When We Make Plans, God Laughs

2012!  A new year.  New hopes.  New expectations.  A new life without cancer.  A new life without chemo!

Until I met with my oncologist.  Apparently, although they only found cancer in 2 of the 17 lymph nodes they removed, there was more cancer in there than there should have been after 6 months of chemo.  And just like that, I was back on the roller coaster of cancer that I had just convinced myself I had already gotten off.

But what came next was almost too much to hear:  Three more months of chemo.

THREE. MORE. MONTHS. OF. CHEMO.

Three more months of nausea, vomiting, mouth sores, body aches, fatigue, special diets, low blood counts, injections and blood tests.  And because my veins are too weak to take weekly injections, I have to have surgery to get a port implanted in my chest.

My initial reaction was to give up.  No more chemo.  I would take my chances without additional chemo.  But then the emails and text messages and voicemails from friends and family came pouring in.  All urging me to continue to fight.  And then I got the best advice from my brother.  He told me to go back and read all of my previous blog posts, because it was in those posts where I could find the real me.  The woman who always fights.  The woman who makes others laugh in the face of adversity.  And most importantly, the woman who never, never gives up.

This is definitely not how I planned my 2012 to start off.  But it's true what they say, when we make plans, God laughs.  However, one plan I know God won't laugh at is me fighting for my life!