Aeveryday14 ~ Weeks 6 & 7

 

Here are my pics from weeks 6 and 7 of 2014 :)

 

 

Day 36: My love :)

 

Day 37: Since I was going to end up missing Valentine's Day with my students due to my surgery I decided to try and make the heart cake that was popping up all over pinterest. The kids loved it and it was fun and easy to make so it was a win win all around!

 

Day 38: It was the day of our Valentine's Dance at school! Mary Jane and I are super happy to see our babies have fun but also super happy to see it over! lol

 

Day 39: When I got home from the dance I had a wonderful Valentine's surprise! Frankie had gotten me this beautiful heart wreath!! I was so excited when I put it on the door the next day.

 

Day 40: Frankie and his truck.... that's a tight bond right there.

 

Day 41: My mom and I headed out for our road trip to Augusta.

 

Day 42: My very first surgery.

 

Week 6 ... had to commemorate it by adding snowflakes since the snow was headed our way. :)

 

 

 

Day 43: We were going a little bit stir crazy in our hotel so we ventured outside to see what everything looked it. It was very mushy on the roads but this tree was beautiful to me so I snapped a picture of it.

 



 

Day 44: We finally got to head home and Frankie took me straight to Covington to meet my newest nephew, Layton Thomas. Just a bundle of preciousness.

 

Day 45: Happy Valentine's Day. I know Valentine's Day was over a month ago but I really need to do a post about our wonderful day. These flowers definitely helped make it fabulous!

 

Day 46: Nothing makes you feel better like a bowl of popcorn and a good book. :)

 

Day 47: My favorite boys in the whole world!! Love!

 

Day 48: My toes were ready to get some color. Why is it that you just feel better when you have pretty toes??

 

Day 49: I love being home at lunch when we have breaks at school. We get to eat together and then I get to watch him take a power nap. Love this fella right here.

 

Weeks 6 & 7 :)

 

New Meals ~ Chicken Marsala

I love to cook. LOVE to cook. I also love to eat out... but that's for another time. Well, I love to cook but once we got married it just felt like I was cooking the same thing over and over and over again and most of the time is was beef, beef, beef, chicken, beef.... you get the picture. I was ready to add some flavor to our meals. I also knew that when summer rolled around I would most likely go insane being bored with nothing to do. So, I came up with a plan to keep me happy :) I am going to start cooking a brand new meal to see if it is something that we might want to add to our regular meals.

The first meal I decided to try was Paula Deen's Chicken Marsala. My mom gets her magazine's each month and I found this recipe in her December 2013 issue. It has chicken and mushrooms which are two of Frankie's favorites so I thought it had a good chance of survival. I made this last Friday night and it was a hit with a few minor changes for the future. :)

I'm going to list Paula's recipe and then I will list what I did to change it up for us.

2 pounds boneless skinless chicken breasts, halved crosswise
3/4 tsp salt, divided
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
3 Tbsp olive oil, divided
1 (8oz) package sliced baby portobello mushrooms
1/2 onion, thinly sliced
1 Tbsp all-purpose flour
1 (15oz) can chicken broth
1 cup Marsala wine
1/2 tsp dried sage
1/2 tsp butter
1 (16oz) package linguine

1. Place chicken between two sheets of parchment paper, and pound with the flat side of a meat mallet or a rolling pin to an even thickness. Sprinkle chicken with 1/2 tsp salt and pepper.
2. In a large skillet, heat 2 Tbsp oil over medium-high heat. Add chicken, and cook, in batches if necessary, for 5 to 6 minutes on each side or until golden brown. Remove from skillet, and keep warm.
3. Add remaining 1 Tbsp oil to skillet. Add mushrooms, onion, and remaining 1/4 tsp salt, cook, stirring occasionally, for 8 minutes or until tender. Sprinkle flour over vegetables; cook, stirring frequently, for 2 minutes. Slowly stir in broth, wine, and sage. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer for 6 minutes or until liquid is reduced by half.
4. Return chicken to skillet, and cook until heated through. Add butter, stirring until melted. Serve chicken and sauce over linguine.


Okay, first the things I changed about the ingredients:

• I did not measure out the salt and pepper to season the chicken with, I just did what I normally do.
• I did not use portobello mushrooms, well I might have but it didn't say. I just bought the mushrooms that we buy to use on anything we cook with mushrooms. (I know we like those so that is what I stuck with.)
• Frankie does not like onions so instead of slicing an onion I just used a small amount of onion salt. (He likes the flavor but not the texture so I decided to try using a small amount of the onion salt and I don't think he noticed at all.)
• Lastly, I do not like sage so I didn't use it.

