful to have her next to me as the Occupy movement continued ;)

The end of January

January turned out to be a pretty busy month for us. Most significantly was the surgery on our sweet baby girl :( Kadence had her adenoids removed, the holes in each of her ear drums patched, and a tissue sample sliced from her middle ear to be biopsied. Baby girl made it through like a champ and literally the next day you would have never known she had surgery! The unlimited amounts of popsicles added to her diet may have helped ;) Regardless, that's the kind of recovery we like around here :)

Next up, we got RAIN! Yes! Rain! May not be very exciting to a lot of you but it has been unseasonable dry around here and our grass and plants definitely needed it. The girls were SO excited to dance in the rain, jump in puddles and play in the mud. It started with "MOM! Can I pleeeeeeeeeeeese go jump in the puddles?!" (see river in our front yard BTW) I agreed.
Then it turned into "Can Kadence and I jump in puddles in the backyard?" I again agreed.
This is what turned up on the deck: two girls completely covered in mud! Ahhh, childhood!!

Next up: Sleepover time!!! These 3 little ladies played so hard ALL day that when it came time for bed...

they crashed! Not one peep from either of them! 3 little ladies fast asleep in the "fort" they made!

And finally, "the nursery." You know how I've said Kadence sleeps with a thousand babies and that's why I call her bed "the nursery?" No joke. I finally snapped a picture. Girlfriend has 12 babies there that I can count but I know there are several hidden under that blanket! She's already said she wants a "Baby" cake for her birthday! No Dora, no Princess, BABIES! Guess I'll check out shower cakes instead of birthday cakes LOL!!