Images from NYC...

Here are some advance pictures from my friend Nancy, who came to the event at Carnegie Hall...




Christine, her donor, on the sofa with Vic after they met on stage




Victoria & Noah backstage




Backstage at Carnegie Hall with the organizers




Victoria in a cab




Christine, Victoria, Noah and Christine's mom

Things just get more surreal…

Hello Sweet Amazing Community:

Things with this trip to NYC are just getting more and more surreal. Today I got a call from the Blood Center in NYC, who has been arranging all of this.

They asked if I would be willing to do an over the phone interview with someone from the New York Post. They will interview Christine, my donor and me. A human interest story for the Thanksgiving Holiday.

Its not 100% but she was pretty sure. Wow Human interest story, you’re not kidding!!!! I’ll say!!!

I continue to be blown away by this whole trip to NY.

At the same time, my lungs are currently giving me a bit of a hard time. Which is frustrating and is creating a lot of anxiety for me. Do I rest? Do I walk? Do I take a pill and knock myself for the day? Yikes.

I know I’ve been complaining a lot lately in my posts but, I guess I’m just in that space.

It’s hard when Noah is away and his re-entering back home is always weird, he's been in geek land for days and long hours, and I have been in solitude. So it’s always tough and it honestly takes a couple days to get reconnected. So we tend to bicker a bit and its just yuckie.

But jeez, what can you do, ya know? Here we are being human, doing our stuff, trying to be good, trying to take care of what we each need to take care of...and ugh.

I feel my anxiety rise, and then I breathe and pull myself to this very moment. But that mind is taping on my head and teasing me and saying don’t get stressed its not good for you....oh your getting anxious. Blah, blah, blah.

I wish I could explain it better, but it’s a royal pain in the butt.

Oddly enough I am sleeping really well at night and deeply too. So this is good. And my counts are good and we are still on track with getting me off the pred (thank goodness). My liver and kidneys are so good and doing their job, my blood pressure is starting to go down as the pred is lowered.

I get to go to NYC with my husband and see a friend I haven’t seen in nearly 10 years, and have some yummie time with Noah away from our routines and distractions, we are going to Carnegie Hall for Pete’s Sake…I’m meeting Christine at last!!!

I’m alive
I’m loved
I have so much abundance in so many forms

What do I have to complain about??

Why do we do this to ourselves as humans?

I heard it said by many masters, teachers and gurus (not in these exact words). Do the Trees complain, do the rocks bitch and moan, do the birds get anxious...

This gift of being a human being is truly rare, but it is a practice to be a good one, isn’t it, it takes work to be awake and aware. To be loving and kind as much as possible if not all the time.

Over and Over again from all masters of every spiritual practice and religion I hear what is boils down to is LOVE.

Gosh, Love, this I know. But all the stuff that is put in our path to challenge us and try to lead us away from all that, to test us and frustrate us, to show us what we are made of, to see if we really mean it...... Whew that’s a load.

I don’t know why having Cancer has made me more aware of this but it has, I knew these things before. Maybe it is when you don’t know which it is going to go, if this is going to be your last moment, you start to wake up.
but staying awake.....ah there is where the real work is.

So I guess I’m in the real work part of my Complete and Unlimited Health and Healing.

The diagnosis, the chemo, the Temple on the Hill, the transplant...all that was the ceremony. Now is the time to apply everything I learned during the ceremony.

Gratitude, Love and forgiveness those are the big ones.

I don’t know its crazy ya know. All of this. Sometimes I literally gasp out loud when I think about what I have been thru. And sometimes I am moved to tears that I am here to share this all with you, and even more grateful that you want to hear about it all.

And that you all pray for me and my husband and my family.

Wow, life is just so amazing. And I feel better already just sitting down here and sharing this you all.

May you all have an Abundant Thanksgiving and be surrounded by those that you love.

It IS all about the LOVE!!!

Love, Blessing, purrrs and peace.
Sweet Dreams.