 

I had to cook my chicken in batches, the olive oil got really hot and starting popping pretty bad so I left the top on while they cooked.

 

The olive oil did a really good job of browning the chicken and her time of 5 to 6 minutes on each side was pretty accurate.

 

After I added in the mushrooms.

 

This was after I added in all the liquid. It was suppose to reduce by half but mine never really did. I'm not sure what I did wrong but next time I will try to figure that out.

 

Once I added the chicken back in.

 

The finished product. (I'm not sure why this picture is so hazy.)

 

My thoughts....

• I really loved it but I would definitely not do pasta with it next time. We had green beans and mashed potatoes with this and it tasted much better without the pasta.
• We both wished the sauce would have been a little thicker and next time I make it I will probably add another tablespoon of flour to it to see if that helps.

 

As far as the easiness of this meal, I was actually very surprised how easy and quick it was. The only reason that it took me a while was because I was reading and rereading and double and triple checking the recipe. Once I know the recipe by heart this will be a breeze to make. :)

 

I am going to rate each new meal that I make on a scale of 1 to 10:

1=probably not going to have that again 

10=will add that to my favorite meal box

 

Frankie's score - 9

My score - 7

Looks like we have found a new chicken recipe :)

 

:) Happy Eating :)

 

 



Aeveryday14 ~ Weeks 4 & 5

One day, maybe by the end of the year, I will be caught up with these pictures :)

 

Week 4 :)

 

Day 22: I got this beautiful necklace on my shopping trip and I really love it!!

 

Day 23: I went by the library and got my next Harry Bosch novel by Michael Connelly. I love all things crime and mystery and this was by far the highlight of my day. Snuggling up with my new book.

 

Day 24: It felt like I waited a lifetime for these wonderful pictures and finally I had them!!!

 

Day 25: Even though he wasn't yet 5 we were celebrating his birthday and I can not believe that he is already 5 years old!!

 

 

Day 26: My mom and I headed to Covington to celebrate with Meggie the upcoming arrival of baby Layton!

 

Day 27: My parents, especially my mom had been stretched thin with going back and forth to the hospital to help take care of my granny. My dad had not had a home cooked meal in a while. We cooked and it worked out where both of them could come. I took this picture afterwards like my dad and Frankie talked. I love having company!

 

Day 28: One of our many snow and ice storms had begun. We were looking forward to spending the night at home. Actually Frankie had fallen asleep at like 7:00 that night, which was a good thing because he was called out to take care of some 18 wheelers that were stuck and he stayed gone the entire night. This is where his truck should have been while he worked all night and I worried all night. :/ sigh...

 

Week 5 ... I messed up my cute little collage, but this really is only week 5

 

 

Day 29: This is what my new house looks like all covered in snow. :)

Isn't it pretty?

 

Day 30: Back to school and I was all happy about my healthy chicken salad I made.... I was happy until the next day when I realized that the dressing I was craving was not in my fridge - it never was. It was at the store all along.

 

Day 31: A trip to one of our favorite pizza places in town and I couldn't resist snapping a picture of this handsome guy.

 

Day 32: We were on our way to a funeral but I never see him in a tie and he looked so darn good that I had to take a picture.

 

Day 33: My sister's family came down to visit my granny and that meant that I got to eat lunch with 2 of my favorite boys!

 

Day 34: One of Frankie's favorite meals - spaghetti :) I kind of rigged up a new way to do it and he loves it like this. On a side note - how cute is my polka dotted dish??

 

Day 35: Our classroom door at school! I love this door and it is probably my favorite that we do the entire year. We were ready for Valentine's Day!!

 

The Big C ~ Part 3

Once we were safe and sound at home everything with my recovery was actually wonderful. I felt really good, I was able to eat anything that I wanted and I had no problems getting up and heading out for the day. I was really shocked, simply because they told me that it would be 7 to 10 days. I was definitely not seeing that.

I only had to use my pain medicine for a few days after the surgery and the biggest and probably only problem that I had after that was the fact that I was not sleeping at all. I wasn't sure if it was because the pain medicine knocked me out so good that I just couldn't sleep without it or if it was because I wasn't really doing anything during the day and I just really wasn't that tired. I didn't sleep all that well until I went back to school a whole week and a half later.

