9 years ago, on this evening my life forever changed… And while my life merely changed, another life was lost forever. The accident was not my fault. But being connected to life ending in any manner isn’t something I would wish for anyone to ever experience. My heart will forever go out to the family, the friends and even those who never had a chance to know the young man who drove his motorcycle into my car on the evening of November 29, 2006… I am forever grateful to all the people that night who stopped when they saw what took place and did what they could to help. To the two young men who thankfully were wearing white t-shirts and used them to flag oncoming cars in both directions to avoid further catastrophe on that night. I’m thankful every single day of my life that I was alone in my car and that Brandon was not there with me, and not only wasn’t hurt but didn’t have to experience what took place or see me in that condition. I’m grateful to the Fire Dept, Paramedics, EMTs, and Police Officers on the scene. There are no words to express the gratitude I have for my family and friends who truly were there for me. Those who showed me love unconditionally.

My life almost ended that night. Complications from the accident have continued on for years. And here I am 9 years later still living in tremendous pain. But, the most important thing, is that I am LIVING !!! We are still hopeful that in time the pain will decrease or be gone all together. We’re open to new routes to try and achieve that and have tried so many things. I cannot lie, being in pain 24/7 is friggen exhausting. Anyone who says it isn’t, isn’t being honest with themselves or others. I don’t deny that it sucks. I simply accept that for right now, in this moment, it’s not something I can control. I guess while I still have tremendous pain every day I have to look back and recall what the misfires were once like and how horrific things were when the tumors were in there and causing my entire body to shake, my speech was messed up, hands trembled all the time, and docs were diagnosing me with things like MS and other auto immune and neurological disorders because they were misreading my symptoms and couldn’t figure out what was happening. Thank God for the MRI which revealed the nerve tumors and thank God for my Cali Doctor who was the only one willing to go in and get them out. I truly believed once they were gone I would free of pain. Sadly that didn’t happen, but I was free of the neurological madness they had been creating in my brain and body. So again while not a perfect situation, there was major improvement.

My life is one I can look back upon and see so much improvement. And that is something I proud of every day. Sometimes it feels like someone turned up the ball machine and they’re firing 1000 baseballs my way and I can’t swing fast enough to keep up. lol. I have learned that it’s ok to feel that way from time to time. It’s ok to get exhausted. It’s okay to allow yourself rest or to slow down. I have always been 100mph kinda person. And then one day someones on a motorcycle doing well beyond 100mph and drives right into and in doing so, your life quickly slows it’s roll. I have often been asked why I was never angry, why I never got upset with the person who caused the accident that night. How can I get angry at someone who is no longer here? And what purpose would anger serve me or anyone else? Anger wouldn’t have driven me to walk again after being told it wasn’t possible. Anger wouldn’t have helped my family go through all the worry, stress and feelings they were going through. Anger would not have keep me alive in anyway… In my opinion, anger would have only made things harder- for everyone. I am not a perfect person. I’ve made mistakes in this life. Everyone has. Forgiveness is what frees us. Forgiveness is what allows us to keep moving forward in our lives. Anger makes people sick. It keeps people attached to the negatives in this life. Anger keeps you living in the past. Our past is our past. It is part of what has lead us to the place we are today. I have ZERO regrets. Every single solitary action, and reaction, every feeling, every thought, they all matter and they all were and are a crucial part of life. Something I think we all need to think about from time to time and realize the importance of ones past, but never allow ourselves to be chained to it. Yesterday was lived, and now TODAY is meant to be lived 100% in the here and now, and God willing tomorrow will be gifted…

I would like to once again say thank you, because I could never thank the people who have been there for me enough. Thank you to each and every one of you out there who were there back then, who were there throughout all that followed, and who are there still. My life has been so blessed, and no matter the hards that have happened throughout this Journey, the blessings have more than surpassed the them all. Life is full of balance. Finding ours, accepting ours, and living within ours is key… I have been a firm believer all my life that the things that have gone on in my life, had far more to do with then just me. I wasn’t in need of a wake up call to appreciate my life or life in general. Some times people do need that and things like accidents and cancer give them a huge wake up call and change their lives. I have found for me, that instead my experiences, my story shared, my life has helped others to find greater appreciation in their own lives. My life has helped inspire others, motivate others, and give others a deeper sense of gratitude and appreciation for who they are, and all they have in this life. For that I am so grateful. It gives me some sense of sanity in the insanity. lol. We all have a purpose in this life. We all make a difference in this life. Whatever it is you do, whoever it is you love, whatever of yourself you give to others, YOU are making a difference in this life. Doesn’t matter if it’s to one person or to a million. Any life that is bettered because of YOU, is a life thats bettered. Be the best YOU that you can be. Be the best partner. The best friend. The best parent. The best boss. The best employee. The best ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING you possibly can… If we all did so, this would be the best world it could be… Just imagine that…

