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Saturday, April 9, 2011

The Magic Quilt's Moves On


In January of 2011 I received the following  email from a woman named Corrine:

I just wanted to let you know that this week, Lila and I passed along the quilt to its new owner, my great friend Kathy.

Stan's wife, Lila, and daughter-in-law, Corrine passed the quilt on to a pregnant friend, who had, during her pregnancy, received the news that she also had breast cancer.

The following is the post from Corrine's blog, Littlest Bird:

Passing on the Magic Quilt

Remember Stan, my sister's father in law, who passed away last October?

Do remember the magic quilt that was given to him as a gift, to help him through his journey?

The magic quilt was ready to burst with the need to give its magic to someone new

and I thought of my friend:

Kathy.

My book-club companion and fellow lover of the written word.

Six weeks after finding out she is pregnant with her third child

she was diagnosed with invasive breast cancer.

As of this week, she has already had surgery and several rounds of chemo (that began when she entered her second trimester).

Her baby boy is doing amazing.

They are holding off on more chemo, now, until he joins us on this earth and then she gets to start again.

But this incredible woman needs all the magic she can get right now.

When I asked if she was interested in being the next recipient of the magic quilt,

she said yes.

So on Tuesday evening, Lila and I went to her home.

She and Lila sat on the couch while I helped Kathy's daughter, Naomi.

Lila told her about the quilt, the love that went into making it and the strength that she and Stan found in its folds.

I took their picture (along with the darling Naomi).


I had Naomi hold my camera and take a picture of all of us.


May the quilt works its magic of peace and heart-healing for you, Kathy, and your family.

You're in my prayers.



In June 2011, Kathy finished her chemo. On her blog, Bobblehead-ology, she describes it perfectly:

Friday, June 24, 2011


Done

I finished chemo on June 3. It was a date that couldn’t come soon enough. I really didn’t want to spend any more time in a room hooked up to Taxol and my one-time friend Steroids. Decadron was supposed to help my body accept the chemo called Taxol. I’m sure it did. But Decadron, you’re such a bi###. You seem all nice at first, giving me these wonderful break-from-the-norm energy bursts. But when that energy kick runs out, you’re just left with puffiness, swollen feet and ankles, weight gain and roid rage.

Note this important equation before taking up a friendship with Steroids:

Before steroids - 1 slice of bread = 110 calories
After steroids – 1 slice of bread = 1100 calories**

**(Actual calorie numbers may vary. This estimate based on fatigue and roid rage.)

Anyhow, as I was saying, June 3 couldn’t come fast enough in my mind. I almost felt like if I could just fast-forward time, I could somehow escape the dizziness, fatigue, joint pain, hair loss and loss of feeling in my feet from chemo.

But my fast forward button broke. So I just went through the 12 weekly treatments like every other mortal.

And now I am done. DONE. I felt pretty drained after that last chemo session. My body feels and looks like some poisons had a party in it for six months. I look in the mirror and wonder who that person is. My hair grew back during the break from chemo to deliver Kilian and is now mostly gone again. But chemo is over. It is time to kick those poisons out, clean up the crap they left behind and move forward. I’m not waiting for radiation to be over to start this process. I’m reclaiming my body now.

I joined Weight Watchers. And I’m making myself exercise with whatever energy I can muster. I went to a kickboxing class at the gym on Saturday. The girl in front of me wore a pink shirt. Since pink is the symbol color for breast cancer, I focused on her shirt during every kick and punch and imagined myself kicking cancer right in the nose. I’ve heard tales from runners about a euphoric feeling they experienced after running a certain distance. I never understood that feeling before. But after that kickboxing class, I did. I felt like there was this light exploding out of me and smashing into that pink shirt.

Die cancer. Be gone Taxol and Decadron. Take your side effects and leave. You all are no longer welcome here.

Friday, October 4, 2013


3 Years Later

I saw someone at church this week who reminded me of something I've known for a while: I should probably tell all the awesome people who followed the blog and helped us that everything is going well for us. I recently passed my two-year anniversary of ending treatment. Last week I got a clean mammogram.

Kilian is now two-and-a-half, healthy and seemingly a normal, curious, talking two-year-old despite growing in my belly through surgery and half of my 6-month chemo regimen.

The biggest health scare we've had from him so far was a case of walking-pneumonia last spring and some extremely picky eating behaviors that made him suddenly drop off the charts for his weight, despite maintaining an average height.

But thanks to weight-gain Pediasure, bacon, fruit smoothies with ice cream and scrambled eggs cooked in olive oil, we recently celebrated him returning to a more normal 11 percentile weight.

(Below are two photos I took of the kids last spring in our garden out front).



3 comments:

Amanda said...

As sad as it sounds, I didn't know where the quilt was or when it was passed along. I've talked very little with lila as we've been sick a lot since January. I'm so happy to read this and know where the quilt is and hear of the magic spreading!

TisforTonya said...

happy to see the journey continue - and keeping Kathy in prayers :)

Nutty Hamster Chick said...

It is wonderful to see the journey the quilt is taking.