Dr. T told me the day of my surgery that if it wasn't for the ice storm that they would probably know the results of my pathology by that Friday but with the ice storm it may take longer. Well, those results came a week later. My glue was starting to come off, I was starting to see a light at the end of the don't do anything strenuous like work out or breathe the wrong way tunnel. Things were looking up. Then Dr. T called. He really didn't waste time either. The conversation pretty much went like this...

Hi Mrs. Garrison, this is Dr. T. Your pathology reports came back in and it looks like the nodule that we removed was in fact cancer.

 Bam. Well there you have it. He just kept right on talking and I kinda quit listening for a minute or two while I let it sink it. I wasn't really shocked but I wasn't really expecting that either. The only real reason that I wasn't shocked was the picture of the nodule they removed. I mean, did you see the size of that thing? It looked kinda nasty, so that was a little bit of a red flag to me. I quickly brought myself back to reality as Dr. T was asking if I had any questions. My first question was simply, how do we know that it is not going to spread? He stated that since they removed the tumor it would not spread. If it did spread, it already did and that is why they would need to go in and remove the rest of my thyroid. Wait, wait, wait... go back one second... tumor?? Okay, this "lump" that was never called a lump in the first place, this thing that had a fancy name called nodule was now being called a tumor?? I had a tumor in my body. I mean, what am I supposed to do with that information. I still don't really know.

Dr. T stated that they would like to go in and remove the rest of my thyroid in about a week. You would think that the normal response was sure go ahead, remove whatever you need but I just said, "Can I talk to my husband about this?" Apparently Dr. T was more than use to that response and he said sure, just call me or email me when you are ready. By the time we got off the phone Frankie was in the car with me and we were parked at our favorite restaurant in town (since I was on my way to get Frankie when Dr. T called). I just looked at Frankie and said, well, my results came back and it was cancer.  He kinda looked like someone punched him in his stomach. I just sat there, I didn't really know what to do. He finally started shaking his head and of course the tears started flowing. Hahah, most people would think, well of course that is a perfectly normal reaction but since I cry at songs and commercials and a stranger crying on the street it is really just a part of my everyday life. Frankie immediately said "please don't cry" and all I could say was "please don't be mad at me" lol Just a ridiculous conversation from two people who have had way to much going on for only 3 months of marriage. :) He reassured me that he wasn't mad at me just mad that this was happening to me and I just remember saying, "don't do that because I don't want to cry about it. It is what it is and from what Dr. T says it really shouldn't be that bad." So, we both sucked it up, went inside and enjoyed a wonderful meal at one of our favorite places.

The rest of the day was spent telling my family and my best friends. Most of which handled it very very well. The way I needed them to handle it, like it was no big deal and we were just going to take care of it. (lol when I wrote take care of it  I immediately thought of a mob boss telling his contract killer to "take care of it"  - wow - I watch way too much crime drama) The rest of the day also consisted of emailing my boss and Dr. T and scheduling the next surgery.

I of course had my really upset moments, but most of those moments came with Frankie. I guess most things like that come with your spouse. ( I have a spouse. Weird) He just let me cry and ask ridiculous questions that he would never be able to answer. He was really really awesome. I don't really know how he took it, he simply stayed in the garage (that's his man cave, he literally stands in there and stares at cars like they are the best thing God ever created. A 10 on the Ridiculous Scale) and this time he didn't look happy, he looked sad but the last thing I could handle was him being upset so he did a really good job keeping it covered up out there. With everybody else I was simply happy and okay, and I really was okay.

The biggest issue I had was that every doctor I had seen from day one of this journey told me "Oh, you're young and healthy so I am sure everything will be fine" Well you know what? It wasn't fine so does this mean that I am no longer young and healthy? Was I never healthy? Was there something I could have done to avoid this? I could have driven myself crazy but there really wasn't anything that I could have done. Everything I looked up said that they don't know where thyroid cancer comes from or what causes it so the best thing for me was not to dwell on it. I just don't really like that saying anymore. Just because you are young and healthy does not mean things can't happen to you. Of course it helps but sometimes s..t happens and we just deal with it.

