As the clock ticks down on 2017, I am not sad. I am ready for this god awful year to be over. I don’t want to rehash everything in 
my mind, let alone on paper. Let’s just say that I am really over it. I was hoping to end the year on a positive note, being able to give a good report after being on my newest med, exemestane/Aromasin, for the last month, but no. The side effects have kicked in and the last two weeks have been getting worse. I have pain in my joints. Everywhere. I wake up in the morning and my fingers ache. One of my arms is always in pain, depending on which side I am sleeping on and how much the little pillows under my armpits have moved during the night. My knees and my hips are acting like I am 93 years old and don’t want to move very much or very fast. Kneeling down to do laundry is painful. We have been lucky enough to go see a few movies over the holiday break (go see the new Jumanji – it is great!), which I love, but getting out of the seats after a few hours is rough. I have been spending time resting in bed or on the couch with pillows under my knees and Deep Blue rub by Doterra on them to help the pain. I have insomnia again. My naturopath gave me a “fall asleep” capsule which helps, but I can’t stay asleep. The numerous hot flashes every night have me waking up and then throwing off all of the covers. I then fall back asleep and wake up again because I am freezing. Over and over again. This is the third (and final) medication which I could be on to help prevent my body from producing estrogen which my cancer fed on. All three of them gave me similar side effects and it is just a matter of deciding now which one of them is least of the evils. Damn it. I am pissed. I do not want to spend the next ten years of my life feeling like this, but since I have had two estrogen loving breast cancers, and the second one while I was on tamoxifen, neither I nor my oncologist feel that I can forgo this preventative medication.
Better in pain than dead though, right? I am not in debilitating pain, just a “pain in my ass” pain. I use lots of things to help: Aleve, Epsom salt baths, CDB oils, essential oils, massage therapy, acupuncture, cupping and wine. Wine and massage are my favorite, but wine often gives me a headache the next day and starting tomorrow, I have a fresh deductible and out of pocket max so my massages will no longer be free. So I will live with the pain, try not to complain too much and just keep moving on with my life every day. I have it A LOT better than many people, and I am very lucky.
Tonight many people will go out or hang out with friends or family. We chose to stay in and relax and planned to get to bed early. It has been a rough year in our house for more reasons than just my health, so it is a night to just be, appreciating the lives that we do have and each other. That was until we got sidetracked by Ancestry.com. With Christmas money, I bought myself an Ancestry DNA kit and I registered it today. Tomorrow, I will spit in a vial and mail it in and then wait 12 weeks for my results. I really want to know more about where I come from beyond my grand and great-grand parents. I think I am mostly German/Western European, but truly have no clue where my family is from before they came to America. Tonight, we turned on a movie and I began to fill in my family tree. By the time the movie was over, I had completed all of the information through my great-grand parents using the basic free service. I handed my iPad to Nate to show him what I found and he stole it. Literally for the past 2 hours, he has been filling in his family tree (up from Jackson) and even submitted for the trial membership so he can go farther back and add in more information. He keeps telling me “Back to Denmark now. . . In Germany now, etc.” I had no idea he was interested in this too, but it really is addicting. So I guess, tomorrow, AFTER I take down and put Christmas away, I will be back on Ancestry.com doing more research on my side of the family. I do think this an interesting way to ring in the new year, by finding out about our past. Happy New Year to all. Appreciate what you have and make the best of it. May 2018 bring us all health, peace and love. And a vacation. I really could use one of those!