Luck

Vegas did not disappoint. When our initial hotel arrangements evaporated, we ended up staying at the Wynn, a fairly new and definitely luxurious hotel. We certainly spent more time in the room than expected with the space and the view of the golf course behind us (I mean, it had a TV in the bathroom!) After Mom finished walking the room to estimate square footage, we snacked on wine, crisps and cheese compliments of Colleen, and then eventually headed outside the room!

We managed to leave the hotel the next day to get to some amazing outlet shopping just 10 minutes away, and secured some very nice deals. Eating delicious Japanese fusion by a waterfall that night (still in our hotel), we were happy our original hotel plans had disappeared! The following two days were spent mostly soaking up the sun during the day and watching crazy artistic acrobatics at Cirque de Soleil's "O" at night. Our minimal penny slot machine play even earned us each free meals, so that balanced our shopping finds!

The three of us never have any difficulty having fun together, but our beautiful surroundings sure supported a short vacation beyond my expectations!

Mom and I ran out of luck when our late flight home was delayed by 3 hours, so we arrived at 4 am Monday...yuck. I had to get blood work done later that morning and mom had to work, so it took until Tuesday to return to normal!

My blood counts were all good, and on Wednesday I saw Dr. Brown, and stopped the chemotherapy I have been on for the past year and a half. It's a strange feeling...Dr. Brown described the plan as "giving my body a break to rest before I step out in front of a train"! Okay, I'll take the break! He updated me on the transplant application - while the "wrinkle" that I mentioned last post had not been completely ironed out, Health Canada had reported that my file had gone to formal review. This simply means it was back in the review stage, and while the timeline may have been extended slightly, it at least shows they are willing to consider it despite the need to iron out certain issues. So the wait continues but there is a light at the end of this loooonnnng tunnel.

I'd had a cold and cough for a few days and so I laid pretty low last week. Last Thursday night I woke up feeling shivery and took my temperature to find out I had a fever. When it hadn't gone away by the morning, I phoned the clinic and went in to the hospital for tests. The preliminary tests showed a type of pneumonia, so I started on medication and took Tylenol to try to manage the fever and symptoms. While the fever remained through Friday night, accompanied by bone pain and headache, by Saturday it had calmed down and after a lot of rest and a few more doses of the anti-biotic, I feel a LOT better today. So the plan this week is to fully recover and get back to getting strong before the train hits.

A lotta good luck and a little bad luck. Just another turn in the roller coaster, right?