The love and support that everyone has shown me during this time has been nothing short of amazing, wonderful, and to be honest humbling. The phone calls and hugs and prayers have probably been the number one reason why I have been able to honestly say that I'm good and I'm doing okay when others ask how I am. I really am good, I really am ok. Church was a tear jerker the Sunday before my next surgery. Brother Garth (who is just a wonderful wonderful man and pastor) made sure to mention me during his prayer requests and said to just pray a special prayer for me but that is not all he did. At the end of the service that day, after the invitation he walked up the aisle and said "Anna and Frankie, can y'all come out into the aisle here for a minute" Of course the tears started flowing, probably because Garth is the sweetest person ever and probably because I was so embarrassed that he was calling us out in front of the entire church. He told everyone to come close and touch someone and he prayed the sweetest prayer, not only for me but for my family. For my sister and her family with the new baby, for my grandmother who had been in the hospital for a while and for my parents who were having to deal with my granny, my sister and me. It was so evident how much he cares for my family and I was just boohooing like a baby right into his microphone. Which means that the entire church heard me crying, sniffing and snotting - just drop your head in shame with me - I felt so humbled, so loved, and so embarrassed all at the same time. AND! To top off the day my wonderful Sunday School class did the same thing. I just cried again. I mean, it is obviously a part of who I am.

I went back to work for only two days before my next surgery but those two days were so so wonderful. I love love love my babies. I was so happy to see them. I got tons and tons and tons of hugs and kisses and it made my two days to see my sweeties. That Tuesday after work, February 25th, Frankie and I packed up and headed back to Augusta for surgery number 2. This time Frankie would take me and my mom would meet us at the hospital the next day. She would then stay with me until Thursday and bring me home. I know it may sound really crazy but there was something so comforting about going in at the same time and seeing the same faces just 2 weeks later. I paid the same lady, the same nurse gave me my stuff, I was only in one room over from the room I was in two weeks prior. They wheeled me down to the floor where the operating room was located and Frankie came with me until it was time to wheel me to the operating room. The same fellow was there and she made me very relaxed. There was something different about this surgery that made me more nervous, I mean the nodule was out, this was simply removing the normal side of my thyroid. However, I don't know if it was because of all of the attention that I was suddenly getting but somehow I was crazy nervous and scared of this surgery. My fellow came in and then Dr. T came in and I was just at ease. Then my sleepy nurses came in. That's what I will call them. I had the same ones. I was very happy and they asked if I remembered them and of course I did. I was super happy to have to same ones. I mean, like weird happy about it. I guess I felt like they did a good job last time that they would do a good job this time too. They wheeled me back and before I knew it I was getting woke up by two sweet nurses that were laughing at me a lot. I felt kind of bad about that but they kept saying that I was such a good patient (and I must have been because they sent me a card in the mail lol - what kind of people do they see down there??). They fed me ice chips and made sure to call my room and see if my mom had gotten there when I asked if they could find out. They just kept laughing, they didn't even want to leave once they took me back to my room with Frankie and mama. I must admit that they did make me feel pretty good. Once I was good to go my mom took me to get some lunch while Frankie went to pick up my medicine. This time my medicine consisted of my new thyroid pill and my calcium pills.

Once we got back to the hotel Garth, my wonderful pastor, came to visit! Yes! The man drove 2 and a half hours to visit me for like 30 minutes. Just wonderful and sweet! Then a friend that grew up in our church who is now a pastor of a church in Augusta came to visit. There are no words for how blessed I felt. Once again, I had some soup for supper that night and thank goodness for no ice we woke up the next morning and were able to head home.

This time the recovery has actually been more like 7 to 10 days. I have not enjoyed it. My mom keeps reminding me that it was my 2nd surgery in 2 weeks and that I need to take it easy. Plus, I am missing an organ these days which is not very fun by the way.... but I am happy to say that they think the Big C is all gone. We won't know for sure until my follow up with Dr. J which is in a few weeks but I am thinking positive. :)

It's crazy to think that I had cancer in my body and I would have never known it if I didn't go to the doctor. It's crazy to think that I had cancer in my body and I felt perfectly fine the whole time. Kind of scary actually. Kind of makes you want to go get checked out huh? You should. :)

 

A picture I snapped on our way headed to Augusta the night before the second surgery.

 

I got pretty scarves from Dr. T! How wonderful is that?

 

My glue and bandage from the second surgery.