Namaste
Victoria

Something to Share...

A friend of mine sent me this poem today and I felt it was so worth sharing. It touched me very deeply.

Pass it on…


KINDNESS

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakend broth
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in the white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
It is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.

Naomi Shihab Nye



Namaste
Victoria

Just wanting to say hello...

Hey Beautiful Community!!

Where ever you are I hope you are cozy and warm or enjoying the sunshine. I hope you are feeling loved and feeling my gratitude.

It is early here, not 8AM yet. But I did get a good 8.5 hours of sleep plus an afternoon nap yesterday.

So I’m awake and moving Slowly.

Noah is in Kansas again, Actually Overland Hills, working with Sprint. He has been away more then he has been here the past couple of months. So the weekends are precious...busy catching up on things and trying to have valuable time together.

He is enjoying his work but getting a little tired of traveling.

NYC will be a precious gift to share with one another.

We intend to have a very mellow Thanksgiving for the first time in a while. I decided I didn’t want to cook and together we decided on a quiet dinner for 2 somewhere and a walk in nature, conserving our energy for NYC.

11 days till we leave and I want to be strong, grounded and rested.
What an amazing gift it will be to meet Christine, AND wow, meet her in such a big way!!!!

I have to admit that lately I have come up against challenges I didn’t think I would come up against during this healing process. And I have realized that these challenges really get me down and pull from my energy recourses that should be reserved for healing.

But here I am a human person who is alive and will still come up against human life things.

I made an attempt to go to a support group last night but passed out on the couch and woke up at 5 when the class was beginning, I’ll go next month and make sure I have my nap earlier. I am hoping this will be helpful in navigating this part of my healing.

The things I question/wonder/ or have discovered:

What is too much to ask of Friends?
Am I expressing gratitude the best and most humble way I can be?
Do Cancer patients come to a place when they see who they can depend on and who they cant, who can hang and who can’t?
Do Cancer Survivors lose friends because of their Cancer and recovery?
How much stress can affect the healing process?
When do you draw the line and say this is too much for me to be involved in and step back?
How can I navigate this and not take it personally and still know I am loved?
How do I express loving boundaries?
How do I express my truth in a loving way?
How do I reflect peace when I am feeling "attacked" or told I’m not doing enough or not doing what I "could be" doing?
How do I drop defensiveness when I am feeling defended?
What would Gandhi or Jesus do?
In the wake of all of this how can I continue to reflect peace and contribute to not only my healing but the healing of this planet, thru the practice of complete peaceful interactions?
How can I find the joy and remember the joy and the gift that I am alive and remember the healing I am receiving every minute of every day?

One would think that just trying to survive Cancer and trying to bring my body in balance, take all my pills, go to clinic, get stuck with needles, get my blood taken from me and then returned, getting huge bruises on my arms every 2 weeks, trying to eat well, trying to walk every day to get strong and remain open and PATIENT to my Complete and Unlimited Health and Healing is enough to do, enough to work on, presents enough challenges, presents enough opportunities for growth and practice....but gosh at this year and 7 months mark I’m finding this not to be true. There’s more.

This is part of being alive and being with other people I guess. And being Human.

I’m searching online for groups like this, ones that meet more then once a month, or people that are ahead of me in this process. I’m just waiting for the info to come in. I think that these questions can only be answered by people who have been or are where I am. And also by what my heart tells me.

I feel slightly sad and a little depressed and even a little angry in some ways. But I get to sit with all these feelings and get to the bottom of them…and work it out because I have very few distractions in my life currently. It’s all just right there in my face.

Who would have thought? But I’ll bet every Cancer Survivor has a story to tell like this.

I just keep learning how to protect myself, how to let the emotions flow thru me, not take things too personally, practice compassion for others, and in it all I am discovering who I am or rather who I have become.

