Thanks everyone! ♥

As I said last night, it was midnight and I wanted to continue working and I did.  I ended up crashing at around 3am and couldn’t wake up this morning!! haha! The alarm went off at 7 and I wanted to throw it…haha! I turned all the alarms off and crashed!   Poor Tim didn’t fall back asleep because he is so busy with work and has no time for a nights sleep.  I couldn’t believe I crashed like that and couldn’t wake up but hey I knew it was coming.  One of these days my body was going to say “OH no! I need to sleep so screw the plans”.  I had somewhere to be at 1pm and 6pm but I canceled both.  I didn’t have time as I am still in the checklist and need to get it done no matter what! Generally I say how much I LOVE rainy days because I have a hard time working indoors when it’s so beautiful out but today was our first nice day in a while and I actually accomplished a lot.  The sun and nice day gave me an extra oomph I needed!

I have been purging more stuff daily.  I said how I am purger and not a hoarder,  I’m big into have everything new an up to date.  All my computers and software are all new and I am not saying I’m a techie and have to have the best, but I simply like being up to date with everything and ok, I do have the best because I believe quality matters.  We had accounting software that was about 3 years old that I back up, threw it out and ordered the 2013 model.  I always sell my things so I am not a waster!  I get amazing bargains and then sell before I lose much so I’ve done a lot of selling and purging lately.  Even old files.  I’m a person thats obsessed with records and keeping everything because I like being on the up-and-up and can back it all up but it also creates more paperwork and therefore more space.  I bought a receipt scanner years ago but with my diagnosis and going through such a hard year last year I fell very behind and there came the boxes full of receipts.  This stresses me out! I can’t handle boxes, I love things in their place.  I don’t do the whole shoebox for pictures, I have my albums and everything are in there my date/month… you get my drift. I also have cds for back up.  Ok, I’ll stop before I sound anymore crazier but when I say I’m trying to finish my lists, it’s because I was so behind from last year that I’ve been playing catch-up for so long.  I also have the whole medical stuff going on now and looking at my options elsewhere because if my hospital is going to do the whole “wait and see game” then it’s time for a change!

Theres a bombshell for you!  This news is all news to you but something I’ve been privately working on for a while now.  It’s taken some pushing from those arond me to leave my family enviroment at my hospital but at the end of the day it’s about me and who is going to be the best to help me.  I am not trying to live a little longer, I am trying to beat this sh*t!

Looks like I am going to have to cancel this weekends plans that I’ve been looking forward to for a while now!  So sad! I was very much looking forward to the kick-off weekend to summer, starting the fun the way a Michigander does, the wilderness/s’mores/beach and trails.  VERY disappointed!  I am having spleen pain and problems that I am going to have to stay here, find out what the surgeon can do at another hospital and take care of that business. Sad…  Will I even get to Michigan?  Not sure. Really will find out after my hospital visit tomorrow…

It’s 2:30am… whats wrong with me?! I’ve gotta get back to a healthy schedule!! Better sign off the blog now and lay down.  I have so many new books I don’t even know which one to pick out..eek! So excited

XoXo ~Ashley

List lists and more lists! I am a LIST freak! Do you know this about me?  In case you didn’t…. you do now! I always have a To-Do list and it never gets smaller it seems!  I suppose thats normal, it’s always something.  I’ve been doing a lot of everything this past week and trying to keep to my lists and I had pages written out that I break down into days and prioritized and of coarse it’s all typed out and printed haha! I have done everything from going through medical bills, monthly bills, Tims jobs/taxes/invoices/receipts, to seeing friends at Police Week (which normally I’m a big part of!) to doing cancer support groups and everything in between.  This is why I’ve been having 15+ hour days for the past week and no sleep. Call me type A, call me crazy and I really don’t care but I am the type that gets major anxiety if things aren’t organized, perfect and done.  I always have travels right?  So I plan on my to-dos with a goal date of my next travel.  It seems things come up, say I’m hospitalized for a colon hole and then things get pushed back and new things come up.  It’s what I call LIFE.  I can rest easy knowing things are done, in it’s place and good to go.  It’s essential for me to rest easy when I’m gone because if not then I’ll have anxiety which causes stress which causes health problems and trust me, I can’t afford more problems in that area.

Given my personality I am the type that finds it all doable.  I find anything that anyone wants to accomplish in life doable.  A pet peeve of mine is when people complain about not doing things or not having money and making one excuse after another.  It’s not easy but hard work goes a long way.  Nobody said accomplishing high goals comes easy  but if you set them high and work hard then good things will come your way.  I’m obsessed with HGTV and always compare my to do list with a home project.  I feel if they can do all that work on that house in that amount of time then I can get my things done no problem.

