and I thought cod liver oil was weird...

This is my Northwest doc, Russell Kolbo (N.D, D.C), adding in a potent vitamin brew called a "Myer's Cocktail" to the last dregs of my first ever IV dose of 3% pharmaceutical hydrogen peroxide. To anyone including hidden subpersonalities of my own who might be thinking, "What in the WORLD is she DOING???" - I respond by saying, "My prayerful best to rebuild my weakened immune system."

I do have a wee photo gallery (click on said word) of the past few days, from the Mt. Rainier Clinic I cannot BELIEVE I forgot to link to my new in the woods bed & breakfast out on the Key Peninsula yet a mere 7.4 miles to the Clinic.

It's Sunday. Question of the day: How's it going? Answer in the moment: Slowly, sometimes challenging and yet hopeful. I cry sometimes when the needles go in, and there are no shoddy phlebotomists around including Russell. My veins are scarred from the hospital treatments of 2-1/2 years ago. I'm a 'fraidy-cat. It hurts and I don't like the pain. I do wish however that I'd be getting more of a BUZZ with all of these megavitamins bypassing my gut and going straight into my bloodstream! I tell you, were it not for Lent, I would be snarfing down the there there now comfort chocolate like mad! Still - how can I not feel looked after here? Everyone at the clinic rocks. Russell's wife Cherie, who'll soon have her own juice & smoothie bar plus educational studio, has brought me whopping healthy green smoothies four times this past week. She makes her own "health bars" with grains, low-glycemic sweeteners & dried fruits, wraps 'em up and leaves a basketful in the IV Lounge for all the patients. "Here," she or Russell will say, "take one of these!"

I love when deep wisdom, decades of experience and a kind heart come burbling together. While I would like to be kicking up my heels TODAY.... bounding up a mountainside TODAY... not being so tired or suffering from a Herxheimer episode that I missed a local 10am Church service this morning, I feel that I am in the right place. That especially includes where I lay my head at night.

After 5 days and nights at the lovely Maritime Inn, I reached my limit with the street noise. I had been sniffing around the local environs for quieter accommodation, however in my tiredness I really wanted the Maritime to work out. I didn't want to pack up and schlepp out again. Then 6am Friday morning, I heard them, yelling. Boisterously. Kayakers. Oh bless their fit and able hearts and bodies!

That was enough. I'd had it. After a phone call to the kindly Innkeeper here at the Bear's Lair B&B out in the blessed Thank You God! boonies, I was penciled in. The manager at the Maritime was understanding; there were no issues even though I'd booked the entire 12 days. And I am just beginning to find some deep, uninterrupted sleep. Yeah!

That's enough outta me. I am slow. I am grateful. I am healing one day at a time by God's Grace and through the hands of some very gifted servants of His.

emerging from chaos

I'm feeling better already.

I remain needle- and pinprick-adverse. I can't watch them poke me. I can't even stare at it once I'm wired in. However on Day #2, now with a whopping 75 grams of Vitamin C and other healthy bits dripping into my veins (versus yesterday's intro of 50 grams), I feel so much better than from Monday's late and rainy arrival that I want to skip a jig around the nearest evergreen.

Grumpy would be too polite a term for my mood when I arrived. The worn 12-Step mantra of "don't let yourself get overly hungry, angry, lonely or tired" came scrambling back in with a humbling vengeance. I thrashed through 'em all and went straight to psycho. It is possible, perhaps even likely for example, that when I staggered over to the Thrifty Car Rental counter at SEATAC Airport, having reserved a "Wild Card! Let us surprise you!" deal of a 'mid-sized or larger vehicle' for $16.95/day (can you blame me?), the offering of a Dodge Grand Caravan (akk!) could've been renegotiated to something else without them insisting I would pay MUCH MUCH more for it. It's rather hard to be seething while shattered exhausted. I did not want a tank. I wanted a car. "The computer chose this for you," the gal smirked. Perhaps more grounded and rested I might've walked to another counter. I didn't. I nay'd their insulting push for THEIR auto insurance options (another $170 for the 12 days), brushed past a near threat of her vocally wondering if MY insurance company would pay for my time & rental while any damage, yes even a windshield nick, would see the $$ ticker go on until any repairs were completed, and finally signed, outraged and spent. I am driving a white monstrosity that gets 15 mpg. But such a deal, eh?