I guess this kind of thing can come up in our lives Cancer or no Cancer. So maybe some of this sounds familiar to you.
Thank you for letting me share as usual.
Thank you for all your continued prayers, as usual.
Thank you for the love and your desires to see me survive and live a long happy and healthy life.
Thank you for being apart of my Complete and Unlimited Health and Healing.
Thank you for all each of you have done for me in your own ways...near and far.

Love, Love and nothing but love to each and every one of you.

Namaste
Victoria

Navigating the Seas of The New Normal...

Hello Dear community

It has been a little while I know.

I’m not even sure where I left off.

The one year remission party was wonderful and my mom and dad surprised me by flying in. it was such a joy seeing them but way too short.

I got the official results back and I am officially in Remission. And sailing along.

My lungs feel better every day and I suspect that when I have my next PFT, I will show a marked improvement.

The most wonderful thing happening is that Noah and I are being sent to New York City so that I can meet my donor Christine. But not just meet her; we will all be attending a fundraiser at C Carnegie Hall put on once a year by The Laurie Strauss Foundation. A foundation started by the parents of a very young girl Laurie Strauss who passed of Leukemia at the age of 26 in 1981.

Christine and I will be introduced to each other for the first time on stage at this event. WOW is all I can say, I am blown away, excited and humbled.

I’ll get all the details by the end of the week.

What a wonderful way to meet Christine.

The event is hosted by Rob Reiner and will have various music people like Natalie Cole and Marvin Hamlisch. Trippy!!

The event is Nov. 26 and we will be leaving for NYC on the 24. I am so happy because I am hoping to see my friend Nancy who I haven’t seen in a very long time.
So it is my job to rest a lot and get strong for the flight and the trip in general

This brings in the topic of navigating the Seas of the New Normal. When do I take trips, is it safe, do I expose myself to germs knowingly. How can I live my life fully and protect myself. As my immunosuppressants are weaned when does my new immune system step in to cover my butt?

I am sure every patient faces this.

I was recently faced with a tough choice when a weekend was planned with a group of friends and at the last minute one friend came down with a bad cold. who stays behind me, or the person who is sick?

In this case I went away and the friend graciously stepped down.

I honestly don’t know how often this will come up. I do know that for the party I posted a request that if people were sick to please celebrate at home. Over 12 people stayed at home with various illnesses. I was so grateful for that.

What do I do?

I just don’t know.

I feel it is one thing to be mindful when I shop, that i wash my hands often, but you never know when the person next to you in line at the store is at the beginning stages of a cold.

It is one thing to walk into the mouth of the Lion and go where I know there will be someone who is sick.

People are sick going to the clinic, in the elevators and the lobby of
UCSF.

It is my responsibility to make choices to support my recovery until my immune system is operating in a way I will be protected.

But is it also the responsibility of others in general to be mindful of their own health and spreading of germs.

I honestly don’t know. Everyone has a different perspective. We have all gone to work and social events with symptoms of a cold.

So wow I am torn.

I can not force my view points on others, yet I do hope that everyone is mindful no matter what my state of health is.

All of this has given me a lot to think about, from one end of the spectrum to the other. From feeling guilty for being sick; to hoping that people will learn to be more kind to their bodies because of my illness and their own well being, to feeling like it is unfair.....all of it.

Ultimately tho, I know that I am the only one really in charge of my own health and healing, with the help of prayers and Creator of course. But only I can say, no you know this doesn’t feel safe for me, I need to not do (fill in the blank).

Is this the New Normal, is this the New forever, and how can I live my life so I don’t feel isolated, yet I feel safe?

With a year behind me new questions arise, and I am sure new knowledge will be gained and hopefully not too many challenges.

I always pray for my continued Complete and Unlimited Health and Healing and some of it is not just physical some of it is spiritual and making hard choices.

Its flu season all, wash your hands a lot. Get that extra sleep, don’t wear yourself out so much, take time to slow down, love yourselves and your bodies, including your emotional bodies. Be kind to this physical sacred vessel that we get to inhabit as human people.

Thank you for all your love and support and prayers always.
Love Love and nothing but Love

Namaste
Victoria