The Big C ~ Part 2

Dr. T's office wasted no time calling me and getting my surgery date set up. They wanted to schedule it sometime in January but when I asked about the recovery time they said 7 to 10 days. What!? I don't have time to be off 7 to 10 days. So, I requested to have it set up for the week before our school's Winter Break. This way I would only miss a few days that week and then I wouldn't miss any due to the fact that everybody would be off. Well... Dr. T only does surgeries on Tuesday's and Wednesday's and I would need to be there the day before surgery so they would be able to do my pre-op evaluation. So much for only missing a couple of days. I would only be at work 1 day.

Fast forward to a week before the surgery and Dr. T's office called and asked if they could bump up my surgery to that Tuesday instead of Wednesday because he would be out of town that Wednesday. Well, do I actually have a choice?? (Which is what I was thinking in a very sarcastic way) So long to being a work at all that week. I now had to be there for the pre-op appointment that Monday and surgery was Tuesday. The surgery was in Augusta, which means it was a 2 1/2 hour drive away. The surgery was an out patient surgery but for patients that live that far away Dr. T requests that they stay in a hotel overnight just in case anything goes wrong. My Mom and Frankie both wanted to be there for the surgery, which I probably would have made both of them come anyways, so they devised a plan that seemed to work out for everybody. My mom would drive me there Monday and do all the pre-op festivities with me and then drive me to the hospital for surgery the next day. Frankie would wake up early the day of the surgery and drive over to the hospital.

My mom picked me up around 8:00 Monday morning, February 10th. We stopped for breakfast and had a fun time on our road trip to Augusta. By this time I was super nervous so it helped that my mom didn't seemed worried about anything and she helped put me to ease. When we arrived in Augusta we went straight to the hospital to Dr. T's office for the pre-op appointment. That was loads of fun.  They didn't waste any time getting me back and the nurse came in and just plain as day like it happens every day (which to her I'm sure it does) says, "I'm going to spray this solution in your nose so when he comes in he can put the camera in and take a look at your vocal cords." Umm, excuse me, WHAT??? Where is he putting a camera? I have to be awake for this? This is something I should have known about so I could have prepared myself!! I was not very happy. So here she is putting this spray stuff up my nose and one nostril did fine, the other...well let's just say the spray and my nose had a disagreement and the spray went everywhere. I felt like I had spray down my shirt and on my pants. I was coughing and gagging and eventually got sick right there in the office. How disgusting, how embarrassing. The nurse was so apologetic and kept saying "I am so sorry, that has never happened before"... yeah yeah, blah blah blah  The nurse left and my mom kept saying yuck yuck yuck, you're gonna make me get sick (and I was thinking just join the club over here, I'm sorry that my actual throwing up is going to make you sick) I composed myself, Dr. T came in, put the spray in with no problem then stuck this little camera up my nose and down my throat to look at my vocal cords and I had to say "eeeeeeeee" a few times and then it was done. No problem at all. Dr. T was wonderful, he answered any and all questions that we had and said to call a number after 6 pm to see what time I had to be at the hospital the next day for surgery. We were set to go.

Once we left I texted Frankie to give him a peak into our morning.

Me: Things over here are off to a rough start:/ they just shot up some stuff up my nose and it came shooting back out, (which by the way, she claims has never happened before) I then proceeded to throw up my breakfast lol... I told mama that if this is any indication of the surgery tomorrow things aren't looking so good.

Frankie's response: Babe that's nasty

I couldn't help but laugh out loud with that one. Short and to the point. Gotta love him.

The rest of the day we spent eating and finding our hotel. There was also the looming Ice Storm headed our way that was just going to be the end of the Earth from the way the news anchors were describing it. Catastrophic, Devastating... ridiculous. Well, with the fact that we were no where near home and my sister was going to pop out baby number 3 at any time my mom was pretty stressed about what to do. We didn't even know what time my surgery was going to be and my sister was going to the doctor that day to see if they needed to go ahead and induce her. The hospital called me before 6:00 and said that I need to be at the hospital at 5:45 in the morning to get ready for surgery. Wait.....5:45.....in the morning?  Have you lost your mind?  The good news about that time was that my surgery was scheduled for 7:30 which means that I would get it out of the way.