Speaking of the allure of deals, my dear friend Ruthie sent me THIS:



Somehow naughty words misspelled in another dialect are very funny.

Fortunately for penny saving I am committed to my healing here at the clinic in Gig Harbor rather than taking an extended road trip. Otherwise for 15 mpg I'd rather be in a Ferrari.

Incidentally, for those who trust in the efficacy of IV megavitamin therapy, what I've gotten in the Bay Area runs around $200/treatment (1-1/2 to 2 hours). This clinic charges $75.00. That alone helps pay for any return journeys!

My room at the Inn is okay. Trying to hack past the fairy tale glens of hotshot websites, even aided and abetted by the likes of TripAdvisor, doesn't prepare you for What It Is. Like the "surprise!" of Thrifty's wickedness, you get what you get. The Maritime Inn is a LOVELY place. My room is very posh. My tub has jets! And the traffic noise, yes, from the 2-lane main drag of pokey little Gig Harbor grates on me like... well, fill in your own analogy. However with one day of healing treatments under my belt, my crankiness has ebbed a tad. I may switch; I may not. The manager of the place cannot be nicer, and that is a plus.

The week preceding my departure featured me slamming down the greens, both in fresh green smoothies and sauteed delicacies from spinach to dandelion greens. Logically and intuitively I knew that it would help. I had become THE slacker on things green months back. Hey. This is my health and life! Funny how the yummilicious organic bakery sweets from Whole Foods began to take the place of my fresh juices and green smoothies. I think my inner 4-year-old had scrambled into the kitchen. It is amazing how alluring sweets are to me. I need a TREAT! Multiply, amplify... and away we go.

Prayer. Green drinks. Prayer. And? Yesterdays CBC (April 5th) saw those pathetic platelets MOVE from 73 (March 28th) to 85.

That. Is. SOMETHING! What'll they be after a week of all this turbo joy-juice? Hoooo-eee!

WBC crept up from 1.6 to 1.7. At my levels, I take all the positivity I can get. RBC is still a slogger at 3.2 but I've never felt in danger from their lowness, only fatigue. Hmmmm. Grass-fed steak or a bowlful of beets? Bring 'em on!

I have dear friends here in the Northwest I'd savor seeing. I'll be at the clinic every single day, even on Sunday afternoon (after Church of course). Not sure if I'd be energized or flattened, I've made no social plans but one. I'll let the time unfold.

I am immensely grateful to God and my holistic healing team for this opportunity to undo the last few months of ecch and rebound in greater wholeness.

wanna play ball, scarecrow?

I'm drinking Dandelion tea and packing.

Monday I shove off for 12 days in the Pacific Northwest - to a little town called Gig Harbor to attend to matters of health in as focused a manner as I can.

On the one hand, my ultrasound results were, as far as I can tell reading the report, that lovely medical term of "unremarkable." Evidently the 2.5cm "mass" was an ovary itself. Silly CT scan, eh? If there's anything else awry down in them thar parts, it wasn't see-able from that test.

My latest CBCs were not good. That's why I'm hitting the road Now.

Akk! Eeek! What's "not good!?" I've had a significant platelet drop in only 3 weeks from 89 (already too low) to 73. The WBC that was a robust-for-me 2.2 just 2 months ago has slithered to 1.6 again. I'm still anemic (RBC 3.32). Neutrophils in their usual scraping the bottom ozone (.4). I'm tired. Mojo is gone. All that I do on many levels got hit with some trigger, singular or plural, in the past four months. My immune system has been having the air let out of its little tires. Two of my practitioners went into a huddle and this was strongly recommended. The clinic there boasts many holistic therapies, including but not limited to megavitamin IV treatments. Damn, will I ever get away from these needles? There's also some hyperbaric oxygen about a half-hour away. I've booked a room at a small Inn, got the flights, got the car reserved, and am getting ready.

It will not be an inexpensive endeavor. However my path needs a boost now.

I'll unpack possible "why?"s later. It could be any number of things. Whether weak or strong, the proverbial straw often arrives unexpectedly.

