A Little More

I am trying more to be committed to doing this. I don't want to force myself to write, it isn't a job. It's not as if people are waiting on the edge of their seats to see what I will post next. I never wanted to make this something I dread doing. I love writing. I love allowing people to see into our world. So if I don't post for awhile, it usually means one of two things. One being that what ever is happening doesn't seem note worthy. Or, that I really just don't want to write. I have noticed in the past few weeks that Josh and I often go through a roller coaster of emotions. There are days, weeks, or even months when we are the active, fun, easy going couple that is down for anything. Then there are a days when we want nothing more than to just shut the world out and spend days in our apartment. I know it's not healthy, which is why by the third or fourth day I force ourselves to go out and do something. This month it seems to be our down month. We have locked ourselves in the apartment more often than usual, but we did bust out for a few things. I think cancer aside, we often get to busy with our lives that we forget about the little things. There are some days when we do nothing more than lay in bed together and just hold each other. There are times when we binge watch an entire show in a week, only going out for food or appointments. Yes, to some people that isn't healthy. But for us it works because we have never been able to do just that. To just sit in silence. To just hold each other. To just make our own little nest of blankets and pillows in bed and watch an entire season of our favorite show. It's nice that we have the ability to do it now, so for now, I'm allowing it. I'm appreciating it.


First off, Chemo was delayed a week by our doing. I have been overwhelmed with keeping everything straight I delayed Chemo without knowing it. In my defense, no one from his oncology team called to tell us this so we just rolled with it. There is room to wiggle when it comes to chemo. The rule is that he is off for four weeks before starting the new cycle. Since we have delayed so many times, I can honestly say I have no idea what the original track for chemo is, haha. But we were okay with the delay, it offered me a week of seeing my old husband, which was nice. Chemotherapy has become so routine for us. We have it down to a science though Josh likes to push the limits every now and again, lol. We, once again, decided to go to a concert in the middle of chemo. I swear I try to plan around it, but for some reason it always lands that way. Anyways, we went to see Machine Gun Kelly while Josh was on chemotherapy! Concert was amazing, as I thought it would be. Being that we only go see rock concerts, it was a different atmosphere at a rap concert. However, it was hands down the second best concert I have ever been to! Josh didn't get hit on this time (last two concert he had) but he did get asked if he had any "coke...or like any other drugs.." I told him he should have told her he was an undercover cop, that would have made for a good night, haha. My husband, who was wearing a Batman shirt and dad shorts was assumed to be a drug dealer! The only good thing he had on him was chemotherapy and if she wanted that, she was either desperate or stupid.

Another high light from August was that Josh celebrated his 9 year anniversary in the Navy! Many people don't know the story behind Josh joining...well here it goes! At 19 years old, Josh was eager to get out of our hometown (like most people) and was willing to do anything. I remember him telling me he was going to join the Marines because and I quote "they were the most likely to take him." Now, my memory is fuzzy, but I can recall a huge fight over this. Keep in mind I was only 17, young and in love. Luckily his dad stopped him from joining, but still determined to leave, he decided on joining the Navy instead. In our minds, we were convinced he would never have to go to the desert being on a ship and all. Boy were we wrong about that! But anyways, back to the story. I can remember him riding his bike over to my house to tell me that he had enlisted into the Navy. I was furious, and I think, being 17 young and stupid that we actually broke up over this. He never told me that he was going to join. Memory is hazy, and yes, he will probably deny this but I can't remember us discussing this. Our first year in the Navy was as bumpy as can be. We broke up so many times, I missed his boot camp graduation, we dated other people. But, ultimately we got back together and became the couple we are today. He never ended up on a ship, but the time he has spent in the Navy has made me extremely proud of him and all that he has accomplished. We have grown over the past nine years, individually and together. Nine years...three deployments, countless training, three duty stations later and now they are saving his life.