I’ve always been told I do too much and need to slow down but it’s not in my nature to slow down nor is it to ask for help.  If I want things done right then I do it myself.  I life perfection so I couldn’t imagine asking for anything.  I watched an episode of Shark Tank not too long ago and a kid was on there asking for an investor for his dog treat business.  I was so impressed and motivated by this child.  I was in pain at the time, just back pain from lifting too much and was laying down when watching and he actually made me shake off my hurt back and get back to what I was doing.  Times have changed and people have gotten so lazy in this day and age that you don’t find young entrepreneurs anymore that actually want to work hard.  Sure you have find young entrepreneurs that want to get rich quick without putting in the work and delaying the vaca but thats not how life works.  It’s sad and sometimes I wish I grew up in another generation where hard work was appreciated.  I won’t get into my biggest pet peeve which is people that believe having children is free and cry because they don’t have money because that would make this post a novel long.

Oh… I also cannot stand when people text “u” “2″ for to or “c”for see.  REALLY?! You are TOO LAZY to spell out words????? hahaha goodness!

This also relates to my fight for my life.  It is hard work and impossible they say but I am working hard on my fight, beating the odds and believe I can win.  I found out the reason Tim said my posting on my chemo treatments sounds like a walk in the park.  He said that I sounded like that in how I explained my days but it really aggravates him when people act like it’s a cake walk for me simply because I do well with it.  It bothers him when they see me do well and think I have it better when in fact they are older which means they are better off to get it at an older age and they don’t have stage 4 pancreatic cancer.  He gets annoyed with hearing all of this and knowing that this is the DEADLIEST CANCER (especially stage 4).  There is no stage 5.  Stages 1-3 have higher survival rates. The strand of pancreatic cancer that Steve Jobs had, neuroendrocrine, also has a much higher survival rate. I’m glad I figured out why he threw out such a statement and agree completely.

I am down to just 2 days to finish everything! AHH! I better run off here.  It’s only midnight, I’ve got to work for at least another 3 hours and get a little sleep because tomorrow I have a ton to do. I haven’t slept well or for long in a week at least, no wonder why I crashed a few weeks ago! Do I do this often to myself?  I don’t think so, I think generally I get a good sleep and healthy days.  It’s just this week I have so much or this past week rather and this coming week for a few days then I can rest.  I can probably rest by Friday!

Night… XoXo ~Ashley

No relaxing here…busy but my weekend has been fantastic!

XoXo ~Ashley

My secret to success… XoXo ~Ashley

my glass…

I started watching a show after the producers of the Katie show had told me about it called the Big C and at first I didn’t care for it.  The main character has a cancer diagnosis and basically starts the whole “live like your dying” attitude and basically sees herself dying soon.  This wasn’t refreshing to me and like I said I didn’t care for it and was going to stop watching it because although I had that mentality in the beginning because I was told that, I haven’t thought that way for a year.  It was last summer that I changed my thought process and obviously you see how far I have come from being positive.  I wasn’t “negative” prior to last summer but I was simply realistic and when the doctor said you are going to die within a couple months... I believed them.   It’s when I lived through a couple months and not only was living but was progressing when I stopped believing what my doctors said.  You can call it naive but I don’t!  Tim always says how much of an optimist I am and always has been.   He knows me better than anyone else and so people go to him and ask if I’m always this way or what and his response is always “Yup! She’s a glass half full kinda girl and always has been” while he is the opposite.  I’m a firm believer that no one knows when they will pass and it’ll happen when God wants it to.  Although when I started watching this show I began to start thinking about this beating me and of coarse that is very hard to think of.  I can cry on the spot when I think like that.

When I begin (ok, and this honestly does not happen often) about pancreatic cancer winning and I dying, I immediately think of my in-laws and Tim’s family.  Why?  I fear they and my friends and family may not be the only ones with a loss. You can call it selfish of him, you can think whatever but he is his own person and will do what he wants.  We have had deep conversations on this topic and he likes to speak about much more (to me that is) than I but he has shared that he would be reckless.  I wouldn’t want our 4-legged pups without 2 parents and he knows this but God only knows what he’d do.  This is what makes me fight even harder! I am not fighting for just myself and Tim and our dogs but also for the pain it would cause those closest to me and even Tim’s family.

I’ve been meaning to upload those pictures of gifts and share as I mentioned before and once again my day started at 6am this morning to get up and go and I leave and returned home at 7:3pm0ish tonight only to see home for about 3 minutes because Tim had just arrived home and wanted to head to Arlington for material for a client. We arrived home around 11pm tonight.  These “12hr” days have turned into 17hr days and thats the reason I’m behind on that as well as responses and very exhausted tonight.  It was a good day today, just long.