We woke up, got to the hospital and they wasted no time getting me ready and into the operating room. Frankie was on his way and would be there when I woke up. And, he was. :) I was happy to see him and mama when I got back to my room. I was a little out of it but it didn't take me long to come to and get ready to go home, well to the hotel. Frankie and my mom had worked out a plan since Meggie was in fact going to be induced that day. My mom took me to get some lunch which consisted of a baked potato from Wendy's and Frankie went to get my medicine filled. Once I was all settled in back at the hotel my mom went ahead and left headed for Covington. It was raining and while it wasn't freezing just yet we didn't know when it would start so it was best for her to get on the road as soon as possible. Frankie stayed with me and we napped pretty much all day. We finally ventured out to Olive Garden (well, I stayed in the truck and Frankie picked up our order) I had soup and pasta and Frankie was able to have something really good too. I was actually surprised at how well I could eat the soft foods like pasta and soup. I just couldn't eat a lot of it. We had plenty of left overs which is a good thing because needless to say with the ice storm on the horizon we were definitely stuck there for an extra day. :( It actually wasn't that bad, I was able to get plenty of rest and we did venture out of the hotel room a couple of times just so we wouldn't go crazy. While we were waiting out the storm I got good news from the school - I was actually only missing 2 days because school was canceled due to the weather the other 3 days. We also got great news from Meggie and Terrell. Layton Thomas Selph was born Wednesday, February 13th.

Frankie was definitely going stir crazy by Wednesday night and was dead set on going home Thursday. Which is what we did. He, being the awesome hubby that he is, took me straight to Covington to meet Layton! :)

Here are some of the pictures from our stay (warning: my nodule that was removed is in fact a picture...)

 

Dr. T came in to check on me after surgery and showed me this picture, I said which part of that is the nodule, he said all of it. Wow, that is pretty big!

 

My bandage, they used a small band aid and glue to put me back together :) The purple there is from their markers where they drew on me before surgery.

 

My soup, it was really really good. I have never been a soup person at Olive Garden before but this is definitely one I will be getting again.

 

The mushy mess outside of our hotel.

 

I love this picture, even though the ice creates huge problems you can't deny how pretty it is.

 

Once we were on the interstate the roads were actually not bad, it was the exits and surface streets that were the worse.

 

 

The highlight of my trip. Getting to see Layton. We were the only ones who got to meet him in the hospital since all the ice and mess. :)

 

 

Part 3 coming soon.....

 

The Big C Word

Back in October I decided that I better make an appointment with my doctor before I got married. That is pretty normal, most girls do make a point to go see their OB-GYN before they get married. I had not been in probably four years. I absolutely hate going (I mean who doesn't) and I wasn't taking any birth control and therefore felt I had no real reason to go. Well, one month away from being married and we were not ready to come home from our honeymoon preggers so I needed to get back on birth control. I wanted to go for a few reasons. One, was to have my exam, one was for birth control and the last reason was to see if there was any way of knowing if I would have a hard time getting pregnant. Although we don't want to get pregnant right away we definitely don't want to wait too long to have children. Frankie will be 40 this year and I will be 29 so we don't want to wait too long. My parents had a hard time getting pregnant with my sister so I just wanted to double check everything.

I went and we talked about all kinds of things. I even talked with her about my weight problems. I had gained weight and then when I met Frankie I gained more weight. oops :) I just kinda chalked it up to being my happy weight. However, when we got engaged in June I, like most future brides, started to focus on losing weight. I wanted to look wonderful and skinny and tone in my dress. I went to the gym every day, I started watching what I was eating and started eating a lot of salads. Nothing happened. I didn't lose a single pound. We talked about all of this and she asked if I was sensitive to temperatures hot or cold and yes, in fact I was never just normal. I was either bone chilling cold or heat flashing, sweating bullets hot. While we were talking she was checking my neck, lymph nodes, throat - you know - what your doctors normally do when you see them. This time though she asked me to swallow. I did, no problem. She asked if I ever had any problems swallowing or feeling like something was in my throat. No, I didn't have any problems with that. Did I have any pain in my throat or neck? Nope, not that either. Well, she decided that she wanted to do some blood work to check out my hormones and thyroid levels. She also wanted me to go and get an ultrasound done on my thyroid. Of course I was a little thrown by all of that but she didn't seem too concerned so I figured I wasn't going to be either.

