For the Love of Glorie

Hard to believe it's March already!! What a difference a few months can make, it's been tough and tricky, up and down, and I'm still trying to navigate my way through this very steep and real learning curve.

I just want to say a massive thank you for the messages, prayers, donations, visits, gifts and the outpouring of love and support. We wouldn't have been able to get through what we have without our family and friends embracing us through this. The generosity has been overwhelming, from kind strangers, work family, old school friends, family friends, neighbours and colleagues, we are incredibly grateful and this page has allowed us to put the funds towards my last three immunotherapy treatments. I'm now up to my 6th immunotherapy keytruda treatment, my 5th chemo session and had one shot of radiation.

I may have been a bit quiet lately, but it doesn't mean life hasn't been eventful :P . With the cancer spreading into my bones, my oncologist suggested a bone strengthening treatment that worked way too well and sucked too much calcium from my blood into my bones, leaving me in hospital for 2 weeks trying to get back to "normal", this involved coming out of a dark and depressing few days to get to hospital and get onto a 24/7 heart monitor. Luckily, things balanced out, but not long after I was admitted back to hospital with a PIC line infection, caught early, it just meant a week in hospital on IV antibiotics.

Since December, I've had two reviews with my amazing Oncologist to see how things are progressing. The first one in January showed that the primary tumour in my left lung had shrunk slightly, some lymph nodes had shrunken and there was evidence of bone healing. Last week's CT scan, showed similar results along the same trend with no new growths or increase in cancer presence - so win, win! I'll definitely take that!

More importantly, I've started to feel like I'm returning to a somewhat state of "normal". I'm not so exhausted, confused or nauseous, my left vocal chord seems to be coming right so I'm not so squeaky (much to Nick's disappointment! haha), and I'm on crutches and working on improving the penguin waddle with the new bionic hips. I'm not out of the woods yet, and may never be, but a few months ago, days like this didn't seem feasible. They say treatment generally gets harder, thankfully because it started out so rough, things are getting better, I'm weaning off medication and painkillers, and exploring more natural and holistic approaches.

For now my treatment plan is working and my body is responding positively! I feel better than I have in so long, my blood, platelet and calcium levels are stable, fingers crossed it continues.

My family and I are forever grateful and thankful to you all for your love and support xx