Life is the greatest gift that we can ever be gifted. It should never be wasted. Never be unappreciated. Never be taken for granted. Never give you some sense of entitlement. Never be lived from or about selfishly. Be the gift that you were created to be. Be the friend, the partner, the kind of person you want in your life to those in your life. To have true friends, you must be a true friend. To have a partner in this life worth sharing your life with, you must be that partner yourself. And last but not least everyone who has actually taken the time to read my mini novel here. lol. Don’t let lifes speed bumps, potholes, or detours, throw you off your route. Your Journey in this life is gonna have road blocks. It’s gonna have things that try to throw you off your path. Things that slow you down. Realize when you are slowed down, that that in itself serves a purpose. Perhaps you were meant to take that time to reflect, to think, to create a new plan of action… the list goes on as to the reasons… But to often people allow the hurdles that come along the way to stop them… If you are still breathing, if you are still here, if you are still ALIVE, then keep on keeping on. Don’t allow anyone or anything to stop you…. being slowed up a bit isn’t being stopped… It’s actually the time when you build the very most…

Wishing you all a beautiful and blessed Sunday. Thank you all for being a part of my Journey. For being the blessings you are in my life. I have the most incredible Ohana a bring could ever be blessed to have. My life, my heart, my spirit are full of love that is given and received fully and appreciated for the gift that truly is.

You are who you choose to be. You can do whatever it is you decide to do in this life. You are not who or what others think or say you are. You are not other’s opinions, unless you actually decide to be. You and only you walk in your footsteps, think with your brain, and make the choices each moment of the day that shape YOU!!!

People can think or say whatever they want. They can tell stories. They can judge. They can talk all they want. What you listen to is your choice, and your choice alone. Truth is those who generally do, are too afraid to focus on themselves and their own lives. Rather than doing so, afraid of what they might find, they often attack other’s lives, and choices and make judgements. There are many people out there that cannot truly stand the sight of their own reflection. Referring to their true reflection; not just what shows in the mirror, but what lies within. In order to avoid that reflection, they deflect the attention onto others.

It is never our place to judge another. We are not anyones judge or jury in this life. We are only our own. Other people thoughts of you, are theirs to have. Just as your thoughts of them are yours to have. At the end of the day the only persons life and choices that should matter to you are your own. It’s you that has to live with yourself. Be someone worth living with. Be someone who can truly embrace your own reflection. And if you don’t right now, then choose to change whatever it is about yourself that you aren’t happy with.

It’s pretty simple… YOU are the writer of your life story. You can write it any way that you choose. Let each person be the writer or their own life story. You don’t even have to read their story, should you choose not too. And they need not read yours. The only way someone else writes your life story, is if you allow them to do so. When you are in a good place with yourself, when you understand your choices, values and motivations behind the choices you make, and the actions you take, it all makes sense. And you realize how others see or think of you, really isn’t your concern. How your choices and actions affect others of course is always a concern. You can’t think only of yourself, and not care how what you do can possibly hurt someone else. Your every thought and action goes out into the world, and travels far beyond only your life…

Care less about what others think, say or do, and care more about what you think, say or do. Free yourself of the burden of carrying other people’s version of you, and embrace who it is you really are.

A very positive update… Aside from having soft tissue injury and fracturing my back from the last biopsy all that followed this biopsy has been super positive. lol. All my previous biopsy samples were re examined that were done throughout this past year. They were first checked to be sure no mix ups had occurred and that it was my actual DNA. lol. Laugh, but this does happen sometimes, which my Doctor admitted to and why she requested it… And all the results were accurate and were all me. Of course we would love to have heard that the initial findings weren’t in fact mine, but it’s better to know then to question. She felt it important to make sure, because the MDS and MM are so rare in someone my age to begin with and the amount of abnormalities in my chromosomes and percentages were so crazy high on the first biopsy as compared to the second one and it’s apparently even more rare for the numbers to decrease so dramatically without having the transplant and such… As Doctors focus on western medicine the studies they look at at compare things in and get there numbers from are always based on western medicine treatments as well. They don’t tend to look at studies where people take alternative routes on treatment and such… So we don’t put a lot of stock into the life spans they quote ya, or much else to be honest. If we did, then I probably would have died off a long time ago from other things too. haha.

So what we know now is very simple. Between my mind set, my faith, my spirit and the prayers, blessings, love, faith and spirit of all my loved ones, and everyone out there who truly cares and has sent their amazing blessings and prayers into the universe and to the man upstairs, well we now KNOW and have proof of what is possible… We already knew in our hearts and minds, but the crazy amount of tests support it in medicine standards, lol.