About a week later I got a call with the results. But, they didn't tell me the results over the phone they said I needed to come back in. Dun Dun Dun.... Talk about your stomach dropping. Why in the world did I have to go in, what was so wrong that they couldn't tell me over the phone. I of course went that day and my doctor, who is wonderful by the way, told me that my thyroid levels looked fine as far as the blood work went but that my hormones were all over the place. She informed me that I had Polycystic Ovary Syndrome, PCOS and that the PCSO was most likely the reason that I had gained weight and more importantly why I was having such a hard time losing it. More on PCOS in a later post though. Well, with that news out of the way she dove right in to the results of my ultrasound. I had a nodule on my thyroid. Talk about quit listening! In my mind I was going, a nodule, a nodule - wait - do you mean a lump! I have a lump in my body?!, She was wonderful and calm and kept saying don't freak out, it's most likely nothing, these things are common blah blah blah blah blah.... I had a lump with a fancy name for it  - a nodule on my thyroid. She was sending me to an endocrinologist.

Sooo... in November, fresh off my honeymoon I finally got to go see my endocrinologist. I was very impressed with him. For one, he took time to talk to me and my mom and another, he made sure I got my biopsy done that day. I was not prepared for that but that is probably a good thing. It was the day before Thanksgiving and they were short staffed and he still made sure that they got my biopsy out of the way.

Fast forward to about a month later and I finally got the results. They of course called me a couple of weeks after the biopsy to say that they sent it to another lab for further testing and to please be patient that they would have the results as soon as possible. So, in December I heard from my doctor. My biopsy was ruled a follicular neoplasm. Which is a fancy way of saying that they couldn't tell. Apparently the only way to tell was to remove it. So, once again I got transferred to another doctor, this time a surgeon. A highly recommended surgeon by the way, Dr. J ( that's what I'll refer to my endocrinologist as) just went on and on about Dr. T (my surgeon) and how wonderful he was and how lucky we were to have him in Georgia. But, one thing Dr. J did make sure of was that I would not freak out about this result. There was still an 80% chance that everything was fine and please please please do not think you have cancer or worry about it at all. And honestly, I can say that I really didn't worry about it. I had just gotten married. I was so happy and in love and bottom line, what could I really do about it? There was no point in freaking out until I knew I had something to freak out about.

....This post is crazy long so I will post part 2 tomorrow.... :)

Aeveryday14 - Weeks 2 & 3

I am trying to catch up on my everyday pics that I post to instagram so here are weeks 2 and 3 :)

 

My collage for the week :)

 

Day 8 - I wore my new Toms to work and by far the highlight of my day was a little girl in kindergarten who noticed them and with major enthusiasm stated "Ms. Garrison! You got new Toms!" It cracked me up that a five year old noticed my new shoes ;)

 

 Day 9 - We finally got around to hanging our new home decor on our walls and this is one of my favorite new items!

 

Day 10 - Friday means jeans and tennis shoes for me at work. I love a jeans and tennis shoe kind of day!

 

Day 11 - Frankie and I travel down to Warner Robbins to make a very important payment on our wedding rings! This was the day that we paid them off!!! Yay!! I love my rings and I love that they are paid for!!

 

Day 12 - It was finally nice and semi-warm outside so I talked Franklin into grilling us some hamburgers. My favorite food ever.

 

Day 13 - We were really wanting to try to make some vegetable soup and I finally found a recipe that I thought we would both like. We met at the store after work and shopped for everything we needed. The entire time we were at the store I sneezed and coughed and just all around felt like crud. So, after we spent all that time buying groceries for our soup my wonderful husband looked at me and said "There is no way you are going home to cook when you feel bad, I'll order us a pizza."

I'm so glad I married him :)

 

Day 14 - We finally made our soup. It was wonderful, and it will definitely be something that we make again!

 

 

Week 3 :) Unfortunately, I did miss 3 days this week...

 

Day 15 - I was still feeling terrible and honestly my day was so yucky that the only thing I could take a picture of was my new best friend which happened to be sudafed :(

 

I was feeling horrible and with sudafed being my best friend you can understand why days 16, 17, and 18 never happened. There's always next year.

 

Day 19 - Once again we had a rare and sunny day and Frankie worked on my car all day long and then being the wonderful and hard working and ocd man that he is he washed it for me. :)

 

Day 20 - Happy MLK Day to me! I can't remember the last time that I went shopping for new clothes for myself and I desperately needed something new to wear to work before they staged an intervention for wearing the same 5 shirts to work every week. This was a happy happy day!

 

Day 21 - I was craving a baking session. I do that sometimes, where all I want to do is bake something. So, I decided to bake my sweet babies at work a treat. They were super excited too. :) I was happy, they were happy. Mission accomplished.