**Also, happy 11 months smoke free! I'm super proud of that too!**

Last August highlight was our Nationals game! As Josh is a wounded warrior, we are often offered to do so many different things. This time we signed up to get free tickets to a Nationals game. Both of us grew up going to baseball games, so it was another professional sporting event to check off of our list. We not only got free tickets, but they were suite tickets, score! We were able to go to the Presidents Club, which is for the elite, where it was a buffet of all different types of food. Once lunch was over, we were to go to our seats that were located RIGHT BEHIND HOME PLATE. Holy smokes, we were so close we could hear the players talking! However, being behind home plate, the ball tends to come in your direction more often than I thought. Luckily there was a huge net in front of us, but that didn't stop us from flinching every time the ball came in our direction, lol. It was a great way to spend Sunday afternoon

July...

I haven't posted in a very long time. I would say it's writers block but as I am not a writer nor am I mentally blocked, I really have no excuse. Instead I would go with the fact that I really have nothing to write about. Day in and day out my life revolves around this disease. There are moments, days even, when I want nothing more than to think about something else. That, however, is not my reality. My life revolves around medication, doctor visits, puke patrol, chemotherapy, and making my husband's life as easy as possible. I am trying to change content of this blog, add more happy stories, talk about our trips, and try to not make the disease my main focus. But everything in my life reverts back to cancer. Every month we do chemotherapy. Every month my husband has been making it through it with flying colors, only dealing with minor moments of nausea. I try to reinvent every blog every post, to make it interesting and to add humor as much as possible. More often than not it's hard for me to put our month into words. Sometimes it's a great month, sometimes it's a very boring normal month. I try to make it as interesting as I can, to trying new things and change it up. But the bottom line is that this blog is for myself. I created it with the sole intention of updating people on our lives and for giving myself an outlet to deal with the life I have been given. I shared this with Josh, who in his ever supporting manner told me that I shouldn't worry about keeping people interested. I shouldn't care if one person reads this or if twenty people read this. It's about keeping myself centered and for allowing people into our lives. With that being said, I will update all on our lives!

June 14th was my last update and as it is almost the end of July, I have one word to say- yikes!

July 4th was spent at the White House. Yes, we had the most American Fourth, haha. Because Josh is a wounded warrior, we were invited to attend a barbecue and fire works. The actual day kind of sucked, it rained all morning so I knew no matter what was going to happen, the ground itself was going to be muddy. I was no where near prepared for how muddy it actually was, but that's not as interesting as the actual visit itself, lol. Since it rained all morning, they canceled the barbecue which was a real bummer. We arrived about an hour late due to traffic and issues beyond our control. The White House really did have a nice set up. The event was sponsored by the USO so they had face painting booths for the kids, a photo booth and a concert stage. We really didn't know about anything that was going on prior to the event. We actually got to see Bruno Mars perform, neither one of us are fans but he actually puts on a really good show. He is definitely one of those artists that sounds exactly the same on an album vs. in real life. We were also then told that the President had not made appearances in the past years so it was doubtful he would be making it this year. Well, after Bruno preformed, he introduced the President and First Lady! Regardless of how you feel about him, how many you can say they were standing in the same room as the President?! After his speech, they started the fire works. Though our fourth wasn't the perfect day, plans changed and by the end of the day both of us were annoyed with everything, looking back on it now, it was a great day. I love being so close to DC that we are able to experience these things. Josh being a Wounded Warrior definitely opens a lot of doors for us and allows us to meet extraordinary people and do amazing things. I am grateful for this.

It seems as if our month of July was incredibly busy and incredibly chill at the same time. I feel like we did so much, but at the same time we had a lot of down time. Aside from Chemo, we rarely had any appointments. This of course makes us stir crazy, so to fill the time, we took a random trip down to Norfolk. Spontaneous trips have become our new norm. As crazy as it sounds, I don't worry about money. If there is something we want to do, somewhere we want to go to, something we want to see, we do it. It was a Thursday when I found out there was a Norfolk Aquarium. We packed the car up Saturday and spent the weekend down there. Never in my life have I have been this spontaneous but I figure aside from making our appointments and keeping his health in check, this is the third most important thing, experiencing life. So we spent the weekend in Norfolk, catching up with one of our best friends, and then going to the aquarium. It was actually a cute little aquarium and since we were there when it first opened in the morning, we were able to go through all exhibits and see the animals active.   

And last, but not least my parents came to visit! My brother moved to Virginia for work so my mom tagged along with them then half way through the week my Dad arrived. It was nice to have them both here, it was nice getting a break from life.