A belated THANK YOU for making me a winner!

As you all know by now, thanks to your efforts, I won Healthline's Best Blog contest.  That was no small feat as my competition was fierce and as energized as I was to win.  The competition was very long, but my friends pulled it out at the end, for which I am so thankful.  I was gratified to see my blog readers voting, my facebook friends, then their friends, then friends of friends.  The SoulPancake video of my family was shared and lots of people got on board.    I had a wonderful month where I gained new readers and new facebook friends and lots of people telling me they'd just found my blog through the contest and were going to remain readers.

Hey, y'all.

Oddly enough, on the afternoon of 15th, the day the contest ended, I became seriously ill.  I suddenly became very shaky, very weak, got a headache,  my heart was beating funny and I know my blood pressure was low.  I had to go to bed.  I followed the contest as best as I could through my iPhone in bed but that is very limited.

I am still quite sick - right now, on February 19th at 1:33, is just about my first foray out of bed.  I am like a little colt, walking around on wobbly little legs, trying to get her bearings.

Or, really, more like a Zombie, whose hips and knees don't coordinate with each other and who lurches along, hoping she'll get to brains.

I will soon be going back to bed as it is exhausting just being awake and up for the half hour that I have been. I have chemo tomorrow but will ask to see the doctor instead, and perhaps he'll know what is wrong, maybe this is normal cancer progression.  More likely, some tests will be ordered, or maybe - since I seem to be slightly improving - he'll just skip chemo and let me continue to improve and maybe I'll get better and this will be a cancer mystery.

Who knows?

I have had a stabbing pain in the spine and with the wobbling legs, I wonder if cancer has finally left the liver and entered the meninges?  I hope not.  Perhaps, the pain is just from sleeping in bed for four days straight? With bad shoulders, it is hard for me to turn over easily and with the enervation I've felt, I have not moved much.    It is hard to know.  I really should have gone to the ER but my one criteria for going to a place I consider hell - a fever - didn't happen.  

Without a fever, I stay put.   I didn't have the energy to get dressed, get in the car, and walk into the ER,  and my husband will probably have to take me to the doctor tomorrow, which is a rarity.  I do this thing alone.

I want to share that the first two days, I ate nothing.  Then one day I ate a yogurt, then yesterday I had a cup of coffee, a mini-brownie bite, two yogurts and a sandwich and a popsicle.  So I am improving in that area.

Anyway, all that is to say, I wish I could have been online to enjoy the celebration of my win with all those who actually helped me to win.  I wanted nothing more than to write a personal thanks to each and every one of you who helped me gain that money for my son's education as well as those of you who have been donating to my paypal fund and Derek's fund.  I wanted to "like" my brains out all over the place and WooHoo it up!  After a two month contest, we all deserved that.  I have planned (and still plan) to record my son saying Thank You since the money is for him.

But, this blog post will have to do for now and when I am healthier and up and around again, I will NOT forget.  Thank you.

Here is a video I recorded on the 14th, Valentine's Day, when I was thinking I might lose but not feeling like a loser. I posted it on facebook on the 15th, before the end of the contest and was going to post it here, but got sick too suddenly.   How quickly we can go downhill physically!  It's breathtaking.

Mentally, I still feel like a winner.