Laughter is the best medicine;)

Jimmy is MBs best medicine! She's still laughing at all the funny things he said today

MB smiling again!

When we were soldiers.

Taliboo shaved his whole face just for me!...and work lol

The day started off rough. MB woke up in excruciating pain. She took a shower and I could hear her mumbling her prayers all the way through. When she mumbles those prayers, I know she's hurting and I worry. This pain is not new, we were introduced to it a year ago when MB's back tumor began to grow, the tumor is located on her L4 vertebrae,when it grows it squeezes her nerves and makes her feel like her leg is being crushed to pieces. The doctors radiated it last year and it shrunk but unfortunately you can't radiate the same place twice so now we have to wait for Dr. Bs gene targeted therapy to work.

Understandably, MB was in a crappy mood all morning. In her moments of weakness, she starts being really negative and giving up on herself. I have to be honest, today she pissed me off! I was like, " I know your going through a lot of pain but you can't give up, it will all work out, you just have to believe!". She stresses a lot over finances, she starts saying maybe she'll only do part of the treatment and exclude the really expensive stuff. I told her she was doing everything and we'd work on a way to pay it. Luckily, as soon as we made it to the clinic we asked the doctors if there was anything they could do about the meds. The doctors here know medications are expensive and they do try to work with the patients who have crappy Kaiser, it's definitely easier if you have a PPO(remember kiddies when your picking out insurance spend the extra 50 a month on a PPO). Our doctor prescribed an older drug that does almost the same thing as the vampire pill(the 500 dollar a day one). That drug is only 20 dollars a day, much better. MB needs to start realizing that I am always right! Now we just need to find a doctor who will give her chemo mixed with Avastin, the chemo is cheap but Avastin is 4,000 and they both have to be administered intravenously. One battle at a time I guess.Dr. Yi prescribed Oxycoton for MB's pain but apparently there is a shortage in HTOWN because every pharmacy I go to doesn't have it!

As if by fate, MB ended up not needing the pain meds. When it was time for her to do her chemo cocktail they sat her next to Jimmy, Jimmy and his wife are from Long Beach and they are hilarious! There wasn't a place to sit in the chemo room so Jimmy's wife and I went outside to wait in the lobby. As we left MB looked down and out, she was mentally, physically and emotionally exhausted. Two hours later, it was time for Jimmy's wife and I to go back and give our patients their PB's, those are the antineoplastons they have to take every 2 to 3 hours. I hadn't even walked in the room when I heard MB's laughter. Jimmy had revived her, he loves an audience. As a seasoned dance instructor in LA, he's used to worknig the room! MB was a different woman when I walked in, Jimmy and her were sharing crackers and jokes and having a BLAST. When we left she got right up and walked to the door, no mumbling no huffing no NADA. I asked her about the mornings excruciating pain and she said the icy hot patches had helped her, I think it was the Jimmy patch that got her on her feet.

Later in the day I needed my Taliboo patch, the days events and the horrible letter from our Kaiser doctor  left me all knotted up. When I went to his place he gave me the best massage and we just watched TV and laughed at all the crazy people there are in Texas. I needed those laughs! Later, I watched Taliboo shave off his beard for work and I left.

When I got back to the hotel MB and I were laughing at our Grumpy Papa Bear. One thing you have to keep in mind about him is that when he is under a great deal of stress he loses all of his social graces and manners. Everything annoys him. It's actually kind of funny to watch him in action, the only person who can calm him down is MB. She is his Prozac, without her he is a crazy lunatic. It's been 3 weeks since he's been off his MB meds and he's looking to explode. Word to the wise just leave the angry PB alone until further notice. We call him Grumpy for a reason lol.

Also, i'm sure most cancer patients and their relatives will agree that we don't like to be bombarded with questions about the illness, the medicines and things like that. We deal with it everyday and hate having to talk about it with everyone. If your that curious read the blog. If we don't bring up the subject you shouldn't either. MB stopped going to parties after a while because the constant curiosity about her disease annoyed her. Think about it this way, if your husband just left you ,would you want people asking you about it everytime they saw you? Same with Cancer. We have a don't ask don't tell policy and now you know;)

This whole ordeal reminds me of the show Goldrush. It's a reality show about miners who invest all their money in equipment and supplies just for a chance at hitting it big in Alaska and returning with piles of Gold. Even though most think they are crazy they keep hope alive and take a risk. There was a miner on the show who was moody, arrogant, negative and downright annoying, finally someone beat him up and he just went home penniless. The miners who worked hard, had a positive attitude,worked together and stayed focused when all looked hopeless actually started finding nuggets of Gold. I'm just trying to keep MB focused on her own gold nuggets, her health.

Good Night, God Bless and please check out the Gold "donate to Mama Bear button on the top right". Please continue to support us on our journey a little or a lot is appreciated. Let's keep hope alive for MB!