Memorial for JoAnn Asbury, health issues, cancer

     When a friend dies unexpectedly it is kind of a shock, and
when it is related to cancer, it gives you even more to think about. I felt I should go to be present for my English Club friend JoAnn Asbury and drove on roads that were getting a big sleety (is that a word?), but since it was a basically straight, level drive I thought it would be okay.
    The United Methodist Church where the service was held, (Pulaski, Virginia) was spacious-- well, it was weird. It looked like they had two santuaries/chapels, and I got there a few minutes late and couldn't seem to find anyone. But I finally found a "connecting" hall and someone directed me to the service in progress, which one of my English club alum from R. U. also came to late.
    The church chapel seemed, as I remembered it (Dec. 14) white and gold and with a poinsettias and red ribbons in a few areas. She probably wasn't expecting to miss the Christmas season. This memorial service, which I only happened to hear about through an email, surprised me as JoAnn had only been diagnosed with it in August or September, and she told me about it the beginning of October. I don't know very much at all about "multiple myeoloma" (sp?), but they are not sure what causes it. It is a cancer of the blood. She went for (I believe) a stem cell (or bone marrow) transplant, but had MRSA and pneumonia and so decided to go home to pass away.
     The immune system is implicated in this cancer (and many others, from what my research is showing). I knew she was overweight, exercised little, drank a lot of diet Coke and was under stress. Well, she had to put off retirement to put a roof on her house, then her older sister started acting senile after an operation and JoAnn mostly wound up babysitting her, and her husband has M. S. Some retirement! All this added up to a body not well protected from disease, though she did have a cheerful disposition when I saw her.
    A fellow teacher and another English professor, Parks Lanier, spoke about JoAnn, her laughter and  ideas when it came to teaching. She was an "untenured" professor (special purpose faculty), yet she won the "Dedmon" award for outstanding teaching. Yet that did not save her from cancer.
    There is really too much sugar (inflammatory to the system), especially at Christmastime, in the American diet. But I recently read you should drink cocoa and add some truvia and that will "Help" with inflammation.

What if I have cancer again

 I didn't do great with cancer treatments the first time around. I had breast cancer then. But I have this soreness in my back that is not going away -- a bad sign. It could be pancreatic (no) or lung cancer. I am not a very lucky person. Maybe I should have stayed on the Femara. I have tried to
lose weight but my intestinal tract and thyroid  I don't think have cooperated.

    I did lousy on chemo, but some people don't do chemo, or do it in combination with different things. I need a plan.

Found Good Cancer Site, Semester Moving Along, need book deal

     The semester is well underway and I guess I am doing okay. You normally have no idea what the students think till the end of the semester, but I gave them an "interest survey" in the beginning and had an idea about what they knew, or supposedly, what they said they knew. And in one of my classes I heard a student say "this is my favorite class." Well, someone likes my class !
And that's a good thing.
      But it pays so awfully little, this adjunct faculty gig. I have a Master's degree and they pay me like I just graduated high school!
     Wish it paid better as I think I have low thyroid-- hair keeps thinning, brain is getting fuzzier in the memory dept. I ordered iodine online and it 'says' it's natural-- from a place in Las Vegas, no less. Vegas, where a stubborn mother, mentally deficient, juvenille sister and unhealthy brother live. Not a lot to cheer up your day. If my mother passes then what then I have to deal with? They don't have a lot of money to live on and the same here. Wish my mystery "The Butler Didn't Do It" would be considered by some agent/publisher. But who am I kidding, as I am not a great novelist. But it would be nice, and then I could afford healthcare.
      So I look online. I found 1uponcancer.com and I need to go back to it as it has some  good information. Well, I need to leave soon for class. Tah tah.

Doctors, Options, Health after Cancer

    I guess I'm not any bigger a fan of going to the doctor than anybody else. But sometimes it's necessary. After you've had an operation, after you've had some
serious health problems (from broken bones to cancer), you have to do followup.And followups aren't the worse thing in the world, especially if you come prepared in advance with some questions.
    So I went to my doctor, oncologist to be specific, to do a "followup" and talk about ideas I had for different options. And for some reason a storm fell on the town, tossing old pine needles all over the parking lot. The lady who came in just after me was all worried about her just washed car. I'd had mine washed the other day and somehow didn't see the problem with the big trees beyond her parking space. But in a few minutes the wind whipped up hundreds of yellowing pine needles, splattering them unexpectedly on her  car and mine.
    Was this a sign of things to come? I was already a bit anxious about this visit as I was going to propose something different: alternative therapy. Those two words are an anathema to some doctors, who believe a patient wanting other options in treatment is some nutty crackpot. But I'd done a fair amount of research since learning I had breast cancer and done the "traditional" treatments, treatments that put me in the hospital and made me want to quit the whole dang business.
    But you can't trade bodies (at one point I said this to my spouse) and ignore health problems. You have to address them at some point or other, whether you like it or not. So I told the doc I had a wonderful assortment of side effects from taking this pill, Femara, and wanted to see about alternative therapy. His response was that Somers' book Knockout was basically anecdotal and that his research on women surviving cancer on "his pill" was backed up by studies. True, but at the cost of making me as
old inside as my mother, giving me her immune system and ultimately making me
vulnerable?
   Well -- surprisingly, he said we should do a bone density scan (back soreness being one of my complaints) and actually look into alternate therapies. What a surprise!