Lenten lessons and posh jeans

Oh, the rigors of unwellness to amuse, educate and humble. Possibly edify. Depends on my attitude and how much of it, willingly with soft YES, I give to the Lord. "Take my weakness, take all of me." As well it's almost amusing how a very old paradigm towards God remains: When things are purring along, I'm chipper and exuberantly grateful. When the chips are down, I slither into a back closet, yearn for chocolate and scowl. "You meanie!" I harrumph. "If You really loved me I wouldn't BE in this mess!" How many more Warner Brothers cartoons stock lines can you come up with? I could readily load 'em up under 'garden variety abandonment issues'. A few sniffles and aches are all it takes.

I suspect this is ADD of the soul, a massive schism of disorganized focus. In my weakness I am readily blown about by winds. I've checked off my To Do List - score! I made it to the gym, to the hills, to 15,285 websites this hour scouring the baffling wails in my trade, to that phone call, even to the Eucharist - score! When I was little I always handed my elementary school report cards to my Dad. Obviously my mom read them too but what remains is the pat-pat-patter of my heart memory handing them to Dad. I was a little kid in a tumultuous household and had a patchwork array of grades: 1-2 C's (math!), a glob of B's, a few pristine A's. "If you can turn the C's into B's and B's into A's, that would be much better," my father told me.

A half century later I look back and see that I live my life never acing it and never experiencing profound satisfaction save when I am kneeling at the foot of the Cross. Many of my hours include the tiny daggers of "just a little more." Fathers and mothers, be aware of the seemingly idle words you say to your sensitive children!

Side-stepping others' sniffles gets old. Most people step out into the world unwell - it's the American Way. Well, unless I wear a sandwich board proclaiming my undercut of neutrophils, eventually a stray germ will slither through. Tuesday it began; a sore throat. You know how AWFUL those feel! I scoured the web for folk remedies and found a doozy site, then began pounding back the hot water and herbal teas with organic apple cider vinegar, honey and a brash sprinkling of cayenne. Down the hatch! My brain fogged. My body ached. Drink açai juice with aloe vera and 3-5 drops of grapefruit seed extract. Wednesday I had a mild (100.2º) fever - akk! help! - yet that lasted only a few hours. Thursday whispered a turnaround and still I gave choir practice a miss with achiness, self-pity and a Greta Garbo voice. Today I'm savoring more hours without lunging for a Kleenix every 15 minutes. Cold or severe allergies? I have a funkomatic immune system and I am not sure.

I am healing. And I am nervous. I have weeks' old petechiae on my lower extremities and will get another blood test Monday rather than cower and think, "Oh no, my platelets, OH NO……." There's faith and then there's foolish denial. I need to look.

I am still waiting for the ultrasound results.

So when the going gets tough…. let's shop! Two years (can you believe it!?) after being sprung skinny from the half-million dollar chemo diet, twigs here got curves, 8 lbs. worth. After bludgeoning myself for in-denial gluttony and then setting aside sugar, chocolate and wheat for Lent, I still need more than 2 pairs of trousers to live in, the remaining laughing at me from the nether reaches of my closet. As I allow the Lord to reshape me - versus the I'm gonna kick some ass! battle cries at the gym, which resulted in NADA after 6 months save for a few tighter muscles - I wanted a few more pairs of slacks. I lumbered down Hwy. 101 to a local mall and raided Chico's. I bought two: Dandy petite khaki's on sale for $29.99, and a new pair of jeans at full fat retail. $79.99 PLUS TAX. I'd already scoured the sale racks but found no $30 jeans that appealed - they all had that "we shop at K-Mart!" veneer. These rocked.

I have never before paid nearly eighty bucks for a pair of jeans. Even though I see ads all the time (when I stray from online Scriptural studies or my market research) for posh jeans from $100-200 and up which of course I would NEVER PAY. I am consignment store girl! I took a recent old fave pair to the tailor's for gosh sakes! "Sale" is one of my favorite 4-letter words.

I just paid eighty bucks for a pair of jeans; Thank You, GOD. They are soft, beautiful and fit me. I took one little side-step out of a very old paradigm and sighed a sweeter smile.

I love letting The Lord nuzzle me through the ordinary.

Waiting on God and a few doctors

Bless you curious ones! Of course in spite of my gross impatience, most test results take time. A week. Two. More. (Unless I'm getting my OWN blood draws via a handy place called Direct Labs; then it's often the next day).

I endeavor to wait with patience, living and breathing and giving thanks today.