It’s a lot of information to explain, but one of the main things that gets monitored in these kinds of cancers, aside from my blood work, is the chromosome abnormalities…. And in things like this because it’s not just in my blood but in my bone marrow, they have to do the bone marrow biopsies in order to see the extent of the chromosomes being effected… I had several abnormalities when I first was diagnosed. I had deletions, additions and translocations. Often people are diagnosed long before chromosome abnormalities are seen. So it wasn’t really possible to know how long or when exactly things shifted in my body and this all began. We have had our theories of course and know that my blood work starting showing the low white blood count and the abnormally shaped red blood cells over 2 and 1/2 years ago… But it wasn’t until a year ago that the Neutrophils starting such low numbers and that more in depth testing got done to figure out if this was some kind of auto immune disorder or for anyone to bring up the “c” word … Once they ran a million tests and ruled out all the auto immune stuff and found the low IgM levels and others things it didn’t take long to have the first bone marrow biopsy scheduled and performed. The list is very short on possibilities of what someone has when their white count, Neutrophils, platelets, hemoglobin, IgM, Kappa and Lamda light chains and such are low verses elevated… Elevated levels have a HUGE list of possibilities. Soo you all know the rest from there…

My numbers are incredible at this time… None- yes you heard me correctly- NONE of the several chromosome abnormalities that were present in my previous biopsies and FISH tests are showing up at this time. My Doctor is very happy, and admits to how rare this is to see and says whatever I’m doing, just keep doing it… And GOD willing it means I don’t have to keep doing these crazy biopsies every 3 months like we’ve had to do thus far… I still have to do all the blood tests and labs every month and monitor levels… I have had 3 months now of maintaining the increase in my white blood count, platelets, hemoglobin, and neutrophils and for the first time all year the IgM and Kappa and Lambda light chains have all increased as well and are in normal range… The dysplasia and the polytypic plasmacytosis are still being seen when they do the blood smears and marrow sample tests, but these can continue to be monitored through my blood, and take a break from needing marrow samples removed from my back (hip/pelvic region)… And considering the damage done on this last one, we’re beyond grateful not be having another scheduled anytime soon. I’m hoping never for my next one. lol. Seriously though, this is beyond incredible news. I know a lot of what I’m trying to explain probably sounds like a foreign language to most people. Although many people are familiar with cancer, most people are more familiar with the type that is found in tumors verses the type in someones blood, plasma cells and bone marrow.

So that is our very happy happy and happy news to report… For some time now I feel like it’s been hard having so much of my FB and honestly outside of FB discussions with family and friends be focused on my health- or lack there of it honestly… the stress, worry and all that falls upon those who love me is a very hard thing to deal with and truthfully is harder than me directly dealing with any and all of this in regards to how it’s effecting myself…

Soooooo that being said, my FB page, my phone calls, my texts, my life isn’t going to be about my health, medical crap, fundraising or anything else that ties with this all. My life is going to be about LIFE and the positives of it all… I’m not leaving this world anytime soon, and that’s that… So I ask that everyone please respect this choice and understand where I am coming from. This is something I need to do for Myself and my family… Where we focus our energy in this life, is where we give our power too. My energy, my spirit, my mind, my heart, and my soul are focused on living, loving and enjoying life. That is where my time, my energy and my power are going… I’ve always believed strongly in the power of just our simple thoughts and the words we use… When someone says I hate war, they give war power… instead say I love peace… Give peace that power … Give what you love power instead of what you hate… Hate has as much power as love… something we can all apply to life… When we focus our energy on negatives, we give them power. And even though my focus isn’t on negatives, when every phone call or text or email or conversation is engaged in and people want to talk about cancer or how I’m feeling it gives the YUCK power, and I’m not gonna give it any… Does it mean it all goes away and we all live happily ever after? Of course not, if life was that simple well none of us would ever be sick, or hurt or endure any kind of hardship. Hardships, difficult times, they are part of life. Trust me, not naive a bit… Just a firm believer in the difference between circumstances and choices… Circumstances I cannot change… but the choices I make in dealing with them, are 100% within my power…

I know how many people are sending blessings, positivity and praying for not only me, but my Ohana. And we embrace and welcome it all, and you all. Prayers can be private and prayers can be out loud. They can be said in our head, said out loud or written… Either way they reach the person and the greater source they are being sent too… They enter the universe and connect wherever they are needed the most. I truly believe this. The power of all of your prayers, the blessings people have shared with us, and the love are so much more powerful than most people can even believe. And I know, truly truly truly know with all I am, that that power, your power, your care, your prayers are equally as powerful as mine and have helped bring healing and will continue to do so. And my life will flourish because of it all. I am not a give it all to god, throw my hands up in the air and expect change to come about person. I believe I have to help myself, help others, allow help from others, and all that goes into anything great in this world for change to happen. I can’t just ask for it too, I have to help make it so. Does that make sense? I pray. I pray my butt off. But I know also that God created us with free will, with minds, hearts and souls and the ability to better ourselves and lives… Gonna keep praying… Gonna keep living… Gonna keep loving… Thank you each and every single one of you out there who has been fighting this with us and who is fighting this battle, all battles, and helping every other being out there fighting the fight to be in this life. Love you all so very much!!! Never ever ever give up believing in all that is possible!! And if you do, call me and I’ll help you get back in the fight- that I can promise YOU!!!
AMEN!!!