Look, Mom!! I did it and didn’t get hurt!

I’m in the place of parenting where I’m trying to let my kids do things on their own but while still teaching them the dangers that can occur. And with millions of parenting articles out there, it’s hard to think I’m even close to doing anything right.

But when my little girl said this to me, I at least had the boost of confidence to know they are listening.

I had my 6 month appt with my oncologist last Tuesday. And it’s amazing how humbling of an experience it was, even for someone who has been in the system for over 2 years now. I’m blessed to surround myself with youth everyday. With young, strong, children and the sounds of giggling toddlers. And this was quite the opposite. And I had to discus my health with my oncologist.

The big number we are tracking is my CEA. Baseline in Indy is 2.5. In February 2017 mine was 3.2 and this past week it was 4.8.

It’s ok if it’s high, we just want it to be stable.

Since this is a cancer blog, you can say it with me, Fuck. Well, those are my thoughts. A soul crushing week it has been. I can’t even begin to describe how this news has changed me and unfortunately worn over to my husband.

So it doesn’t mean that I have cancer. But it means we take another blood draw in 1 month and if numbers are still high we do a CT scan soon (current one is scheduled for Dec 2017).

But as my oncologist pointed out, scans have their limits and “it” could be too small that we don’t see it. Comforting.

It could also be something else. My dr noticed my weight loss and asked if I was doing anything. I eat little red meat, very little meat, minimum dairy, basically eat fruits and vegetables. And I’m running two mornings a week. So he wasn’t concerned. But we pulled my Thyroid. My THS and T4 are fine and my T3 was slightly elevated (.4 higher). So we are hoping that’s increasing my CEA. We will rerun my thyroid labs in 3 months.

Nikki commentary:

I wasn’t going to post this because I didn’t tell my mom about the CEA going up.

But didn’t think she would find out from this post.

The weight of worry. When you have kids the worry never stops. I think the same goes for being told you have cancer. You always worry someone’s going to tell you the exact same thing, again.

© Nicole Szymonik and This Is the Pause Button, 2017. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Nicole Szymonik and This Is The Pause Button with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.