I’m done for the night.  I’m not sure glue would even hold my eyes open any longer… goodnight!

XoXo ~Ashley

When I am back to me like I have been because I’m only not totally me for just 2 days after chemotherapy then I’m back and that means I have a hard time stopping.  It’s about 2am… I should be sleeping but sadly I wanted to finish laundry and Tim and I were going over designs for a job he’s doing. I figure I have this long list of things I need to do within the next 7 days and I can do them a little at a time or just get everything done I can as quick as I can and be able to relax next week.  If I have to do it regardless I’m the type that would rather just knock it out now and get it over with.

It’s funny… when I was at chemo last week one of the nurses asked the usual question of “So what have you been up to, do anything since you’ve been here last?”  I answer like I always do with “Nothin’ really… same ol‘” but then I recalled what I did like I always do and added “Well, went to NYC for Tims bday and there was a pancreatic event, caught a ball game in Philly, went to Vegas, did get sick in Vegas as was in the ER and in our ER with the infections/hole/air, got a call from a tv show about appearing, got asked to speak at 2 pancreatic events as well as throw the first pitch at a ball game, and was asked to do a commercial on Monday for the PurpleStride here… that’s about it”.    They all laugh and say that I do more in 2 weeks then they do in months or a year.  haha!! Tim and I laugh because it’s our life, it’s how we’ve been living together for the last 11 years so to us it’s life and everyone else it’s crazy.

I was going to write about an old episode of Grey’s Anatomy I caught today in relation to my life but I’ll write tomorrow because I’m kinda tired now.  I normally get up in 4 hours from now so this is only throwing me off for tomorrow… ah!  As much as I love sleeping in if I can, I also love getting an early start to the day and doing so much that when you look at the clock you go “it’s only noon??” nice!  I hope I’m not waking up at noon tomorrow… haha!!

XoXo ~Ashley

Sooo….the husband read my blog which doesn’t happen often and said that I make chemo sound like a walk in the park. HA! Well then. Huh?!  Ok, let me re-phrase?  I meant to say I handled chemo better than my body generally handles.  I really already described how I normally feel and if you follow me you know so I’m not sure what Tim is wanting me to say?  It’s no walk in the park! I make that clear, always right?  I say how much chemo sucks… it’s not fun.  Nurses start my treatment of injecting these poisons through my mediport and this is a whole day process because of the time it takes for the dugs as well as the pre-meds, it happens to be a lengthy treatment compared to a normal pancreatic cancer treatment.  Anyways… sorry if anyone else took it like my husband, that I make it look easy but it’s not and I guess I have a tendency to make most things look easy given that I have tough skin and handle pain well.

I had my first small meal! Woohoo! Soup went well and I can eat again and basically I feel like I’m back.  Like I said, my chemo I am doing well so I am down and icky for a couple days and now it’s day 3 after chemo and I’m back to me again!   I have just 10 days to do EVERYTHING before I’m gone again. I received an invite from my little sister about her graduation which made me smile at first when I recalled telling her after I was diagnosed that I wouldn’t see her senior year and I wouldn’t see her graduate high school.  I would be dead by then and now it’s just under 2 weeks ago. Wow!

I can’t say I have been bubbly and optimistic since meeting with my doctor last Thursday.  She did give news and basically clarification that wasn’t so easy to take.  The spleen problem that has been going on since the whole rupture experience last August after I ran a 5k in Pittsburgh, is getting worse.  First it was a problem of the leaking artery to my spleen that had me hospitalized and getting bags of blood until it stopped on its own. Now it’s the problem of the spleen basically not operating like it should because the artery is still blocked and we have scar tissue and abscess problems all that could or will cause more complications if it continues to get infected and if the antibiotics start to become resistant.  Ah!   Basically they say people die not from the chemo but from complications.  I am still on the first treatment option which is harder than doing folfirinox, gemzar, 5FU, gem/abraxane etc.  I still have all those treatments I could do one day because I’m doing 3 other drugs that isn’t any that I mentioned.  So generally I should be on chemo option #2 …months ago and I’m not, mine is still working but now we are up against the complications given from the chemo!

Ok… I’m done even thinking about all of this.  I am going to do something to brighten my night, maybe have some ice cream… haha! I just am ready to get tomorrow over with!!  I have to go to ABC7 here in DC and shoot a commercial for PANCAN, although my part is small I’m still not a tv kinda girl so I’m nervous! haha  Maybe I’ll video blog tomorrow when I am going there and that’ll calm me…

XoXo ~Ashley