"Don't worry," said the doctor.

That is about as clear and concise as I am able to share, to those quietly as well as noticeably eager to hear my news!

The doc left me with his own repeated beliefs that this was probably a small benign ovarian cyst. I have the requisition forms to get another appointment, this one to tango with a hospital-based ultrasound team (hotter gear), a mammogram and a CA-125 blood test. The older ultrasound gear he had in the office, he said, would tell him no more than he learned by examining me manually; pressing here, pushing there. He explained a number of things: One, 2.5cm is not a size to be concerned about. "Many menopausal women can have 5cm cysts. The important thing is that after your hospital ultrasound with 'doppler studies', to repeat these tests every 6 months. We want to watch you." I kept pressing him with my need to walk out of his office TODAY knowing FOR SURE whether this little thing was cancerous or not. He said fairly straightforwardly, "I cannot tell you that for sure today, neither can the equipment that I have. What I can tell you is that I am not worried. And I don't want YOU to worry. Now these are our next steps...."

I can become excruciatingly AR wanting to KNOW! Just hand me the damn certificate stating without a question of a doubt that Everything Is Great! This reminds me of a poignant scene from the movie Ghost Town where the lead character survives a near death experience (following a colonoscopy which I am also being advised to arrange, akk akk!), against all odds, miracle of miracles... only to step in front of a bus. So I didn't leave the doc's office today knowing with unerring certainty that I was 150% as fit as a fiddle. This doctor is not a kid (which I prefer in a physician - a kindly demeanor, intelligence - genius, in fact, warm heartedness and gray hair). My insides say that I can walk away with FAR more hope than the curt wording on the CT report which made for just a FEW nerves....

"Don't worry," he said after explaining next steps once again to my prodding. "Don't worry. Go home and have a good night's sleep."

Sunset was near as I drove north over the Golden Gate Bridge from the City. I exited at Sausalito and took the winding road to the Marin Headlands. I wanted to SEE the ocean. Not the bay, not a stream - the expanse of the sea, oddly calm. I thought of my Dad and growing up in Venice Beach. I thought of the devastation in Japan and sighed another prayer.

I needed to breathe the ocean air.

Contrasted with oncologists who exhaled muted doom, this physician was almost reassuring. I will know more after more tests. Yes, I know that the CA-125 - a blood test for ovarian cancer - is riddled with falsehoods and inaccuracies. "Benign tumors or cysts of the ovaries can also cause an abnormal test result." Yeah, check THAT out! Warning to worrisome self: Do it and don't freak.

"Don't worry," he said.

Philippians 4:6-7 (New International Version)

⁶ Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. ⁷ And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Pray for Japan

First - please stop for a moment now and pray for Japan. I cannot get my head around the unearthly devastation and ongoing hell following an 8.9 earthquake. It's a tiny country with real people dying and suffering.

Yes, I think of Biblical prophecy such as Matthew 24:6-8,

⁶And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. ⁷For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.⁸All these are but the beginning of the birth pains.

Was there ever such a time until now? I don't know.

I ponder the voice and messages to which I listen. I'd spent the better part of almost an hour combing the most up-to-the-minute websites that I could, including USGS on Twitter. Shifting from care for others to concern for my own behind, I have tried to discern what was the real MESSAGE regarding the tsunami waves heading towards the west coast of the USA. I looked, scoured, read. Real danger! Oh they're now hitting Crescent City! Are my friends there alright?

To what do I pay attention? And what action do I take?

Finally I found the local radio station on the internet. It was playing classical music. And when the announcer's voice came on, there was no panic. There is awareness. The waves are beginning to hit the West Coast NOW! And.... they are 2- to 5-ft. in height.

I'm calmer knowing that my own flesh is seemingly safe for now; may I still pray for the hundreds dead and thousands hurt in Japan! The aftershocks continue.

Pain and suffering are in so many places.

Sometimes I listen to fear and purported reason in potentially alarming situations. The waves rock the small boat and o, where IS the Lord? I get an ultrasound today, in a few hours. It will discover what is already inside of me, this mysterious "2.5cm mass." Benign or malignant? I don't know now; I will by this evening, most likely.

"Be not afraid," said Jesus to the cowering fishermen, "It is I." (John 6:16-21).

The storm was real. So was Jesus.

"Be not afraid."

"Be not afraid."