Alone with my thoughts

I'm going to be honest.  Monday was pretty rough.  It was the first day that I was alone, and it was really hard to not be up in my head all day.  Luckily, I had a lot of phone calls to make and forms to fill out.  This kind of helped to break up the time allowed in my head.  My head can be a scary place.  It seems to be filled with pitfalls and traps that slowly peck away at my optimism.  I could feel all of this down-time slowly eroding away at my confidence.

I called Fran Mott, who heads up the Michigan von Hippel-Lindau Family Alliance.  She's been a fantastic help with many things in the past few months.  I hadn't had time to call her with my diagnosis.  I filled her in, and she gave me a lot of hope, and restored much of my optimism.  There are some trials going on at U of M and the National Institute of Health for my cancer.  It's good to hear that, as my type of cancer is pretty damn rare.  Fran has been an amazing help through all of this, and I'm so thankful to have her willingness to help me.

Tuesday was also a little rough.  I had a bit if diarrhea, which is really frustrating.  Things were good all through the hospital and continued to be good through the weekend.  Luckily, it wasn't nearly as bad as it was before the hospital.  I finished up my Christmas shopping and it sapped me.  With things being normal, shopping normally kills me.  I hate the crowds, I hate the traffic, I hate walking around the store not knowing where to find something.  I was only gone a few hours, but I had to take a nap when I got home.  Luckily that is over, and I shouldn't need to do any more shopping until after the holidays.

This post has been pretty dark, but I do have bright shining spot to report.  My appetite was ravenous last night.  I made some pasta with turkey sausage and red sauce for dinner, and I ate like it was my last meal.  It was awesome.  Heather and I watched the new documentary on Joan Rivers.  If you haven't seen it, watch it, she's a fantastic comedienne.  It's called "Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work".

Today is going to be getting ready to head to Alma for Christmas.  I've got a busy day ahead of me, which is good for keeping optimistic.  Hopefully, we'll be driving to Alma tonight.  Sorry for the slightly dark post, hopefully this will be infrequent.